It’s really up to you on how you would like to address your audience. I personally prefer writing in third person when referring to my work mainly because I feel it conveys a sense of professional etiquette. It creates a press release persona that can maintain your audience’s attention. However, if you prefer to write in first person you can do that and still have strength to your sentences. Either way you want to spark your audience’s interest in you and your work.
The difference between a how a hobbyist or a professional artist or writer can be determined simply on how they are conveyed through content. You want your sentences to have strength and power to them. Each word and phrase counts because they are performing a difficult task, representing you, when you are not there to do so. For example you could say, "I’m an artist from Erie, PA. I am trying to make a living doing art. Hope you will look at my work.” This sentence hardly provides any credibility to my name or my art. It conveys that I am not really serious about what I’m doing, but I still would like you to look at my work. That’s a lofty expectation to have of my audience when I lack taking myself serious.
A professional sentence structure as an example, "[info]Heather J. Tait was raised in Erie, PA and began her career as a professional artist in 1997.” You want to state who you are, where you come from, and what it is you do. You want your opening sentence to really state a few basic facts about you and your work. This is not an easy task and perhaps one of the reasons why many artists and writers procrastinate completing a biography. Perhaps one of the reasons why, just as Alan Wilson Watts states, "Trying to define yourself is like trying to bite your own teeth.”
It’s quite the challenge to write about yourself and really expand on your talents. You have to convey your work and yourself from almost another person’s perspective. Imagine yourself as a Public Relations Specialist and you were just hired to write about an artist or writer. What are some things you would need to know about that person? What strong points do you want to enunciate about this person’s life and accomplishments? What active role does this person assume now?
You don’t have to be overly personal but you really want to give your audience a sense of who you are. Let them know how you began your career. Write about your technique or your style. It is possible to be personal but also professional. You may have to work on several drafts until you get a nice flow of words and a functional biography. The time you put into writing this valuable piece of information will pay off by getting people to take notice in something very dear to you, your purpose. So share your passion with your audience. You just may notice that your enthusiasm might be contagious.
You want to have a short version (100-150 words) of your biography and then a long version (500-1,000 words). It’s advisable to work on your long version first so then you can easily copy a short version by taking excerpts. As an example you can view my biography online: http://www.silencespeaks.com/artist/artist.html. I had a shorter version posted several months back, but because of numerous requests to know more about me, I had to rewrite it. You may experience similar feedback from your viewers. The long version will be for your website and the shorter version will be used for promotional websites that commonly limit your biography to 100-150 words.
You can also write a statement about your work. A statement simply is a personal claim about your work or perhaps on what inspires your work. Get creative here and really just type what you feel you need to express about your creativity. I was asked for an artist statement back in 1999. I had no clue what that was but I wrote one down. I’ve used the same statement ever since. You can view it online to get an example: http://www.silencespeaks.com/artist/artist.html
Take time to really write down your talents and accomplishments and don’t be afraid to express them in your content. The more people learn about you, the more they will be able to relate to you.
Your challenge for this month is to create a full length and short version of your biography. As a bonus create an artistic statement if you would like. Read other artists’ or writers’ biographies and ask yourself which ones interested you and then explain why. Which biographies had strong statements, which ones were weak? Then take that information and apply it to yourself. Evaluate what traits you want to express, organize an outline, and then write your biography.
By Artist & Inspirational Writer Heather J.Tait
About The Author
Silence Speaks- http://www.silencespeaks.com
read more articles from this author at Silence Speaks Inspirations
Artist and inspirational writer [info]Heather J. Tait began her career as a professional artist back in 1997 in Morgan Hill, CA. Her style combines simplicity and complexity. She uses bold lines with the aid of her Sharpie Marker and completes the process with splashes of bright watercolors.
Her work can best be described in its entirety as inspirational. She has over 160 pieces of all original works with inspirational quotes that correspond to each piece.
Her art as well as articles are syndicated internationally. Her work has been featured in the Spire Press (New York, NY), the Gutenburg Litegraphic Society (Salt Lake City, UT), Tony Awards (Atlanta,GA) and the FOX Theater (Atlanta,GA) to name a few.
She was also recently inducted into the Who’s Who of American Women 2004-2005--the definitive biographical resource featuring the most accomplished women in all areas of human endeavor.
