I think a theme that captures an entire seller’s stock is fair enough, IF that sellers stock is pertinent to the theme.
Eg landscapes. If a landscape artist only has landscapes in their stock and every single one is captured by the theme of the day on one day out of 365 - great for them. They sell landscapes, its right that they feature, isnt it? I thought that was the point.
What it objectionable is fake tags, changed purely to match totd when the product clearly doesnt (eg polar bear tag on a floral card). Most of the time though, it looks like a “copy listing” error, with tags not being updated.
It would be nice if folksy had a way of breaking up clumping in the list so the spread is more random, but i truly dont know if thats possible.
120 pages today for ‘handmade jewellery’ which is a fune example why it needs to be more specific tags , its page after page of the same seller items. In the Craft Drop a few months ago and the Shop Early for Christmas, it was limited to 3 items per seller, you could tag as many items you like, but Folksy would only show 3 from each seller, which gives the buyers a much wider variety of items for sell and more exposure to more sellers.
I believe it requires action from support to restrict the three whereas the theme of the day simply needs a daily tag select to be coded. So absolutely understandable why it is not restricted.
Today just shows the complete pointlessness of the Theme of the Day in its current form. 119 pages by 60 items a page. No customer is going to trawl through that lot.
I sometimes tag things “handmade”, as customers may use that phrase to search. I also use the phrase regularly in my listings as it helps with external searches. Can’t remember if Folksy tags are Google searchable (but I think they are on E), but it’s a habit I’ve gotten into to tag everything with at least one tag like handmade, hand crafted or hand sewn.
I even put tags in photo descriptions, even though I know the platforms rename them to numbers or the listing title.
I’m not a fan of the more generic listings, but we have to accept this sometimes happens. This close to Xmas, I can see why Folksy want to give as many people the chance as possible. A jewelry maker that specialises in silver bangles would be upset if the favoured pre-Xmas spot tag was beaded jewelry, or necklaces. And vice versa.
TBH most customers will look at the first few pages, and everyone has a chance to be on those at some point during the day. If I have 2 or 3 items to specifically tag on the day (rather than stuff already tagged) I tend to stagger as relists throughout the day, rather than all at once. That way, I have more chances to be near the front.
The original theory behind the Theme of the Day was to have something different on the front page every day, because it was becoming very stale. Also that ALL sellers would have a chance to be included, as the Featured, Favourites and Gift Guides are just the lucky select few.
In order for it to happen at all it had to be quick and simple to program, which is why it uses the tags that are already on the listings. With a sensible variety across the list of themes, everyone should have a few chances every month. Not ideal, but much better than what was there before.
I’m sure no-one considered that sellers would spend time changing tags! The idea was it would use what was already in place, a quick result for everyone. If today the theme is “clock” and you sell clocks - it’s your lucky day. They should all be there, even if there are 200 of them. There’s no point all the people who don’t sell clocks complaining. Tomorrow they will vanish, and someone else will be on the front page, and that is fair.
Yes of course any system can be abused, and there is nothing to stop selfish people putting irrelevant tags on their items if they really are that stupid. Do they think the customer doesn’t notice? If they put the tag “clock” on their handbag, do they think someone looking for a clock will buy it? Do they think other sellers will help promote it?
The Folksy team has a lot going on, and spending time re-programming this feature cannot be any kind of priority. We can make it work better by making sure the list of themes is as sensible and varied as possible, so everyone gets a fair chance to be seen.
I was very interested to read this from Roses workshop about the original idea of Theme Of The Day, and it means my take on it has been totally incorrect! As a relative newcomer, I had no idea of the history and so just read what it says on the TOTD intro.
As you say, gift guides etc are chosen by Folksy and sellers have no control over what appears, apart from , of course, making sure your items are the best possible!!
TOTD, I thought (wrongly, it seems) was one that you could, in effect, opt into. And yes that meant actually changing tags to match the TOTD tag. And, that means if you have hundreds of items that could be included then it is up to you how much effort you were prepared to put in adding appropiate tags, and your “reward” of how many appeared on the front page would directly relate to the amount of effort put in. That is why, when the TOTD was something like, say, “glass” it seemed unfair to me when someone whose entire shop of hundreds of items were all glass and all already had a tag of “glass” would dominate the TOTD when the seller was probably totally unaware and certainly hadnt put in any extra effort! That is why further back on this thread I suggested something like “TOTDglass” as the tag, so no one would already have it and it would be up to each seller how many items they specifically tagged. So, totally different to what Roses Workshop sets out, saying no one expected people to actually change tags!
But, my view of how TOTD was intended was obviously wrong, and I will be trying to redirect my brain to think of it differently! Am I the only one who has viewed it “wrongly”?
I wasn’t aware of the history either, so in the same boat as you. My “issue” with the theme of the day isn’t the amount of the items a shop might correctly have, but the false manipulation of the feature. A perfect example in the post from @rosesworkshop, is the clock & handbag.
