I’ve been on Folksy a good few months now but don’t seem to be reaching the right audience or tbh any interested audience. I’ve been tweaking my shop details and price but so far no sales. I’m only hoping for one or two sales a month as what I do so far is just a hobby. Please can someone have a look at my shop and see if you can spot anything obvious where I might be going wrong.
My shop is called: CareCrafts.
Saying all that, love what Folksy is about and see what amazing things sellers are up to.
Hi, Rob. I am new to Folksy but have been in business for 9 years. You have lovely items but the description is short and only 3 photos for the listing that I looked at. Can you expand a little more, if possible, how else could I use the bowl if I don’t want to use it for fruit etc with a few more lifestyle photos perhaps.
Do you use social media or Pinterest to drive traffic to your shop?
Like you, I would be happy with a couple of sales per month, but have yet to achieve that level! Folksy is great, easy to use and very friendly, but sales tend to be slow.
I would thoroughly recommend taking part in the Daily Listing Challenge thread, it is quite a committment, but I did get some sales. Apart from that it is great fun, and you get to know other sellers. If that is too much of a committment, then posting on other forum threads will also get you known amongst other sellers, who are potential buyers too.
I like your items - something different! I agree with Sarah - use all photos and description. Also, the huge price reductions might be a turn off to buyers, implying goods might have been grossly overpriced to start with, which doesn’t make for confidence in a seller. Just a thought.
Wishing you all the best, and hoping that elusive first sale comes soon.
Sales are currently slow for everyone, even for those of us who have been with Folksy for over ten years. Sales are not what they used to be. Unlike you this is my business and a lot of time and money has been invested, like so many other business sellers. It’s very worrying.
welcome Rob…love your items..they are fabulous and I love the idea of using old magazines etc.
I am a seasoned ( old) seller on Folksy, so here is my best advice.
Keep adding new items as often as you can. As I always say, if you pass a shop on the high street ( if there are any left…lol) you look in the window…if you go back the following week, look again and see the same items, ( and the next week etc), you will stop looking.
By adding new items all the time ( not a lot all at the same time ) , people will keep going back to see what is new.
ALSO, every time you add a new item, you get on the folksy front page for a short while…and therefore get more chance of being seen by visitors.
Liz is correct…when you have enough items…( you will need 30 ish), join the daily listing challenge and sign up for ONE month.
it IS hard work but generates sales because we all click to like each other’s items and every time you get someone to click on an item, again, you get on the front page. It takes a while but really IS worth the effort.
If you cannot manage the challeng thread, keep going on the forums so that people will get to know you and visit your shop…after all , until I saw your posted thread, I didn’t know about you, so you need to get visible
ALso, it takes a while to get those illusive first sales…it took me 3 months to get my first one and I now have over 2100 sales…SO stick with it…keep making and enjoy the process…
WHat you make is brilliant…and I am sure people will soon find you and start buying from you.
Hi Demelza, thanks for your reply. I’m so sorry to hear things are slow for you at the moment, especially as you rely on. Hope things pick up really soon for you. x
Thank you so much for what you have said. It certainly feels like I have joined a lovely community on here via Folksy. I’ll look at my shop again and try and have a fresh look. I’m not sure I’m read for the challenge yet, maybe in time. Thanks again, for your lovely message and feedback, it’s really appreciated. xx
I’ve been active here for around 5+ years now and think I’m doing well if I have one sale a month. To be fair, I don’t spend a lot of time promoting at the moment because I’ve kind of lost the will to live with Instagram and the like as their algorithms have become much more about seeking out entertainment for their audiences and I don’t create that type of content, nor have the desire to.
Fortunately with 13 years in business, I have a base of loyal customers that come to me for custom makes for niche items (knitting accessories mostly) and custom gifts. My other shop on E*** (we can’t say their dirty name here) does much better for me, mostly with the US audience.
