Is it possible that most of us don't get it?

[1AEON]

I wrote a long post (this is just as long haha) then erased it, the point of it was that this change might be the biggest challenge I faced on Etsy, and seemingly most sellers are confused in teams and forum posts at least. More and more specific changes pop up to follow - just to stay relevant (no pun intended). Boy, it's a tough one.
Constant tag, title, description changes and now only the beginning of the title maters…Etsy and Google keep changing the way to find items, then keep up with trends and what might be popular. On the top of all we need to pay attention to the stats, pay actually $ to show up in searches, now bidding on promotions and pay for Google search ads and Google Keywords Planner…and counting.
My sales completely tanked like others have, and i'm so ready to figure out what is the deal, how can I get at least a portion of my sales back soon. A few weeks ago amazing sales and now none?
As a seller since 2006 had my ups and downs, and I'm ever so thankful for the golden years! I use to sell a few items a day, and quit my job and worried about my products and fans/customers for years, but lately I had to get a job again and if it doesn't turn out easier, I might have to make even bigger changes. I wonder if things will get easier for us sellers here (or more like buyers to find us). I also was wondering if Etsy can get a program written and applied that is taking care of all these issues…

I asked friends and family (intellectual and street smarts types as well) and no one even understood what they should be doing or where to start.
I am clearly lost haha!
Let me know if any one has a simple explanation.

I found this on another team's post and even this sounds confusing (a team that is dedicated to tell you about these changes Relevancy, SEO &Stats):

How To Be Relevant for the Etsy Search – Simple Version

If you want to be relevant for the search “abalone earrings”, then you need to have the exact phrase “abalone earrings” in your title AND on a tag. Both places.

Having the title “Abalone Shell Earrings” will not be as relevant for the search “abalone earrings” because of the extra word in between the search terms.

Having “abalone” & “earrings” on separate tags is not as good as having them together on one tag, for the search “abalone earrings”.


hm…I have been told for years that the longer 3 words phrases better than the 2 words ones, also "Abalone Shell Earrings" seemingly more specific, more relevant.
I'm full of questions and curiosity:)

Etsy I love you as much as anyone else, but I'm ready to get back to selling and making my items instead of statistics, tags, titles, ratio between desired and wanted google search results. Please make it more simple for us. Thank you!

[Untwistedsister]

I would think it would depend how a particular person searches. Maybe Etsy doesn't work like other search sites that drill down and narrow the search when you add more descriptive terms like "red jasper stone earrings" . Logically, it should narrow the search from earrings to stone to jasper stone and then only red jasper stone. But it doesn't always seem to work that way.

I often check my stats to see what searches people use to find me and generally they are 2 words.

[1AEON]

Hi Terri, thanks for wring, mine are mostly 1 word ones, and a ton of 3 and 4 words ones, but that goes against everything about etsy teaches for usage of tags and titles. just another thing is confusing.

[NatureCityCo]

You are not alone on this, 1AEON.

[1AEON]

i found this too again from Eva from HandmadeByEvaRose says Edited on Sep 22, 2014
It is not etsy. Google has removed the option of exact match from adwords-and the PLA format has changed completely. That means your keywords in the tags need to be changed to long tail, otherwise your rank will tank.

Thank YOU Eva! If this means that we need long titles and phrases? Because If we suppose to use these long phrases as tags as well that have very limited character space…perhaps not.

[Former_Member]

I'm a little unsure about what you think is the biggest change yet? The search function / SEO has worked the same way for the most part since they switched to relevancy a few years ago. The only thing that has changed is that there is increasing competition every day. So before, you could be found with mediocre SEO. Now it is very difficult unless you have good SEO.

You also do not need to pay for promoted listings to be found if your SEO is good.

The short version is that Etsy shows items that have the exact search phrase in both the title and in a single tag before it shows any other listings. So you should try to come up with 2-3 word search phrases to create your title and match them exactly in single tags.

