Anyone else have seemingly invisible phases??

[SugarAndPaint]

Ever since Etsy changed the front page a few years ago, I have these segments of time where activity wise, my shop seams almost invisible. Everything will be going great and then absolutely nothing for about a week or so. No views, no sales, nothing! I will often have a drop in sales here and there but this is views also..down to 0! Then suddenly orders and views are back. Unfortunately its happening now when I was hoping to have a lot of Christmas sales. I guess I don't understand enough to know what it would have to do with that front page change but thats definitely when it started. Does anyone else experience this or have any idea why it would happen?

[Former_Member]

I noticed the same thing (this year especially) & it got even worse when the treasuries were discontinued in October. I've also been wondering what possible purpose the teams serve, now that there's no way to make treasuries & Etsy has changed its algorithm to ignore "click farming"? I mean, why bother even visiting my teams any more? Why bother clicking, liking, favoriting, etc.? Why am I even here? That's what I've been trying to figure out.

[Former_Member]

I like the word "click farming"! :)

I am new here but I'm wondering what are the relevant factors now if all those aren't?

[Former_Member]

Same for me here. October and November were zero sale months, now in December I've had 2 sales already. It has been a constant up and down this year

[SugarAndPaint]

For sure business is not always booming around here for me but what I am talking about are segments of time (usually about a week) where my shop gets almost no visits or sales. For some reason it seams like no one can find me or something. For a while I thought it was just slow times but I'm noticing a pattern. Then suddenly everything goes back to my normal ups and downs and I have conversations and orders and lots of visits. I would love to be able to figure out what is causing this. Anyone else experience this??

[Plektra]

I first noticed this kind of pattern 2 years ago when I listed a new type of product and it started doing well immediately. I was getting views, convos and sales for about 3 weeks. Then, suddenly, all this activity stopped. Views disappeared and therefore sales as buyers were not finding my item. 2 years later I still have not recovered sales on that product. Sales come almost rarely.

I see this pattern with other types of products as well. One starts to do well, then it stops because views stop. Then another one picks up...and the same happens.

I also see what you describe...sales come one after the other for various products and then they stop. I mean STOP. There are few days or a couple of weeks of no activity and then they start again. This happens regularly. Sometimes during this type of quiet periods I get lots views under 'Etsy' but no favorites, no convos and no sales. I don't know what these views are.

Other times this type of quiet periods happen on the weekends. For some months, almost every weekend my shop was invisible.

Please note I'm talking about Etsy. Not views from other sources and I'm not asking for advice about promotion. Some sellers respond with this general information which is not relevant. What you are seeing on this site is right. You must find other ways of selling. Start your own website - not Pattern. That is not your own website.

[MariasWorkshop]

I have three shops and I have noticed the same pattern mentioned by Liza and Minerva in all of them.

[Former_Member]

Hello all,

I haven't been on etsy for long (1 year to be precise) but i have noticed the same pattern. I was hoping to have some sales for December as i also created new products for the Holidays and nothing..nada.. ! just a couple of views but no sales whatsoever. I don't have a big shop but every month I had a constant 10 more or less sales and now..nothing! Not sure what is happening but it's not cool!

Thank you xx

[Plektra]

And what usually happens is....

Sellers get frustrated, work on their shops yet again, more clicking, more typing, more photographing....to the point they are exhausted and have no time and energy to set up another shop somewhere else.

Or they pay for more listing fees and more Seller Services. Especially as we are in the busiest shopping season.

I'm not falling for it! I spend no time or money or energy for anything other than things I should be doing for my business. Not with the hope that another business will help me.

[PoshandSeductive]

As for me this pre-Christmas season was absolutely great (still is, I guess)
After Etsy changing their algorithm last year, I simply learned to do outside Etsy promotion and have done Pnterest promotion for nearly a year.. and I swear by Pinterest help... Etsy has stressed on working on outside Etsy promotion and that is what they value these days. SEO is up, views are up (wouldn't dream about doing viewing Threads, I get enough organic views).
I carry on doing one "hearting" thread just to target some listings 2-3 times a week... or less...but I haven't missed Pinterest Thread once in last 10 months... Pinterest Thread I lead get sales every day among dedicated bunch of 40-50 people... Persuasion of it is not a "one week's" job but it works perfectly for me in a long term: some people say "it's hard work" as it is manual work but it pays off much more than (using app leisurely "hearting and rehearting over and over again): "heart" sticks only once to a single listing from one who Favs your item,
re-pin accumulates as many times as Pin is re-pinned and snow-rolls organically also.
Convincing? Try it for yourself!!!

