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!

Was It a Great Craft Show to Be In or NOT?!?

For many crafters and artists, summer marks the start of the annual craft show circuit. If you're like me, you've done 3 or 4 a year, thought about doing 5 or 6 other shows and agonized over whether it was the right showcase for your artistic products. I recently came across this article that provides such an interesting twist to determining whether a show is "Good" or not, I felt compelled to share it with all of you.

"The best and worst thing about vending at a craft show is that you have absolutely no idea how you'll fare, sales-wise, at the show. Signing up to be a vendor at any given craft show is a crap shoot. You pay your booth fee, however small or nerve-wrackingly large that may be, and then you show up that day and hope for the best. No matter how well you've planned for the day--all the work you've put into making amazing products, tagging and packaging each one, devising meticulous displays--you can't control about a zillion other factors that go into whether or not your day will be a success.

Generally, the goal is to sell (gross) about 10 times what the booth fee was for whatever show you're selling at--which is to say expectations will vary from show to show, of course. How did I arrive at this number--10 times the booth fee--and really, do I exist on another planet with that expectation?

Here's something to think about . . . .

When you sell your work through a gallery or boutique, whether on wholesale or consignment terms, the gallery is going to pay you anywhere from 50-80% (typically), and take the remaining as a fee for not only paying for the overhead costs of rent, utilities, marketing for the gallery, etc., but also to provide displays and staff the shop to actually sell your work for you. It's something of a luxury fee for not having to do the selling yourself.

When you sell your work online, you typically pay the venue you're selling through a smaller percentage of your gross. For example, we all know etsy charges 3.5% + $0.20 (or more, depending on how often you renew your items to stay visible in the never ending flow of relistings). Let's call it about 5% of your price. Then paypal charges another similar fee on the amount paid to you for processing the payment. So, let's round that up and say that 10% of your price has gone to web fees. This makes sense--they provided you the service of hosting your items while you provided "displays" (in the form of your photos), salesmanship (in the form of the item listing information), and delivery (actually housing the product and getting it to your customer).

In many ways, a craft show is providing a similar service to an online venue, in terms of selling your work to the general public. They have a venue, they do some marketing and advertising, and they give you an opportunity to make your wares available to the adoring masses. So 10% is a perfectly reasonable cut to expect to give them of your total sales for the day. And that is how--drum roll, please--I arrived at the magic number that 10 times the booth fee is a fair goal.

Can a show be worthwhile if you make less than the magic 10 times number? Absolutely! You can make great connections, form relationships, give shoppers an opportunity to see your work in person (thus inspiring confidence in future online purchases) and much more. So making say, 8 times a booth fee (in other words, giving an organizer 12.5% of your gross) isn't such a bad deal, either, of course.

All of which raises the big question--Is there a point to all of this? Of course there is! At a few shows I've done lately, I've heard other vendors mention that they thought a show was "okay" and they'd consider vending at it again, since they made back their booth fee. Now, let's REALLY think about that--if you sign up for a show, pay a booth fee in advance and then show up the day of the show to sell and then only sell the amount that you paid for the opportunity to sell there, you've just given away however much the booth costs in products, and much more if you consider time spent making the products, schlepping the products there, and sitting and selling (not much) all day. You might be a charitable person, but you would have done better to just pay your booth fee and not even shown up, really!"

I don't know about each of you, but I've been known to say, "Well, at least I made my booth fee back--that wasn't so bad!" So the next time you're considering which shows you want to vend at--especially if you've done the show in previous years--you may want to ask yourself, "Is this a 10 times the booth fee show?"

Have a great and productive summer show season!!

Pictures do it all .... Case Study . . SweetLoveVintage Shop on Etsy by Ira Mency

Let's talk pictures.

A PICTURE IS WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS. 

Shopping is fun with SweetLoveVintage, the descriptions are funny and photos amusing.

See this $58 barn pulley HERE on Etsy.  Doing a search for this type item, this pulley catches my eye, and I will immediately pull this up first even if the others are priced lower. It just looks more interesting.

