Sales Flatlined... Please Critique

[Former_Member]

Ok so I originally opened shop in April of '10. Had 2 sales and had to shut down for a bit and get a "real" job. :) I was able to re-open back in May of this year. Upped my inventory, took better pics, joined teams, have a FB fan page, changed tags and titles when relevancy changed, etc etc. In July I had 3 sales. Wooo Hooo!! I seriously thought "finally... I'm getting noticed and I'm on my way. Maybe in August I'll get 6 sales!" Kept adding to inventory, renewing, so on and so on. And... nothing. No new sales. No new possible sales. I get a decent amount of traffic from various activities and ads but wow. 3 sales in one month is such an awesome thing for me, but was it a fluke? I could really use some critiques and opinions please! :D

[GildedXRoseXStudio]

Hi Twisted!

I took a quick peek at your shop. Your pictures look pretty good, lots of different variations....no two featured pictures are alike--I like that! Some look a little dark...how do you set up your photo-taking area? I don't sell jewelry, but the shops that I have seen around here seem to like to keep their shots bright so you can make out every color, detail, etc. I was drawn to this item:

http://www.etsy.com/listing/78865536/green-chalcedony-earrings-sterling

I love that color green, so I am drawn to it anyways :) What I noticed with your tags for this particular pair of earrings is you used a lot of "candy" related words. My first thought was "but this isn't candy!". Try using "sterling silver earrings" and break that tag down; I've read that this is a good method. Of course, I'm still trying to break the tagging code on my own stuff, but...this is what I had noticed. If you were searching for earrings like these, what would you use to describe them? Hope these tips were helpful!

[RaesSpirit]

Your earrings are beautiful. I agree that your pictures could be a little brighter to show off the details. I just typed in earrings and it came up with over 800,000 listings. That is alot to compete with. Even though the new search is relevancy, the listings that came up were all within the first few minutes and hours. Apparently, renewing is still very important along with constantly tweeking titles and tags. Do you use twitter? I actually seen to get more views from there than I do from facebook.
Hope this helps, I am in the same situation!

[GildedXRoseXStudio]

Oh! I forgot to mention that, Raes! Yes...I have noticed that when I post a new item on Twitter that I actually get a few views. And jewelry is THE most saturated category in all of Etsy-Land....so it's a pretty tough market. But if you had gotten 3 sales in one month, that's awesome! Those folks picked *your* creations out of all of the other jewelry! That's an accomplishment, don't give up! :)

[Former_Member]

You have a great shop! Lots of great items and they need to be known!! Like others have said, I would lighten photos a bit like in this one:

http://www.etsy.com/listing/84070809/cranberry-red-hoops-christmas-earrings?ref=pr_shop

Try updating your tags and diversifying them a bit too. Like this one: Cranberry Red Hoops Christmas Earrings Sterling Silver

Try "Christmas Earrings, Cranberry red, hoop earrings, sterling silver earrings"

That way it is more relevant friendly.

Also in your description and tags (and I would even add it to my title), add tags like stocking stuffer, for her, for mom, for sister, bridesmaid gifts, bridesmaid jewelry, bridal jewelry

Adding these tags will broaden your customer base and be sure to tag some as "wedding" that way that large market will be able to find you.

Hope that helps! Good luck!

[Former_Member]

Thank you for the advice. :) The pics ofcourse have been a challenge lol but I'm always trying to find a better way to get them "lighter". The relevancy tags and titles are a bit tricky for me as well and I appreciate the ideas on how to change it up a bit. Sounds like I need to take a day and tweak my tags and titles some more. I've also never attempted Twitter. Maybe it's about time I jump on the Tweet wagon ;)

[Former_Member]

Would anyone else be interested in added their 2 cents?? :)