Three ways to sell more on Etsy

Got your attention? Good!

Here are three simple ways to help improve your Etsy shopper conversions (that’s turning people who are browsing into buyers)

1.) Rock your socks off product images

Chances are the way someone makes it to your Etsy store is by clicking on a picture of one of your masterpieces.  Generally speaking, the better the product is displayed, the more people are going to click on it.  So take the time to put up images that really show the viewer who can’t feel or touch your goodies how wonderful your work really is.  You deserve it!

I know, you don’t have a million dollars to hire a professional photographer to photograph all your lovelies.  You don’t need one!  I’m posting a special “how to” take better photos for etsy next week so stay tuned!

2) I love me, You love me: Your Banner

This is likely the next thing someone shopping your store will notice.  They arrived there by clicking on a product and now they can learn more about you.  What does your banner say about you?  Did you cobble it together in photo-something (you’re not sure what)?

Your banner builds credibility.  A great banner says “I’m a real business.  I care about my work & my clients”.  A not so great banner says “I need some extra cash so I put some stuff up here on Etsy”.  What image do you want to project?  You want it to show everyone how much love and effort goes into your products–so love on your business and get a great banner!

There are tons of designers out there willing to design okay-decent banners for a few bucks.  Decide what your budget is and do two things : 1) Find a designer you LOVE and 2) spend the most you can.  I don’t mean break your bank–I mean get the highest quality product you can afford.

After all, this is YOU to the people shopping in your store!  You want to show your personality but with a polished edge.  Attractive & trustworthy.

One more thing about your banner: if you sell things in a bricks & mortar, you should be using the SAME LOGO for both.  Your Etsy shop is an extension of your physical brand.  You want it to be identifiable!  When people who know you in person get to your store, you want them to go “Yes! This is her shoppe!!” not “Hmm….did I type it right?”

3) Have a Sale

What? I want you to have a sale? But you worked so hard on all those things!  Let me ask you this: do you want to sell one (maybe none!) or would you rather sell more?  I’m betting you’d like to sell more.  Its important that when you price your goods, you make sure you have enough “wiggle room” to offer sales from time to time without putting yourself in a bind.  The best way to increase sales is a 30% discount.  Anything lower, and it’s not enough to sway a decision.  Another GREAT way to increase sales is to do buy 2 get one free. MOST people will buy two even when they were only planning to buy one because they will get one free.  And if you’re paying attention, it’s the same discount–30%.  Only it’s off 3 items instead of one.  So now you’ve sold three vs. one.  Isn’t that great?!

So there you go-three simple ways to sell more on Etsy.

One last tip: if you don’t have a LOGO GET ONE!  This is for consistency.  You want people to always know they found the right store and the best way to do that consistently is to have a logo.  Then you need to use it on your business cards, labels, shipping, boxes, emails, banner, etc.  And someday, you will probably get tired of your logo.  KEEP IT!  Sure, you can update the colors but don’t radically change it.  You want people to continue to recognize it.

Okay, I think that’s enough logo talk for now.  Your Etsy shoppe is an extension of your physical ’shoppe’.  Make ‘em match!

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Make more money with less effort

We all want to make more money and spend less time making it.

The problem is, we’ve got so many great ideas floating around.

You’ve all been there-and some of your are there right now.

The place where the ideas are FLOWING. How do you choose which ideas to implement and follow? Do you just grab blindly and try any idea that sounds great?

What if you had a way to choose the RIGHT idea EVERY TIME?

Would you do it?

Of course you would!

Did you know you may already have the way to do that? I’ll bet you didn’t. If you’ve spent enough time dreaming, creating, and getting to essence of your business, it’s quite possible you have the framework in place to make the right decisions for your business right now.

What is this magic potion, you ask? Simply this: take your idea and pass it through a ‘filter’. For ideas that pertain to what you offer, ask this of the idea: does it enhance, add to, perpetuate or otherwise work in accordance to what your business concept is? For example, if the essence of your business is to offer “country fresh inspiration” and your newest idea is to offer a monthly country trend review night, I’d say go for it. It’s got all three of your essence elements. It’s FRESH, it’s got country and it’s sure to inspire.

If your newest idea is to add an area for children complete with tv & video games, you’d need to pass it through several filters. First filter: does it serve my customer? In other words, what percentage of my target market shops with their young children that would take advantage of it? If it’s less than 20% of your biggest spenders, I’d say skip it and focus your resources somewhere else.

Hanging in there? Here’s the second filter if the idea passed the first one: Can it incorporate your essence, add to it or work cohesively with it? If it doesn’t, pass on the idea. Heck, maybe you can add it to your blog as an idea for someone else.

