In this article, you’ll learn how to sell on Etsy, from setup to getting your store ready to launch. Not only that, after reading this article, you will be able to create a store that looks professional, and attractive, and has a high chance of success.
Before starting I will tell you 2 facts:
- If you just open a shop, it’s very easy
- But for the shop to be successful, it’s not easy
You may be interested in selling after seeing a store that has hundreds or even thousands of sales on Etsy, then you are amazed. Or hearing that earnings on Etsy are huge. Either way, if you’re a beginner who just wants to jump into Etsyland, then this is the right guide on how to start an etsy shop for you.
What is Etsy?
Etsy is an American buying and selling website, launched in 2005. There is a big difference between Etsy and other buying and selling sites. Etsy only allows sellers to sell handmade, vintage, and supplies items. This is where artisans from all over the world gather to sell their products. So if you plan to sell dropshipping products, Etsy is not the right place for you. Read On To find out how to start selling on etsy!
Getting ready to sell on Etsy
1. Define one store niche (no more)
If you already have a product to sell, please proceed to the next stage. You might think this stage is trivial, just choose a niche, what’s so difficult. This stage is the most important in preparation.
Just imagine: You want to start a business, and you already know the area of business you want to explore, but once you start making sales it turns out that no one is interested. Eventually, gradually you get bored, then stop in the middle of the road. That’s what often happens to new entrepreneurs. love for an idea makes us forget whether other people will be interested, need, and want to buy something from us or not.
This is the process of starting a sale that is wrong but often done
- Find an idea
- Turn the idea into reality (in the form of a product)
- Directly open the shop
- Selling
80% of people who start this way will fail.
Preparing products and opening a store costs a lot of money.
The process that should be passed
Before starting to shop on Etsy, we need to know if something you have to offer is of value to other people so they will want to exchange it for money.
Hint, answer this question:
- Who will you be selling to? (target market)
- What can you do to get their attention? (marketing)
- What can you sell to them? (product)
Still confused? Let’s use the following example!
My target market is people from the upper class, aged 40-60 years with an income of 100 million per month. They are the owners of luxury apartments, hotels, and houses. After doing some research to find out who your target market is, find the biggest problem that might exist.
A hotel cannot only contain beds. Is not it? There must be other objects needed to beautify their room. From here we can get an idea of the products that we will sell later.
Next, explore ideas from your thoughts (brainstorm). Guess what they need so that the room is comfortable to live in. If I want to make decorative lighting products so that their rooms are not dark. One problem is solved. If I want to make a painting product so that their walls are not too plain. Please brainstorm the rest yourself.
In the business world we know a saying like this: “If you try to sell to everyone, it’s the same as selling to no one.” For some reason, most new entrepreneurs do not believe in that saying. They say they want to get a lot of buyers at once, so their target market is “everyone”.
At first glance it makes sense, but in the end, the marketing is not effective. Because you are the person who knows best the product you want to sell for the long term, it is clear that you have to solve this problem yourself. At this stage, our main goal is to find a profitable business model by making the desired product.
What have you learned at this stage:
- Who do you sell your product to
- What do you sell
Now you have an idea about the shape of your business and its targets. In the next stage, we will cover SEO Basics.
2. Understand the basics of SEO
If you’ve ever done a product search on Etsy, you’ll have seen a list of the products most relevant to your search. Not just Etsy. Google and other marketplaces are the same. Etsy sorts search results not randomly but based on the level of relevance and quality of a store. There are many factors that Etsy uses to determine which stores appear on the first page. This is what lies behind SEO.
What is SEO?
SEO or Search Engine Optimization is an attempt to optimize a website for search engines to get a better ranking in search results.
SEO basic concepts
Etsy is a product, they want other people to be satisfied with their service. Users want the best stores relevant to their search to appear at the top of the list. That’s why Etsy always wants to show the best results for every keyword that a user enters. So the essence of SEO is to make your shop the best for the keywords you want.
To be the best at what?
- Products presented
- User satisfaction (User Experience/UX)
- Store popularity
- Shipping price
can I do SEO by myself?
Many people or companies offer SEO services, but you can also do SEO yourself. With the various SEO guides provided for free on the internet, you can self-taught and apply it yourself. You can save money by doing the optimization yourself.
What should I learn at SEO?
There are several key components to SEO for your Etsy store, these components will determine how well your store is SEO.
This is what you need to learn to master SEO so that your store can rank at the top.
- Title
- Categories
- Attributes
- Tags
How to Get Potential Buyers to Buy at Our Etsy Store?
If your product is really good, potential buyers will not mind paying expensive shipping costs and waiting a long time until they get your product.
What if my product is normal? If you want to provide free shipping, this could be the best answer.
But impossible, right? Therefore we will provide cheaper shipping costs to our prospective buyers. The trick is to give them a “subsidy”.
Subsidies, what do you mean? Here’s how: Let’s say I make a bag with a capital of 8$, and shipping costs to America using EMS (Express Mail Service) are 17$. Then I sold the bag on Etsy for 20$, with shipping to America at 5$. It’s the same, the money we receive is 25$.
But potential buyers will think this is a pretty reasonable offer because they get cheaper shipping costs. This is called trick psychology. So the subsidy here means adding some shipping costs to the products that we will sell later, the goal is that buyers get cheaper shipping costs.