Sad to say but I think that many new sellers are in for a real uphill battle to get seen unless they happen to hit a super hot trend or invent something that becomes one. The handmade market has been flooded with new makers since the pandemic as well as copycat tat from the big mass market sellers like Temu and it’s harder than ever to get seen by the people who are actually buying (you can’t underestimate the economic situation most people are in where buying is on a needs rather than wants basis). Some people on here say that in person craft fairs do much better for them, which kind of makes sense to me as most people who go to these things have already half committed to spending a little something before they set off, even if they don’t admit it to themselves Of course it depends on finding the right event for your particular makes and making sure that the overheads still make it worth your while. Many other makers that I follow seem to be doing in person events now more for promotion rather than making much of a profit from them.
Anyone who can master Pinterest and videos on Instagram, will have a better chance I suspect. I bet lots of folk who follow handmade would be really interested to see how you create your pieces, for example. Pinterest is stronger as a place to be found right now than Instagram I think, although it is littered with that copycat tat I mentioned above.
Reading that back, I’ve sort of depressed myself! Fingers crossed, Trump will soon be out of office and someone will overthrow Putin - we can hope…
I completely agree with that assessment. I’ve been on Folksy for about 8 years. The last year or so has been very slow and I do well to get one sale a month now myself. Like you, my E*** shop does better, but the bulk of my sales are now happening in the “real” world: Markets, fairs, exhibitions and commissions that I’ve secured mainly through word of mouth. I’ve discovered that my most recent online sales only happened through attending markets. The buyers took a business card and purchased online later (they chose to do it through E rather than Folksy, but at least I got the sales!). If the cost of living situation improves, online sales may get a renaissance, but I’m not holding my breath.
The other thing I’ve discovered at art and craft fairs is that the buyers and browsers who attend are becoming more discerning. They have told me they feel they are more likely to find genuinely hand made at a market as opposed to online; some people are becoming wary of AI and cheap online products. This may explain why many sellers (including me) are experiencing an uptick in market/ fair activity and sales. Indeed some have purchased online after inspecting my wares at a market!
I feel that platforms such as Folksy need to do much more to reassure prospective buyers about the quality and origins of the products. Maybe a degree of curation is now required to provide that reassurance.
I’ve been on Folksy with a variety of different shops since they opened. You won’t ever make a living here but if you are OK with a few sales every so often, it’s a nice place with some lovely people and Folksy staff are very helpful. I think for those of us who do this for a living, Folksy is just an added extra we use for the reasons stated.
Try to add some emotion to your listings, giving reasons why people need your products. Also your heading should include what they are made from. Be more detailed. It’s good you have a photo of yourself, but perhaps showing you at work will have a good effect on sales from a psychological point of view.
My main product line consists of inexpensive, handmade decorative boxes. One of the best ways I have found to generate new sales is where the prospective purchaser can actually see and handle the product in the flesh as it were. This obviously happens where you have your own stall but, for reasons associated with my other work, this has now become very difficult for me to manage.
So I am heavily reliant on the mail order channel through Folksy which can only provide photos and text descriptions for each item. I have started using Facebook and Instagram and will gradually build this up. But I really want to be able to offer people the chance to hold one of my boxes and decide on that basis whether they are worth buying. The target market which could offer the best chance of success is other crafters, who could use my handmade boxes to add value to their own products. So I want to be able to offer prospective purchasers on Folksy a free sample of my products. This would obviously not be viable for items with a significant price tag but one of the few advantages my boxes offer is that their relatively low cost makes offering a free sample possible without huge expenditure. I could, for example, use the Showcase category to offer a regular free sample of one of my boxes. It would look just like any other item in my shop, except that it would have zero cost and zero postage and there would be no requirement for the ‘purchaser’ to do anything. They could use it for a gift, for the sale of one of their own products, give it to someone else, or just thow it away if they didn’t want it. My question is, therefore, would this be acceptable within Folksy’s rules.
I would caution you against offering free samples. People can behave oddly when it comes to free items, some people give negative reviews if they haven’t received a free item they believed they would get with a purchase, and some people leave negative reviews if they simply didn’t like the free item itself. You need to bear in mind that if you are offering a free item on Folksy, the listing will be treated as any other paid item and the “buyer” will have the ability to leave a negative review if they don’t like it. I wouldn’t take that risk.
x
Of course it depends on finding the right event for your particular makes and making sure that the overheads still make it worth your while. Many other makers that I follow seem to be doing in person events now more for promotion rather than making much of a profit from them.
Hope you sales increase soon too. x