Marketing Ideas For A Fine Artist

Get paid up front ;-)

Generally I don't mess with social media but I think this is one niche where things like Twitter and FB might actually perform well. He'll still need a quality site to position his work in the best light. Get a good following over time and the results will gradually grow.

In this situation, your friend will be marketing "services". Marketing services require a different marketing approach, but it's nothing that's hard.

Tell your friend to have case studies made up and to have a website that displays his artwork. Don't worry so much about the design of the site - as i have seen pretty crappy looking websites that pull in alot of dough.

Tell him to host a seminar that displays his artwork. Tell him to craft an effective business card and make sure that front offers ways to contact him, and that the back should contain testimonials of the customers that he's serviced. If this doesn't sound appealing to you, you can always run online campaigns to bring the customers in.

Have him offer some sort of guarantee just in case a client isn't thrilled with his work. Offering a guarantee for his service can do more good than bad, so keep that in mind.

These few nuggets should get him started.

I would say get paid upfront also

If his artwork is that "dark" as in goth, there are many forums and other places devoted specifically to that "style" of artwork. In addition to what was already mentioned, I would tell him to spend time there to help build a following. Signatures to his website and obvious follow/like/lead capture as well. There are also other forums as well that are dedicated specifically to art such as deviantart.com have him post some pics and see what kind of response he gets.

Here is a list of similar sites: Similar to DeviantArt.com

I would also post some work on photography sites and the like. There are also stock image sites as well. Don't know what exact style he is but just throwing some ideas out there. He could end up getting a nice niche cult following depending on how good he is and what he targets.

Start with the deviant art type sites listed by Edmund dantes. Tell your friend to get a collection of work and set up at a craft fare. He can sell already created art work and display portraits at the booth. Make sure he has a stack of business cards at the event. Have him go door to door to galleries with prints/samples of his work. There is usually a fee to have your work shown at a gallery, but if you get in during a good month you can get commission from the patrons.