Ira Mency Says This is a Must Read Book for Handmade Artists & Etsians by an Etsian Timothy Adam of Handmadeology

I rushed out to Amazon.com and preordered this book last night:

 

Cost = a few bucks ($12-$15 range preorder HERE)

Content = Priceless.

Tim Adam of TimothyAdamDesigns on Etsy (a metal artist with close to 2000 sales) is sharing his tips, tricks and sage advice for Etsy sellers, packing into this book full of 200 pages with a very low preorder price on Amazon.

Tim's wonderful metal designs include jewelry trees, ie: Japanese Cherry Tree in his Etsy shop.

I am personally endorsing and promoting this book because I believe you have to be successful on Etsy to tell others how to do it.  I have learned SO MUCH from Tim.  Just when I thought his own words would be enough to fill a book, he took it a step further. 

He revealed last night on his live blog chat on Handmadeology last night,  this book contains interviews with the 8 top Etsy sellers and 12 top bloggers in the handmade and design scene!  This information I am dying to know! 

For those of you who don't know, Handmadeology is a site by Tim, for the handmade community. It's a site where you can learn, connect, and talk about selling handmade things online.  It seems as though I hear about some things FIRST there that I wouldn't find elsewhere. 

Tim used social media to grow his site rapidly.  By trial and error, interviewing, and research,  he learned what works and what doesn't to drive customers to your website, or Etsy store. This is why I trust this book will be wonderful.  I honestly can't wait for it to come out, publish date is set for March 2011 but the preorder price is now!

According to the Amazon description below, some of the social networking info is included:

OFFICIAL AMAZON DESCRIPTION:

Product Description

In a world where most products are manufactured by machines, Etsy offers an online platform for makers of handmade products and crafts to market and sell their goods to a vast network of buyers who demand unique, genuine products. To date, the site has attracted over 400,000 sellers who collectively have sold over 30 million items, generating more than $180.6 million in revenue. The only resource of its kind, How to Make Money Using Etsy--written by Tim Adam who has successfully been selling his products all over the world through his Etsy shop since 2007--guides readers step-by-step through the many stages of selling online. How-to topics include:

• Establish your Etsy shop
• Effectively photograph your products
• Post your products to optimize visibility and increase sales
• Brand your business
• Use social media like blogs, Twitter, and Facebook to connect with buyers and grow your business

---

Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Wiley (March 22, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0470944560
• ISBN-13: 978-0470944561

Don't miss out, PREORDER NOW!

LizzieCaye's First Craft Show

My first craft show was a huge success, and at the same time a bit disappointing. The show was in a church in Dallas. It's a well known craft show, but the volume of "re-sale" type items has grown over the years. By this I am NOT talking about cool vintage stuff. There was quite a number of booths that had fashion jewelry and items that were made in some other country and sold here. There were only a handful of truly handmade items. I think this is what contributed to it being disappointing. So on to the good stuff!!

I love my display and I have to thank my Mom & Step-Dad for helping put it all together. A REALLY close friend of my mom's is an artist who was recently changing up her display, and gave all the grids to my mom. There in turn my mom and I talked about how they could be used for my display. So my Step-Dad cut them down, sandblasted them, and re-painted them. I'm quite lucky my Step-Dad has so many hobbies (Much to my Mom's chagrin). The red cover for my table I got at a clearance sale at a large catering companies sale (they were getting rid of allthe stuff that either wasn't been used, or was a bit too worn). Whoohooo for me.

The Gray topper on it came from some sheets that my hubby and I purchased for our bed, but were a dismal failure (They were so thin that when you sat on the bed the fitted sheet immediately popped off...). We got them at a flea market so couldn't return them, so what you see is the fitted sheet draping nicely over the elastic as it clings to the table.

To create some elevation, I took to plastic bins that I use in my studio to keep projects sorted and put them underneath the sheet to raise some of my purses up.