ALL TOO OFTEN you wonder why your items underpriced and not selling?  You checked your tags, your categories, your descriptions, but nothing's doing.  You moan, you grown, and you are wondering why.  The "competetion" has higher priced items and are selling just crazy stuff in hoards and meanwhile you are wondering why you can't make any sales.  Perhaps if you really look at your pictures, they may fit one or more of the following words: 

Dirty, dingy, dark lighted, poor quality, fuzzy, grainy, one dimensional, lack of details, lack of photos, or perhaps just downright borrrrrrrrrrrrrrringggggggggggggggg.

\

This book availalbe at SweetLoveVintage HERE for only $14,  but do notice how the lollipop sucks you in...For a moment you may be thinking of a memory from childhood past...making the book and this listing seem all that more interseting. Book may be $14, but lollipop is priceless!

SweetLoveVintage makes you want to buy from her shop.  She makes you want to love her items.  She makes you want to shop with her.   I read one description and was on her site for a half and hour before I wrote this, and I need absolutely no more vintage, my RetroChalet shop is overflowing, but something about this shop.....

Never did I fathom wanting a tissue holder so bad.

Sweet Love Vintage offers this for $20.  Go HERE to see it.

Below, Level $16  and Fan $32

Mice $16

Add color and this "Smashed up mug" $10 comes to life.

These cats make you just want 'em. Pair of MOD ringholders for $15 HERE.

The box looks so much better with color added.  Schoolbox $48

So, as you can see, a picture is worth a thousand words. 

Advertising 101 -What Google Anayltics Helped Ira Mency Learn the Hard Way

Question: What is the best advertising campaign that you can launch for your Etsy Shop?  

Answer:  Yourself.

I learned this the hard way, so now I will share the results with you. For one month featuring my RetroChaletStudio upcycled "art store" on Craftopolis, here are the results. First you must understand how it worked.

Cost: $54 for 4 weeks.

Users: Are mostly Etsians wanting to make treasuries.  I figured, those who use Etsy sell on Etsy and often shop on Etsy.

Ease of Use: Excellent, upload a small banner and you are all set. In this case it was this one:

Note: I kept it basic, though I had some other ideas such as these, I didn't use them:

Both of these ideas were nixed, though I liked them a tad better I wanted to keep it simple. 

So, when you clicked on the small banner I had uploaded, you could go direct to the shop.  Additionally, a "Mouseover Feature" enabled people to go direct to see one of my "3 Etsy featured items" 

Both of these features run each day for 4 weeks.

Note: The banner only shows a percentage of the time, according to Craftopolis, you get "at least 100,000 impressions a week. Most of the time ads get around 110,000, but we guarantee 100,000. "

Now for the results:  

new views = 57
New Hearts = 12 (unsure how many from Craftopolis)
Sales = $40, only $20 of which I could attribute to Craftopolis.
Percent of total monthly visits to my store = 7.25%

Overall I must say Shannon & the staff there were definately helpful and easy to work with.  Though I didn't see a huge increase in sales, I'm not extremely dissapointed, as my art has it's own niche' - and I was hoping for at least a 10% increase in traffic.   Realistically, I ended up with almost 2 new visits per day. 

Now, I wonder how it would work if I was selling something highly desireable , like upcycled purses or vintage items instead (and not funky artwork?).

SELF PROMOTION
Now, let's backtrack as for the same month I decided to "promote" my own shop, but my other shop that sells Vintage, which is RetroChalet.

RetroChalet sells some of my art and jewelry, but mostly vintage goodies.

So, I decided to use these avenues: Facebook, My personal web, and FLICKR

Here are those results:

Facebook brought me 78 visits, Flickr 24 and My own site referral at 56.  Altogether that's 158 new visits from my self alone.  So it just proves that you are your own best advertising. 

I should add you have to do some work on each of your sites to do this.

FLICKR - Upload photos and make sure you are using tags , so that people all over FLICKR can find your items.  For instance I tagged a Vintage Cast Iron Mailbox as industrial, blue, cast iron mailbox, griswold, etc.  So, anyone on Flickr searching for cast iron griswold mailboxes woudl have found mine.  Ironically, it sold quickly.

