Selling Advice

[Former_Member]

Hi everyone!
I've seen several people asking about selling advice, and while I've just opened my shop today (for actual business, getting a business license was a bit of a pain for me) I have several tips for you guys that I've read and gotten from veteran members I've designed for!

Pre 1) Make sure you get a business license! Etsy doesn't mention it when you sign up for a shop, but it's actually required in the US for you to do so. Check with your state/county/city to see what else you may be required to have.

1) You need to establish a following. Sign up for a Instagram if your work has lots of picture opportunity! Get a Twitter if you're more inclined to write a few snippets of production! Believe it or not, people like to know what happens behind the scenes. It helps answer the 'how legit is this business' that most all potential customers are going to ask themselves before buying from you.

2) Give things away! Sounds counterproductive, right? Well, you'll actually be doing two things by running a give-away. For one, you'll be networking. If people see proof of your good work they're more inclined to return to you when they need something else. Second, you'll be increasing your views/favorites and building a social media following if you run this correctly (i.e. use your social media "reblog/retweet to enter the contest!" dialogue.

3) Tags! Yes, you know you need tags. But make sure you use every single one that is avaliable to you! From what I have gathered from Etsy, your listing is ranked among others depending on how complete all the information is (i.e. choosing primary colors/materials/etc) and will affect how far up it shows when someone searches a tag you've used. Correct me if I am wrong.

4) Give coupons/discounts. Why? Because your shop needs reviews. If I am given a choice between two listings, one looks slightly more professional than the other, but the more unprofessional one has 100+ more reviews than the other than I'm going to go with that one. Is it unfair? Yep, but that is how selling goes.

5) Get active in the community. This is probably why a lot of you are here. You need shop favorites and being in the community is how you get them. There's no shame in that, that is what most all shops do to get their favorites.

[Former_Member]

Hi Malloree,
thanks for the advice! I'm new to Etsy and this will really help, since I've only had one sale in the 4months I've been opened.
I been thinking about doing a giveaway, but I can't think of ways to do it to attract more people, any ideas?
Thanks!

[Former_Member]

Hi Malloree and Jess! We are now officially a crowd 😊 I just opened shop today too and have not got onto any marketing yet. Just preparing everything for Etsy listings took awhile. Looking forward to marching on with you!
I'll put in my 5 cents (I'm Australian) on giveaways - Father's Day is coming up here and I start to see people broadcasting giveaways or specials on social media and their website or on-line shops. Now fathers may or may not be into jewelry but reckon no harm to do something similar on your social media or online shop to let people know you have these awesome beauties and you are giving some away!
I'm still caught up on creating - everything has to be digitalised so I won't be doing any special or giveaway until I've actually made something to giveaway :D

[Former_Member]

Hello, we opened our peshtemal shop but we have only 18 visits yet. Any recommendation is welcome..
Peshtemalbazaar

[handymandygifts]

I just opened my shop like two day's go. I just put my finished hobby products there for a low price but people won't buy them. What can I do?

[Former_Member]

Jess,

Giveaways should usually be done on Social Media! But, in your situation, I would also post it in the Etsy forums. At the very least you'll see a spike in your shop views and I believe that is figured into the search algorithm so you may end up high in search results from that alone. Have look at Instagram, ask a few people to follow you that have higher amounts of followers, and tell them you're doing a giveaway! I'm going to work on posting a thread here for everyone to network/follow each other's social media.

ThisTableS,
I look forward to it as well! I've been on for a few months working on my listings and making some connections. You bring up an excellent point! What gets you into Walmart when you want to lounge on your couch in your PJs? Holidays! People need gifts and they definitely don't want to get up. Everyone, take note to market yourself for the holiday crowd. Some fathers may not be into jewelry, but the mom who's trying to find him a gift probably is.

PeshtermalBazaar,
Off the bat, take a step back and look through the customer's eyes. When you click on your shop, they see your profile picture (shop logo) and banner before they see anything else. Think of your header as a big billboard; if you see a billboard that is just a picture of a product, would you pay attention to it?

No, you wouldn't. You need to sell your shop to your customer the moment they click on your shop. Here's a good example for a shop I branded as a giveaway a few weeks ago: https://www.etsy.com/shop/NKDNAprints

Your tags could probably use a little work. Does your shop manager tell you which ones are being searched? They may be too generic. For instance, I get almost no traffic from 'branding' or 'logo design', but I get a lot of traffic for 'food logo' or 'rose-gold logo'. It also looks like your using the same tags for each listing. ALWAYS BE DIFFERENT! Sure, put 'towel' on each one to cover those rare generic searches, but include things like 'pink beach towel' or 'peshtemal pink' because you may be excluding other Turkish buyers who are looking for the item buy name!