Here in the Dallas area we have this place called Sam Moon, which has really cheap accessories, I got several purse hangers there to be able to hang my bags from the edge of the table. I used S-hooks of different sizes to hang all of my purses from grid, and I used the basket there to put all my iPhone covers. The first day of the show I ended up making 10 more of them. Came home sewed them together and added them to inventory the next day!

Working on things was definitely a draw for many people. I'd suggest that if you have the ability to work on small things at a craft show - DO IT!! People get curious and want to come and see what you are working on.

The things I learned that I didn't know are that this was not the best forum for me. I need something a bit more artsy and unique, with the expectation that you are paying for quality, craftsmanship, uniqueness, and originality. I also learned that I need to get ACTUAL signs made... I laugh at myself here..... while shaking my head AND rolling my eyes (at myself....). I met some really cool artists that I believe that if I keep in contact with them, they will be great mentors and advocates for me. I also became aware of how I like talking to people and sharing my craft with them. So even though I didn't make the money I wanted to, I met great people and had a great time!

See these creations up close and personal at LizzieCaye.

Random Act of Kindness: Beat Up Creations & Article Writing Sales Tips

I'm proud to salute Angela, our very own Team Member's shop Beat Up Creations as she was featured in this little blurb I wrote in Environmental Graffiti, a UK online publication that's gaining more and more exposure every day. 

It's nature related, and a great way to talk about recycle artists...more team members coming soon.

There's a place to share the article on Facebook, so show some love for your team member. 

SELLING TIP FOR YOU:  Writing articles on sites like this isn't going to get you rich, -- articles must get ZILLIONS of page views to really pay off.  However, EXPOSURE if what really matters.  Spreading the word like this will raise awareness for team members and in turn, drive traffic back to you and your shop.  So why not write an article about a shop that does not sell what you sell, and in turn help each other out.   TranzendentalArts was writing for her local Examiner paper.  Contact Cynthia  for tips!   Don't know how to write articles about stores, no problem.  Maybe you are good with recipes, craft ideas, or pet knowledge...just about anything is a go at places like Ezinearticles.com  and GoArticles.com, wherein you write free articles in exchange for putting a blurb on the bottom about YOU and there you can link your STORE or WEBSITE.


Promote each other!

Proof is in the Analytics: Referring Sites and What That Means To You

I get a lot of people asking me about this and so I'm going to put this out there.  Many of you are analytics whizzes and can text in your sleep, but some of us are still working on social networking our lives and trying to operate our ipods.  So if you already know this, ignore it.  If you don't, here it is, simple, easy, and I want to hear that you are doing it if you are serious about selling and finding out your best sources and outlets of referring sites.

Not only should you be using Google Analytics because it's FREE, but because it gives you a bunch of useful information to help you sell. For those cringing at the thought of learning something new, I have to say, the name itself scared me as I'm no technical guru and at first I didn't know what I was looking at. However, watching a few "how to" videos, and reading up on it, I was a GOOGLE ANALYTIC PRO in no time. I promise you it's easy, and tells you so much that you need to know.

The big things I look for are REFERRING SITES. This tells me what traffic is coming in and from where. Currently, as you know, we're doing a promo with Everything Etsy--so today I'm going to show you how to find out if you are getting views in your store in direct correlation with this promotion. ((Now remember, the promotion leads people to the TEAM TAG -- so whomever listed last, will be on page one and more visible.  If you are a shop that lists a few items every day, or relists a few here and there, your chances of being spotted are better than someone who lists once per week. This is the way to find out whose referring you and how many times, so you may use this for other things as well.))

1. FIRST, Sign into your analytics, and make sure your Etsy shop is showing in the Dashboard.  Below you will see reports for your top traffic sources and keywords used.  This is not what we need.  So, move on.

2. LOOK FOR THE REFERRING SITES LINK as I have arrowed above. Normally it's the "green piece of the pie" and once you mouse over the blue words "REFERRING SITES" you will be able to click directly on them which will take you to the next page.

