As a creative entrepreneur, finding ways to get noticed can be one of the hardest parts of our day to day work. There are so many talented people out there, you need to find an angle that helps you stand out. However, many times persistence trumps talent when it comes to marketing. If you keep putting out quality work and showing up in people's feeds, they will start to recognise you.
Instead of only posting to your website where you have to drive traffic, platforms where people are already looking for creative inspiration can help you immensely.
Without a giant team, there is no way we can be on every platform. That is why we put together a list of our favorite places to get your designs noticed.
OVERVIEW:
Dribbble
Behance
Deviant Art
Instagram
Pinterest
Designspiration
Creative blogs
Teaming up
Dribbble is known for showcasing graphic design, illustration and user interface. It is a great place for inspiration and each creative has their own account. Users search using keywords which means that you should spend some time thinking about your image tags. Once someone clicks on your design, they can see more example of your work and what you have written about it. Other people can comment on your work which creates a great community feeling.
Keep in mind that Dribbble works on invites. Anyone can post to their own profile but your work will only appear on the draft page until you have been accepted. You can also be accepted right away with an invite from another creative.
What is Dribbble best for? Getting your work noticed by other creatives. Perfect if you are looking to improve your website traffic or get work from an agency.
Behance
Behance is owned by Adobe and so has a ton of great integrations like the ability to turn your page in to a portfolio. There is a big community around Behance and both creative businesses and companies looking to hire turn to Behance for inspiration and to find the right candidates. A great benefit of Behance compared to other platforms is how extensive your projects can be. Rather than posting one or a few images, you can create whole case studies with text, videos and mockups to really represent the work that has gone in to it. You can also get featured which tends to create a lot of traffic to your portfolio. If this sounds interesting, check out our tips for getting featured.
What is Behance best for? Showcasing work that has a lot of depth and effort going in to it since you can really show your process.
Deviant art is a community where creatives can share their work and get inspired by others. Even though you might not find many corporate clients browsing the site, it can be a great place to connect with people who have a specific style and to find team members for your next project.
What is Deviant art best for? Illustrations, game and character work
With product tagging, hashtags that help people find your content and more personal features like stories and Instagram live, Instagram gives you a lot of options for building up your brand. This connection to your audience can be invaluable and is something not all platforms offer.
Besides the many features, Instagram is also a great place to get featured on curation sites like @welovebranding or @bestofpackaging. Start exploring which accounts are right for your niche and start using their hashtags to get featured. Some accounts also have an email address you can send your work to.
What is Instagram best for? Creating an ongoing relationship with your audience. Show behind the scenes images and your process to draw people in.
A key benefit of Pinterest is the lifespan of a post. Since people can pin and re-pin your images, they can often be visible to new people for months. Compare that to most social media platforms where you have a few minutes to get noticed. By adding your website or portfolio link to the image, people can discover your work from an image they pinned. Most people don't read the descriptions so you can spend less time preparing copy and more time creating an appealing thumbnail for your work. If this sounds like your kind of platform, check out our guide to get leads from Pinterest.
What is Pinterest best for? Driving traffic to your website for a long time.
This is a great place to find new ideas and inspiration. Designspiration showcases work from a wide range of creative disciplines and when you post an image you can link it to your website. This means that it is easy for people to find you and it is a great place to get your work discovered. On each image, it shows who has saved it to their boards which can work as a very compelling form of social proof.
What is Designspiration best for? Getting your work noticed in the creative community.
Creative blogs
Another way to get your work noticed is to send it to popular creative blogs. These are places that already have a lot of credibility and a link from them to your website will help build your SEO immensely.
Make sure to both provide high quality images and a few paragraphs about the work. Most blogs are very busy and do not have time to research you so this will increase your chances of getting featured.
If this sounds like a great idea, check out this guide from Creative Boom How to get featured on the 45 best creative blogs.
Teaming up
Maybe you have a lot of creative friends with social media accounts? Why not feature each other's work and build your following this way. You have probably seen this done by Youtubers and influencers - finding another account with an overlapping audience and cross promote, but it is great for creatives as well. Perhaps you are a web designer with an illustrator colleague. Why not create a joint project and tag each other?
I hope you founds this helpful! If you would like more tips or get your burning questions answered directly, join our creative community. It is totally free and we are a very helpful bunch. See you there!