FACEBOOK - I used my main account which is under my real name, Cindy Fahnestock-Schafer, which has almost 1800 friends.  That's a lot of friends (some I gained by playing a facebook game, then to put your items out to.  I also  use the free application with "MY ETSY" on it. 

I also use both the Ira Mency (for the Etsy Recyclers Guild Team page) and Cindy Fahnestock-Schafer account to link to sites who have 10,000 or more users, sometimes commenting on a photo and saying "I love this item, (or this fabric, or this idea, etc) my shop
http://www.retrochalet.etsy.com/ sells a lot of these. Thanks for sharing this photo!".

Now you have added a link to your own store onto a site or page that gets thousands of views.  Of course you can't do this twenty times on the same page, but just once in awhile.   Also if the user allows you to add photos you can do so, and put something like "this wonderful item available in my RetroChalet shop on Etsy."

USE OF PERSONAL SITE:  Whenever you have your own website, make sure you are using keywords so that googlebot can find you.  If you are using a web hosting service, make sure they are taking advantage of that.  On Verizon, they use a really easy web builder which gives you a space under "Page Properties" to describe keywords on each page for the search engines to find you.  Also make sure to use a tab and redirect.   For instance, I used to talk about my Etsy shop on my website, show pictures of recent items, blah blah blah, but now I have a tab that says BUY VINTAGE in the sidebar on http://www.iramency.com/ and just to click on it, you are redirected RIGHT to the shop.  I do think a redirection works better and these results are proof positive it does work better.

ADDITIONAL MARKETING TOOL:

Cherri Miele of http://www.cherspassion.etsy.com/ had also told me about using the same type comments  with your URL links on other websites and on direct blogs that get a lot of users. 

In other words, go to a site that gets a lot of hits, for instance, http://www.everythingetsy.com/  (a very cool site by the way and one of her faves)  where you can browse around and leave a comment about something you like.  It will ask for your name and URL link, there you can put a link to your shop, blog or personal web.  (keeping in mind all of these sites should direct people to your Etsy store!!!)  Do keep in mind, most of the comments must be approved by the moderators so you want to keep it really on the up and up and not spam out sales and all that jazz.   

I really never tried this before until Cherri mentioned it to me, because for some reason it never crossed my mind that all these blogs and personal sites DO INDEED have places for comments on their articles or posts.  I must admit I tried it and went to Poppytalk (a cool design site on Blogspot which gets  a ton of hits each month) .  I later tried the Everything Etsy also.   I left a comment, a nice message and my URL. 

RESULTS:

As of now, I have gotten 3 referrals from each of these to my store according to Google Analytics in the past month.

SO REALISTICALLY:

If I had the time to visit 50 blogs a month and do this, and could get 3 direct hits from all 50 blogs, that's another 150 hits to my store.  

 If I could then visit 25 websites and do this, and hope for 3 new referrals that's another 75 hits to my store. 

Add that to my already 150 FLICKR'd, DIRECT SITED, and FACEBOOKED driven visits, and that's  300-325 NEW hits I could be expecting a month! 

That's better than most PAID advertising out there.

GOOGLE ANALYTICS:

I urge you to use this, it's wonderful and over time you can learn what everything means.  It has really helped me a lot.  Go HERE to read more.

Positive Thoughts : Achieve Your Dreams

Positive Thoughts:  Some to Inspire You, We all need them from time to time...

I'm always amazed by people who have great ideas, but rely on someone else telling them they can't do something. Sooner or later they chalk up their great idea based on someone's opinion.

But why?

YOU can do what YOU want and if you do it WELL you will SUCCEED.

I'm here to tell you that you CAN do anything you set your mind to. If you are willing to WORK at it YOU CAN ACHIEVE YOUR GOALS.

If you don't believe me, why not ask these folks what hard work and determination has done for them?

Lance Armstong

Obama

Amputee Runners who run Marathons!

From Forbes magazine I quote, "Almost two-thirds of the world's 946 billionaires made their fortunes from scratch, relying on grit and determination, and not good genes." Read that article HERE.

