Featured Shop: Natural Amber
I would like you to meet Amber from Natural Amber (Vintage Inspired Handmade Jewelry) http://www.etsy.com/shop/NaturalAmber. I found Amber's post on the etsy forums and was very impressed and inspired by what she had to say. Thank you so very much, Amber, for your kind permission to post your article on my blog!
I know first hand how difficult it is to run an etsy shop and how even more difficult to make it successful. It's so easy to just give up and walk away, but Amber's story gives so much hope, inspiration and motivation that I really wanted to share it with all of you! Hope you enjoy it as much as I did! And I also hope you visit her fantastic shop! Happy Weekend! Helen
-----------------------------------------------
"500 Sales and How I Never Walked Away
I logged on this morning and to my happy surprise I hit my second major milestone: 501 sales. It took me 18 months to hit 100 sales back in February and only 8 months to add 401 more. My time on ETSY has not always been an easy time, actually 10 months ago I almost walked away. The end of December 2009 had hit and I was still under 90 sales after a year and half on ETSY. I looked around on ETSY and thought to myself "How could I ever compete?"
At that time I had moved into a little bit of vintage inspired jewelry but 75% of my inventory was still beaded jewelry. So I thought maybe it's time to walk away. I took a couple weeks off in January and had gone vintage shopping with my mom. Something anything me stirred and I thought: "I'll try something new." I pulled most of my beaded jewelry and spent a good three-four weeks creating many different creations and ripping apart and altering vintage classics. Then I posted them here on ETSY. All of a sudden I stood out, and sales came in. I have never looked back.
I still love to make beading jewelry in my spare time, but realize that with the abundance of talent here on ETSY I had to find my own way to be unique and now I have with vintage inspired creations that have my own flare. I feel confident that people can see a picture of my work and say "Thats NaturalAmber"
My keywords to success here on ETSY are:
1. Patience and Persistence: keep trying when everything else fails. Find a way to stand out in the crowd. Think outside of the box.
2. Innovation: Life around us is always changing, and change is not a bad thing. Have a new idea, try it out! Continuing your crafting and creating new items keeps you happy and your customers coming back
3. Standing Out: On ETSY I think its soooo important to be unique, have good pictures, and find a way to entice people into your storefront. Abandoning beaded jewelry was my in, what is yours?
4. And never accept you can not improve.
There is always room for improvement. Working on Tags, pictures, and descriptions is an easy and quick way to start sales again. Need help with tagging I LOVE this link:
http://etsytreasuryteam.blogspot.com/2009/03/tagging-for-maximum-exposure-in-etsy.html
Happy Monday! Maybe you don't need to walk away. Maybe you just need to walk a different direction
Amber"
steufel, thank you so very much for your comment! :-)
ReplyDelete