Ahhh, the classic conundrum of a new NFT creator – you’ve finally produced work you want to put up for sale, but you’re not too sure how to price it.
It is natural to feel daunted by the thought of having to price your NFTs. After all, price is important for determining the value not only of your art but of yourself as an artist as well. The good news is, there are ways to make informed decisions on how to price your work.
So how does one go about pricing without wanting to rip the hairs out of your head? Here are some tips for you:
1. Be patient
This is our number one tip for creators. It’s normal to feel like because you’ve worked so hard on something, that buyers will instinctively pick up on the value of your art and it will sell. But if you’re new, expect that it will take time. Every creator is different, and what formula works for one might not work for the other. It will take some time to figure out what price works for your creations. Don’t be discouraged, just because your work isn’t selling does not mean you’re a terrible creator and you should burn all your tokens immediately. You need to keep working on your vision and make small adjustments along the way – these are all little steps in your journey to achieving success.
2. Do some research
Now that we’ve given you the pep talk, here are the practical tips. One of the biggest mistakes a creator can make is price based on intuition. As a creator, it’s easy to make decisions based on what you might think the value of your work is, but everything is pretty much speculation until you actually look at other NFTs around you and what other creators are doing.
Market data
It’s a good idea to dive into different marketplaces and look at the floor prices of NFTs that are not only of the same genre as yours, but those that contrast yours as well. This should give you a good idea of what the average price of a specific type of NFT is.
Check out the competition
But looking at the prices of other NFTs on the market might not give you all the information you need. A good habit is to also look at different creators – how big of a following they have and the frequency of which their works are being sold determines how popular they are in the market, which should give you a good idea of your own standing in comparison, allowing you to price accordingly. You can also find out who their buyers are, especially if they are creating NFTs that are similar to your own. This will help you better frame who your target audience is, and allow you to get in-depth with their spending habits and buying history.
Let your buyers decide
Some creators choose not to set a price for their NFTs and instead, wait for potential buyers to make some offers. This is a good way to gauge what collectors are willing to pay, and can indicate a range of prices that are suitable for your work. You don’t have to accept offers, especially if you feel they are too low – this can just be a means of collecting information from potential buyers that can inform the pricing of your future listings. If you receive an offer higher than expected though, then go ahead and accept it – and you can feel confident about listing your other works at a similar price. Of course, remember to share on your socials that someone bought your NFT for that price, as this can solidify the perceived value of your NFT.
3. Know thy self
Yes, the age-old adage of ‘know thy self’ does apply in this instance as well. For pricing NFTs, it’s not enough to know the market, you need to know yourself – what you’re producing, how many tokens are you planning to mint, how many NFTs have you already sold, and who your target audience is.
Here is a guide for minting based on the type of NFT and how many NFTs you’re looking to mint:
Inventory
The chances are that if you have only had one or two NFTs in your inventory, it’s hard to convince buyers that you’re an established artist with a repertoire that will fetch a high resale price later on. On the other hand, having too many unsold NFTs in your inventory further heightens the fact that the demand for your artwork hasn’t really picked up yet. So a good healthy number to showcase your creativity and your value as an artist is a good starting point to slowly work up from, and eventually price higher.
Number of copies
Another tip is knowing how many copies of a particular piece of NFT you’re looking to sell. The general rule of thumb is – the more copies the lower the price, the fewer the copies, the higher you can afford to price it due to the rarity of the item. An edition of 10 should always be priced differently from a 1:1 no matter what. However, the previous tip does still apply when it comes to overall selling power. If your work is a “collectible” rather than a piece of “fine art”, then pricing strategies may work out to be different as well.
Value Proposition
Aside from the art itself, what added value is there for your NFT? If you’re offering additional benefits for your NFT holders, this could allow you to price your NFT higher than competitors who are only offering the artwork. Adding value can be as simple as stating in the NFT description that you will offer higher quality file formats, or customized resolutions of your artwork so that it can be used as a wallpaper / fit more nicely into a display frame. NFT holders could also be offered access to exclusive commissions, events you’re hosting, or discounts on other products you may sell. Whatever the added value is, it will allow you to price your NFTs higher as buyers are getting more out of their purchase.
4. Make full use of the platform
Your work is valuable no matter where you’ve minted it. But depending on where you mint it, you can leverage the platform you’re on to add to or increase the value of your NFT. In fact, you should always make use of the features to your full advantage, that’s what they are there for!
Marketplace features
Depending on which platform you’re on, the features on each do vary. On Mintable, we offer creators an unlockable content feature for every NFT. Unlockable content works like exclusive content, like a bonus feature on a purchase. Depending on what you attach to your NFT, it may increase the value of your NFT, hence allowing for a more elevated price too. This is your chance as a creator to be as creative as you can – think about what you can tack on as unlockable content to add extra value to your work and incentivize a collector to buy it. However, what works for one artist might not work for another, so do apply tip 2 of doing some research to this as well.
Read more about unlockable content here: https://editorial.mintable.com/2021/09/05/unlockable-content-in-nfts-what-is-it/
NFT Pricing Strategies
Pricing as a marketing tactic
The price of your NFT can represent more than just the value of your work. Pricing your NFTs lower than you want to, in order to make it more affordable for collectors, can be a marketing tactic to inspire loyalty from your collectors. Some artists do this by setting a lower price for their first collection so that their early buyers feel rewarded for their support, especially if the prices increase later. Pricing can also be a reflection of branding – a t-shirt from a luxury brand would be priced higher than a similar t-shirt from a mass market brand, even if its exactly the same t-shirt. If you have a strong brand that has an exclusive or premium vibe, you should price accordingly.
Selling price vs royalties
With NFTs, there are 2 ways to make money from your work, from the initial sale, and from resale royalties. Depending on the type of NFT you’re making, you may want to set this ratio differently. Collectibles are more likely to change hands than fine art NFTs, so you may be able to sell for a lower initial price and bank on making money from royalties. This could encourage more people to buy your NFTs during the initial sale.
Increase prices in a linear fashion
Our final tip for pricing is to think in linear terms. Entering a marketplace where there are thousands of other NFTs available for sale can be intimidating. And although it’s unrealistic to expect that you’ll be fetching high prices immediately, do not underestimate the value of your art as well. Achieving that first sale is always the hardest, but once that’s out of the way, and you start gaining a steady number of buyers interested in your work, go with a linear model and raise the floor slowly and steadily, working up to pricing them higher as you go.
Final advice
Our final advice is that buyers and collectors are not solely looking at price when they buy your work, they are also looking at the artistry, utlilty, quality, design, sometimes the labor of NFTs, the list goes on. There is an indefinite number of contingent factors outside of price that lead to the sale of an NFT, so selling cheap might not mean your NFTs will sell. Pricing them high is not exactly a good gauge for the true value of your work either. Do your research, make informed decisions, but remember that for pricing that there are no definite rules.
Next up, we havea Guide to Minting an NFT.
For all the rest of our Creators 101 guides, click here.
Learn more about NFTs from Mintable’s best on Sellers’ University.
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