Sunday Mailbag: Social Media?

Q: You’ve mentioned that artists/caricaturists needed to use social media to increase their presence, “particularly Instagram.” I am wondering, why particularly Instagram? Do you have suggestions as to how to build up that presence and ‘stand out’?

A: Instagram has become the platform that seems most effective for visual artists to build an audience and find tangible benefits past just getting “likes”, which last I checked doesn’t pay any bills. Unlike Facebook and Twitter, Instagram is basically 100% visual so it makes a lot more sense for visual artists and their content. I know several working artists who have developed their careers around promotion on Instagram. They’ve used it to not just sell their work directly to their audience in the form of merchandise but also to get work from art directors and media people.

There is no secret to developing a audience on any social media platform. You have to:

• Post content regularly
• Post content that people want to see
• Engage others on the platform so your works gets seen and shared

Engaging means using tags and sharing other’s content yourself to get new eyeballs on your work, which slowly builds your audience. You have to keep at it.

Thanks to Jerry Shippee for the question. If you have a question you want answered about cartooning, illustration, MAD Magazine, caricature or similar, e-mail me and I’ll try and answer it here!