🚀 14 steps to start building your art community on Instagram
#5 Finally get the visibility your art deserves
Dear little demon,
Welcome to the edition #5 of the Art Missive! We are now 1428😈 in this newsletter: thank you sm for reading ❤.
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In this Art Missive
INTRODUCTION : how building a community on Instagram has changed everything for me
Are you the right person to start an IG art community ?
The skill you need to grow that no one talks about
14 steps to start your account from zero
Summary
INTRODUCTION
This year I reached more than 15 million people with my content on Instagram.
And I gained over 79k followers in 12 months.
Literally, I went from “unknown” to “art influencer receiving brand deals and fans DMs”.
As an artist, gaining followers is not the golden medal : we all know that Instagram growth does not really depend on how skilled you are.
However, having a large community of supporters (my demons, how I like to call you guys) is still a valuable stepping stone in an artist career. No matter what type of project you have for your own art.
And nowaday, It is almost a prerequisite for most of us to succeed as we did not attend Art School to get access to academic experience and network.
In this edition #5 of the Art Missive we are going to talk about starting to build an art community on Instagram.
I am going to share with you my own experience and how I approach this question.
This Art Missive is going to be useful for artists who are thinking about starting an art account, but also for those who already have one and who are looking to optimize their journey in growing an art community.
Let’s go!
Are you the right person ?
“How do I know if I can start an art account ?”
“Am I skilled enough?”
You may ask yourself these questions. At least, I was when I started Instagram back in 2020.
Now I have a clear idea of what is the best profile to grow an art community.
You are the right person if :
✅ you are mentally prepared to stay consistent for years ;
✅ you are ready to make Reels ;
✅ you want to engage with other artists ;
✅ you are ready to add value to your audience ;
✅ you commit to take your art seriously and improve.
👉 See ? Nothing about being extremely good at art !
Of course, being highly skilled in art will help you boost your social media growth. The more skilled you are and the better looking your art is, the easier it will be for you to get people’s attention.
However, it is not a requirement to start building a community.
Here is a picture of my art when I started Instagram 3 years ago :
Nothing fancy, nothing very skilled, nothing viral-friendly at all.
Let’s focus on what’s required instead :
1. You are mentally prepared to stay consistent for years
Forget about quick fixes.
No matter what you might see on social media, Instagram growth takes time.
By that I mean months, or even years.
For example, I was able to grow +70k followers in 2022, only because the year before I worked hard without getting any results. During all 2021, I was stuck at 1k followers and for months, I used to share a ton of unsuccessful Reels and Posts until it worked!
Hopefully, Reels evolved and make it faster now to grow.
Maybe it will only take three months for you to grow. Maybe 2 years. It depends on everyone's journey. So be prepared to run a marathon, not a sprint.
2. You are ready to make Reels
Can you grow without Reels ? I get this question a lot and I am going to be honest. According to me, you can’t.
👉 Today : Reels are the only tool for massive growth on Instagram. They have been designed to offer you large reaches and access to new audiences every single day. On the other hand, posts have always been a tool for engaging with the community you already have and they are not so effective anymore to help you grow.
👉 In the future : Vertical videos are the future of all big platforms like Youtube, Pinterest, Tiktok and Instagram. They are going to be more and more predominant in our life so if you miss the train, you’ll get stuck as a content creator.
I know, creating Reels take time. And at the beginning you’ll have poor or inconsistent results because you will still be learning how to make them properly ! But now is the best time to get this new skill because you need it now and you’ll need it even more in the coming years.
3. You want to engage with other artists
This one is simple to understand : Instagram is a social network. To grow, you need to be social.
Building a community requires that you take good care of your followers and that you engage in the larger art community of Instagram. Like, comment, save, exchange great conversations in DM. This is the fundamentals of building an engaged audience.
As an example, I spend at least an hour everyday just to engage with the community.
4. You are ready to add value to your audience
Successful artist content creators share one thing in common that has determined their success : adding value to their audience.
It is a win-win : don’t expect people to faithfully follow you for no reason (except if you are a master in your discipline, showcasing your artworks is not enough as a reason). You need to give them a good reason by finding a way to add value to them.
There are many ways to add value :
- being educational
- being motivational
- being very funny, helps people escape their daily life…
You have to find your own way to help others.
👉 The type of value you add to people evolves with time so don’t overthink it.
However, when starting your community, you need to be willing to add value to your audience. This mindset will help you grow!
