Client Profile
Artist Amanda McSherry
For the last couple of months, I’ve had the incredible opportunity to begin working with Canadian artist Amanda McSherry to establish her e-commerce presence, and launch a digital marketing strategy to put her art in front of a wider audience.
Amanda McSherry is a talented artist with a unique vision who has been painting for years. There was just one problem: she didn’t have an online presence. None whatsoever. Other than some word of mouth advertising, the art community was missing out on knowing Amanda, and her art.
Opportunity Knocks
Without even mentioning Covid-19, and the lockdowns that went with it, being an artist without an online presence in 2022 is obviously a recipe for disaster, and Amanda knew it. Despite all her best efforts, attempts to get something in place to help market her art were not working. Things never materialized. In marketing, just like home renovation, or sports – just about everything, in fact – finding the right people to work with is everything. With so many “marketers” out there, finding someone that’s the right fit, with the right experience and ability can be a challenge. When you don’t, the consequences are real: lost time, wasted money and needless frustration – which Amanda, and her art business didn’t need any more of. When we connected, it was great. Amanda was looking to get this project off the ground, while I was in the early stages of building this digital agency, and looking to help clients in her exact position.
Blank Canvas?
Forgive the pun. But from a marketing point of view, a blank canvas is what it looked like. Amanda had no online presence. No place to showcase her art, no e-commerce and no social media. These are three areas I specialize in, and it meant we had a blank canvas, and the chance to invent everything.
Well, sort of. There was actually a brand already here. It was just that people didn’t know about it. As a painter, Amanda has a distinct style, and the marketer in me knew that was going to be the seed of the brand.
The Web Site
For most, a website still serves as the primary hub for businesses. People can reach out, browse products, and purchase. It’s not the only place to do these things in the digital world, but like a store it’s the virtual place where potential customers can “stop by” and do all of the above, and more.
If you’re someone that wants to raise their profile, not having a web site is still a plan to go nowhere fast. It sounds obvious, but it’s one of the cornerstones of marketing theory: when people can’t find you, they’ll find someone else.
Step one was to pick the right platform. After reviewing all the options, we landed on Shopify. After finding a fantastic, and trendy domain name (McSherry.art) we quickly began designing the brand, evolving a theme and getting to work on building the web site and all its content.
Within about two months we were in a position to launch the first version of the site, with more than thirty-five pieces of Amanda’s art on display.
Art Photography
Before we could launch McSherry.art, images of Amanda’s paintings had to be captured for the first time. This kind of work takes considerable time, because you have to ensure that you’re representing colours and details accurately. Taking the time to do this isn’t just the right thing to do, but it creates happy customers – and happy customers want to come back.
The Invisible Things
My goal was to ensure that Amanda’s online presence was set up for success. That meant not just building the things customers would see, but also the things they wouldn’t. These are the absolutely critical pieces of the puzzle that really set clients out on the right foot. For example, the suite of Google tools: Analytics, Search Console and Merchant Center. On the Shopify side of things, shipping rules, real-time rates, category rules and more.
Creating a Limited Series
Amanda works with resins, which are often finished in a beautiful gloss that makes them look like extremely vibrant marble. She had recently done a couple pieces in an aqua and lime motif, and agreed to create more as part of a limited run leading up to the launch of the site – and the results were incredible. Check them out below.
Content Creation
Amanda’s process for creating often starts with words, and we wanted to make sure that this unique detail, and more about her story, was being told on the web site in a couple of key pages.
