Social media

  Social media is a very important way to make contacts and share your work. It is a more relaxed way to share current works and show case events. Social media is becoming a daily aspect of everyone's lives from young to old so using it to promote yourself means a larger chance of being found.
  Facebook
I find Facebook easy to use and can be updated on the go. I seem to use Facebook the most out of all the social media sites as I find I check my personal one a lot and because there linked I find it easy to post. I also find it easier to be casual when posting and I want my followers to know that there talking to me and not someone who just runs the site, I want it to feel personal. Further I like how Facebook makes things easy to share and how it will automatically go onto the followers feed. This also means people are more likely to read or see your posts. Another thing I like about it is when someone likes your image it will pop up on there friends feed meaning more exposure. Although there are certain criteria I try to follow when posting like viewers wont read really long posts so I try to keep them short and snappy between 100-250 words. I do try and post when most of my followers are on but at the moment I feel I post around university and need to post at least once a week. I also need to start planning more themed posts in advanced so I could get the illustration ready and edited to be posted that day. Now I am going to be attending more conventions I could use Facebook to post promotions such as the first 50 people to my table get a free sticker and run competitions to win prints of my work, this will keep people interested and engaged. I will post a lot of work previews and will also promote other artists in exchange for them to promote me too.
  Twitter
With twitter I know to keep interest you need to tweet often at least once a day, and make sure that each tweet is consistent. A good thing about twitter is gaining followers through the suggested followers helping exposure. Using hashtags at the end of tweets help emphasize the context of your tweets. You can also increases coverage through getting involved with trending topics or asking people to re tweet you. I am not a big twitter fan and don't quite understand how it works but I can see how it is helpful but I don't think I could keep up with the amount id need to be posting.
  Flicker
Flicker is an image sharing site so when updating it make sure they are quality photos and that you keep them in order as you only see the last 5 photos.
  Pinterest
Over the years Pinterest is getting more popular and it could be a good opportunity to share your illustrations on there and see how people re share them.
  Tumblr
At the moment tumblr is my website but once I have built my official site I would like to then my tumblr into another social site like my Facebook because the more I use tumblr the more I find it easier to share my work. I think tumblr is a good site for illustrators and a lot of them seem to use it, especially because people post ideas for zines and collaborations with others and this is something I find very interesting and would like to look into in more detail.
   Overall I don't want to have to many sites to update because even after I have brought my notebook to make it easier to update I don't want to be updating to many sites as when it comes down to it one would end up neglected and this would look bad as I don't want any an outward facing blank or outdated sites. Though I do plan to have a few social sites along side my website that I will update more often and these will be Facebook, my blog and a tumblr once I have built my official site. My blog will be a bit more formal and where I post sketches of character design and other works, where Facebook and tumblr I will post promotions, competitions and work in progresses.