You’ve made it this far–here’s the final test if it passes the other two: It’s going to cost money. Is it going to cost more money than it will bring in? Playing with the childrens area, if you’re going to keep it fresh, that’s probably new decor, maybe new video games. Quite simply, Will it make you more money? And will it make you more money than it costs you? How much? If it’s a pretty small number, is it worth the effort?

The short cut to making better business decisions:

WILL IT MAKE ME MORE MONEY than it will cost me?

Run all your decisions through this filter and see if it doesn’t improve your bottom line. Asking everything you want to do with your money if it will make more money than it will cost, will absolutely keep you focused on maximizing your financial resources.

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What does YOUR blog photo say about you?

Does it say “I had my 4 year old take my picture after I chased him through the park”?

Or does it communicate the fact that you are a wonderful person, established business person, trust worthy and honest?

Can a photo even do that?  It certainly can!

I’m sure you’ve seen the photos I’m talking about–the ones where the blogger (who is blogging for a business–honestly, I don’t care what you personal blog photo is) looks bedraggled, rushed, and unprofessional in every way.

Is that the image you want your online customers to associate with you?

Wouldn’t it be great if the picture of you brings up great thoughts, warm fuzzies and return visits?  It can.

I know, some of you are staring sternly at your screens–you want your photo to have personality! You want it to show how unique you are.

It can still do that.

A blog feels informal but if you are blogging about and for your business, it’s not.  You might feel like you’re just sharing with friends, but you are reinforcing your customer’s ideas about you.  I’m not saying you have to have a boring “business” headshot for your blog but you want a consistent image presented to your customers.

Think about it: If this picture is the ONLY image they see of you, don’t you want it to deliver the best impression positive?  This is your FIRST IMPRESSION for customers who happen to find you via the web. Don’t you deserve an amazing picture of yourself?

While it might seem like hiring a photographer for something as small as a photo for your blog is lavish or a waste of resources, consider this: if you are a small business, chances are good you are your business. So why would you choose to present yourself in less than favorable light to thousands of potential customers or clients?  Isn’t that more wasteful than hiring a qualified professional to collaborate with you to create an image that speaks of you highly?

If you have a brick & mortar store, you might consider having a photographer capture an image of you at the business.

When you hire a photographer, you are hiring a visual artist.  Don’t be afraid to “shop around”. Find someone who’s style, energy, personality and ideas mesh with yours.  You want someone who will not only share your vision for the end result but add to it in an amazing way to deliver an image you will be thrilled with.  If you simply hire any photographer, its true–you could be wasting your money.

If you are looking for a photographer who can deliver an image with personality, you owe it to yourself to do your homework and find someone you feel is a good fit.  Don’t just go with the first photographer you find or the cheapest.  While there’s something to be said for being thrifty, chances are good a lower price means they aren’t as seasoned as a more expensive photographer. This is one reason seeing a portfolio and meeting the photographer is so important.

So take a look at your blog photo with a customer oriented eye: what does it say about you?  What is says about you will be projected onto your business and perception is everything.

We can’t change how people perceive you, but you can control how you are presented.

Be willing to get a new photo if yours doesn’t fit.  It’s not a bad thing. It’s saying “YES” to all those potential clients & customers.  And “YES” to showing you off in your best light.  You and your business deserve it.

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Excellent Service

Just another example of amazing customer service that I hope spurred some “pay it forward” sentiments and actions!

The gist of the story: A Whole Foods store in West Hartford was operating as usual until a computer glitch rendered all the registers unusable. They simply could not ring up customers. So the manager, Kimberly Hall, made a snap decision after consulting with other employees. What was the decision? That is wasn’t fair to make customers wait until the registers were operating normally again. So what did they do? They gave away the groceries. Now, they didn’t announce it to the whole store so people were honestly shopping not loading up to take advantage.

Most people were astounded. One woman pledged to donate to a food bank the amount her bill would have been.

They gave away approximately $4,000 in groceries. How amazing is that? I’m quite certain that those customers who were trying to beat a winter storm home near the holidays felt doubly blessed and will easily make the choice to shop at Whole Foods every chance they get.

You can read the WHOLE story here: The Story

So what can you do for your business today that will encourage employees to have such great minds?

My recommendation would be to promote the idea of living out great service not just giving it lip service. Share stories like this one that exemplify the type of service you want delivered to your customers–with or without you.

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How do I….

See how many comments are on a specific post on my own blog?

In WordPress, its easy to see all the comments on a single post and they are even numbered for you.