3.  Once you click on the "hyperlink" for referring sites, you should then be able to see a bunch of referring sites (below).  Now it becomes a "hide and seek" mission so to speak.  You must look for the site in question, in this case, it's EverythingEtsy.com  (note I did not put the www. in front of everythingetsy.com) As you can see in this photo below there is no EverythingEtsy listed in the top 10 or so referring sites.  So, since my report says I have 139 different sources (in  the header it says I have 247 visits from 139 sources So, going to the bottom and "view full report" is out of the question for me.  Much easier, is just to type in what you are looking for where I have the red arrow.

  4.  I am typing in EverythingEtsy.com 

~POOF~

it appears! 

TA DA!

5. Review your analytics.   In this case I only had one referral, but that's okay, my store was closed for awhile on vacation mode, so I'm not complaining. The first bubble tells me how many visits = 1.  The second bubble tells me how many pages per visit that visitor spent (and compares it to the average time on my site in teeny print beneath it.)   The next bubble is the average time on my site (only twenty seconds to see two pages, that sort of sucks, maybe they didn't like the item after all....not sure) , and the bounce rate is 0%.   More on bounce rate HERE, but the bottom line is high bounce rates are no good, and low bounce rates are better.  In this case you can't get lower than 0 can you?  So maybe, just maybe, this customer was referred, saw the item, and bought it......I don't know how to get this far without asking my customers. 

6. Bonus tips.  I want to back up a minute.  In case you did or didn't notice I have yellow stars on my top 10 Referring Sites page.  I wanted to show you these are 4 of 10 of my own sources for driving traffic.  Look again: 

Here are my 4 suggestions to you based on my stars: 

FACEBOOK:

This just goes to prove I'm busy driving people to my store.  Facebook:  I ask my friends to share treasuries on my personal and professional facebook pages.  They share and ask their friends to share, and before you know it people are bookmarking your shop. 

MY SITE AT VERIZON:  These are nothing more than landing pages the web carrier gives you, I used to have a website on Verizon, but took it down, and use blogger for everything, so now when you go there it's a page that says SHOP NOW and points you to my Etsy shop.  See, it's working....so if you get those free web templates, use 'em what can it hurt?  You'll be in cyberspace somewhere....

FLICKR:  Gotta warn you about this YOU WILL GET BOOTED OFF FLICKR IF YOU PUT LINKS TO YOUR ETSY STORES OR ARE DIRECT SELLING.  However, there are coy ways to do this.  My user name on Flickr is the same as my vintage shop, and so you get a profiile area and can tag your FLICKR photos.  I've often found items this way too .  I looked for Russel Wright Melmac, found it on FLICKR, googled the user name and found them on Etsy, and bought the set.  Voila.  Open a free FLICKR account under your shop name and in your profile talk about how much you LOVE ETSY. 

COMMUNITY AT ETSY:  Treasuries, or forums where you particpate and people view your shop.  Those who sell on Etsy often buy, don't you? 

As for the other top traffic,  like Google or TheFind, I do investigate to find out how they got here, which you can do by going more in depth and looking up how they are searching for you. As for my Recyclers Guild Blog, it's hard for me to tell if this was direct sale traffic or if they are just using the link to convo me to join the team, so I disregard that, but if it's in yours then people are checking out your shop!   You really have to learn and use your analytics, and sadly, LEARN that just because you put an item on Etsy, selling it may require a little outside client building to drive traffic to shop on your part.

For those of you using Analytics, please comment how much EverythingEtsy traffic you are getting.  Would like to compare this and keep tabs, thanks!

.

Green Love Treasury by Into the Trees and How to Promote Your Treasury

In case you're wondering, I'm using "Whale Shark Studios Website Treasury Tool"  to make these.  First heard about this on Handmadeology.  You simply take the "treasury ID" and get a script code where you can post into the HTML of any blog, website, etc! The best part? Someone can CLICK right on the item itself, and go to the item via your shop and BUY. (We used to have to do screen shots to post the treasuries we were in, not so anymore folks! Now it's live and adaptable) What a great idea for your blog or web page to increase sales....some team members featured here, I just really love the way she did this treasury.

