A few fellow artists have asked me why I prefer Reddit over Instagram and why I consider the latter not worth bothering with. The reason is simple: within a few hours of posting on Reddit, I get more views all of the posts on Instagram within a week or two, combined.
For me, views are important, as I have nothing else to do with these paintings but show them to the world. If you're selling something or want to gain followers you will never reach (my most successful posts reach 40 out of the 500 people who follow me on Instagram, max; it's usually around 20, the rest is all hashtags), then Reddit might not do the trick for you, since the largest communities do not allow self-promotion. But for me it's fine, I don't want to be known, I only want my art to be seen, that's why I share it, otherwise, I'd keep it on my desktop.
The absolute worst "performing" post on Reddit is still worth months of Instagram (in terms of views, I don't measure "likes", I do not care about likes). Also, on Reddit there is that slim chance that you will also get some actual comments, you know, some human connection.
Is Reddit perfect? Definitely no. Reddit is full of trolls and people who actually make it their life mission to downvote posts. Personally, most of the content from there does not speak to me, but I've never downvoted a piece of art in my life, even if I don't like it, because I know there's a human behind that actually tried, and by trying alone, over and over again, it will eventually get better. But as I said, views are more important than likes. If you show your art to enough people, some will like it, some will hate it, some will be indifferent about it. But this game can only be played if you have the views.
Instagram does not give you views in this day and age, particularly if you're a smaller account, like me.
The photos above show just one example of 14 hours on Reddit vs 2 days on Instagram. I can do it for whatever other image.
My most successful Instagram post ever has reached 20k people (out of which only 151 out of a total 500 are actually followers!! my MOST successful posts, have that register well!), and that's solely because I have attached a process video to it (which is tedious and not something I'm willing to do every damn time). The Insights on Reddit last only 45 days, so I cannot show you a comparison screenshot, but I have a few posts there that have topped that within 2 hours. And some thousands of likes, if that is important.
This is not a total praise of Reddit, it has its issues. But if you're a smaller artist and want your art to be seen, I really believe the Meta apps are not the place. You're simply too late to the game.
And ArtStation is really not the place either, because it's catered towards a very specific kind of art, production art, and it's so overcrowded that you'll get buried within a couple of seconds of posting. I get less views there than on damn Instagram.
I don't know of a better place than Reddit to post art, but if you know of one, please comment and let me know. We can all learn from each other.
[LATER EDIT: I am fully aware that there's an overabundance of art on every corner, that I am doing nothing that "special" or any masterpieces, I am just 0.000001% of everything else, and there are millions of others who are "better" than me. However, as is the case with art, there is no one else who is exactly like me, and who can paint like me, or has an interest in the same subjects, and I've also worked extremely hard to be able to be this 0.00000000001%. And there are millions of others who haven't started their journeys in art, whom I can inspire or help to pick up on their tools of choice and give themselves the best time of their lives. I am not willing to renounce that for the sake of social media algorithms.]
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