Selling on Etsy is unlike selling on any other marketplace. The specialized nature of the marketplace, combined with increasingly fierce competition, presents a variety of unique challenges for sellers on the platform. Etsy sellers must always be on the lookout for ways to increase their Etsy shop’s visibility, while simultaneously ensuring that they’re always ahead of the curve and a level above the competition.
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If you’re wondering how to get more sales on Etsy, we’ve put together a complete guide for Etsy sellers, with proven strategies to increase your shop’s visibility and boost your sales. Keep reading for insider listing tips, expert marketing strategies, and smart SEO methods that will increase your sales on Etsy with minimal effort.
Understanding Etsy and Building Strategies for Getting More Sales
Before we dive into how to get more Etsy sales, we have to look at Etsy as a marketplace and understand what it means to sell on Etsy. As a platform, Etsy functions similarly to many other ecommerce marketplaces – it allows sellers to open up shops and sell goods to buyers on the platform, it works with major payment services such as PayPal and Klarna, and has firmly established itself as a well-known and trusted online marketplace. The thing that makes Etsy unique in comparison to other major ecommerce marketplaces is what is sold on the platform.
Etsy was designed to be the ecommerce equivalent of traditional craft fairs, and its marketplace policies reflect that. Sellers on Etsy are only allowed to sell handmade goods, vintage items, and craft supplies on the platform. If your items fit the bill but you’re still struggling to get sales, it’s important to ask yourself the two questions to better understand how you can grow your Etsy sales.
Is it Worth Selling on Etsy?
Looking at whether the items you’re selling on Etsy are the right items for the platform is important, and not just from a marketplace policy standpoint. Compliance with marketplace policy given, some items are a better choice for selling on Etsy than others. Digital downloads, for example, are a great way to make money on the platform while requiring no logistics and minimal customer service. Certain handmade items, on the other hand, may be more difficult to profitably sell on the platform. Things like handmade leather goods of your own design, for example, can easily be copied and sold for pennies on the dollar by dropshippers or sellers operating from areas with lower production costs, making it more difficult for sellers who sell their own handmade creations to get noticed among the sea of competition. Whatever you’re selling, you’ll want to be sure that it is indeed a good fit for selling on Etsy.
What Makes Etsy Popular?
As mentioned earlier, Etsy is a marketplace for selling craft supplies, handmade items, and vintage goods, and it has firmly established itself as the marketplace for all things creative, custom, and crafty. This is exactly what makes Etsy so popular with buyers – they are familiar with Etsy’s distinctive artsy vibe, and know to come back to it whenever they’re looking for something that can’t be bought on run-of-the-mill ecommerce retail sites.
Tips for Increasing Sales on Etsy
Now that we’ve firmly established what Etsy is and what you should consider when deciding whether an item is a good fit for selling on the platform, we’ll examine a few tried and tested tips on how to get more sales on Etsy. Keep in mind that boosting Etsy sales requires a variety of approaches, but with a little time, effort, patience, and these simple tips, you’ll quickly begin seeing more sales on your Etsy shop.
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1. Optimize Your Listings for SEO
When creating a listing for any item in your shop, the first thing you need to consider is how you can best optimize it for SEO. Put simply, you’ll want to ensure that your listing has all the correct components, in the right format and place, so that Etsy knows to match it to potential buyers’ searches. No matter how good your item is, if buyers can’t see it when they browse Etsy, you won’t ever make a sale. Good SEO practices include clear and descriptive item titles, complete use of tags on every listing, and making sure to keep your listings fresh.
2. Focus on Quality
Like many marketplaces, Etsy has recently become inundated with sellers looking to make a quick buck by selling low quality goods. These can be anything from dropshippers selling mass-produced items as handmade, to dishonest sellers stealing other seller’s designs and selling cheap copies of them. While Etsy has made some effort to tackle these issues, it’s always an uphill battle for honest sellers looking to sell on the platform. For this reason, it is important to focus on offering your buyers quality items that will keep them coming back for more. Return buyers are also more likely to recommend your store to people they know personally, giving you free word-of-mouth advertising!
3. Offer Variety
Your Etsy shop should focus on its unique niche – whether that be jewelry, home décor, leather goods, or anything in between – while offering buyers a rich variety to choose from within that niche. If you started your Etsy shop selling earrings, for example, expand your selection to include other types of jewelry. Make an effort to regularly add new items and designs, and to keep up to date with what buyers are looking for. A store that offers more options will always have a bigger pool of potential clientele, while also enjoying more exposure on a bigger variety of search results.