'Green.. Green My World is Green......' by IntoTheTrees

Collection of repurposed , recycled , reclaimed ,upcycled

Blue and Green Pop Tab Metal... urbanwoodswalk... $15.00	Reclaimed GREEN APPLE Wall S... TheSavvyShoppe... $34.99	vicious cycle cactus planter giddyspinster $60.00
Recycled Bubble Up Soda Bott... bottlehood $	The Girl In Green rufusandpaco $90.00	Upcycled Green Wine Bottle W... orchidcactusgl... $16.00
Teal Green Toddler Dress Upc... Brokenghostcou... $52.00	Green with Envy Notebook relove $	Back Space Steampunk Dog Tag... RetroChaletStu... $42.00
WHITE BIRD ON GREEN scrabble... globalpendants $3.79	Circle Paintings on Reclaime... focuslineart $98.99	Green Colored Vinyl Record W... colerainecreat... $
Green Earrings Repurposed fr... beadsbuttonsan... $10.99	Red Funky Fish - Recycled Li... recycledartco $35.00	Earth Day -Recycle- ACEO- Co... Blakenetizen $3.00

Generated using Treasury HTML code generator by Whale Shark Websites.

SEO and Sales Tips, and Experiment from a Backwoods Barbie : Part I

CASE STUDY: PART ONE

Sigh.   I'm always learning this technical crap and reading up to see what changes I can make in my websites, stores, titles, and tags to sell better.  Considering a year ago I didn't know what a "blog" was, I think I'm doing darned good at learning the ropes and now even make sites and blogs for others which is just insane.  The moral here: don't be scared of learning what you don't know, just make it a point to study harder!

When I first opened my first Etsy store, Retro Chalet, I wasn't "dedicated" to maintaining or cross-promoting as I have grown to be in the past year and a half. One, I didn't have the time. 

Two, I was clueless. I didn't know about tagging, titles, and keywords like I do now. 

Three, my photos sucked.  I remember traveling and taking camera-phone grainy photos and uploading items and wondering why they didn't sell.  Those same items, I my relisted with better photos and better keywords and they sold quickly.  My second store I almost titled the same Retro Chalet Studio but separated my handmade this way. 

PHOTO STUDY:  Let's take a moment.

Does this photo jump out at you?

A good picture is worth 1000 words.  (Arnold, I love you.)
  I'm just saying, this photo makes you look, right?

SUCKY PHOTO!

Cheesy photo, this will never sell my item.  I was in a hurry, and it shows. No detail ACK.


BETTER BUT STILL HORRIBLE, NOTHING TO BRAG ABOUT:
I was experimenting with different backgrounds, this would have been okay had I cut just the focal point on the photo out and did it closer so you could have seen the detail.  Who wants to see my dirty table?   Too much going on!  I'm not selling the flower I'm trying to sell the sculpture!


GREAT PHOTO BY LIZZIE CAYE!

I liked her photo so much I used it as a team search tag and added the cheesy "bags and purses" underneat.

SAME WITH MEMBER ADRIEN ART!

LOVE HIS PHOTOS!

I added the cheesy" Ceramics and Pottery" to the bottom and used this photo as a team search tag.  Note how Adrien's teapot clearly stands out, and the focal point of the photo IS the teapot only!

The thing is, all this reading, watching, and investigating, I learned about things, and hard work does show. You aren't going to get noticed just listing items in your Etsy store and letting them sit.   I spent days in the winter reading all of the Etsy "quit your day job" articles and really making a top ten list of what key sellers did that I didn't do. It's different for every seller.  For me, it came down to photos, promoting, social networking, and keyword-tagging.

I also had to think like a buyer.  This is your "free lesson" of the day.