[Plektra]

We are not talking about how to promote our shops. We are not talking about how to bring sales and views to our shops. We all know we have to promote. Of course we have to promote outside of Etsy. We know that!

We are discussing about strange trends on this site that affect our sales. We pay fees to be seen and sell and lots of us are seeing the same pattern: rotation of items and shop performance. We do not expect a marketplace to do the work for us. We are doing the work. But our shops being invisible so others can be seen is ridiculous. Other shops have to do the work. Other shops do not pay our business expenses to help us out in return.

How to promote and general business advice is a different topic.

There is a long thread in the Forum about this: https://www.etsy.com/teams/7722/discussions/discuss/18151710/page/1

Lots of established shops are talking about the same patterns. It's not just a few of us here.

[NaturesUniqueBotique]

Here is a very interesting article that I found a little while ago from Dec. 2015. Seems to me to be right on. I have noticed this trend also. May want to check it out, makes a lot of sense to me when you do the math. ;/ Seems that I am allowed about 3 sales a month if that, at most, but have to keep listing new things to get them. This season has been dismal as was last year. I noticed the change in my shop in October, the year that they made the first big change in the search, been that way ever since. Just barely making enough to pay my etsy bill and buy supplies for my shop not much left over after that, so I'm just barely making it for the past 2 years. Always keep hoping that things will get better.
Here's the article:
http://www.sparrowsalvage.com/2015/12/the-huge-etsy-change-you-probably-dont.html

[MariasWorkshop]

Arthandpainter, WOW! Thank you so much for that link. Long, but very, very informative. My head is still spinning.

[NaturesUniqueBotique]

Maria, I know what you mean, mine was too. Her math is undeniable though when it comes to the 250 pages listed items. I always thought that there were more than 250 pages until this article, but there aren't, which if you're not showing up till page 250, you're in trouble anyway.

[MariasWorkshop]

Before I read the article, I never even realized that there were only 250 pages - how observant. I am going to read the article again, and again. Now I have a good idea as to why my shops' views and sales seem to be running on cycles.

[Plektra]

YEAP!! Exactly. That's why I've been saying that obsessing with SEO on this site is waste of time and energy. Paying for Seller Services is waste of money.

I read some time ago the Announcement about distributing sales. In fact, I've been looking at my shop - I don't have to read any Announcements and sellers' complaints and comments and news and blogs.

The strange thing is...even if my items are invisible, I AM able to find them if I search for them. At least a good number of them. Others don't find them. So there is something wrong there. And some of the views I get under 'Etsy' I don't think they are genuine.

[MariasWorkshop]

So, I guess renewing does not help any more.

Also, I used to have a schedule for releasing new listings. At one point I noticed that if I released new listings early in the morning or after 6:00 p.m. my listings had more of a chance to be viewed than if I published them at any other time. Now ... I get nothing.

Also, unless I am mistaken, I seem to remember that the persons that favorited my shop would see my new listings when I released them? I just ran a little test in my buyer's account by releasing a new item from one of my shops. I let some time pass to give it a chance to appear in my “New from your favorite shops” section. The item did not show up and I just noticed the wording “Curated by Etsy, Selected from Your Favorite Shops.

I have been wondering why some repeat customers that had shown marked interest in a certain type of item had not come by to check similar items when I newly list them. It is like I am invisible to them. I suppose I just found my answer.

