New on Etsy - HELP

[Former_Member]

Hello Everyone!

Well, you probably read this a lot, but I'm new on Etsy. This is my first day and my page haven't got many views. I'm trying to upload as much as I can so my store can have a lot of variety but I'd like to know if anyone can give me an advice of how its looking.

I'm currently selling in the Dominican Republic and my plan is to turn my Etsy page into my most important source of clients since I want my work to be known in the United States and the world.

I don't know what advice you guys could give me, since I haven't got any clients yet I'm really nervous. Should I advertise it? Add more info about me? let me know!

Im looking forward for your help.

Hugs!

[PaperBoundLove]

OH MY GOSH :D I LOVE YOUR ITEMS :D
Normally, when there's a newbie, my first advice is take good photos, but your photos are perfect.
I'm getting married this December, so your bride's wine glass is so perfect! *swoon!*

I think you're doing really well. Adding more items will definitely help. And join wedding teams, and you could probably ask wedding bloggers to feature your items, if you are not doing it already.

Honestly, Etsy advertising never works for me. It costs too much per click. But like I said, if you can find good wedding websites, advertise on them! I've been looking around wedding things for months, as I'm planning my own, but I've never seen anything like yours before! (:

Good luck and I'm sure you'll do well.

xx

[SofterFireJewelry]

Hi! I'm pretty new, too. Your shop is so cute! Your pictures are great and your products are fun, but I've been reading these forums and everyone says that you need to list a lot of items to start getting more views. Other than that, you seem to be off to a good start! Good luck!

[Former_Member]

It takes TIME for a new shop to start getting a good number of views on Etsy. There is so much competition from other shops that you should do whatever you can to stand out from everyone else.

Etsy tends to show popular listings high in the Relevancy search results. Better SEO, advertizing, promotion and marketing should help to make sales. Once your listings start selling and you have good reviews, your listings will be seen more and more in Etsy search results.

It can take up to four weeks for Google to find your Etsy shop. Give your new shop time to be seen on Etsy and on Google and learn how to make your Etsy shop a success. Success on Etsy takes a lot of work.

[Former_Member]

cute, I am new as well. it takes lots of work, good luck:-)

[Former_Member]

Wow, your work is ADORABLE!! You have a potential customer in Khin, so well done for your first day :D

Besides the "add more items" advice, you need to work on your tags. Mary's advice about SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is key. I'm still working on it, but my modest advice is: Use all 15 tags and wisely! I recommend NOT to use single words. Think how you will look out for your items. For instance, I would expect to find your "Betty" mug searching for "polka dot mug", "hand painted mug", "red ceramic teacup", and so on. Try those tags. Perform a search with them. See what items you find. Explore them: which other tags they use? Would those work for your wug too? Is a hard work, but it's worthy.

Best of lucks and keep working!

[Former_Member]

join lots f team!!! patricipate a lot in them so they favourite and view you item! that will help your search rates.
Also use all tags available!!!!

[Former_Member]

Thank you so much you guys!! Really appreciated :)

[Former_Member]

I am trying to come up with a shop name. I knit mostly baby items but hope to expand upon that one day. Hoping for something clever but am really struggling. Any suggestions are welcomed!!

[maydaylabels]

It does not have to take time if you get your ducks in a row from the start; furthermore, Etsy does not discriminate based on how long your shop has been open, how many reviews you have, or how many sales you have.

Your main weakness at this point is SEO. Here is a good introduction: https://www.etsy.com/teams/10713/etsy-relevancy-seo-and-stats/discuss/12499020/

It is, imo, the most important improvement you can make to your shop.

[Former_Member]

Thank you!

[MaxplanationPhotos]

cute shop

[PaperBoundLove]

Can't agree more (: I shared your item on my personal facebook and everyone loves it :D

[Former_Member]

wao! thank you sooooo much :D!!!

[Former_Member]

Matthew and Sara from ananemone says

It does not have to take time if you get your ducks in a row from the start; furthermore, Etsy does not discriminate based on how long your shop has been open, how many reviews you have, or how many sales you have.

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I have an SEO team on Etsy too (https://www.etsy.com/teams/11352/relevancy-and-seo-for-all-etsy-shops) and have worked professionally with SEO for the past 11 years. My repeated testing on Etsy Relevancy searches consistently shows a preference for popular listings in the first several pages of search results. Etsy shops with consistent repeat sales remain on the first page of search results and on each page after the first page, often with several listings on each page after the first.

[maydaylabels]

There is of course some correlative preference for shops that have lots of sales and favorites (and hearts from search is one thing Etsy does say they take into account); shops that have good SEO and photography and etc. (which helps with SEO as shopper interactions are more positive) are also more likely to have sales, and if you have an item that sells often you are likely renewing it (renewing sold) more often, which helps with the recency component.

However, if Etsy actually did show deliberate preference for established shops or for items that have previously sold, they would be disadvantaging OOAK items, which I don't see them doing. (there are many OOAK shops with great SEO that have good positioning across searches).

Furthermore, Etsy has said directly that they don't base relevancy on total shop sales or reviews.

Correlation does not equal causation.

[Former_Member]

If they did give preference to the top sellers in a given category, i would be first page for pretty much every cross search all the time.

that is not the case.

I am on page 1 for quite a few, but thats because no one is relevant for more cross searches than I am, or list as many crosses as I do.