No excuses people. You must believe in yourself. The Internet is loaded with rags to riches success stories. Some best selling movies in Hollywood were made based on real people's lives. Not everyone is "born into success" but everyone, yes EVERYONE has the opportunity to achieve it.

The only difference that makes you famous or infamous is your will and desire.

I truly believe that if you are determined to succeed and do something you love and believe in, the good fortune will follow.

Case in point, my own husband said my art looks like a third grader made it. He thought I was crazy for putting blocks together and says I should have focused on something that "really pays the bills." I didn't listen to him. My friend (name I won't mention) liked the fact I created things, but he's a fru-fru fantasy painter and to him, my art was...uh....sort of crappy. My own family was like "forced smile sure it's great" but would much rather look at a DaVinci copy associating art with famous people, than some would-be-famous-someday-dream-of-an-assemblage sculpture. You may even think "That is just awful. Her family should have been more supportive..." Truth is this is the common reaction of many of us.

Now, you didn't see any of this stopping me NOR should it stop you! I remember working for my husband (as he's somewhat famous) and sneaking off to create art in the wee hours of the night. My office proved a worthy retreat for studio space.

Making art isn't always about money or getting rich and famous. It is a way to do something you love, alleviate stresses of daily life and somewhere though your art, your voice is heard.

My husband, friends, and family now appreciate the work I do but I never expect them to fully understand a day in the life of the artist. We are a special bunch aren't we?

Now, as for the professional field, I know galleries who would cringe at my artwork, and others who just adore it. You too will encounter this problem (unless you are super lucky) but should not let it get you down. To each his own opinions! Read my other article on HOW TO GET YOUR ARTWORK DISPLAYED PROFESSIONALLY for steps on how to get in the door. I will just say this, if an abstract painter keeps hounding the realism gallery for display of his art, but keeps getting turned down, he only has himself to blame.

The key is finding your niche, and where does your art fit in? It does fit in somewhere. You just have to do a little sleuthing to find it.

Your best support system is going to be other artists that work in your medium who can encourage you and inspire you. (I'm not saying other artists who don't won't be great a great support system as well.) There are situations were the abstract painter and the realism painter do get along quite well, (but while sipping coffee the realism painter is afraid to ask the abstract painter just what those blobs on canvas really mean?)

So if someone tells you:

You're nuts. Dream on. Get a life. Get a grip. Give up the fantasy.

It's your choice NOT to listen and work harder at achieving your goal. If you don't, you have just let that person hold you back from a big wide world of artist opportunities.

:)

xoxoxox

Ira Mency

Top Etsy Seller Study: Emily Martin of the Black Apple

Adorable Kitten Doll by Emily Martin aka The Black Apple . As he grins, he may tell us the secrets to his creator's success.

We all want to know how to be the next 'it' store. There are a lot of great resources for promoting your shop, for free, available to you. I think it's how much work you put into it and how you sell yourself, and your items. Many people complain they aren't selling anything at all, others have stores they can't keep up with. Let's start at the beginning. See who's selling.

If you go to the EtsyWiki page, you can find the top sellers, browse their store and see what they do. Most people look at this page and see the top sellers as being supply sellers and immediately freak out. Think about this: a supply seller who is offering $1 items, has to sell sixteen $1 items to equal your one $16 item, so don't let the numbers cloud your mind. My goal here is to show you HOW to increase overall sales by using examples of successful sellers.

I will use one ART example for this article because I hear all the time people aren't selling their art or handmade on Etsy and they are frustrated with no sales. Are you someone who wishes you had more sales? You've tried the Showcases and tried to sell but it's just not working? First ask yourself: Do you treat your store like a business or a hobby? I have to admit I don't put enough time into my art shop as I should, therefore, it is what it is. I put more into my vintage shop, and it treats me better. So folks, you can only blame youself if you are treating it like a hobby, and not a business. It's not all about listing items, so let's go to a Case Study.

