Frequently Asked Questions
Who owns and runs these artist directories?
I do. My name is Hillary and I'm a one woman web design firm based in Wilmington, NC. I'd thought of creating directories with artists in mind for many years and I've finally, after lots of hard work, gotten some up and running! My Mother, who passed away in 2007, was an avid artist all her life and she inspired me to try to help other artists. I wanted an inexpensive way for artists to be able to showcase their work without annoying ads or a big corporation feel and also to help generate traffic to their website if they have one.
There's no one listed yet on some of the artist directory sites. What's with that?
These sites, with the exception of NorthCarolinaArtists.net have only been live for a few months and are still, for the most part, going through development as I get feedback from artists about what is or what isn't working for them. NorthCarolinaArtists.net has been around longer and shows up more readily in search results although some, like GeorgiaArtists.net, IdahoArtists.net, ArkansasArtists.net, ConnecticutArtists.net, DelawareArtists.net, VermontArtists.net and AlabamaArtists.net, are already showing up on the first page of Google and/or Yahoo.
How much does it cost?
The cost to have a listing is just $35 a year - that's less than $3.00 a month! Since websites can be expensive to build, host and update, this is a great way to show your art (up to 12 images that click to enlarge) and describe yourself and your art. The best part is - you can update your own images and information anytime with no additional costs! The first 20 artists to sign up for each state get a free listing for the first year.
I have my own website, why do I need to sign up on yours?
One of the most effective ways to generate visitors to your own site is by linking to your site from other relevant websites. A search for "North Carolina Artists" (without the quotes) in any major search engine has NorthCarolinaArtists.net (which has been live the longest of all my artist directories) on the first page of results, if not the very first listing, every time. Since there are over 11,000,000 million listings on Google alone, this means that people looking for art will find my site first and in doing so, will be able to find yours quickly too! I'm working to sure all of my directories have the same results in the future.
Why don't you have my state listed?
When I started to get the idea for my artist directories, I wanted to keep the names with a similar look: state name + artists.net. Not all states were available. Currently, I have 14 states available with another 28 in the works.
What states do you have artist directories for?
I currently have active artist directories for: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Massachusetts, North Carolina, and Vermont.
Are your signup pages secure?
Yes. The signup pages are encrypted before being transmitted over the internet. You'll see a "lock" symbol on pages that are encrypted pages in your browser. Encryption makes it very difficult for unauthorized people to view information traveling between computers. The pages have been authenticated through Equifax.
Do you keep my credit card information?
I NEVER store anyone's credit card information. Once your credit card has been charged the $35, your credit card information is completely deleted.
I'm still not comfortable giving my credit card information online.
No problem! I accept PayPal and personal checks. Simply make your check out for $35 to ONNA Web Design and mail it to: PO Box 16, Wilmington, NC 28402 or I can send you a link to purchase through PayPal which keeps all your information confidential.
I hit the back button on my browser window to change something during the signup process and I got "Username already exists. Please try again." when I tried to continue!
Unfortunately, by the time you've gotten to the billing page during the signup process, the information you've entered up to then has already been added to my database. I'll be trying to work out a solution but until then if you run into that problem just contact me or call (910) 795-0230 and I'll take care of everything!
Why are my thumbnails all black!
Make sure you DO NOT have any spaces in the name of your images. The thumbnails are created automatically when you upload your image. However, if there's a space in the name of the image, because of the programming language, it automatically adds a percentage symbol (%) in that blank space. So when it goes to find the thumbnail you named "mylittle stream.jpg" it won't be able to find it because it was converted to "mylittle%stream.jpg".
Why does my thumbnail have a black section.
The thumbnails are automatically created using a set height and width and are cropped a set distance from the top/left side of your image. If your image is too small, the thumbnail is cropped off the edge of your image. This can be fixed by making sure your image is a minimum of 400 pixels wide (600-800 is ideal).
I've tried uploading images but I keep getting an error!
Make sure you don't have spaces or other characters in the name besides a dash (-) or an underscore (_). Also, I recommend an image that's at least 400 pixels wide (600-800 is ideal) but it can be up to 200KBs in size and it needs to be in JPEG format. If you're still having problems, contact me or call (910) 795-0230 and I'll help you get your images loaded.
I've TRIED copying and pasting my artist description from my word editor but I keep getting "please fill in valid values". Help!
Some word editors convert characters into something the browsers can't read when you copy and paste into from your editor into the description area. In some cases the apostrophe and quote characters, which should look like this ( ' and this " ) get an obvious slant to them. To us that doesn't look like much, but trust me, to web browsers, it can cause a BIG problem.