How to become a popular NFT artist in 2022
The advent of non-fungible tokens has revolutionized the digital art market. Now their authors have the opportunity to convert their creations into non-fungible tokens and sell them on special platforms. For example, a digital collage by artist Mike Winkelman (Beeple) was bought $69 million. Such success is pushing many creative people to think about how to become a popular NFT artist. We tell you how to do it.
A digital art object is a work that has been created using technological tools (computer, tablet, smartphone, etc). Almost anyone can become its author. But in order to turn a digital product into an NFT, you need to know the main stages of creating tokens. We divided them into three groups: idea search, NFT creation and promotion.
Checklist for how to become a popular NFT artist
Idea search
- Choose your own niche,
- Tell a story,
- Choose how to create an NFT artwork,
- Be Consistent.
Creation of NFTs
- Select Digital Art File Format,
- Find a suitable site,
- Create a Digital Art Object.
NFT promotion
- Promote your NFT art,
- Use social networks,
- Create a website for your digital project,
- Stand out,
- Gather your audience,
- Chat with other artists,
- Be active in the NFT community,
- Provide rewards for collectors.
History of the development of digital art
While NFTs are relatively new to our market, digital art itself has been around over 40 years. Then the first computer program to artists appeared. Since then, thousands of tools have been developed for digital creators.
Now everyone can take a photo on the phone, apply filters and process it in the application. Or create a short video, gif, draw an image in a graphics editor, etc. This is the case when the originality of the idea is valued more than the skill of execution. Therefore, any user can try his hand at creating a digital art object.
Search for ideas
Choose your own niche
To find your niche in the NFT artist market, you can explore the trends and choose one of the popular topics. Another way is to do what you like without looking at others. For example, some artists are closer to creating digital portraits of media people. Others like abstract works, others choose images of cats or musical works. It is important to stick to the chosen direction and create works in a single theme. This will help you find and retain your own audience.
The only condition is that the author must like the process of creating works. Otherwise, the creative process will become boring and users will feel fake.
Tell a story
How to become a popular NFT artist? We assure you that the audience loves works of art because they evoke emotions, help to better understand themselves and the world around them. To a project to become popular, there must be a story or an original idea behind it.
For example, the famous digital artist Trevor Jones uses references to digital assets, classics and modern technologies in his works. And student Sultan Gustaf Al Ghazali took one selfie a day to capture how he changed during college. As a result, he received and sold a collection of 1,000 images.
Choose a way to create a work
It is important to choose a form of digital creativity in order to decide what tools will be needed. For example, special programs and applications for photo processing and image editing (Adobe Illustrator, Lightroom, Photoshop). You can also use the Piksel app to create GIFs and pixel illustrations, and video and audio editors to edit videos and music.
Currently, photographs, images and collages are the most popular. However, you need to choose the format, first of all, based on personal preferences.
Be Consistent
Sometimes the first work created brings popularity to the NFT artist, but more often than not, it takes time to win the hearts of the audience. To do this, it is important to be consistent and continue to work in the chosen style. Experts advise to allocate 6 months for work in one subject. If during this time NFT-products have not gained fans, you can return to the first step and reconsider your strategy.
Creation of NFTs
Choose a format for your digital art file
Before you start creating an NFT, you need to choose a file format. It depends on the type of artwork you are planning to create. For example, JPG, SVG, WEBP and PNG for photos and images, MP4 and MP3 for music and video, as well as GIF, WAV, GLTF and others. You also need to choose on which blockchain tokens will be minted, and on which platform you plan to sell them.
Choose the right venue
There are many exchanges where you can buy, trade and sell NFTs (OpenSea, NiftyGateway, Rarible and others). To choose the right one, you need to see what functionality they offer to users. In addition to transactions, the standard set of features offers an editor to creating NFTs and a platform to storing collections of tokens. You can also look at the average selling price across different platforms.
Create an NFT Product
Experts advise creating digital works at the same frequency. Just upload your artwork to the platform, fill in the required fields and follow the simple instructions.
On most blockchains, you will need to pay a fee in order to pay for the processing power of mining. Such a commission is called a gas fee, the size of the gas fee may fluctuate. The best time to release NFTs is when gas fees are at their lowest, i.e. when there are fewer users in the market.
NFT promotion
Promote your work of art
Don’t wait what users to find your project on their own. As in the case of works from the material world, tokens need to be promoted. This is the key and costliest resource to achieve your goal of becoming a popular NFT artist.
Add links to your social network sites, applications and other resources when registering a profile on the NFT platform. So people can follow your work and the release of new works. You can also use your own pages and thematic groups in social networks, websites, digital artist communities, etc. to promote.
Use social networks
Social networks are one of the most accessible ways to draw attention to non-fungible artworks. To do this, you need to regularly share your work with subscribers, talk about the creative process and publish tips for other authors of the work and ask for feedback. Accompany posts with popular hashtags (#NFT, #NFTARTIST, #digitalartist, etc. ).
You can also join various thematic groups, comment on posts, engage in dialogue with other members and leave feedback to other artists.
To date, the following social networks are popular for promoting their NFTs:
Create a website for your digital project
If you have a collection of NFT artwork, you can create a showcase site to it. Each work on the site should have a link where it can be purchased. To promote the site, add an author’s blog to it and fill it with articles on the topic of digital art. This will help attract an audience and get a platform that depends only on you.
Stand out
Every month there are more and more NFT-works. They are released by both famous artists and media personalities, as well as ordinary users. How to become a popular NFT artist and attract the attention of the audience? You need to stand out from the crowd. To do this, you need to understand what makes you unique, find your style and a reason for the hype around your work.
Gather your audience
You can draw the attention of users to your project through accounts and groups on social networks, communities and your own website. But in order to them to stay with you, you need a unifying idea. People need to see what values you hold in order to share them with you. It’s a good idea to create your own podcast, Youtube channel or blog where you share your ideas. We gave good examples of promoting yourself on YouTube in the article TOP 20 YouTube channels about NFT.
Chat with other artists
First, by talking to other digital authors, you can learn a lot, get ideas, or get valuable advice. If you create in similar niches and topics, you can «swap» audiences and arrange joint events to promote.
For example, artist Andrew Wood regularly shares content from other NFT authors on his Twitter feed . This helped him gain 16,000 followers as many artists reciprocated and told their audience about Andrew’s work. Besides him, there are many more artists who have succeeded on Twitter. We wrote about them in the article Best 20 NFT Twitter Accounts to Follow.
Be active
It’s not enough to just post from time to time or comment on other people’s work. This process must be continuous. We need to be active at all platforms where digital artists and fans of their work gather. Answer questions, ask yourself, participate in contests and surveys, share your experience. This way you will draw attention to your work and create a reputation as a professional.
Provide rewards for collectors
Create added value. For example, attach files with your work in higher resolution to non-fungible tokens. Or add files that only collectors will have access to. You can also create a closed community for your NFT holders and arrange online meetings.
The NFT market is filled with projects of different value. However, there is always a place to interesting work on it. If you have ideas and a desire to create, use non-fungible tokens to cash in on your creativity. In addition, you will then definitely find the answer to the question: how to become a popular NFT artist.