So let's use this wonderful example to talk about: THEBLACKAPPLE - Emily Martin, Portland, Oregon

"Tea for Two", Print by Emily Martin, $16 TheBlackApple on Etsy

STORE INFORMATION:

Sales as of Today 26961

Member since July 2005

Average Price of Item=$16 most art prints, other items average more or less. .

Average Items in Shop : 160-170 at a time, they sell so fast.

Summary: This artist offers adorable art prints, dolls, notebooks, jewelry, original art, and the like at a GREAT and FAIR price point to customers.

MILESTONE #1 Early on Emily was known for her cute and easy to make doll kits and dolls. By Oct 2007, she had made 8500 sales and was featured in TheStorque on Etsy which you can read Emily's secrets HERE.

Cute Handmade Dolls by Emily Martin.

MILESTONE #2 Soonafter, March 2008, she was on the Martha Stewart Show making her cute dolls with Martha !

MILESTONE #3 Spring 2009 she was secretly working on a cute series for Aladdin which has recently been unveiled on her blog and is available for purchase here.

Emily' Martin's Aladdin Series in the market Nov 2009 for sale!

TODAY Emily's shop is still going strong so I went to check out her current offerings and see what was the secret to her longevity.

BARGAINS GALORE: I could not believe her prints were only $16. Not only are they downright adorable, but a bargain price. I'm wondering how she can afford to sell that low when you figure in costs of making these on high quality papers with archival inks. (Printers can easily run $1000 or more, and papers alone can cost $2 and up each.....not to mention the cost of fancy inks.) Then Emily says they are shipped in a cello sleeve and flat mailer. A true bargain for the buyer! I soon realized she is selling MORE by offering for LESS. Better prices encourage more sales, repeat customers, so in this case, LESS has become MORE and then MUCH MORE and finally WAY MORE. She has built up a clientele and made a name for herself and just think of the amount of her artwork that is out there.

"Girl and the Bunny Print" by Emily Martin, The Black Apple at Etsy

I then checked out her listings. What stood out to me is that SHE truly CARES about her customers. She explains about the archival ink lasting 82 years and talks about the quality of paper. Explanation to the customers about the quality of the item indicates she cares about what they are getting. Her profile page also lets you know she cares about making the customers happy. It goes on to explain if you are unsatisified in any way, she will make things right. Also, she offers print SETS at a very good price (even a bigger bargain) caring enough to give you the best deals possible! LOVE, LOVE, LOVE is written all over this store.

GOOD PHOTOS. She also cares about showing you what you are getting with professional looking photos that show close up of detail and are crystal clear.

When I noticed her main store page it said she had a blog called "Inside A Black Apple." Note she has chosen yet again the Black Apple name which is attached both to her blog and her store. A great tool for CROSS-PROMOTION. The blog is cute, consise, and markets her well. You can learn about Emily, see that the blog itself cross references her Etsy shop and anything she is currently doing (craft fairs, new works, etc.) She cross-promotes her store and offers support to other artists/sellers also.

Newer creations by Emily Martin of The Black Apple.

Lastly, I went onto Google and googled her name. Her name and shop name came up in some FLICKR photo results. It appears she is offering some transfers via Sublime Stiching and her photos were appropriately labeled with her name and shop name ---a great way to get in the Google search results. Cross promoting and name branding via photos is also a great tool that many people overlook. Why not join a few FLICKR groups ang tag your photos? EXAMPLE: "Ira Mency of Retro Chalet Studio presents this Trash Art Umbrella..." (If you are interested in seeing Emily Martin's Transfers on Sublime Stiching GO HERE.)

Combine all of that with the fact that she has absolute true artistic talent, Emily is sure to stay in Etsy's Wiki for top sellers for a very, very, very long time.

So remember:

LESS IS MORE!

CARE ABOUT YOUR CUSTOMERS!

CROSS-PROMOTE!

STAY POSITIVE AND FOCUSED ON YOUR GOAL!

(and lastly, but more importantly, YOU MUST WORK AT IT)

Kudos to you Emily for having a super cool shop!

Note: All images are Copyright Emily Martin, The Black Apple, and used with permission for means of this article only and versions of this article I may publish on Associated Content about The Black Apple.