4. Take Great Photos
The impact of good-quality, well-staged photos cannot be overstated when it comes to selling on Etsy. Buyers come to the platform to purchase things they’ve never seen in person, as opposed to buyers who flock to platforms like Amazon to find better deals on items they’ve likely encountered before. The saying “a picture is worth a thousand words” is doubly true on Etsy, and that’s because your listing photos are the only way buyers are able to assess the quality of the item you’re selling. Always use good lighting, take high-resolution photos, and ensure that your item photos are cohesively staged across your listings.
5. Offer Discounts and Free Shipping
A significant part of making a purchase attractive to buyers is offering them a good deal. This can be in the form of discounts, such as coupon codes or price drops, or benefits like free shipping. You can increase your sales by offering interested buyers who’ve favorited an item in your shop a discount code, or offer free shipping to buyers with domestic shipping addresses. You can also offer discounts for holidays such as Valentine’s Day and Christmas, or send interested buyers seasonal discount codes to encourage them to complete their purchase.
6. Promote Your Products
Promoting your products on Etsy is a great way to get more sales and increase your Etsy shop’s visibility. This is easily done with Etsy Ads, Etsy’s simple PPC promoted listings model that gives sellers the option to promote their products in buyer searches.
When looking at how to get more sales on Etsy, it’s important to not get tunnel vision and lose the ability to look outside of Etsy itself, however. Etsy also offers its sellers a program for promoting their products outside of the platform, known as Offsite Ads, in which sellers are automatically enrolled. There is a 12-15% fee on a sale that results from one of these offsite ads, but the benefits of getting your product and store out there far outweigh the steep referral fee.
Strategies for Building Brand Awareness and Increasing Sales on Etsy
In this section, we’ll take a look at how you can build awareness for your brand or shop through a variety of avenues. By increasing visibility of your shop and bringing in buyers from multiple places, you’ll be able to not only get more sales on Etsy, but also build your Etsy shop’s reputation both on- and off-platform.
1. Utilize Email Marketing
Email marketing is a great tool for selling online, but it’s only beneficial when employed correctly. The first mistake many sellers make is sending emails to buyers who never explicitly asked to receive those emails. Never send emails to anyone who hasn’t asked to receive them; the best scenario is that the email gets ignored, and the worst is that it gets reported as spam. Instead, offer buyers who have already purchased something from your store the option of opting into marketing emails, or use other platforms (such as your own website, if you have one) to allow buyers to sign up to receive emails. Don’t forget to make these emails worthwhile – include promotions and discount codes to ensure that people will be happy to receive your marketing emails while also nudging them towards making a purchase.
2. Create an Engaging Blog
Etsy is a marketplace for many creative and artsy types, and many shoppers on the platform have unique hobbies and interest that you can write about in a blog. Your blog should focus on creating articles that are relevant to your store and interesting to potential buyers. If you sell home décor pieces, for example, your blog can talk about interior design, tips for decorating small spaces, ways to incorporate pieces from your shop into different design themes, and more. Your blog doesn’t have to feature a new article every day, but aim for no more than a month between each post to keep your blog engaging without adding unnecessary fluff.
3. Maintain a Strong Presence on Social Media
The importance of a good social media presence cannot be overstated when it comes to selling online, and that goes double for sellers who sell on Etsy. If you already have a social media presence for your business, leverage it to promote your Etsy shop and attract buyers. If you’re just starting out or don’t have established social media accounts, go ahead and open them. Choose your social media channels carefully, and take into consideration where your target audience is more likely to be. If you’re selling vintage Y2K clothes, TikTok is a more suitable platform than Facebook, for example.
4. Participate in Relevant Forums
Similar to the aforementioned social media presence, participating in niche-relevant forums is a great way to increase awareness of your brand and get more sales on Etsy. No matter what you sell – from vintage watches to mid-century style prints, naturally-dyed craft yarn to retro home décor – there is sure to be an online community that’s interested. Keep in mind that you want to be an active member of these forums, not just a seller trying to plug their store. Share your knowledge and tips before you post links to your Etsy shop. Remember that the smaller and more specific your niche, the greater the impact your participation in these forums will have, whether that impact is positive or negative!