She is also the founder of Silence Speaks International Artist Association and Intrigue Magazine which works to promote artists and writers.
In our previous step, Step 2, you were challenged to get active and network with other professionals in your field. By now you should have an abundant source of resources to reference and help you mold your personal aspirations. You should have a collection of bookmarks of peer’s and organization’s websites.
You can really gather a lot of information in a short amount of time when you are dealing with the internet. So I recommend keeping organized with your information right from the start. If you are keeping track of your information in a notebook, adopt a method to keep it orderly. Maybe have your notebook sectioned into topics, for example, ‘references,’ ‘organizations,’ ‘peers.’ If you are bookmarking your reference information through your browser, organize your list by assigning them to folders. This option is usually listed under your favorites menu, typically called ‘organize favorites.’ Do whatever makes sense to you and will help you easily retrieve the information you need in the future.
Organization doesn’t just stop at notebooks and bookmarks. It goes much deeper than that. Make sure you are personally organized before you start our next challenge. Clean up your workspace. Take care of your priorities or any tasks you may have been procrastinating. The key here is to not just clean out your physical space, but mental space as well.
Now we can start working on creating your collection. Your ‘collection’ is going to be the foundation of your purpose. If you are creating art for example, it would be your artwork. If you are a writer, it would be a collection of your writings. If you are intending on being a merchant of other sorts, it would be your product.
So the first question to ask yourself would be: do you have a collection? If you do, now is the time to organize your work. Again, maybe break your collection into groups, organize your work by likeness or by time frame. This can be done by simply creating categories and assigning your work to the appropriate heading. This will help you set the stage for your web presence. Now is the time to keep in mind some of the sites you went on in our previous step. Think about what sites were easy to navigate and what sites were not. Did you like how a particular site was organized? What did you like about it? Apply your answers to your own concept of organization.
If you don’t have a collection, then now is the time to work on acquiring one. Establishing a collection does not happen over night. So be patient with yourself and set realistic goals. My very first website was created by a friend of mine when I lived in California, before I started designing my own site. The first collection was composed of only 13 works of art, but it was a start. Now seven years later, I have a collection of around 160 paintings. You don’t have to have an extremely large collection of works or products to get started. One of the best things about opening a store on the web unlike a brick and mortar store, you don’t have to have a large product line. Granted it helps, but it is not always necessary. The key here is quality not quantity.
Once you have your collection created or organized you can now work on the information side of your collection. Assign your collection or product names, titles, or SKU numbers. Write up descriptions for each piece or group. Be as informative and descriptive as you can. Put yourself in the consumer or viewer’s place and think about what information you would need to know in order to make a proper buying decision. You do not want to be vague here at all. Your description not only aids your buyer, but it also protects you as a seller. Describing your product or service honestly, prevents any likelihood of surprise to your buyer. As a result you should have less returns and refunds and more customer satisfaction.
Once you have developed your collection or product sheet, make a column for pricing. Pricing can often be the most challenging task of designing a web front mainly because you are being asked to place a price on yourself and your own value. This is especially true if the services you provide are rendered creative. A normal or typical marketing tactic is to research your competitors and get an idea of the market value of your product. If you are working in a creative field or freelance field you can search for guilds that offer pricing guidelines.
After you get an overview or others’ pricing then you need to realistically figure out what it will cost you to perform your services. You want to consider the amount of time you spend on a project, the cost of materials, the tax you will have to pay, and the cost of shipping and or transportation. Your cost may be very different than your competitors. Pricing is a personal choice and decision, so base it on what you believe the item to be worth. You want competitive prices, but worthy prices. The biggest mistake I see creative people make is under pricing themselves. Buyers believe they get what they pay for, so make your pricing valuable to them.
Develop a confidence in your work, but back that confidence with experience and knowledge. Believe that what you are creating has a value to more people than just yourself. Most importantly, be excited! Your enthusiasm will be conveyed in every area of your work. If you are not excited, then you need to go back to step 1 and reevaluate what your purpose is.
Your challenge for this month is to get organized in your personal and mental space, organize or create your collection, and then write effective descriptions for your works or products. During this process, continue to network and continue to learn and you will develop your path… your purpose.
By Artist & Inspirational Writer Heather J.Tait
About The Author
Silence Speaks- http://www.silencespeaks.com
read more articles from this author at Silence Speaks Inspirations
Artist and inspirational writer