While I found the history bit interesting to know, the TOTD is a feature appearing on the first page of Folksy. Promoting items of a specific theme to customers. No matter how generic it might be, a customer clicking to see glass items for example isn’t expecting to see wood, fabric, or anything else but glass items. This is what the tag said, this is what got them into clicking on the tag. They don’t care about the history, and 99.9% they are not even aware that there is one. I agree, it doesn’t look nice and it is tiring to have lots of pages flooded by one seller (I do give up looking eventually as I cannot be bothered myself), but if it cannot be shuffled or something to give everybody an equal chance of appearing, then as @rosesworkshop already said, it is just a day, the next day something else will show.
As I mentioned before, I personally like the TOTD, it gives me ideas for my tags & the chance to have related posts on my social media and promote is as well, so I would like to see it a bit more “tidy”.
I’m not sure why Rosesworkshop says that was the original idea. ? I have been here For Ever and never came across that ?
And anyway things change over time.
I believe i was the loudest shouter for a Nortification faciltiy.
I was wanting a little in your face short and sweet message area like you get on a shop window, on a sticky tab, when the shopkeeper has to nip out…“gone to the bank, back in 5” sort of thing… something any customer could be guaranteed to see.
Instead we now have an area where some sellers write their life history so it is no use at all really as an Announcement.
With the theme of the day I understood the idea was if you have an item that fits the theme then tag it with that theme, whether or not you already had that tag is irrelevant as long as the tag is appropriate of course for the item. I don’t think it matters if a shop has 100 items tagged with glass if they are a glass maker and good luck if they do as it might be the only theme of the day that fits their items for months. I think the discussion was really about shops tagging items with a theme that clearly isn’t relevant and the high volume on the none specific tags such as Christmas where it might be better to have Christmas cards, Christmas cushion or christmas bauble instead.
In September there is national teddy bear day and the majority of my shop will be tagged but i don’t think it would be fair to say they can’t be because there are 20 of them and I am sure at some point all areas of craft have that one day a year where most of their shop has a turn. A few years ago the tag for Yorkshire day was used and I emailed Camilla to ask how we used that tag and her response was that all of my shop could be tagged as they were all made in Yorkshire. I think the problem is with those that tag intentionally when an item doesn’t fit the theme and the themes that are too generic. There are also plenty of times when items have the wrong tag by mistake, I actually made that blunder recently, the theme of the day was thank you cards, i had just added 6 cards to my Folksy shop and did as others have suggested by copying the listing and changing the relevant bits, I forgot to change the tags on 2 cards which are birthday cards, the blank cards have thank you, anniversary etc in the tags and I didnt remove them from the listing. I realised half way through the day and changed them but it was a genuine mistake and easily done.
Well because that was the original idea when I suggested it Way back in 2018 I think (I’ve been here forever too). I didn’t really expect it to still be there after all this time, but the team have more urgent things to work on.
Just to clarify. If the TOTD is Yorkshire and you then changed your tags on all your items, then that is exactly as I was seeing how it worked. No problem with the fact that then every item would be in TOTD . But that doesnt fit with this “nobody expected people to change their tags” way of looking at it.
By the way I love your bears and would be disappointed if they weren’t all on the front page on Teddy Bear Day!
I like TOTD too as it gives me inspiration for new ideas and boosts my creativity - I’ll pick a couple later on in the month and challenge myself to make a couple of new items that fit that theme.
I often suggest ideas for the upcoming themes (admin ask on here and on the FB page), and I do a bit of research for things that might suit the relevant month, as well as suggesting a couple that would be helpful for my current makes . Of course, not all my ideas get used, but when one does it’s a super nice feeling.
I don’t know anything about the ‘nobody expected people to change them’. I 've been here since 2018 and I’m sure we’ve had TOTD most of that time. I don’t think it matters whether you intentionally change them or not, quite often I see a TOTD when I log on in a morning that is really relevant to my items but which i hadnt thought of, if I have time i go on and add it, a lot of the time I don’t bother and some months I will add them when the list comes out. The idea is that we tag relevant items so that we have a chance of being seen on the front page of Folksy. But yes Folksy said I could tag all of my items as made in Yorkshire so all 40 something were in the TOTD that day and I would also be disppointed if the bears didn’t have their day
As far as I remember in previous discussions about Theme of the Day, Folksy told us that the main aim is that the item should be relevant to the theme. If that is picked up via a tag that already existed, or one that was added because the maker realised that the item fitted the theme but was not already tagged, it does not matter. In the past I have added a tag to an item if I felt it was relevant to the theme. For example perhaps my existing tag had not used the exact words specified eg I might have tagged an item ‘small present’, but the tag words asked for by Folksy were ‘tiny gift’, so I changed ‘small present’ to ‘tiny gift’. At Christmas I might change it again to ‘stocking filler’ if that was the specified tag phrase. As far as I am aware there is no problem with that.
TOTD is useful, and a fun thing to take part in. Yes, a few people do seem to be trying to game it by inappropriate tagging, and there can be clustering - but that is due to mass relisting not adding the tags per se, but generally it works well.
Way back in 2018 I think (I’ve been here forever too). I didn’t really expect it to still be there after all this time, but the team have more urgent things to work on.
