More Tips & Tricks

For those of you who spend a lot of time on Facebook specifically I found out a neat trick that I didn't know about through this great blog post: http://www.vavoomvintageblog.com/2013/09/how-i-make-time-for-blogging-and-family.html

I should also mention that that blog post is an excellent read for anyone with a busy life and children but still trying to run your websites and social media!! 

What I discovered:

You can actually schedule your facebook posts directly through Facebook by clicking on the little clock button and setting it to what ever time you think it should be posted at!

(picture also from VaVoomVintageBlog)

She also mentions another website similar to BufferApp called "HooteSuite" which might be useful for some! 

Otherwise, I've been busy trying to figure out all of the statistics on the best posting times! I will be posting more tips & tricks soon though!

Buffer Pt.2

Really I just forgot to mention in the last post that you can also download Buffer App on your iPhone / iPad / etc FREE! This way you can even manage it while you are out! 

Buffer

Today I'm starting my experiment with a website called "Buffer App" (www.bufferapp.com). This website helps you manage your twitter, facebook, linkedin, and google + accounts. 

Have you ever wondered when the best time to post something is? (not new items but general posts about articles you've read, updates about your shop, sales, etc). Well this website helps you post those things at the right time. 

The best part is, if you're like me and can "never find the time" to post on these sites, you just need to take a few minutes out of every day to line up the posts you'd like to do for the day. Buffer than lines them up and posts them at what it knows as your busiest times. This way each post will hopefully reach a larger range of your followers. Buffer also keeps track of your statistics: views, clicks, and so on. 

All it takes is signing up through one of your accounts (twitter / FB / etc) and allowing the website to have access. The website must have access to be able to post for you. 

You can also choose if you want those posts being sent to all of your social media sites, or just one, or just a few. If you copy paste a link into the "sharing" space, give it a few seconds and it will shorten the link for you. This then gives you more room for wording! 

If you already have an idea of when you'd like to post time wise, you can also set your own schedule. It's also important to make sure it's set to your correct time zone as well! 

Best of all.... It's FREE! 

There is also a $10 a month option that connects to up to 12 social networks for you. Which is at least good to know incase you find it useful! 

Advertising Part 1

Let's say that at this point you've started making some sales. You now have a little money flowing through your shop and you'd like your sales to be even better. Well maybe it's time to think about doing some not-so-free marketing. By this I mean, Advertising!

Now there are many different ways of advertising, even in the online world alone but for today's post let's stick with advertisements on websites and blogs. 

How to do this:

First of all do some research as to what blogs & websites post relatable subject matter to what you sell. If you sell fashion, then specific fashion sites would be your first place to start for example. Like finding a fashion site that shares the same style. Remember you are more interested in who reads the blog than who creates the site because those are your potential customers. Once you've discovered some sites that you think might be useful and already have advertisements (some sites don't use sponsors), they will either have a section that says "be a sponsor" or "advertisement". If not then just find their contact and send them an email asking if they are accepting new sponsors and if so what their rates are. Also remember to send them a link to your shop so they know who you are and that you are serious! 

Some websites will have one set advertisement size, some will have varied depending on the price for example:

Others charge based on where your ad will sit on their site. Whether it be at the top which will likely get the most views, or middle, or bottom. Prices will often vary depending on where you choose to put your image. 

So make sure you make your little advertisement is the size suggested by the site so that it fits properly in the ad space. 

So set a budget for yourself on how much a month you can afford to spend, then choose the amount of sites, which sites, and which ad spots will be your best deal! 

Once you have your ads up you can start monitoring your traffic from those sites on etsy by going to your "shop stats" section. 

^^^ It should look something like this ^^^

The Traffic Sources section is going to tell you where people are discovering your shop from. You can also choose to view this by day, month, year, and so on. These stats tell me that the blog I advertise on (the blurred one) brings me my 3rd highest clicks and is worth keeping as a site to sponsor. 

Now if after a month or so you notice that some sites bring you a lot of attention but others don't bring enough for what you pay: stop advertising on the low ones and use that extra money to buy better ad space on the ones that are working! Or save some money by removing those that are not helpful to your sales. 

When to Post

A big question that many people ask is, when is the right time to post a new listing? Or when is the right time to renew my listings?

Well, I came across an article that may help:

http://www.everythingetsy.com/2010/07/best-times-to-list-on-etsy/ 

Now, it's not perfect as it in itself explains but it's a pointer in the right direction. 

Another good way to figure this out is by trail and error. But remember to document your findings. If you post at say 10AM every day for a week check your views, do this again at say 12PM every day for a week and see if you can spot any differences. 