5. You commit to take your art seriously and improve.
You don’t have to be the best artist to start building a community. If you add value to your audience, you will grow.
On top of that, people love to see improvements! You just have to see how the “how my art improved” Reels are so popular.
Your art level should not be an obstacle to you starting your art community on Instagram but one requirement is to take your art seriously. If you want to build an engaged community, you’ll have to constantly create new content, show some improvements and be actively involved in your art niche.
You need to be passionate about your art to gather people around it.
The skill you need to grow that no one talks about
If you are motivated to start building a community on Instagram, you might already know the basic rules to grow : ✅ be consistent ✅ interact with your audience ✅ post regularly etc..
But there is one important thing that no one talks about while it is a real game changer.
👉 This thing ? Having a creator mindset.
What does it means ?
According to me, it means that you start to view the world as an art content creator. You don’t open Instagram “just to chill” anymore. Every day, you open this app to analyse what other artists do and how you could do better. Reels that you like become precious information about how you can grow. Random interactions you share with others become a guide to help you understand what you should do better.
Shifting your perspective from “consumer mode” to “creator mode” will help you :
✅ improve faster as you gain more experience in a short period of time;
✅ find the answers of your questions ;
✅ react more efficiently to failure.
I could write a book about this, so don’t hesitate to tell me if you want to know more about this topic.
In the meantime, here are some insights about how to build the right mindset :
👉 TIP 1 : be critical towards others. Each time you see a content that was successful, ask yourself “how could I do better?”.
👉 TIP 2 : be critical towards yourself. After sharing a content, systematically ask yourself “what could I have done better if I had more time or more experience ?”. If you have the time, try to do some research or compare your content to others.
👉 TIP 3 : be analytical. You spend so much time on Instagram. From no on, you must scan every content that you see and systematically answer these questions :
“What are the reasons this content was successful/unsuccessful?”
“How did the creator add value with this content?”
“How can I reproduce this content myself ?”
👉 TIP 4 : be patient. A mindset is something you need to build. At the beginning, it is going to be hard to ask yourself these questions and make the effort to answer properly everytime you see something interesting. But I highly suggest you to work hard on that, because once it starts to become a second nature to you, you will gain a new superpower and a competitive advantage.
👉 TIP 5 : change the way you see failure. Each time you identify that you made a mistake or that your content failed, acknowledge this “Failure is healthy, without it I cannot improve. How can I learn from it?”. I think it is the most difficult tip to apply. And it probably might sound a bit cheesy to you. But trust me, this will shift your perspective, make you more resilient and protect you from mental breakdown too!
Your turn to start ! 14 steps tp actually start your art account.
Don’t be scared by all the information that I gave to you. These principles are to be progressively built throughout the time while you grow! All the tips I have given to you until now are meant to help you decide whether it is worthy for you to start building an art community.
Now, we are going to see how you can actually take the first steps towards building your art community!
In the first period of time, your goal is not to start growing but to get started properly ! Indeed, before growth, you need to make sure that you get used to being a content creator.
After this phase, you’ll be able to focus on how you can optimize your content and start growing effectively.
Here are my suggested steps to get started :
1. Preparation
👉 STEP 1 : be aware of the drawbacks of Instagram. 80% of being an artist on Instagram is self-doubting, feeling pressured and being frustrated.
First, Instagram is a competitive and profit-driven platform : be prepared to be overwhelmed.
Secondly, Instagram can be challenging for your mental health : It is very frustrating and disheartening for artists to be exposed to so many other artists that they are in competition with. This can lead to self-doubt and imposter syndrome that are devastating for an artist’s fulfillment.
Finally, Instagram can influence your art in a bad way : Instagram is a platform that is heavily focused on visual content, and many artists may feel pressure to present a certain image or aesthetic in order to be successful on the platform.
Most artists don’t succeed on Instagram because they were not prepared to overcome these risks. This should not discourage you but I just highly suggest you to get informed about all the risks linked to being an artist on Instagram. This way, you’ll be able to overcome them and grow better.
👉 STEP 2 : set up specific Why’s. Be intentional and write down the reasons why you want to create an art account. Make sure to have easy access to this list for times when you feel demotivated (it is going to happen!).
👉 STEP 3 : Prepare for a long journey ! Growing on Instagram does not happen overnight, no matter what you might see on the platform. For most of us, it is going to take months, or years. As a consequence, bear in mind that the main difference between successful art accounts and random ones is consistency and persistence.