[maydaylabels]

For instance, if I search "navy blue dress" - the first page of results, I get in the top 2 rows:

Lirola, an established seller with lots of sales/reviews/etc.
suertedia, who has 2 reviews
Lizardqueen, who has no reviews
memetik, who has 73 reviews and is semi-established
ediedylan, who has 3 reviews
OsEstorninhos, who has 314 reviews and is fairly established

the rest of the page is more or less the same way - some sellers with 1 review, no reviews, 20 reviews, 1500+ reviews, 200 reviews, etc.

All items are tagged and titled "navy blue dress"

eta: coldfish, who has approx. as many reviews as lirola, has an item on the second page but nothing on the first page; if Etsy preferred established shops surely she'd be on the first page? It is tagged and titled correctly for the search. Also on the first page are many vintage dresses (it is a search that combines handmade and vintage, I think) - why would they have good search standing if previous sales of an item were a factor? (as you can't generally sell the same vintage item twice)

[Former_Member]

Etsy does factor OOAK items into the search algo. These usually come from shops with high sales. Etsy always includes a few newer and smaller shops at tje top of the search results but most listings are from popular shops.

This is especially true for more general keywords such as "knit hat" and less true for more targeted keywords such as "mens blue fisherman knit hat."

Google also counts popularity for Google searches using different criteria.

[maydaylabels]

So when I do a search for "navy blue dress" and find a variety of sellers with different numbers of sales, you're saying that Etsy has written their algorithm to do this:

1. Give an advantage to shops with many sales and reviews.
2. Give an advantage to items that have sold many times.
3. Give an advantage to some shops with fewer sales, or no sales.
4. Give an advantage to some items that have not sold before (the ones I mentioned weren't tagged OOAK, so I'm not sure how you think Etsy is finding these?)

First, it doesn't make any sense that Etsy would create an algorithm that does two sets of contradictory things (deliberately advantages items with many sales and then deliberately advantages items with fewer sales to offset; deliberately advantages shops with many sales and then deliberately advantages shops with fewer sales to offset). If the goal is a mixture, why wouldn't they just ignore the number of sales factor in the first place?

Secondly, Etsy has directly said that they don't do what you are saying they do. So not only are they supposedly doing something more complicated than necessary, they're lying about it?

I dunno, I just don't see enough evidence to not be correlative instead of causative - and I am not a cupcake (Etsy cheerleader) by any means.

[Former_Member]

why would a ooak shop have more sales than a non ooaK??
I see the opposite
.the more I sell of somnething, the more I make like it. I build up a number of things i can go multiples with.Multiples have a disproportionate % of my sales than ooak.

i can find more searches where it isnt true than where it is.

And looking at any wood category will dissuade you very quickly.

as will "Cross".

and "wood". oh boy iphone cases from noobs. wow. quantity of 85 for everything.with 12 variations. Good thing they didnt make separate lsitngs for all of those
.they could make 1000 listings

[Former_Member]

Every ecommerce Web site, every search engine, every popular blog and social media Web site, has a way of "showcasing" whatever is popular ALONG with providing access to everything else that is available.

In the past three years, I have worked on over 400 custom Etsy shop SEO projects (not through my Etsy shop). Research and testing on both Etsy and on Google are almost daily work for me. This work continually shows that popular listings and shops are represented significantly more than less popular shops and listings. Maybe Etsy would not call this "giving preference" anymore than Google would call their ranking algorithm "giving preference" but evidence shows that popularity plays a role - just about everywhere on the Internet.

If you had several highly popular items in your own ecommerce web site - guaranteed sellers - do you think you would place those items where they would be immediately visible to all shoppers?

[maydaylabels]

Etsy does this in a variety of ways; they use Browse, the Finds, those top three spots on the home page (that is sometimes a banner, depending on the season), Trending Items, etc. etc.

Relevancy search does it as a matter of course in that Etsy gives weight to things that have positive buyer interaction (that is to say, "are popular") - it just doesn't privilege (it says) popular shops *because* they are popular (separate of the positive searcher interaction with the specific item in question), or items that have repeat sales *because* of the repeat sales.

I think you are claiming a causation where you can only determine correlation (especially as Etsy has denied the causation).

[Former_Member]

haha I love you stuff!!

I am a wee bit older than you (tihihi) and, the thing people keep telling me : more products, better photos, perfect SEO.

You can always add more products, you can always improve your photos (never perfect! :), and you should perfect your SEO (for the specific key phrases that are relevant to you).

You would be amazed how changing the order of the words in your title would affect your ranking - one of my items jumped from the 14th page to the second page (search results), just because I changed the order of the words in the title (to match the keyphrase) and added it to the tags.

Once you bring your items up in the search pages, make them pop with beautiful photos (which you already have!).

Good luck!

[Former_Member]

what other sites or search engines do is irrelevant as far as etsy goes.

there is more evidence to the contrary that items from high sales shops are favored because they come from high sales shops. There have been occasions where I have had more cross sales than the entire page 1 for Wood or Wooden Cross, yet not show up until page 5.
if what you say were true, that couldnt happen.

To prove it you would have to know the following for each search....

How many relevant items are in it.
How many relevant items could be in it. Noobs are not relevant for as many terms as a veteran, so they dont have as many chances of showing up on early pages.
Define what are high and low sales shops for that item. That will be extremely difficult to do if, like the cross and wood searches, have a mix of handmade, vintage and supplies.
Count how many high and low shops are in each, and how many items each have n a particular search so yuo can determine the number you would expect to find in early pages.
Set a confidence level and margin of error which will then tell you how many searches you need to look at.
What factor does recency play in given search?
graph the results.