In other words, in a search for "blue hoodie" Etsy would show all items that had "blue hoodie" exactly in the title and "blue hoodie" in a single tag. If someone has "blue wolf hoodie" in their title like you do they would be shown AFTER everyone who had "blue hoodie". Why? Because you didn't have the phrase searched exactly in your title or tags.

The goal is to try to vary up your phrases to cover as much ground as possible. I would probably still stick with blue wolf hoodie in your title or maybe change to "blue hoodie" and "wolf sweathshirt" and a few other phrases then add those phrases to your tags. It's about trying to cover a variety of phrases that you think your buyer might use. no, you won't be able to cover all of them. But you should be able to cover several for each listing.

Thus, yes a search for abalone earrings won't show "abalone shell earrings" in the first group. But with "abalone earrings" you are relevant only for "abalone", "earrings" and "abalone earrings". With the "abalone shell earrings", you are relevant for "abalone", "shell", "earrings", "abalone shell", "shell earrings" and "abalone shell earrings". So the numbers game is working in your favor since there are more searches you are relevant for with "abalone shell earrings".

And maybe you have "silver abalone earrings" elsewhere. Then you are relevant for "abalone earrings" there, plus "silver", "abalone", "earrings", "silver abalone" and "silver abalone earrings."

Good SEO is not ever about a single listing. It's about how your shop as whole performs. You need to relevant for a wide variety of phrases in order to cover as many searches as possible.

[1AEON]

Thank you so much for your answer, but see,
You just contradicted the leader of the Relevancy, SEO &Stats team's explanation of why the "abalone earrings" makes you more relevant than “Abalone Shell Earrings”.

If I'm correct… if not, I must be such a dummy that I don't understand what I should be understanding. hehe.

I know nothing is cut out for all the sellers, everybody's case is different, and I will stop asking these questions, ( there are lots more and) there is no universal solution anyways - which is my very point. It's getting harder and harder to keep playing around when you loosing your rent in a few days. My family doesn't think it's a fun game to figure out if I can pay my bills or I have to borrow to eat. it sure gets tricky. Computers work much better than our brain nowadays, seems like it would be easy to write a program and apply that covers all this.
Well instead of stating how difficult it is, I better go because I have a ton of items to fix. My goal is to survive now haha!
Thank you so much for all your help everyone and good luck!
Also chin up and have a wonderful day!
Gabe

[Former_Member]

I'm don't think I contradicted anything Cindy said. I think she would agree with what I said generally speaking.

You are more relevant for "abalone earrings" with the phrase "abalone earrings" in your title and tags. You are more relevant for "abalone shell", "shell earrings" and "abalone shell earrings" with the phrase "abalone shell earrings" in your title and tags. You are relevant for specific phrases. Not relevant overall.

[Former_Member]

The only thing I did differently for purposes of an example was to switch what you want to be relevant for. If you want to be relevant for "abalone earrings", then yes you need to have "abalone earrings". If you want multiple phrases, try the second option. Better yet use both in different places.

[ModernSwitch]

You do have to tweak things slightly different for google and Etsy.

For Etsy your title you would want Abalone Earrings Abalone Shell Earrings with the tags Abalone Earrings, Abalone Shell, Shell Earrings, Abalone, Earrings etc. Now the bummer is Google will penalize you since in the title you have both earrings and abalone twice.

So you either pick and choose if you want Abalone Earrings, or Abalone Shell Earrings to appease google, or use both to appease Etsy. Another alternative is to have 2 listings, one is Abalone Earrings, the other Abalone Shell earrings (whether or not they are identical listings is up to you).

Of course the downside to having 2 listings instead of one, is sales and views are apart of Etsy's search relevancy as well (ranked below title & tag of course, they are more of a tie breaker when you have 2000 listings for "Abalone Earrings" then the search engine goes and finds ones that get a lot of attention) ....then you have to ask your self, is it better if listing A has 3 sales, and Listing B has 7 Sales, or if you just had one listing with 10 sales.

It's easy once you grasp the concept, the hard part is deciding who you want to cater to (Etsy or Google, or Both), and then implementing into your listings.

