EDITOR’S NOTE: Prices and information below may be out of date. Since launching our own art website service for artists at Foliotwist.com, we no longer feel unbiased enough to continue updating or reviewing other art website services. Visit the website below for their most recent information.
If you’re an artist that specializes in any type of art; painting, photography, even hand-crafted artwork (such as apparel, jewelry, or furniture) than you may be interested in GoZabo.com.
Although still very new (meaning little to no traffic) GoZabo.com has a few features which I like, so I thought it worthwhile to review it here on EmptyEasel.
The first thing I noticed about GoZabo is the wide range of categories available to list your work under. Even things I wouldn’t normally consider art, like “edibles,” “stationery and books” and “pet gizmos” (just to name a few) are offered.
Basically, if you make hand-crafted. . . anything. . . there’s going to be a place for it on GoZabo.com.
But—and this is one of the things I liked most about GoZabo—all of their artwork is juried before being listed, meaning that not all artists will be accepted.
I view this as a very necessary evil in the world of online art, just so that customers can find quality artwork quickly without wading through tons of junk. Unfortunately, very few sites do this, so I’m glad to see GoZabo taking this route.
The other thing I really liked about GoZabo was its emphasis on geographic location. In other words, you can search for artists by US state, or by city, which is great for finding local artists.
GoZabo is mainly for US artists, although there is one category for artists outside the US.
Other than that, the state-based categories currently available are Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Tennessee; along with a catch-all “Other States” category for everywhere else.
As more artists from around the US sign on, I’m sure the remaining states will be added.
To join GoZabo, you must first submit several examples of your artwork via email to be juried. You should receive an answer from them within 24 hours.
Once approved, there’s a subscription fee of $89.70 for six months, or $164.45 for a year (which saves you $14.95).
The gallery options for artists are fairly standard—you can upload a photo and bio, and then manage images of your artwork, descriptions, and prices.
There’s no limit to the number of products you can list, which is nice as well.
And if the mere mention of “uploading images” or “setting up a gallery” scares you, GoZabo.com can do it for you—but you’ll pay a little more.
Just add an extra $50.25 to your first 6 month subscription, send in all your artwork photos and information by CD, and your gallery will be up in no time.
HOWEVER, every time you want to change something in your gallery, you’ll have to pay a fee. If you wanted to update your name, photo, and bio, for example, there would be a $5 fee for each. Other fees abound as well, like $2 for every new product you want to add, and $0.50 whenever you want one deleted.
If it was my money, you can bet I’d just set up the gallery myself. It’s not that difficult and you wouldn’t have to wait for your CD to get there either.
Now, obviously the big question with any art-selling website is: “how many people will see my artwork?”
Preferably, people would find your art just by searching on Google and jumping straight to your product pages. . . Or at least by searching through GoZabo and having your product come up first.
Both of these, on any art website, tend to be unlikely.
So with GoZabo you can gain more exposure by paying extra to advertise on the home page, individual state pages, or city pages. You can choose whether to advertise yourself (you‘ll see a box labeled “featured artist” with your name, profile picture, and intro paragraph) or to advertise one of your products (you‘ll see a “featured product” box with a photo and paragraph.)
It’s pretty spendy though—extremely spendy for the small amount of traffic you’d get right now.
For an ad on the GoZabo.com home page it‘ll cost you $75 per week (or $250 per month). For an ad on your state page, it‘s a little less: $45 per week (or $125 per month), and on your city page, $30 per week (or $100 per month).
January, February, November, and December are 25% more. . . Holiday season advertisement I suppose?
Granted, the GoZabo site is nicely designed and they seem like great people—but if you want my honest opinion, here it is:
I really like the fact that GoZabo is juried, and I’m interested to know if they plan on limiting the total amount of artists on the site at some point. Personally I think that’s the way to go in order to maximize the benefit to each artist.
And of course, $90 bucks for 6 months is about fifty cents a day, so it doesn’t seem like too much.
But for a new website with no guaranteed traffic, I’m not completely sold. I like to see guarantees for my money, which is why I prefer commissions when selling art online, rather than a monthly fee.
And until traffic picks up, that’s a lot more cash compared to other established art sites that actually get traffic. If you do join, I definitely see no reason to pay an extra fee and advertise on the home page, state, or city page.
Of course, one reason TO join early on is that there’s barely any competition on GoZabo, so anyone who finds GoZabo will probably find your work as well.
Take a moment to check out GoZabo and see if you’d like to try it for 6 months. After that amount of time you’ll certainly know whether it’s worth it.
In the meantime, you’ll probably want to read this article on helping buyers find your artwork online, or check out this tutorial on photographing your artwork for the web.
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