One shop or two?

[amusebeads]

As I add more items to my shop, it is starting to seem less cohesive and more... chaotic. I make beaded beads, beadwoven jewelry, bead embroidered journals, lampwork beads and sometimes finished lampwork jewelry or copper components. (I wish I could focus my crafting, but I get bored easily...) Everything goes into the same shop. Would you mind taking a peek and seeing if I should split and add another shop, or if maybe there is a better way to rearrange what I have?

Thanks!!!

[nlcbeads]

As long as you can keep categories as separate as you'd like them, I'd stick with one shop.

Your journals are lovely.

[Former_Member]

I think if you start to have enough of the books that could warrant a different shop. It's worth thinking about. I'm trying to learn about SEO and the book covers won't have any overlapping keywords with other items. Your shop name and title and stuff won't bring in people for those either.

I only recently learned this- I may just be the last to know: you can control the order of items in the shop, separate from the sections. So of you feel that certain things are incongruous next to each other you can rearrange. You could go either way with that: relegate books to a later page so your main shop page is more cohesive or keep a row of each type of product on the main page to give it all some exposure ...

[CrowbirdieMiniatures]

I just spent some time looking through your shop. You have the sections - maybe bring more attention to them in the intro? There's a listing where you have a lampwork bead with matching beaded beads - that's unique and they work together beautifully. Very cool! Personally, because I have such a short attention span, I would never think to look for something like that but since you had them in your bead shop I saw something that had I the cash I would buy immediately. That happens a lot for me in the eclectic shops. I see things that I wouldn't know to search for.

It is trickier to keep track of multiple shops. Heidi talks about the SEO and that's pretty critical - you can do that in your item titles so that they show up better too. Check your "Shop Stats" and see what people use to find your shop. My searches most often begin with "Lampwork glass ...." so I try to make my titles start that way.

Whew- sorry, book first thing in the morning!

-Lauren

[Former_Member]

Actually I think it all works... yes you have leather journals but they are beaded ones. So it ties back in.

[Former_Member]

I ended up with 3 three separate shops, due mostly to the sheer volume of stuff that I have. 10 categories was simply not enough. I have well over 200 beads to sell and make more regularly (they aren't all listed yet lol). Over 400 jewelry items (also not all listed yet) and the stitch markers are just a totally separate market, and I tend to be very productive, so will soon have over 100 to list there. Too much for one shop.

I agree about the journals, if you end up with enough of them, they would probably do well in their own shop. And it doesn't cost any extra to list them in a different shop.

[hilobeads]

So far I'm keeping all my 'stuff' in one shop. I have had customers buy drilled mgambo seeds together with un-drilled mgambo seeds, or with jewelry.

The listing costs the same whether you list in one shop or many, but in my opinion shops with more items are more likely to be found (I have more to list too, but not as much as Sonja by a long way).

[AnneLondezGlass]

I have 2 shops because I wanted to keep my glass separate from my fine arts and photography but since glass is my day job, I am having a hard time managing the second shop, which as a result is pretty much inactive. It does double the work load and I just don't have enough time these days... so I'd advise you to think carefully about it before opening a second shop.