Thursday, November 1, 2007

An ETSY review of October

When I first started my shop on ETSY, I had hoped for a sale or two. My shop opened in early August and my inital items were scarves. Now there's truly little chance of selling a scarf in 95 degree weather, but with 4 month listings, I was looking more towards Autumn and Winter with the listings.
My 1st month on Etsy, I sold a couple pairs of earrings and I set goals to double sales for the following month. In September I found my items receiving many more views and after a couple of quick sales, things quieted down. I did hit my goal to double my August sales, making 5 September sales and once again I was looking for the same goal... double my September sales.
Like September, October started quickly, slowed in the middle third of the month. The slowdown was mostly my fault. I spent more time preparing for a craft show and didn't put many new items into my shop. Once I realized that sales had slowed and placed new items in my shop, sales increased and we finished the month with a flourish, easily making my October goal.
Overall my crafts did fairly well in October. The 2 shows I did were both moderately successful, I sold a few items and I believe I've built up a bit of a following, while promoting my ETSY shop and the ETSY site (along with a few ETSY sellers!) I made a few small private sales in the last few weeks, so my "hobby" is keeping me busy replenishing my stock.
I'm currently about a dozen items short in my ETSY shop (between craft show sales, shop sales & Halloween items that are being deleted) so I'll be adding more items on ETSY over the next few days, while gearing up for my next show. I'm still looking to add a show, hopefully next weekend. I do have shows book on 11/17 and 11/30 and I wouldn't mind a 12/1 or 12/2 show.

So that's my October review. I'm further along than I really expected (I guess I didn't want to be disappointed if my creations weren't accepted publicly) and I'm really happy I'll have the opportunity to make sales on ETSY after the holidays.

If you haven't read my published article about ETSY titled "Move over Ebay, make room for ETSY" please click on the link and check it out.
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/424772/move_over_ebay_make_room_for_etsy.html

Please feel free to comment and rate my article. I'd love to know what my fellow crafters think.

Til next time...
R

2 comments:

Unknown said...

I am finding that etsy has many more sellers than buyers... I wish they would structure it like ebay with a bidding process, I think a lot more items would move through.

Elektra Loaded ♥ said...

yes for sure, but at the same time, you can just let ppl you know, aware that you have an account here, a shop and they can visit and buy...so it doesnt just have to be ppl on the etsy community that purchase your items :)