[TOMgirlApparel]

If you focus on being relevant for Etsy, you will help yourself for Google as well. The best way to get at the top of Google searches for Etsy sellers is to show up well in the Google search result "popular items for shell earrings on Etsy". When someone clicks on that from a Google search, they are taken to an Etsy page which is sorted by Etsy relevancy.

[1AEON]

Dudes and Dudettes, thank you so much! i didn't get much smarter and both your posts just proves how complex and difficult it is to get it right. I know Etsy has some issues and the new mobile apps have issues too, so I will just wait and see. I print t-shirts and tote bags, Thats what I do best. II am just simply not smart enough to figure out new algorithms. I will work on the tags and hopefully things will turn out great! Thank YOU!

[Former_Member]

You should research the keywords you are thinking of using and choose the ones that are the best fit for your products. You can try different keywords for similar listings and see which ones work best ("abalone earrings" or "abalone shell earrings").

When you research keywords you will see how often each keyword is used in an an average month. The 3-word keyword may not be used or used so rarely that it;s not worth using it as a primary keyword phrase.

You can and should SEO your shop for both Google and Etsy. There are parts of your shop that Google uses for Google searches that Etsy does not use. It's good to know this and work on those parts as well.

This thread on my SEO Team might be helpful: https://www.etsy.com/teams/11352/relevancy-and-seo-for-all-etsy-shops/discuss/14907695

There are other threads you should find helpful including an SEO Q & A thread https://www.etsy.com/teams/11352/relevancy-and-seo-for-all-etsy-shops/discuss/12972720

[CopperLeafStudios]

here's what has helped me understand SEO, especially phrases and word order...

Let's say you sell a red pencil skirt. As a person, you know the difference between a "pencil skirt that is red" and a "red pencil", but a search engine doesn't. If someone searches for a "red pencil skirt", it will match your item and rank it higher than a red pencil, or a blue pencil skirt, because they are less relevant. If you also tag it "pencil skirt", and "red skirt", and "womens skirt", you are more likely to be connected to searches for people looking for that particular clothing item. AND, you will be less likely to come up in searches for pencils, school supplies, etc. Make sense? So using a variety of phrases that can accurately describe your item in your tags will best connect you with people looking for that item, and keep you out of searches for items that are not related to yours.

An example from your shop: you don't really want people who are looking for gold antler, you want people who are looking for sweatshirts. So your "gold antler sweatshirt" should have more tagwords related to the type of clothing in that listing than the picture on the front. Not that you can't mention it, but you want to focus on the sweatshirt so you weed out people who are in the market for spray painted antler jewelry trees ;)

[BeadtheWaybySC]

I am new to selling on Etsy, and just a couple months ago they told me to use more words, vs. less in my tags!! Also that if any of my words are searched, it will bring up the whole tag! Now my friend searched for an item in my shop using the word "arrow" and "arrows". She searched on Google, Etsy home and in my Shop. Nothing.
I had used "pointed arrow" thinking someone may search some jewelry that has pointed ends & wanting to use my 26 tags!
You're right, apparently that is out, this week! I am disabled and barely have enough "good" time to do what I do, yet every reply from support is 8 paragraphs, with 5-10 Help articles! Though my question never gets answered directly! Even when it involves helping a customer order my items.
I love Etsy too, but honestly, I haven't been able to finish listing one thing in four days.
Lost even more.

[Former_Member]

I'm lost too -- I try to work very hard at marketing and promotion -- but my sales have tanked too. I'd love any advice or coaching available if anyone has the secret.

[maydaylabels]

Running a small business, selling things online, takes a lot of work. Not very much of it is the actual crafting, unfortunately. Etsy has a platform that both sets up the structure of a website for us and helps out with drawing people looking for handmade/vintage/supplies, but there is a lot of work still to be done.

If you use the phrase "pointed arrow" in your title or your tags, your item will come up when someone searches "arrow" on Etsy, but it might be way way back, just because there are so many items titled or tagged "arrow."

