SheNFT navigating through the Male World

This study looks into how female digital artists utilse Instagram to establish their brands and showcase their NFTs (Non-Fungible-Tokens) in a field mostly male-dominated. Ultimately, it aims to answer the following research question: How do female digital artists use Instagram to establish their personal brands and promote their NFT artworks?. NFTs, blockchain-based assets, have completely changed the ownership and trading of art pieces, providing artists with new opportunities for monetization and self-expression. Despite the fluctuations of this young market, NFTs nevertheless reflect broader systemic issues, including gender disparities. This research focuses on how female digital artists face these challenges through self-branding on Instagram, a platform mostly visual based, with an extended reach. By using a mixed-methods content analysis approach, employing both qualitative and quantitative methods, the research analysed the Instagram profiles of selected female and male NFT artists, the latter was used as a control group. The qualitative analysis examined various different profile elements, such as pictures, biographies, and captions, instead the quantitative analysis focused on metrics such as follower counts, following counts, and the frequency of use of emojis and story highlights. This comprehensive approach provided insights on the strategies or intentions of these artists in regards to self-brand and self-promotion. The results indicated that female digital artists were more likely to blend personal and professional elements more frequently in their Instagram profiles than their male counterparts. They followed significantly more accounts, possibly indicating an engagement strategy that is more proactive in comparison and with the aim of fostering community and some kind of reciprocal interaction. Additionally, the feamle artists also use emojis and story highlights significantly morefrequently compared to the male control group, adding depth to their visual storytelling and boosting engagment. These behaviours indicated a mix of self-expression and branding, portraying female artists figures who are multifaceted as well as reletable within the NFT community. On the other hand male digital artists often maintain a more polished and professional profile, mostly focusing on their art and technical skill. As they had a lower following-to-follower ratios, alongside minimal use of emojis and story highlights, it can possibly reflect their already established positions within the NFT landscape. Finally, this study demonstrates how female digital artists utilise Instagram for self-branding, self-promotion and community building, to our understanding of art and gender differences. It also highlights the potential of NFTs in democratizing the art world by giving marginalized artists a platform to showcase their work and challenge existing gender roles in the space.