Advertising in Magazines

[Michele Rushworth]

I am contemplating running an eight month series of small ads in the local decorating magazine. It's very expensive but the magazine reaches my target audience of wealthy women very well.

Has anyone had experience doing print advertising for portraiture and can report on their success rate (or lack thereof)?

[Kimberly Dow]

I know Tim Tyler has in the past done this (perhaps not for portraits though) - anyway his wife told me that the ads were always well worth it in attracting clients and galleries. They told me to do it whenever I could. I haven't been able to yet, but it sounds promising. Now - I believe they did it in INternational Artist or Southwest Art...not sure.

[Jimmie Arroyo]

I ran an ad in a local paper that was also used for other small town papers. It was one of those free newspapers that are thrown on lawns once a week. Our paper is called the "Twin-Boro News" and covers three towns. There are other papers throughout the county that cover a certain area under different names. It was a quarter of a page, ran for one month, but never got a response.

I also opted for one month in a paper magazine called "ParentPaper". It's a free paper that circulates in a bin at Barnes & Noble, other bookstores, libraries and schools. I recieved one commission from it. The best thing I got from it, was that the client was president of a mortgage company and gave me a great deal on a re-finance.

I tried it again, and nothing. This is an area where they can easily afford portrait art. Chances are potential clients are having their nannies look thru the local papers while they look thru the Wall Street Journal. There's also a strong chance that Madonna's nannies looked at it.

I was thinking about running another month before a holiday, but I had started working seriously on my drawings. I make enough at the tattoo shop and did'nt want the extra stress.

Good luck.

[Terri Ficenec]

Hi Michele -

I've run a little ad since April in a local free magazine (free to readers, but the ads cost $) 'Bay State Parent' that's available in Metrowest Boston and surrounding areas. Have gotten a few calls but none that have panned out into actual commissions yet. My sense is that most of the callers are surprised at the price. I think at least one of these calls will result in 2 commissions but as yet don't have a signed contract so I'm not "counting chickens".

I started initially with a 1/4 page ad mixed in with the articles, but am now running a little 1 7/8 inches x 2 inch ad under 'portraiture' in the ad section at the back (thinking that it's easier to find and a whole lot cheaper).

One month when they gave me a color 1/4 page ad at the black & white price (they wanted to encourage more color ads)... but it printed with the skin tone downright orange! So now I stick to black and white and very simple since the ads are small...

What's been more successful for me has been giving my card to a couple of local frame shops (one is a combination art supply store/frame shop). Two different frame shops have resulted in a commission each (one a 35th anniversary portrait, and the other a pet portrait). I haven't offered any compensation to these shops for giving out my card since I assume the client takes the painting back there to have it framed. So the arrangement is mutually beneficial.

[Jen Reinstadler]

I used to work as a graphic designer at one of those "free newspapers." I'm not sure about print ads in general, but in specific, this is probably not the place to advertise portrait paintings. We used to joke that our paper could be found in rosebeds across the city and bragged that they lined the finest bird cages in town.

On a statistical note, they re-designed the look and feel of the paper while I worked there to appeal to rural folks, i.e. county western top-ten, denim, cowboy boots, you-know-you're-a-redneck-if jokes. Our research determined that the paper was most widely read by people who lived in smaller communities and farm country throughout our section of western Montana, even though we sought most of our advertisers in Missoula (pop. 60,000 or so on a good day).

I would suspect that this is the case in your respective areas as well. People shop those papers for good deals on second-hand stuff and to give away ads. If your local shopper papers are full of farm supplies and four-wheeler ads, you may want to think twice about your target audience.

[Leslie Ficcaglia]

I have considered running a small ad in the regional Jewish newsletter. A lot of area professionals contribute to it and read it, so it would reach a good audience. Whether or not they want portraits is another question, but the disposable income is there. You might want to look around to see whether there's anything comparable in your areas. Ads are quite reasonable in publications of this type, and this one tends to run to funeral homes, accountants, legal services and so forth.