• Simply login to your administrators page/dashboard,
• Click “Manage” You’ll see a list of all your posts.
• Click the number under the “comments” column that corresponds to the post you are interested in.
• Voila!

How is this useful?

If you remember that a specific post has a comment you’re looking for this can be faster than using the search function under “comments”.

And if you run blog contests that require entrants to leave a post, this is the easiest way to pick a winner.  Simply note the number of comments there are and have someone special choose a number between 1 and that number.  That commenter will win!

Much less work that printing out the comments and having a drawing–and still random since you will choose someone who hasn’t memorized or even looked at the comments on your blog, right?

Hope that helps!

This answer is Wordpress specific.  Check with your blog hosting company  if you are using something else. :

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Where to start?

Q. I want to start a business. I know what I want to open (clothing store, bookstore, music store, furniture store, lighting store, photography studio, cafe…you get the picture) but I don’t know where to start. Help me!

A. I know, it all seems overwhelming the number of things you need to do to get your business off & running. Hopefully this helps!

1. Get a name for your business. Don’t fret! This DOES NOT have to be the final name you put on your store. You need a name so you can get your reseller tax ID (if you buy something with the intent of reselling it, you want this–it means you don’t pay sales tax on it since you will be collecting sales tax on it when you sell it). If you have a name, great, if not use your own or use one you’re pretty sure you like. You also need a business name in order to being working with wholesalers. No business name and you won’t be able to get catalogs or place orders. Also make yourself some basic business cards with this name & your personal contact information. You can get free business cards from www.vistaprint.com and since these won’t be a part of your permanent store identity, you don’t want to invest much into them.

2. Create a business plan. Don’t be afraid to ask for help from sources that can find the information you’re looking for more quickly. Sometimes it pays to hire someone to do initial research on locations, the market and the local economy rather than trudging through miles of internet sites and books. Having a business plan means you will have a much better idea of your target market, budget and what financing you may need to pursue. It also means you already have a polished document ready to take to the bank.

3. Learn to live & breath your target market/demographic. You want to know what they like to do, listen to, drive, where they eat, what shows they watch..you get the picture. The better you know them, the better you can serve them.

4. Gather. Start a file on wholesalers, merchandisers and other people you want to work with. Clip magazine articles & pictures that you feel represent something you want in your store. From colors & fabrics to lighting & merchandise, write it all down! By the time you open, you’re likely to have all the key items in one place and ready to go!

5. If you KNOW you are going to do this, start buying the basics. Since you have time, you are much more likely to be able to sniff out deals and save some cash on essential things like your cash register and other non-inventory items.

6. Do hands on research. Go to stores that you think might be like what you want, head to a trade show, soak up information at a conference…Each of these trips will inspire you, grow your knowledge and build a network of talent that you can readily access. Going to a merchandise mart is a great way to meet vendors and narrow down companies you think you’ll want to work with.

7. Soak it up! Again, hit the pavement…even virtually. Shop online stores if you think you may want one. The idea is to gather up as much exposure so you know what you want to and don’t want to do in your store. Take notes!

8. Read Read Read. Information again. You want to read up on every aspect of your business since its likely you’ll be running it. From taxes to employees to marketing and customer service, you want to know what to do, how to do it and how to do it well.  At this point, you are your business so you have to be in command of everything from writing good business letters, sending appropriate emails, being professional on the phone, placing adverts.  So until you hire some help, it will pay off to be prepared to handle all the tasks you will be undertaking from filing sales taxes and finding your COGS (Cost Of Goods Sold) to hiring.

9. Ruminate. Don’t jump in. Live with your business concept, name & information for a bit. Ask yourself the deep questions before running in headlong. You don’t need to take a sabbatical, but do spend some time thinking about this since it is a big decision that will impact your entire life and financial stability.

A few questions to ask yourself:

• Am I okay with how this will change my life?
• Am I willing to work hard (and even harder) to make this work?
• How will this change my life?
• Is this going to help me get where I want to go? (or think I want to go?)
• How long can I do this alone? (here I mean running the day to day business–you need support even if it’s not through having employees)
• Do have I support at home?
• If this doesn’t work out, how will it impact my life?  Will I lose my home? Car? Can I sell the business? Can I break even?

There is so much to ponder as you begin the process of starting a business.

A few recommendations: hire a CPA to deal with at least the taxes for the business.  Tax law is complicated–let a professional handle it.

