Feeling fed up

After starting a new business of home decor after nearly 10 years of jewellery making is making me so fed up i feel like packing it all in…i had trouble with SEO before but did very well with sales despite this…now i am struggling getting seen with what i have made so far…not alot i know just yet, :frowning: but plenty of new ideas in my head :wink: starting over is not easy…any criticism welcomed from my shop so far

I think your makes are beautiful! :slight_smile: You just have to hang in there, it took me ages to start getting views again after swapping from natural skin care products to embroidery. As for SEO I haven’t the faintest, I just try to add simple sentences that I would google :expressionless:

Thanks Donna @RedDragonDesigns…i will keep at it i think as i do enjoy what i do…good luck to you also…and i hope things improve in time xx

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It takes time and a lot of promotion to get your shop off the ground, even more so that the handmade market place is getting bigger - more and more people are opening shops on here and the darkside and that just means we have to work extra hard to be seen. A couple of comments on your shop:-

  1. folksy crops the photos on our shop fronts and in the search results to square - if your shots aren’t square then it trims them and you can loose bits of the item. A few of your items have fallen foul of this and could benefit from a recrop (I use picasa and it has a cd cover option which gives a square shot).
  2. search engines like repeation and prioritise the words in the title and first paragraph over anything later on so looking at your horse tankard the most important info (as the web bot would see it) is ‘Do you love horses…do you own a horse?’ which doesn’t actually tell it what the item is. So you may wish to rework your descriptions to have fewer paragraphs and all the important stuff in the first one. I was told to write descriptions as if I was describing the item to a blind person so remember to include colours, textures, over all theme/ feel of the item, shape, size, what it is and what it is made from - all in that important first paragraph.
    I hope that is helpful and good luck

Thanks Sasha…yes your right i need to redo lots of things…i take big pictures and do straighten them but when listed they are cropped and look real bad…and taking pictures of glass is a nightmare…thanks for your criticism i will give my shop a overhaul this weekend

I feel your pain re photographing shiny surfaces - using a diffuser (large piece of thin white cloth or tracing paper over the light source) can really help get rid of glare but white on clear and reflective like your etched glasses is going to be a real challenge. I had one piece reduce me to tears trying to get it right but it sold within 6 hours of listing and not because of any promotion on my part so it is definately worth the effort of getting it right.

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A tip for Google (if you haven’t done this already) make sure your image names are descriptive of the item before you upload them, then Google will know what they’re of as their algorithm can’t read a picture :slight_smile:

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Not sure what you mean of image names @PaperDaisy oh dear i am going to be busy this weekend…but needs must :wink:

I mean the name of the image file - So when you take a picture and put it on your computer the file might be called DSC0786 or something similar. Change the name of the file to something descriptive. Like “wine glass engraved with rose” or “handmade pink greeting card with ribbons and butterflies” - ya get me? :wink:

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Wow I’m finding it really difficult to sell on Folksy! But I am selling on Etsy and I started the ElizabethJulianah store on the same day. I use the exact same tags!!! Not sure Folksy not sure at all

@Ladpn From what I can see looking at your twitter feed all your promotion points people to your etsy store so that is where you will get sales - if you directed them here you would have sales here. Also currently there is nothing in your folksy shop (the one that is linked to your forum profile in case you have another) for me to look at or potentially buy, you won’t achieve sales (or views) if your shop is empty. Try restocking and a promotional push and folksy might work for you.

Hi Sasha I have another store ElizabethJulianah https://folksy.com/shops/ladpn1 which is handmade clothes even the first one Ladpn for the jewellery did not sell a pin yet the etsy store is selling