I’m new to the forum (fairly new to Folksy too) so I hope I posting this in the right place, please let me know if not.
I’m currently working on setting up my blog and I thought it might be nice to sometimes share items from other Folksy sellers too
I’m not sure how to go about the photos though. Is it ok to just use the photo from the shop (with a clear link to the shop obviously) or should I contact people and ask permission to feature their product?
I’d be really grateful for any advice as I’d love to promote other people’s work as well as my own
I’ve featured in other people’s blogs twice before - once they told me that they had used my work and I gave them a shout out on my facebook page, the other time they didn’t let me know and I found out by accident (I googled my name as I was interested to find out if my work had made it onto pinterest etc). I prefer to be asked/ told - its a little pick me up - and if people don’t want you to feature their work they can always ask you to remove it, so long as you acknowledge that it is their work and link to their shop what’s the down side for them?
Good luck with the blogging
Sasha
I have been featured before and as far as I am aware, I have always been asked. I’m always really chuffed if people have found something of mine that they thought was nice enough to go on their Blog.
I would definitely prefer to be asked : )
I think it’s probably best to ask, although I would imagine most people would say yes anyway! I’ve been featured in a few blogs and it’s always lovely to see I got featured without being asked on a Hungarian craft website and am still getting views to my shop from the item they featured, which I don’t even make anymore!
It’s always nice to be asked, it’s free promotion after all so I don’t think anyone would object. Also, the seller you feature may share the link to your blog & you gain more readers & exposure of your craft. Win-win situation!
I also think it’s best to ask first. Some crafters might not want certain items featured if, say, the blog is about ‘things to make / ideas to try’ etc.
Also, if something is featured it’s nice to see it and read comments as it happens. Sometimes I get views in my shop, I go to the blog (I can see from GA) and I can’t find my items. So I have no idea what got featured, how my photo was used etc. Once I contacted a blogger to find out and she couldn’t tell me which item (s) she featured. I thought that was odd since my work didn’t appear on her blog on its own. At that point I felt that she used my work to bring attention to her blog, not to feature me as such.
Keep in mind that any views you see on GA for a folksy shop may not have come directly from a blog, it’s a fun little quirk of GA that if someone sees something from A’s shop on a blog and pops over for a nosey, then gets sucked in by folksy and visits B, C, and D’s shop as well, every shop gets a visit with the blog as referral even though only A had an item included:)
I got featured without being asked on a Hungarian craft website and am still getting views to my shop from the item they featured, which I don’t even make anymore!