I see many of you with great items just sitting in your store.  Look at your item title and tags. How would someone else FIND this item. 

LET'S DO A TEST: 

For instance, if you are selling a pink polka dot purse:  how would I find it? 

This one, by Embroidery by Melissa, is tagged pretty well!

STOP RIGHT THERE. 

DO NOT OVER THINK THIS.

DO NOT UNDER THINK THIS. 

JUST THINK.

LET'S DISCUSS!

Who on earth is searching for a pink polka dot purse?  Very few people at this very moment.   However, you want to sell me that purse whether I need polka dots or not, right?  We know of course people on earth searching for a new purse is LOTS and LOTS OF PEOPLE!

So your goal is to tag and sell and title this pink polka dot purse correctly MARKETING it to everyone looking for a new purse!

What I mean is, don't be a tag waster!

NO NO NO ---  pink polka dot purse, polka dots, circles, pink, large purse, dots, circles,

IN THIS PARTICULAR BAG YES YES YES:

bags and purses --main category
hot pink  --- will cover the "hot pink" people and "regular pink" lookers
fuchsia  --- another word for your color
tote   --- another word for this items, it is an over-the-shoulder tote
canvas  ---material is a plus even though you have room to list this in material area
mod pod -- off the wall but is 'era related' to the style,  other words: modern , chic, urban
handbag --- another word for someone looking for a bag
pouch -- another word for someone looking for a bag
TEAM TAG HERE ---better chance of coming up in your team or group area for visibility
polka dot &-- descriptive

THAT LEAVES YOU SEVERAL MORE KEYWORDS!

Let's brainstorm.  Was it made in your home state? Why can't that be a keyword, for people who aren't using the GeoLocator, maybe they are searching for your state.  Does this purse have enough room to be a travel bag of sorts?   Can it fit your beach sandals, book and towel?  Will it fit a laptop?  If so, possibly a LAPTOP or BEACH BAG or TRAVEL BAG would be other ideas, when you could clearly explain this in the description.  " Big enough bag to take on your travels, to the beach, or fit your laptop in!"  Is is the best gift idea ever? GIFT is a great tag.

So, when your item is up for renewal, change a few tags.  Does it help?  Are you getting more views? 

You have to multi-market your item!~

 
Facebook was a big thing for me to learn how much it helps.  I have to admit, on my personal FacebookEtsy shop. I have no qualms doing so , every once in awhile.  (So sad to hear the "My Etsy" tab is going away soon...)  If just a few of those 1700 friends share my link with other friends, and the sharing keeps going and going, well, that's the best networking ever and sooner or later people will visit my store and buy my items.  Using Google Analytics, I found that about 11% of my visitors were coming from Facebook.  So, you decide.

Social networking is a huge thing and something that I clearly don't have enough time for.  If you set aside just a few hours a week, you can drastically improve your visibility. It works.

Figuring it all out took some sleuthing and help from others. I talked to some sellers along the way and if I liked a shop that was selling more than me, I had no bones about using the Etsy Convo to ask them questions.  What kind of camera do you use? What kind of lighting is best?  Most were happy to help and looked at is as a compliment.  I was shocked that some sellers use make-shift paper setups to take their photos when in fact I anticipated them having some huge studio room and professional lighting like in the movies.Perhaps, illusion is everything!

On top of that, you have to make sure the customers you do get walk away happy.  Give them incentive to visit your store again. If someone is unhappy, fix it. 

So I started thinking about Search Engine Optimization, and reading all about THAT and trying to improve my exposure. Quite honestly it's confusing but from what I get in a nutshell is certain keywords give you certain rank on search engines and there are tips and tricks for better "optimization" .   Let's break this down a bit, if you search for Vintage on Etsy, you get over 800,000 results at any given time, and on Google, well, just imagine.  However, if you label your item Vintage Red Pyrex Bowl, it's going to narrow down results and you have a better chance of getting discovered, but then who on earth right this second is searching for the bowl you have?   I wondered, how to get MY items higher in search ranks in Google?  