5. Collaborate with Influencers
If your niche allows it, influencer collaboration is a great way to boost your social media presence to drive more Etsy sales. The benefit of influencers is that they do much of the social media legwork for you – they already have an established following and presence on their social media platforms of choice, and their followers already trust their credibility. Collaborating with an influencer is a great way to get more sales on your Etsy shop, and it can be done in many creative ways. You can offer discount codes specifically for that influencer’s followers, have them promote a product, or even just give your Etsy shop a mention.
6. Take Advantage of Etsy’s Ad Campaigns
We’ve mentioned Etsy’s ad options before, but they’re worth mentioning again from a brand awareness perspective. Aside from driving sales via direct clicks, ads have the added benefit of boosting your brand’s awareness, both on and off the platform. Keep your shop enrolled in Etsy Offline Ads instead of opting out – it’s a great way to get more exposure for your shop and products because it utilizes Etsy’s advanced algorithms and wealth of analytics data to promote your products where they’ll have the biggest impact.
7. Utilize Social Shopping
Social shopping is the next phase of digital commerce, and has taken a significant bite out of more traditional ecommerce shopping in recent years. Put simply, social shopping is a shopping experience directly through a social media platform, without leaving that platform. May social media platforms now have the option of opening stores in-platform, or linking directly to your store’s website. This poses a problem for Etsy sellers, however, since Etsy does not integrate with any social media platform to offer a true social commerce experience to the end user. To give your buyers the option of social shopping on platforms such as Instagram and Facebook, you’ll want to utilize a third-party integration tool that can take your Etsy shop and integrate it with a shop on your social media platform of choice.
Final Thoughts and Important Takeaways
As we’ve seen, increasing your Etsy sales requires a concerted effort on several fronts, including marketing, social media, and listing SEO. The most important thing to remember is that all these strategies work together to drive more sales on your Etsy shop, which is why it is so important to implement them together in order to get the most out of each one. In short, there is no single “how to” for getting more sales on Etsy, but rather a series of good practices and strategies that you can start implementing today for a more successful Etsy selling experience.
FAQs for Increasing Sales on Etsy
Here, we’ll go over a few of the most common questions we receive from sellers who want to get more sales on Etsy. Browse them, and feel free to let us know if you have any questions of your own that you’d like us to address!
Q: How do I optimize my Etsy listings for SEO?
A: Optimizing your Etsy listings is an important part of getting more sales on Etsy. A well-optimized Etsy listing will have a complete and descriptive title, utilize keywords correctly while avoiding keyword stuffing, take full advantage of tags, and include researched and relevant keywords.
Q: What tips should I follow when trying to increase sales on Etsy?
A: Important tips for how to get more Etsy sales not only include good SEO practices and taking good quality listing photos of your items, but also encompass product and brand promotion strategies that make use of the marketing and social media avenues at your disposal. Brand awareness and SEO aside, you’ll want to focus on offering a wide selection of quality products to your buyers, and offer them discounts and promotions whenever possible to drive more sales.
Q: How can I use social media to get more sales on Etsy?
A: Social media is a great tool for both building brand awareness and promoting your products in order to get more Etsy sales. Using social media correctly to increase your Etsy sales includes promoting both your store and your products to your followers, working with influencers to get the word out about new products and sales, and offering buyers a social commerce experience by integrating your Etsy store with various social media platforms.
Q: How can I build brand awareness for my Etsy store?
A: Building brand awareness for your Etsy store requires a combined marketing and social media effort that promotes your Etsy shop and brand on multiple platforms simultaneously. You’ll want to hold on to past buyers by giving them the option of signing up to receive marketing emails, promote your Etsy shop through participation in niche-relevant forums, and collaborate with influencers to get the word out about new products and promotions. All these can give your brand and shop better credibility in the eyes of potential buyers, and ultimately drive more sales on your Etsy shop.
Q: How do I make sure my products stand out on Etsy?
A: Creating eye-catching listings – and promoting them – is a surefire way to get buyers interested and engaged. You’ll want to follow good Etsy SEO practices to ensure visibility, and supplement them with high-quality images that attractively showcase your items. High-resolution photographs combined with deliberate staging are a good way to impart a unique brand feel while making your listings stand out from the competition.
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