Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Just because you've listed an item on Etsy, doesn't mean the listing is carved in stone.

I'll often go through my listings and look for opportunities to improve them or update them.

Let me give you a couple of examples.

Updating descriptions and titles

Your listing description shouldn't say that your beautiful handmade item has a lovely pastel palette perfect for Easter - in September!

If you have a seasonal description, you should update it seasonally. The above was a really blatant example, but season descriptions can creep in subtly. Minor changes to make your listing "fresh" can make a difference.

Last Christmas time, I listed the earrings on the left under the name of "Christmas Kisses", complete with a holiday-themed description. I ended up selling quite a few pairs . But I didn't want to stop listing my "Kisses" in my shop - they really can be worn any time of the year. So, after Christmas, I renamed them "Valentine Kisses" and wrote a season-appropriate description.

That worked very well and I did sell several pairs for that holiday.


Take opportunities to improve your photos

My Dangling Swirl Earrings were originally available in my shop a couple of months ago. Even though I had photographed them several times, I was never happy with the photos. On the right is my original listing photo for them. Yes, they've sold twice and I've relisted them, but I thought the photo needed major improvement.

I was recently playing around with my lightbox - changing the lighting and experimenting with different backgrounds. I wanted a background that would complement sterling silver. I tried various colors of cardstock, pieces of wood, tiles, different types of stones, etc - then I tried a placemat with rich dark colors. (Placemat??!!) I really liked the deep color and the way silver seemed to pop against it. It also subtly evokes the holiday season.

I went back and took new photos of the Dangling Swirl Earrings and I am so happy I did. You can see the new photo on the left.


Now I feel the photos represent my earrings better - and I don't cringe every time I look at them.







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13 Comments:

  1. Anonymous said...
    Wow! Thats great info, thank you!
    Unknown said...
    Hey there!

    I'm kinda dropping by randomly (& kinda dropping by to hit you with my EC) to tell you about this new selling site I found. It's called ArtFire.com & you should check it out.

    It's still really, really new (still in beta) but it's heading in a really good direction! They are already buying advertising online & in print magazines to bring in traffic to the site. (It's already got almost as much traffic as indiepublic.com)

    It's got stats for shop views so you know where your customers are coming from! I know! Gasp! Faint! Right? hehe

    & it's just $7 a month (for the first 5000 artists) to list & sell as much as you can FOREVER. $7 a month no matter what! I signed up on that alone! haha

    Anyhoo, it is new so there aren't zillions of people using it (which is good & bad) but I thought you might want to take a look at it. With the ad campaign they are working on kicking in soon (or so they are saying), I think it's going to be a good place to start listing!

    If you sign up, give me a yell & let me know what you think!

    Always,
    Amy

    P.S. Great tips for sprucing up listings! Words to live by!
    High Desert Diva said...
    You are so right...

    *note to self: update*
    Chichiboulie said...
    great ideas. thank you for sharing.
    Anonymous said...
    Great post and I know what you mean by having good photos. I really suck at taking photos but I am slowly getting there. To be honest I like both backgrounds for the sterling silver earrings you have there and I love those kisses earrings too. All of the photos are great to me. :-)
    Contrariwise said...
    Pegasus,
    Good photos are probably the #1 thing that you can do to improve your shop and enhance sales. Keep on working on your photography; it will definitely pay off for you.
    Virginia said...
    Thanks for the timely post. My photo skills have gone up a notch or two since I opened my shop and several items just don;t seem to have zing anymore. Time to break out the camera and do some new photos.

    Also time to move the computer closer to the fire!
    Andrea said...
    This is a great post. I think I probably need to do some reshooting. I had done some a while ago, but I think I still need to work on taking better photos.
    CarolynArtist said...
    I totallly agree, I spend hours redoing photos and changing holiday themed items, descriptioons, etc!!! Good reminder!!!
    Anonymous said...
    Great tips, I've been working on improving my photos too, and I've been gradually replacing bad photos with better ones. There is *always* room for improvement.
    JMW Jewelry said...
    Good tips. I've been working on trying to figure out what backgrounds make my work look best. It's a work in progress, lol. I know that most of my photos I have right now are way too busy in the background, and I am trying to rectify that, too.
    Contrariwise said...
    JMV
    I just checked your shop. While they are a little busy, your picture are very consistent. You can recognize that they come from your shop, which is a really good thing. Branding is important.
    Over The Top Aprons said...
    Thank you for visiting my blog. I love how you have showcased your jewelry; the pictures are so clear and crisp, your jewelry just shines through beautifully.

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