Maybe I think too much.  I wondered what if my Retro Chalet store would have actually had a name with " Vintage " in the actual title of the shop?  Would this have shown in the Google results better as in better rank?

So I went on Etsy and tried to open another shop. Just about everything Vintage was taken already.  If not buy sellers by buyers.  Vintage This , Vintage That, Vintage Sorry-I-Got-Your-Name-First.   Here is what it said when I went to search for sellers with the name Vintage in their title:

We found 3082 sellers whose names start with vintage.

OUCH. Okay, so obviously I hadn't been the first one to think of this....so I did another experiment.  I decided to look at the ones who had items listed, and see how they were doing-   It truly varied.  Some had great photos and and great priced items but they weren't selling that much. I couldn't figure out why.   Others were selling tons, but I wasn't sure why because I found the items cheaper and more interesting in some of the other stores. The ones selling however, at least two out of three of them,  did belong to networks, blogs, and some even teams. 

So I wanted to go to the EtsyWiki to see a list of top vintage sellers excluding supplies.   That redirected me to Etsy by Numbers, which redirected me to Craft Count!  So here you go:  Only 2 of 10 of Etsy's TOP Vintage sellers even have the word "vintage" in the title.

So , maybe it's not in a name.  I like to go against the grain so I'm doing my own experiment.  I've opened a new store with the keywords Vintage in the title, a blog, and I'm going to compare visits, views and sales with my other store in six months.  I'll get back to you.


Stay tuned. For more...

IN THE MEANTIME YOU MAY WANT TO EXPLORE FROM PROFESSIONALS:

TAXES-ACCOUNTING-FINANCE-ORGANIZATION
Are you clueless at running your Etsy business?  There are some sellers whose entire stores give you sage advice on running your business, such as JJMFinance, who offers bundles of files for the self-employed and has 100% positive feedback to date, having sold upwards of 756 sales.....I've never bought anything but with this type feedback from other Etsy sellers it's definitely worth mentioning. 




FOR TIPS-TRICKS-SELLING-MORE-ORGANIZATION
I see this seller BusinessMinded having a LINK on Facebook all the time!  This item is the main item they sell, for $24.95, and the feedback is great...check it out! 

Our first Craft show by THE WEEPING WILLOW'S

We did our first craft fair last Sunday and it was fantastic. It was held in a little seaside town near us called Lancing. The fair was actually held in the theatre on the actual pier with stunning views out to sea and it was a beautiful sunny day.

Me and my mum got together on the Saturday to finish off a few things that's we thought would only take an hour or so..............well, it took a lot longer! So the first lesson we learnt is to prepare a little better and not leave the packaging until the last minute.

On the morning of the craft fair everything was running smoothly until I dropped a huge box of tiny seed beads on the pavement outside the venue.....we both saw the funny side, hunched over on all fours at 8am with everyone watching us whilst we picked up tiny beads! Lesson number 2....put lids on EVERYTHING!

We had not set up a stall before but had lots of fab ideas and the stall next to us did not show up so their table was added to ours at no added cost which was fab. Lesson number 3, always bring extra material in case that happens again as only our first table had our lovely turquoise material on it.

We sold things from 3 of our shops.

The Weeping Willow's
House of Willow
Willow's Wool
anyway, here are some photos of our set up:

Things like these offered in our Etsy shop located here.

Overall we had a great day and it went well. We made quite a few sales but more importantly got out there, meeting people and getting a really good response. When you work so hard on your Etsy shops you don't get the experience of face to face sales and they really are amazing.

We feel confident now and have already made a booking for a second craft show in the same venue next week.......

We had such a great response to our 'use again' and 'recycle' products....it was really nice to see.

top tip: Put everything into one of those soft suitcases on wheels because you can then just tip it up slightly and wheel all of your things in and out really easily instead of carrying box after box!