I have not had much luck in directly selling Art online. I have made a some coin by having folks click on my art. Now if I could just get a couple million more people to reach out and touch me--so to speak--I'll be able to retire.
I have made money by posting my art on article cites such as Associated Content and Bukisa. I recommend that you seek out every article on how to make money, sell items, SEO, setting up internet stores, and getting more hits on eHow, hubpages, and Squidoo. Since I have never bought the books that some of the "get your money making opportunities here" types sell, I can not recommend them. Hey, maybe they work but since I don't know that from my own experience I can not say. What you are looking for is the same thing I ran across. Different places to post your content.
As other revealers of inner, hidden secrets have related, one of the tips that can make you money is cross posting. If you post an article here on eHow, you can also post it on Bukisa and if you are careful about the copyrighting settings: Associated Content. Associated Content is not rocket science, just be careful to admit that you have posted the content first elsewhere. Your mileage may vary but I prefer to post my original content first on a site like eHow and then cross post it on Bukisa and Associated Content. Let the lawyers haggle over the truth of the matter but the way I read what you sign up for when you post something on Associated Content is that if your post it exclusively and say that you a have not posted it elsewhere then you are legally bound not to post it elsewhere. I believe that the legal recourse that Associated Content uses is to ban you for life. Given that you can be honest and tell them that you posted it elsewhere first, why not go that way? The exception for me to this rule are when I take an assignment from Associated content or submit something for up front payment from Associated Content. Then they get the first and only dibs on the content. These remarks refer to written works only. I have not had anyone say that I was restricted in where and when I can post my art so I do what I like with it.
But I digress, we were discussing how to make money from artwork. Okay, on both Bukisa and Associated Content you can make slide shows of your artistic content. I make jpegs of my abstract art and I combine them together to make little movies or slide shows. I make jpegs by using C# and VB.Net directly in Visual Studio 2008 but if you are not a programmer then I would suggest you stick with things like Adobe, Microsoft, Flash and the like to make your movies. I will put links to my work in the resources so you can get a look at what the finished product looks like.
Squidoo is a different breed of cat. You need to begin with written comment and then use your art to illustrate the words. Hubpages has a similar outlook on life but I am not aware of how to make money just from clicks on Hubpages so I am not recommending Hubpages as a way to directly make money from clicks.
They tell me you can make money from putting affliate links on your pages but I haven't had much luck there either. In so far as I can tell, it doesn't hurt to affiliate, maybe you will have some luck with it.
Yes there are art sites that you can use to display your wares and online shops that will help you show case and sell what you have wrought. But I have never made any money in those places. Nevertheless, for the sake of completeness check out DeviantArt, LuLu, RedBubble,ebsqart,Zazzle, and CafePress.
Don't forget to blog about your art and to create web pages based on it. You can have the most freedom on your own web page of course. But how do you get anyone to look at it? If you go with the right blogger you can have some control and can keep the graffiti types from selling too much porn and viagra on your site. Hey some junk is going to leak through to your blog comment pages--if you don't think so you haven't taken the porn and viagra industries seriously. Like they say in horror movies, those dudes are relentless and they never sleep...
Tips & Warnings
* Always use the links and resources in eHow and Associated Content.
* On sites like Squidoo and hubpages, don't forget to provide links to your books or content. If you have something on Amazon or Ebay, they have ready made ways for you to offer up your wares
* Be careful when cross posting. If you claim that are only posting written content on the one site, remember that they may search the web and find you out.
* Content is king. First have something interesting to show, display or say. Only after you entertain the masses is it time to sell them something.
* If your are boring, they will never click on you again.