👉 STEP 4 : Pick a niche. Sticking to a niche will make you grow faster because it makes it easier for Instagram to understand to whom to show your art. On top of that, consumers on Instagram want to know what they are getting when they hit the follow button. If you post on many different topics, you’ll disturb them and they will be less likely to follow you. Eventually, people follow you for a specific reason, if they don’t find this reason in each one of your posts, they will not engage with it.
👉 STEP 5 : Dedicate time. Decide how many hours you want to spend on building your community. Doing so, you want to include the time you need for making art, creating Instagram content, engaging daily with your community, finding new reference content to reproduce etc.
My advice would be to start slow ! Because starting big can be discouraging. That is why I encourage you to set up a plan that you are sure you can follow for a few weeks. Once being a content creator becomes a habit for you, you can try to spend more time on this art community project.
👉 STEP 6 : Choose a frequency. Depending on your own goals and situation, choose a frequency of posting and stick to it for at least 2 months. Instagram loves consistency, and your art practice too ! So, if you choose to post 3 times a week, actually do it. Don’t miss one, don’t add one. After 2 months, you’ll be able to see the results and decide whether you wanna keep this frequency or not.
👉 STEP 7 : Same day, same time. Share your work on specific chosen days and time of day. To make this decision, go to your insights and have a look at when your audience is the most active on Instagram. At the beginning, you might wanna try different days and times to see how it works for you.
👉 STEP 8 : What to share? Everything! People are not only interested in your final artworks, they wanna learn more about your process. Your account will be more authentic and dynamic. Here a list of content you can get inspired by :
- work in progress and unfinished pieces ;
- behind the scenes content ;
- tutorials ;
- relatable content : funny content about things artists have in common.
Make sure to create Reels and Posts on whatever you are working on!
👉 STEP 9 : What value to add? Decide in advance what type of value you want to add in your content. You want to make sure to give a good reason for people to follow you. You’ll be able to add value in the content itself (Reels, posts..) or/and in your captions. Don’t hesitate to do some research and analyse what other artists do and don’t do.
2. Action !
👉 STEP 10 : Start ! Don’t overthink your art account. The biggest enemy to social media artists is inaction, that is why you should start creating, record your process and post it on Instagram even if you think that you’re not fully ready😈.
👉 STEP 11 : Create. Create your Instagram account, add a profile picture of your best artwork and write a sexy bio. There are tons of youtube tutorials on how to write an effective bio. It Takes not more than an hour to do so.
👉 STEP 12 : Engage. Follow other artists. Bigger and smaller accounts. Instagram is a social media, so learn how to be social and interact with your environment. This will not only help you reach a broader audience, but it will encourage you to learn every day from others. On your art account, almost all your following should be art related accounts so that Instagram understands in what community you engage and to whom to show your work.
👉 STEP 13 : Before starting to post, prepare 3 to 5 Reels in advance. I would also suggest you prepare several artworks in advance because at the beginning you are going to underestimate the time you will take to create a given content. To make sure to stick to your plan of posting, prepare your content in advance.
👉 STEP 14 : Post your first content! It is not mandatory but you can also ask your relatives to support you.
🎁 BONUS TIP 1 : engage with other content and try to build real relationships. NEVER ask people you don’t know to follow you in DMs and don’t do things like “follow for follow”. This is not how you build a healthy community.
🎁 BONUS TIP 2 : Don’t hesitate to join a lot of challenges like “Draw This in Your Style” challenges. They will help you create artworks faster as you don’t have to think about the design and they also give you access to a brand-new audience ! When I started 90% of my content were from challenges.
🎁 BONUS TIP 3 : Use only trendy audio for your Reels. This is the best strategy to start growing. You will recognize a trend when there is a little upward arrow next to the audio. Another way to identify a trend is by paying attention to the Reels you watch : if you hear that a song is used by many different creators, it is probably a trend and you want to join before it’s too late as every trend has an expiration date.
3. Motivational words for my little demons 😈
Lastly, I know it is intimidating to start an art account. Trust me, I know.
But keep in mind that most of us started with 0 followers, bad content and clumsy art.
When I started, I had no special talent and I knew nothing about Instagram either.
So as cheesy as it might sound, if i was able to do it, you can totally do it too !
All you need is : motivation, consistency and time.
Summary:
1. You don’t have to be the best artist to start building a community, you just have to be highly motivated and mentally prepared.
2. Building a creator mindset is going to make growth easier for you.
3. You only have 14 steps to take to start your art account ! .