My experiences on Etsy promotion

I had a fun time selling on Etsy, and I learnt a lot. Hopefully I have another shop in the future and perhaps it might be useful to put my Etsy experiences on record. If you have anything to add, please do comment :)

This is how I improved my listings

• for popular categories - such as fabric I listed at specific times of the day (e.g. USA lunch and dinner time).
• I also staggered fabric listings over several days and different times to maximise exposure at the top of the search list.
  
• I continually tried to improve my photos so they were (mostly) clear, good quality and show all possible angles of the product. My biggest lessons were to avoid using the flash as it distorts the colour and use macro to get closeup.
  
• worked on the first image so it enticed people to click and view my listing. (take care that when your images are cropped into squares by Etsy, that the photo still looks ok (to solve this simply crop the image yourself into a square)
• I added short and fun descriptions (something you would say to a person if you were actually standing in a shop)
• and descriptions that tell told buyer stuff they can't see in the photos - dimensions, weight, smell, texture, history/background
• looked at descriptions of similar items to see if I had missed out anything - especially shops that are doing well. When I added some information about how I refund shipping and that I only ship single pieces of fabric I got more sales. These are things that people buying fabric find important.
• updated my featured items for my regulars so they could easily see when I had new stuff
• if an item wasn't being received well, then I would change the photos and the description and eventually you find out what works
• renewed items if I had nothing new to add
• Adding measurements in cm and inches

How I helped people find my shop

• blogged and blogged just about almost daily
• linked my blog to my shop (using the Etsy mini tool)
• commented on other peoples' blogs (especially if they had anything to do with african fabric. And this was fun for me)
• told my friends and family
• put up links on Facebook - using the My Stuff application. (Do this with any other social networking sites you use e.g. LinkedIn, Twitter)
• posted in the forum (mainly in the critiques and promotions sections). Look out for posts with subjects that are relevant (e.g. if you sell fabric please post here). If you start your own posts remember to use subjects that tell people exactly what you are posting about because then people who are interested are directed to you.
• found shops that sell similar stuff to me, or used African fabrics to make stuff and made them my favourite. This meant they noticed me and could become my customers or their customers could maybe spot me.

Tags are important because they are how you drive people to your products. They are the words people use when they search. These are my tips

• you should use all 14 if possible
• think about what people who would buy your product would search for
  
• think of words that mean the same thing (especially American vs English vocab)
• include materials, location (African), theme and main colours

I also learnt that showcase doesn't necessarily generate sales (you can buy a spot for $7) - renewing your items a couple times was recommended (I never managed to prove this). And it helps if you buy things on Etsy because you know what you look for in the shops you support and you can see what the experience is like on the other side.