The thing is, unless you are selling an arrow, it's not important - very few people will search just "arrow" when they are actually looking for jewelry, even if they want the jewelry to incorporate an arrow. They are more likely to search "arrow necklace" or "arrow bracelet" or something like that.

Secondly, does anyone search "pointed arrow" at all? Have you done the research on it?

[maydaylabels]

Sheila, you need to revamp your SEO.

[KiltedWoman]

Don't let it get overwhelming. List your stuff with "bad" tags and titles then go looking for a successful shop who sells what you do and look at what they are doing for tags, titles and descriptions. Avoid copying but see what you can do to improve. You don't have to reinvent the wheel. It has taken me a full year to change my titles and tags a few at a time. It is a slow process and I am constantly learning new things. It isn't terribly confusing if you don't overthink it. You will never have the perfect shop, you don't have to! Constant forward progress is the goal.

[SeasideRoseCreations]

@Chris:

This is all so helpful.

Does this apply to Google AND Etsy or just Google?

No one finds me via Google. I should say Google keywords. I am found in generic Google searches when the photos show up and they click one, not by MY keywords.

Help!

[CopperLeafStudios]

Roselle ~ Google's algorithm isn't exactly the same as Etsy's, but the same basic principles apply. I think part of the reason why the Google keywords showing in your Etsy stats (and mine) are more generic is because Etsy only tracks how a buyer gets from Google to Etsy, not how they get to your specific item. I'm not explaining that well (t's been a while since I've read up on how it works), but the Etsy Google stats don't always tell the full story.


Regarding SEO, I usually think of it this way... as a buyer, when I'm using a search engine, I'm SEARCHING for something, not browsing. The more specific I am, the more likely I am to find what I'm looking for. I might start out more generic, but then I will drill down to get to what I really want -- and weed out things that I don't. As a business owner, I try to be pretty specific with my SEO. But, I also do other forms of marketing to reach people who might be just browsing. Just like I do other forms of marketing to connect with repeat buyers. Ideally, I try to balance those three. But I think a lot of sellers try to connect with people just browsing via SEO, and that's not really the best way to go about it. Does that make sense?

[Former_Member]

I reopened my shop a few months ago after a hiatus while I worked at a marketing company and learned a genius method for SEO. Took me awhile to completely rework all my keywords.

I have just started getting ranked on Google and thefind.com! This is tremendously exciting and it's on top of lots of views via my keywords on Etsy. So it can be done ... but it takes a lot of work.

If you want to read about my method, go here:
http://cleverruthie.wordpress.com/2014/09/08/a-sweet-secret-to-seo-and-etsy-happiness/

[Former_Member]

I'm thankful for all the info everyone is sharing, however; it gets super confusing right after it starts making sense to me. I go everywhere to get tips, even have my shop critiqued time after time. Recently I was told to use most of my title space by adding keywords from my tags. Then I was told to add more words to my tags.. and so on and so on.

Well, I closed my shop for a while to work on improving it. I reopened with all the new changes, paid etsy for search ads and extra promotions and still.... No Sales. Its beginning to cost me a lot. I posted a listing from my shop below, will someone anyone take a lot at it to see where I am going wrong? Is it hurting me to have a title name for all my pieces, and then giving the description within the title? For example, I list a bracelet called "The Harlem Bracelet" then I add my keywords after... is this harming my shop? This SEO thing bums me out :-( I need all the help I can get #FacePalm #Bummed

https://www.etsy.com/listing/204813672/exclusively-me-earrings-vintage-horn?ref=shop_home_active_22

[AprilsCottage]

I hope we are not the only ones totally confused and frustrated by all of this. Played around with the title on one of my listings to see how it showed up. I guess the fact is there is just a lot listed. I will try some two word tags like the title to and see if it helps.

[maydaylabels]

Ivory, just having lots of words in your tags and your titles doesn't make good SEO.

Does anyone looking for your kind of items actually search for those words? You need to do the research to see what phrases are useful for you.