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 Shopping Carts Changes and Launch |
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Accounting and legal issues connected to sales tax payments caused a further delay in completing the shopping carts. We also heard from members who were concerned with the system as it was designed.
The system we had originally designed was one that would have had Artspan collecting all sales proceeds and disbursing them to members. Artspan would have appeared on the buyer’s credit card statement, and would have collected and paid sales taxes for the members.
We will now be going with a system that more closely resembles that of eBay and Etsy. You, the Artspan member, will be the seller and will receive all proceeds of any sales at the time of the sale (allowing approximately 3 days for the transaction to process) . You will be responsible for paying any taxes due – though Artspan will calculate and populate the sales tax field for North American sales. Your name will appear on the buyer’s credit card statement. The Artspan role in this will be to provide tech, web and promotional services to our members. We are not a party to any sale transacted with the shopping carts.
We have completed most of the new programming and the system is being tested. We are currently adding the sales tax calculator. Once that has been done and also tested, we will go live. We appreciate your patience – we want to create a durable and useful sales platform.
You will need to have a PayPal business account to participate and will also need to agree to certain basic conditions as an Artspan Seller. Full details will be forthcoming.
Participation in the Artspan shopping carts program is optional (you can still have your own PayPal cart). However, all members participating in the prints-on-demand program must use the Artspan shopping cart. The advantage of the Artspan carts is having them fully integrated into your website (no PayPal branding), ability to enable any or all items, buyer use of credit cards, a North American tax calculator and more. We will also offer a tax payment service, but this will also be optional.
For all current member plans, there will be a 3.5% commission on sales (same as Etsy but less than eBay and there will be no listing fee). However, we will also be adding a new member level, the Premium Seller Plan, with no commission on sales.
The commission will help cover the setup, maintenance and ongoing technical cost together with customer service and legal costs. We will also actively promote the new shopping carts.
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Other Developments |
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Collectors Website. We are launching www.collectorsmoment.com in the next week or so with our partner, Laurence Zale, a noted art advisor. It is our aim to raise the profile of all the Artspan sites, particularly with a view to attracting collectors attention. This new site will provide advice and information for collectors.
Prints-on-Demand. This is still the next big event for us and has only been waiting on finalization of the integrated shopping carts. Assuming final agreement with our printer partner, we will proceed to integrate this feature.
New Templates. The new templates are being coded and we are also working on a design for a template for Associate members.
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Artspan Member Marketing Tip: Making Buyers Feel Special
(by Cathy Harville) |
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One idea I have found helpful is to make collectors part of the family. When a customer buys an artwork, even a print, I give them a card entitling them to 10% off, and tell them that is the "family discount". People like that - they often comment, “oh now we are part of the family,” and I say, yes, and everyone laughs, and its all good. They feel special. And next time, they buy something, they get 10% off, which can be a lot for a large piece (retail stores call that a bounce-back, I think).
I have also priced my work to sell. I have a feeling for the price points I need. High end impulse sales are down, but the sales people think about are strong – for example, gifts, and pieces for special purposes. So the framed prints and small works I made are still sitting, while the very large pieces sell, and the cards and magnets fly out the door. Weird, huh? Cheap impulse items are selling well, and high end stuff. Nothing in between.
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Keeping Your Site up Without Interruption
(by Denise Glover) |
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To keep your site running without interruption and to avoid error messages, there are some basic matters you need to pay attention to. We mentioned one in last month's newsletter but a number of people missed it - it is critical to keep your domain registration current. To see your expiration date, enter your domain name here: http://www.networksolutions.com/whois/index.jsp and look for the “Record expires” date. If your domain name expires soon and was registered through Artspan, then log in to your Artspan Control Panel and click on Manage Your Domains to renew. If you registered through another registrar, log in to the site of that registrar to renew.
Don’t lose your domain! Your site will not appear and it will be difficult or impossible to get the same domain back. Incidentally, if your Artspan site is a subdomain (i.e. YourName.artspan.com), you do not need to renew or do anything.
It’s also very important to make sure your credit card and related information is up-to-date at all times. This includes the name and street address information that is in your Billing Information section of your Artspan Control Panel. Please be sure to enter the name and address that matches the credit card that you have on file with us. If you are having trouble saving your updated information, please make sure you format your credit card number with no spaces. The expiration date should be formatted as follows: mm/yyyy with a forward slash (“/”) not a dash (“-“ as in mm-yyyy).
Be sure to also enter a working email address so we can contact you in case of any issues. We do make every attempt to contact our members when payment is past-due. Please do your part to help us keep your site active and online!
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Featured Members |
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| Brian Patrick Adams |
| Mixed Media Painting, Assemblage & Collage |
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| He has been an independent curator and installer for the past fifteen years and an artist his entire life. He has “always been drawn to telling visual stories with the use of collage and mixed media.” He combines multiple disciplines and mediums within a single piece while moving back and forth between two and three dimensions.
“My narrative is not literal but symbolic. I use religious,mythic and historical icons as well as other found and assembled objects. My goal is to show how and why we create our own realities in order to cope and transcend the challenges in our daily lives.” |
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| Roderick Lyons |
| Fine Art Photography, Photojournalism, Portraiture |
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| Rod Lyons has been a working photographer for more than 35 years. During that time, he has worked as an editorial photographer and freelance photojournalist. In the last few years, he has decided to follow his passions of street photography, portraiture and urban landscape.
His work is constantly evolving and, while it still representational, it has become less narrative than it was at one time. “...at this stage of my photographic journey, I feel that if my photographs can tell a story that's ok, but I'm more interested in how the various visual elements, especially light, are revealed in the photograph.” He sums up as follows: “my subject matter will continue to be urban and social landscape, but just as Ansel Adams photographed "weather" ( a description of how he saw light), I want to make images that reveal a certain truth, but in the final analysis are also beautiful photographs.” |
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Legal and Other |
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Copyright 2009 Artspan LLC. All rights reserved.
All /images are the property of their respective owners. The opinions expressed in this newsletter do not necessarily reflect those of artspan.com members.
Thoughts or ideas for future newsletters? ask@artspan.com
Technical questions or problems? www.artspan.com/help
Visit www.artspan.com today! |
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