Why are we all here and what do we do next?

[WimerWorks]

I joined this community a couple of weeks ago, and feel grateful for the invite. But I've seen a number of comments from other members that reflect my concerns. For those who are leading this community (RitaRocket? Others?) can you please answer the following and follow up? This is not meant to be critical, but to pose some opportunities to help. Otherwise I am afraid you will lose the good momentum you started and members will opt out or ignore this group. 

First, please set default email notifications for topics and conversations so members don't receive an email every time a new member joins. Or at the least, provide instruction up front on how to manage this. Someone else posted the help link in a later thread which was helpful for me. But I've played with the settings twice and I still am receiving emails I don't want or need.

Most importantly, I believe (supported by many of the messages I've seen) that Etsy shop owners who create original art are excited to find ways to sell more effectively, and eagerly jumped on board here as something new and different. But I think it would have been useful to have a) gone a little deeper on the group goal, b) why people were invited, c) how you intend to help people and their shops. I've joined Teams before and seen the value in advice and direction from those that have been successful, favorited each other's shops, etc., but haven't seen much sales movement because of it. Perhaps an Art Promotions platform: "a place to promote and share your latest artwork, drawings, and paintings" will be different. I believe this kind of original art is REALLY hard to sell on Etsy, which is why it would be nice to find a boost. But I notice there are members of this group who sell the more typical Etsy stuff: stickers, pins, jewelry, buttons. Not a complaint, and with total respect for that type of artwork. But that seems to require a different sales approach. Also, it seems whenever I hear an Etsy success story it's selling those kinds of products.

So it comes back to, how is this going to be different? Favoriting each others work is helpful, and it's good to see other great work, but it feels like there should be more. And I'm willing to get involved to be part of the solution.

Thanks,

Karl

[frighten]

You should be able to opt-out of emails here. It worked for me.

https://community.etsy.com/t5/user/myprofilepage/tab/personal-profile 

[EarthyImaginations]

I hope so! I just want to unsubscribe from this and not Etsy notifications all together :) 

[WhiteMtnArtistry]

I totally agree with your post Karl.  This seems like another fruitless circle (kind of like when you are searching for help on the Etsy site).  Maybe the team members who have been invited can actually be the ones to put our heads together and come up with something.  I am very creative, but not so technically smart.  It would be nice to collaborate and market our work from our Etsy shops besides a pinterest page (which I already messed up I guess and don't have the logo on my dashboard to post things).  Hope others will be willing to work as a group. 

[JoanClearOriginalArt]

I agree.  I am "flattered" to be invited to join the "Team" but I don't have a clue on what I'm supposed to do next or how participation will help boost my sales/profits.   The thousands of artists competing for the same buyers, the difficulty in making an individual shop stand out from the masses as well as the charges assosciated with maintaining an on-line presence make it challenging to sell at a profit.  Like most of the people who sell here Art is my therapy.  I don't have the expectation that it will ever make me "rich" but it would be nice to be able to have my sales cover my expenses so I would not need to dip into the "grocery money" to buy more glass!  I'd welcome any collaborative effort that will help create better exposure and generate more sales for all of us. 

[RitaRocketArt]

The email notifications seem to be a big problem with this new community update Etsy did to the teams. I have seen lots of users complain about it in the Forums page. In the mean time you can just try to unsubscribe from threads, disable notifications, or set a filter in your email inbox to ignore those notifications.

This team is also not meant as one of those "favorite mine and I'll favorite yours" games. The reason we have a section to post coupons and listings is because buyers can also find your posts here. Google and other search engines will index your posts here. With the new Pinterest board you can get extra traffic from customers through social media, and I'll continue adding new ways to promote and boost traffic for your store as we go.

[WimerWorks]

Thanks RitaRocket,

I appreciate the follow up. 

Good to hear it isn't just user error on the email filter mgmt. I want to see relevant feedback and new topics, just not every response, so I hope Etsy assigns someone to fix this.

It's also good to hear that the intended approach for the team is something different. I haven't had a time to list new posts and see how to get the new Pinterest board to work for my sales, but will. I'm very interested in what else you can do to help! If the Etsy format allows it, it might be worthwhile to find a way to elaborate up front (or in the initial invite email) what the team does that is different and better.

I'm way behind last year's Valentine's Day sales, and I've spent more on promotion, with a lot more inventory, so I'm scratching my head for answers.

Best

[JanetRomaArt]

Oh, yes

[paulettefarrell]

Yes agree. Original art is not craft the two are very different. Original has no use for the buyer at all. You can’t wear it or sniff it or use it to clean your body. It is a completely different selling mindset, coupons, vouchers, buy one get one free is not the way to sell original art. It is a personal experience and a connection that the buyer gets from the art that leads to sales. I’ve yet to find the key selling ingredient but I can certainly tell you what it isn’t.