If you can, outsource anything you don’t want to do or just don’t have the skill to do.  Sometimes you can trade, but regardless, it is always cheaper to have a professional (or someone with oodles of talent) to do something that you would have to invest tons of time into.  Like designing an ad–find a marketing student and an art student.  Get the marketing student to figure out your message and the art student to design it.  Chances are, it will be faster and better than what you would have cobbled together.  Putting out poorly done marketing is usually worse than doing none at all–it puts a bad face in people’s faces.  Not a good first impression.

Remember all that about reading?  Make sure you put a few start-up books on your list.  They will help you with things you’ve never even thought of.

I hope this helps you get started with building a business.  Owning your own business isn’t a cake walk and doing your homework will always pay off in the end.  In business, there’s no extra credit, no late grades, and no one to take your test for you.

If you like what you’re reading but need more answers, Jennifer & Deb are available for 1 on 1 mentoring sessions.

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Customer Service

I know, what hasn’t been said? Everyone has a perspective on great customer service.

Take my word for it, you WANT to watch the short movie clip that this link will take you to.

If you ever need inspiration to bring your customer service to the next level, this is it.

Here’s my .02 cents on business changing customer service: you can’t fake it.  So if you can’t do it, find someone who can.  It’s my belief that we are all capable of changing someone’s day for the better.  It really is the small stuff that can change your day from not so good to great.

So bust out of your routine and do something nice for someone else without considering what you might receive. 

Need a challenge? Take it one step further: pay it forward.  Next time someone does something for you (no matter how large or small)  PAY IT FORWARD.  Give a gift of experience, advice, talent, time, kind words, gentle ears or whatever you’ve got going for you (or just maybe, what they need!)

We can all use a little more love.

Spread it.

Share it.

Live it!

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Outsourcing & Independent Contractors

I know, the thought of “Independent Contractors” sounds big & scary and somehow, very official. Don’t worry! It’s so much easier than it looks.For every business, what you outsource will vary. Some will need to hire out big jobs, some small jobs–after all, there is so much to do but so few hours and only one of you. Hiring them as an Independent Contractor means you don’t pay their income taxes or social security benefits. That means they’ll have to take care of that on their own taxes. This is NOT a way to get around hiring employees see this article on what it means to be an employee. We’re trying to avoid doing anything that could later be audited and determined as illegal. This is the good part–all you need are two simple forms. (Crazy right, tax forms and simple–can that even go in a sentence together???) You definitely want to take care of these since they will help you keep everything “on the level” if you will.
Before you start paying them you want to take care of the first form. Just click the link, print & get it completed. You can find the form here: W-9: Request for Taxpayer Identification Form. It is recommended that you do this for anyone you *might* be currently paying under the table-and before you pay them any more.

While we’re focusing on working on making everything good with the IRS, it’s important to note you should probably have a contract with your Independent Contractor to deal with the job including deadlines. We’re working on a section that will deal with contracts for an upcoming feature.

I know you’re an awesome bookkeeper and you’ve been noting how much you’ve been paying them all year long. Here’s the important thing: At the end of the year, if the total amount paid to one individual is more than $600 than you need to fill out a 1099 Miscellaneous Income Form for each individual and provide them with their own copy at the end of the year. (You need their Tax ID, which is why the W-9 form should be collected in advance of payment.) All of the instructions are included within the form and there’s always additional help available directly from the IRS.gov website.

Why is it important to document this pay with the IRS? So that you can legally deduct the income you pay independent contractors, (What is an independent Contractor you ask? Find out HERE ) rather than paying income tax on money you didn’t actually earn! Those dollars are best used somewhere else.

So that’s it-two simple forms (W-9 & 1099 Misc) is all you need to free yourself from stress about the IRS and someone else’s taxes. I know, everyone always makes it sound so difficult but now you know the truth so go and help yourself by getting some help.

*Special thanks to Carol Drake, CPA; and Nate Reynolds for their contributions to this topic.

**Extra Special Thanks to Anne Ruthmann for providing the resources & inspiration for this post!

Just a reminder, please don’t trust this more than your CPA–they’re up on the newest tax codes so they are the first place to check.

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Coming Soon!

We’ll be posting tons more info that’s great for entrepreneurs–we’ve been there so we’re gonna share!

First up: Independent Contractors

How do you pay them??

Coming right up!

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Used Bookstore Marketing Schedule

Running a used bookstore? Need some help figuring out how to improve sales? I’ve created an easy to use-easy to implement marketing plan for small indpendent bookstores. Doesn’t have to be a used bookstore, though there is some information on setting used book prices/buying used books.

Leave a comment if you’re interested and I’ll get in touch.

It’s $20 for the standard plan, $75 for a customized plan based for your unique business.

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