Etsy now has something called a "shop dashboard" you can find this by hovering your mouse over "My Shop" and it is one of the drop down options. 

Now, this doesn't show exact times in the day, but it does give you some interesting comparisons! 

It's also not a bad idea to sign on throughout the day to check your "activity feed". This feed lets you know how many people have been favouring your shop or specific items in your shop. Start documenting what times it seems to be the busiest. 

(choose "your shop" - it will have a number next to it if it's active)

This is a good example of what I mean. Here it says that I had 4 different people admire things 5 hours ago! So that is something I should right down (and the corresponding time). But remember sometimes it's just one person liking a bunch of stuff. So make sure if it's a busy time that it is different people admiring your items. 

Hope that helps!

How to Find Your Community

Alright, since the latest post I came to the realization that finding those other people to connect with might be hard if you are just starting to enter your particular scene. This post mostly pertains to artists, designers, and the creative types. My mom pointed out a website that is both accessible on your phone as well as online. It's called "pulse". 

Now this site is a great place to read articles, and find other artists in your scene. This way if you see one you like you can look them up, find their blog / facebook page / instagram you name it! 

Here you can see a selection of the things this website covers. 

Once you sign up it will give you a selection of categories to follow including women's fashion, art, photography, food, etc. Pick the ones that pertain to your field as well as any others you may want to see for fun! 

Say you choose "photography", it will give you a selection of recent articles and photographs to choose from. There are different sections and categories as well. This is a great place to start discovering connections. 

Another great website for discovering up-and-coming artists is called "booooooom". This website has a great selection of artists and many categories of art to choose from.

This website also allows you to submit your work! Who knows, maybe your work will end up on here! 

Building a Community

Today I'd like to talk about why it's so important to build a community and some ways of doing so. 

What I even mean by "building a community": Since this blog is about selling online that means your buyers and those that could potentially help you out are also online. So in the same way you build friendships in person, it's time to build those friendships online. The example I know best is obviously the vintage clothing world. For me I find Instagram useful for finding like-minded people who love to share their vintage finds, talk about history, and so on. In this sense, we may not know each other but we are able to share knowledge and learn from each other as well as build relationships with buyers. Having professional friendships with your buyers is always a great thing because people love knowing they are buying from someone they respect and can relate to.

If you are an artist you can network with other artists and interesting fans, or even search for art galleries and art directors who could potentially help you out. Remember if you are an artist, even your Instagram is like a public portfolio and you never know who might spot your work! 

So let's stick with a few networks that I find have been useful for people to build a community: blogs, instagram, and twitter!

Instagram: 

(A great little conversation between customer and artist, as well as a lovely comment from a fan that says a little more than the typical "this rocks".)

So as I've been saying, start searching for your fellow like-minded people. Follow those that interest you and then remember to comment on things and show interest in their life/work. The "this is awesome" or "great work" comments are great, but the "wow, I'm really impressed by your brush strokes" can go even further in having them notice you and want to follow you. Commenting and liking other artists images as well as posting images with questions such as "I can't decide what colour to paint her hair! Any suggestions?" are a great way of building connections. Basically you really want to spark audience participation. 

Blogs: 

(No, these are not the most interesting comments in the world, but they really show that they fully read the article and had opinions on the review that where worth sharing. This is enough to spark more of an interest in who you are vs. passing by you)

Almost every artist, or designer, etc have a blog. Most of which allow comments (sometimes they just review them first). So first of all, you should have a blog! (we will go over this later). Blogger seems to be a good place to start because it's highly used by other bloggers and it's easy to comment, but tumblr and wordpress are also commonly used. Every time you post a comment it will say who posted it, so think of something interesting to say to a blog post that may spark someones interest to find out who you are. This way you can get more followers. Do not however comment and say "YOU SHOULD FOLLOW ME", or expect attention if all you say is "that outfit rocks". Useful, informative, or well worded compliments will get you more attention than just saying something is cool. Again, this is how you build a community, you bring something to the table and therefor are useful and people want to connect with you and share your world. 

Twitter: Now, I am still new with Twitter but I have known it to be very useful for a lot of people. Twitter is an online website you can use with your phone, mobile device, or computer. It literally just posts "statuses" or updates. This is a place to post new items in your shop, markets you may be selling at, interesting information about the art scene you are involved in, etc. You can also comment on other tweets just remember to follow the rules mentioned above. You can also re-tweet a status you find interesting / important and it will still give credit to the original person that made the "tweet" but shows you have an interest in it. 

Most importantly, building a community should be fun! This should be the relaxing part of your work day where you have some interesting conversations and post some fun updates on your work! 

Please leave questions in the comments!