I send out emails about 4 times a year to existing customers
I offer promo codes to Facebook viewers, and by email to customer base
I’m now trying to push things so they are back up to previous numbers, I need to be earning more from my shop, so any advice you can offer would be gratefully received.
Do you only use Facebook? I find Instagram better for driving sales. I also use Twitter and Pinterest and find them also effective. I find Facebook more useful for local sales. Though I’ve never done anything ‘promo’ so can’t speak for how that works on social networks.
But the more social networks you’re on the more people you’re possibly driving to your shop. Regardless of how many posts you put on Facebook, Facebook will only allow so many people to see it anyway. So the more you can reach out the better.
I don’t do anything like emails because personally if I received anything like that I’d just delete it- unless I’d given serarate permission to receive them.
Erm…yeah sorry none of that is particularly profound! Haha
As @curiousseagull says it’s all about promotion really, how you are reaching not just existing customers but new ones too. It’s what many of us shop owners find really hard to be honest. There is #folksyhour on Twitter tomorrow eve, 8-9pm, and we’ll be talking about how to find new customers. It’s hosted by Camilla at Folksy and we all share tips and ideas so might be worth joining in?
I’d be very careful about emailing your past customers as there are new EU wide laws that say you have to first ask your customer if they’d like to be put onto a mail list and make it so that at any time they can opt out of receiving emails. Otherwise it’s considered unwanted advertising eg Spam and if a people complain to their emial service provider you’re email address can be ‘Black listed’ and blocked as a spammer.
As already said you need to promote more than just rely on facebook as facebook only show a tiny percentage of your followers your posts. This is simply because facebook wants our advertising revenue.
You’ll need to promote often and as in as many different social media platforms you can find.
Join in with those of us who promote each other in the Showcase part of the forum
try using twitter (I’m not that keen on it so don’t do much on there but it’s still useful)
Pinterest
Craftjuice
google+
wanelo
instagram
tumblr (I’ve not tried this one myself as yet)
The more places you promote the more people you will reach as not everyone is going to be on all social media sites so bascially you’ll be casting your net further and wider.
I notice your descriptions are just copied and pasted which is not good for a Google Search. Google see’s it as spam and will push your further down in a google search. I would suggest changing up some of the sentence, a bit, change some of the words between your listing descriptions.
Hello Lindsey, I’m sorry I don’t have any advice as I’m in a similar boat. I’m struggling to get any visitors to my shop at all. I’m on a few platforms (Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram) but struggling to just get a look in at shop. I realise I need to fill the shop with more stock (currently working on new stuff) but it’s the getting to grips with social media that I think needs more work. Best of luck to you and your shop! Grainne
That’s a really good point Eileen @EileensCraftStudio! The other problem is that, as we’re mainly ‘one man shows’, there’s only so much time you can devote to promotion - we have to make time to actually make things (as well as do everything else!).
Promoting is extremely time consuming isn’t it. I find I do more of that than making and creating
Sometimes I let my promoting slip abit and sales slowly ebb away… I’ve just started to get a grip again after Christmas and it truly is hard when your a one person small business…
I guess we don’t think about the social media side of things or realise their importance until we take the plunge to open a shop. It’s all a big learning curve which ever way we start and while many of us are skilled in crafts we’re not all technologically minded. I’m sure we’ll all get there.
Interesting ideas. I guess I had thought that being on Folksy, they advertise and promote the site, so we would get some organic traffic that way. One of the reasons I use Folksy is because it should offer us some visibility. And historically it has for me, and maintained sales. As it gets bigger the onus is more on us to self promote.
I work in the tech sector, so am fine with tech, and understand social, etc (I use FB and Twitter, I think it’s good to choose a couple and do it well). But one of the reasons I create handmade items is to get away from working at a computer screen all day. But if, like some of you have said, you actually end up doing more social than making I begin to wonder where the balance has gone.
I think I need to review SEO some more. And try to connect with media types with larger followings, to piggyback off some of their work on social. I want to maintain some handmade time in my day. But I do also need to address the reality of selling it too. Investigations continue.
I do a 2hour yoga class on a Tuesday night, and it clashes with this #folksyhour. A real shame. But the yoga is for long lasting mobility and sanity so can’t be moved. I might just make the last section, or could at least look at conversations people have had. Thanks for the info.
Have you worked out where did your previous sales come from before? What parts of the year? Whaty products? What was the client base like? What did you do to get those sales? I think you should do this in-depth analysis first and see if there are any trends.
Also, bear in mind that there are people out there who do not like or use social media. There are many other ways to promote your business that don’t require the use of social media.
I think these are really wise words, and I should do as you suggest. Have a good look at the analytics and where sales come from. good advice. Thanks BelaFarCrafts.
Hi, I know I always bang on about photos (they really are crucial to success) but I think having a good look at your images and perhaps brightening some up and looking at creating a particular style would help.
Maybe think about creating a standard background and set up for all your pictures so you can get the lighting bang on every time. Also a little tweak with photo editing software to brighten pics will help.
Often people who sell cards and notebooks create little lifestyle scenes -
here’s a good example from a fellow Folksy seller who uses props to add interest to the image
or this one where they have used roses as props to catch attention
when you look at the images in this shop as a whole you see how it all looks bright and hangs together.
Not suggesting you copy this but think of a way to display your own products in a setting that suits them and your unique style