[NaturesUniqueBotique]

Maria, I think that it does help to list or renew items, as they do automatically show up on first pages of search when you do that. I have checked that out. It's just more money that you have to spend renewing and listing. I found that when I get a sale it is usually when I list something new, for some reason. Also, a while back when they decided that they would hide search from International buyers, and make their local shops appear when they typed in a search, my views and such started going down. I used to get customers from UK, France etc. but now nothing. I don't know why they decided to do that since people always had the option to click on their country when searching, now they have to click on "anywhere" when searching as it will not automatically show up. Anyway, yes, in my opinion it does help to list and renew items. That seems to be the only thing that helps me. I still do favathons mostly on weekends though also but don't really know how much that helps anymore, other than people seeing your item crossing favorites from other shops randomly, but it's still getting seen anyway.

[LeedsRadio]

I agree with Minerva - there's a whole bunch of sellers who are running themselves ragged tweaking, promoting, tweaking more. It doesn't work.
Promoting in social media for a shop that is just starting off is a total waste of time. And do you know why you hear advice saying you should promote on social media? It's because the big boys, who already are selling, want you there. You're not a voice there you're the AUDIENCE. The big boys can have posts that are 50%+ ads for their good or services. If you're a small fish and you try that you'll have no followers.

Want to make sales?
Make your shop a natural, honest reflection of you. Change things up regularly. Don't force. Look a shops that sell get ideas but don't copy.
Number one piece of advice? Offer world class customer service no matter what. Trust your customers. Be professional yet friendly at the same time. You may think that's something you can starting doing tomorrow but you need to start today.

Sales slow now? You're not going to fix it in real-time. You need to re-assess and make changes. It could be a month or longer. Whatever the holiday season is, or is not, sales-wise was cast in June or July. You should already be planning spring.

[NaturesUniqueBotique]

I agree also with Minerva and Richard that the tweaking constantly is a waste of time, especially since they are regularly changing up the search thing and so many other things it would just be impossible to keep up with trying to do that. I try to pick out the best SEO tags and title that I can think of at the time I list and leave it there. I only mess with those if I think of something better later on down the line.
I agree also that customer service is key and a good rep., and being friendly. Also good pictures are a must, but that takes time and experience to accomplish. I am slowly getting a bit better at that, finally. Also good practice to get ahead of the sales holidays, as you say, I do pin my stuff sometimes but I don't spend a lot of time doing that, just occasionally get over there. Don't have FB. Don't have any time left over as it is. I did try the Instagram thing a few times but seemed like a waste of time to me, as was twitter. Just don't have time for all of that. Seems to me that the best way to gain attention is to add new things regularly and renew stuff. ;) (of course that's spending more money) Never have paid to ad.

[NaturesUniqueBotique]

PS: So sorry about your sweet cat Richard. She is beautiful. I am an animal lover also, of all kinds. I have 2 dogs (rescues) myself that are my constant companions, and Mother has 1 dog (rescue), and 1 cat also rescue. My dogs are 1/2 Jack Russell Terrier and 1/2 Fhist (? don't really know how to spell that) lol They are like humans in dog suits, understand everything I say and love watching TV! but hate the news!. ;)

[LeedsRadio]

arthandpainter,
Thank you I am ever so slightly a dog person than cat person. So slightly that when I've had cats I didn't necessarily wish I had a dog. Next time I will get two dogs.

[SugarAndPaint]

arthandpainter, that article totally explains the whole problem I'm having. Thats why I go invisible sometimes!! Thanks so much for posting that! It was long and admittedly didn't get to the end but, I will!

I have to say I feel a little bit deceived by Etsy though. They give you the impression that if you are doing all you can..perfect SEO, tags, promotions that you are giving your products the chance to be seen. In fact, if that article is true, and it does make sense, all of that will only work for you when they decide it should work for you! And when we are encouraged to promote outside of Etsy, it is to benefit Etsy...it might bring more shoppers in general to Etsy not necessarily our shop. It limits all of our potentials and keeps us all hoping for more.
Minerva, you are right, all this time spent on tweaking and adjusting for better SEO is a waste of time.
Wow, that is really frustrating!!!!

[Plektra]

Thanks Liza!

I think it's impossible to keep up with all the changes that will affect your shop and manage to stay on top. There are changes on every level (search, payment methods and how these are displayed, search again, categories, shop appearance, search yet again...). And Etsy is a public company now.

At the end of the day, your relationship is with your customers. If you do the changes you feel will help customers, you improve your chances of getting sales. You have to think like a customer. Your customers will pay you.