we have 5 winners!

A warm congratulations goes out to the following winners of a 30 minute marketing consultation with me:

Jewels of Hope
Jillian Frances
TwinMum2006
Serendipity Handmade, and
Michele

I must say that I got SO excited while looking over your shops. My head was swimming with ideas for ways I can help you improve where you want and need to. I will be contacting you shortly to schedule your consultation!! To the rest, thank you so much for your entries. I wish all of you the best as always. If you would like to purchase a consultation, email me for details.

etsy holiday open house

Looking for a creative holiday marketing idea and a way to find a new audience? What about finding some other local crafters near you, and hosting a Holiday Open House for all of your friends? You could have it at someone's house, or find a local shop who would also love the traffic. You would all share the cost of light beverages and appetizers and have your work on display. You could advertise it to your friends as a holiday "one-stop-shop" event with the added benefit of supporting local artists and friends. You could use the Etsy shop local tool to find people near you.

Has anyone ever tried this? This really doesn't just have to been for the holidays. You could do a Valentine's Open House, a Spring Open House, etc, etc.

(Red hot rose fascinator clip by Sara Peach's Hair Accessories. Thanks Sara!)

let's help each other

Danielle from Twist21 emailed me to share a cool forum link. She created the thread "let's help each other" on the Etsy forums, and I think her idea is really resourceful and brilliant! You pick an item that you like from someone above you on the list and share it for them via Facebook, Twitter, or blog. Then you post about it and you are on the list for someone else to return the favor. This way your product gets shared with an entirely new channel of people. Great idea Danielle!

(Eco Bamboo Tote Bag by Avendano. Thanks Mildred!)

Cross-promoting your Etsy shop

Wow, you really have to check out this fantastic article. Double Your Marketing with Cross-Promotion is a concisely written how-to guide for increasing your traffic by collaborating with another Etsy seller who shares a similar audience as you. Bonus - the author will help you find someone to partner up with! I highly suggest working on this for your holiday marketing campaigns. Please share with us if you have tried this strategy and how it is working for you!

(Fuchsia Crystal Spiral Necklace by Christine's Beadworks. Thanks Christine!!)

FREE Etsy Business and Marketing Plan Consult wtih Jordan Moore of Handmade Success

I am a very lucky woman to have met all of you over the past year. I am blown away on a daily basis by your talent, motivation, effort, and most of all by your kindness and mutual support of one another. I am proud to be a part of your community - thank you so much for welcoming me with open arms!

I would love to do more for you and have been searching over the past few months for ways to do this. First, I wrote the free Etsy 30 Minute Social Networking Kit which, judging by the feedback I received, proved to be useful to quite a lot of you. Now, I am so excited to announce that I am launching a consulting service - and to kick it off, I am giving away 5 free sessions!

The Service:
The Handmade Success Consultation is a 30 minute telephone conversation with yours truly. Over the course of the consult, we will review everything and anything related to running your handmade business - your product line, your Etsy shop branding and copy, your marketing efforts, and your advertising strategy. I will listen to your concerns and craft a strategy for you to improve upon each of these areas and give you advice on how to streamline your efforts so you can spend more time creating your product and less time on the computer. We will talk about your goals for this month, this year, and beyond. At the end, I will follow up in writing with a concise marketing plan for you to refer back to. Sound good? The charge for the consultation is normally $75.

The Contest:
To enter to win one of the free consultations, you must respond with a comment to this post describing your biggest frustrations in running your Etsy shop/online business. You will get one (1) extra entry if you blog, tweet or share this contest on Facebook and post the link in the comments.

I will be selecting 5 entries at random to win the free consult. Entries must be received by midnight PST Friday, October 16, 2009 and I will announce the winner on Monday, October 19th. Good luck, and I really can't wait to work with you!

50 Ways to Market Your Shop

I just came across this really fantastic list of 50 marketing ideas on about.com. It was written for retailers, but most of these will apply to you and your Etsy shop. Happy Friday everyone!!

(Camphor Bowl by The Norsk Woodshop. Thanks Patrick!)

5 Tips for Getting More Facebook Fans

I received an email from a customer who was particularly daunted by the idea of building her Facebook page wondering how she would ever be able to build a big fan base. She asked me for some extra tips and I thought I would share them here too. She has an etsy shop and also a tanning salon, so you will see I came up with some ideas for the salon as well. (names have been changed)

1. The best trick I can reveal to you about getting fans is to have as much interactive content as possible. This means that when you post something it should be an item that makes people want to mark as "like" or comment on it. When they do one of these things - every single friend in their network will receive an update that "Jane Meyers commented on a post from Debbie's Tanning Salon". Then their friends will click the link out of curiosity, and their friends, etc. This is how you go "viral" on Facebook.

2. I would suggest doing special Facebook-only campaigns. Come up with special offers for Facebook fans only.

3. Post polls, quizzes, facts about your industry...you could come up with some funny posts like "overly-tan celebrity pictures" and then you could explain how to end up not looking like that! You could do a contest for a free session, etc, etc. Just get people engaged and the rest will follow.

4. You may seriously consider paying for a Facebook page ad up front. $10/day will really help you lay your foundation for your fan base.

5. Don't wait for your old high school friends to find you--find them! And after you do, invite them to become a fan of your page. You need to try and become "friends" with everyone you have ever met, and then send them an invite to become a fan of your shop. Now is not the time to be shy!

I hope this helps some of you too...and let's make THIS an interactive thread. Please share with the group what has worked for you in building your page!

(Pick a Peach print by WozArtStudio. Thanks Florence!)