Handymandy,
I would not sweat two days. Do you have any views? Get active in the teams and forums, do daily promotion threads, start a social media account if you haven't yet.

As far as buyer point of view goes, you're probably not going to sell anything without a shop logo. Your storefront needs to be open and ready to sell, but having no shop picture is essentially the same as operating a business with the lights off all day.

If you guys have more in-depth questions, feel free to message me. If anyone needs/wants new store branding, I have a coupon up just for newbies that get's you 40% off (just type in NEWSHOP at checkout).

[handymandygifts]

I do have views yes, I will get an shop logo soon, I try to make one. I will try to get active in different teams as well. I am just so afraid that I do everything wrong, but I have so many things that I really need to sell it to make space haha. Thank you for you're tips Mallory Eady, it is very usefull :).

[Former_Member]

I have been open two days and had 67 views. Several people have favorited my shop but I don't see it mentioned where the stars are on my page, does it take a while before they appear. Also I notice manger left two notes. One was had I consider charging more as most people when they start not sure of pricing? Anyone out there any thoughts on this?

[Former_Member]

Maybe if you want to check my pricing EtchedInThreadByAlly.Etsy.com.
Also you mentioned shipping I have the price of my item and shipping is extra.

[Former_Member]

Do you have any advice on how to run a BOGO half off? I'd like to run a Father's Day sale but not sure how to do it with coupon codes. My store sells beard oil. Www.etsy.com/shop/WoodsWhiskeyBeardCo

[Former_Member]

Thank you so much, Great information!!

[Former_Member]

Ally Bryant,

The new Shop Manager has a several hour lag, so if you're getting alerts of favorites and not seeing them on your stats, that would be why.

I keep getting the same thing on the 'review your prices' alert. When it comes down to it, about the only way for this alert to be coded is for it to seek out other listings with similar tags and compare prices. Your prices seem fair, and it may be compared to another listing that has far more detail or is much larger, etc. I wouldn't worry about that.

Woods and Whiskey Beard Company,

First of all, slow clap for your shop name. Brilliant!

My advice is to do what I typically see done since ETSY isn't optimized for a sale such as that. When you run a BOGO, put several notices up (such as in the listing picture, shop banner, shop description, listing information, etc) that you are having a BOGO. Inform the buyer that if they want the free listing (of equal or lesser value!), to put the name of the listing in the 'Message to Seller' box at checkout, and to not put it in their shopping cart. There's no easy way to allow them to buy them both, so typically this is the method used. This way you know which they are buying, and which they want for free.

In short,
Buyer puts listing they want to purchase in cart, lists the item they want for free in the 'message to seller'. I would note in FAQs & Policies that with BOGO sales, the free listing must be of lesser value than the one purchased.

[Former_Member]

Thank you for the advice. That seems like a really easy way to accomplish that. What about a BOGO half off?

[Former_Member]

Woods and Whiskey Beard Company,

Within the same sale? Seeing as most of your listings are about the same price, I would suggest a coupon that's $10 off $20. Your other option would be to let them buy both, then refund half the price of the second one.

If you opt for the coupon, you may want to make them in in steps. For instance, if someone buys four of your items, you'd want them to get two for free, so they'd need a $20 off of $40, and so on.

If you do either of these, be sure you add instructions/explanations into your policies and listings to keep problems to a minimum.

[Former_Member · Accepted solution]

I'm starting a Facebook page to post advice that I think could be useful for marketing and such on Etsy and other platforms! Feel free to also ask questions there so other's can benefit from them!

https://www.facebook.com/Malloree-Eady-1747231915303621/

[Former_Member]

Just wanted to say hey and great info, I'm trying to increased sales as everyone is and the support on here is fabulous :0)

[Former_Member]

Lisa,

Glad to have you! Try using your shop banner to show off your best sellers! It'll get you some quick suggested sales!

[Former_Member]

shop banner?

[Former_Member]

The large image at the top of your shop! I would send you a screenshot but Etsy doesn't allow you to post images in teams apparently.

[CreationsWithOils]

Thanks Malloree for the helpful information. It is much needed.

[Former_Member]

Great team. Glad I found it and thank you for the advice. I am going to attempt launching a 40% off voucher today. All my items are due to expire so I thought it may be a good way to sell existing stock quickly. Wish me luck 😊

[susandearey]

Hi all

just read up on all the branding chat and I see a lot of interesting information, I've signed up on Instagram and Facebook to see if I can rustle up more trade, I've only had 2 sales but at least I'm off the starting block

I would love some advice on my store if you have the time
https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/DaintyMinatures?ref=pr_

thanks again for allowing me to join your group :)