Day 21. Shop Cohesion

Last few days I was really busy with Mother’s Day giveaway event activities. However, I have to admit, this is very rewarding and I really enjoyed reading your comments. This is the most exciting part - check new comments and new posts first deal every morning. THANK YOU!

Now it is difficult to get my mind back to research mode and today’s title – Shop Cohesion – put me to shock at first. Good for me that Lisa explained it very well: “Shop cohesion refers to the overall presentation of your online storefront. When a visitor lands on your (or any) website, their mind develops a first impression immediately.”

I do not think I know a person who would argue with that statement. The question is how much freedom do we – Etsy tenants – have? Technically, my shop’s home page filled in automatically with my products and my job is to arrange them in a most harmonious way. Is that it?

I can also develop a nice banner which is shown at the top of my shop’s page. I think it is supposed to be in the same style and color theme as the rest of my designs. Honestly, I think if I have to do it myself, I simply cannot make a lot of mistakes there, because banner design as well as my product designs reflects who I am. Well, it does not guarantee that a lot of people are going to like it, but I think it is OK. This is part of the deal of being an artist :-)

So if a customer likes what she sees in my shop, she may want to know a bit more about myself. Perhaps, even become friends on facebook or follow me on twitter. And I’ll be happy to tell my story and make a connection – there is “About” page in my shop, which can really help:

https://www.etsy.com/shop/SoMeJewelryShop/about

Day 20. Build an Email List.

The whole idea of collecting email addresses seemed a bit outdated to me. We are living in the time of big internet and social media and I can follow my favorite people on twitter, become friend on facebook and read everything they would like to share instantaneously. So why bother with emails?

The only explanation I could come up with is it has a better “delivery warranty”. I feel like if I have something really important to say, a big announcement or perhaps a few words about closing my shop (just joking!) how can I be sure that people I care the most – my customers, of course – will read it? I’m personally following hundreds of people on twitter, but I check my news feed only (!) a couple of times per day. So there is really big chance that I can miss something important simply because the number of posts in my feed is measured in hundreds per day! Emails, on the other hand, usually get more attention and therefore could be trusted for a message of extreme importance. I’m not going to abuse it, of course, but I feel that I need this “priority” service.

I started looking for a simple email service, but could not find anything better than what Lisa has recommended: Mail Chimp. Basic service is free and it allows registering multiple mailing lists. It also generates nice subscription forms, which could be placed in blog or facebook. I have to admit though, that as of this writing it does not really collect emails, but I have already contacted them and hope this issue will be resolved soon.

Mother's Day Giveaway

In order to show my appreciation for all the amazing mothers out there, I'm doing this giveaway! You may start entering today - just click on the form below to like my Facebook page and share my giveaway on twitter!

Set is made with Swarovski Crystals, Lampwork Beads, silver plated chain and ear-wire.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

This giveaway will run from NOW rough the April 28th, and the lucky winner will be chosen by random.org on April 29th, 2014. The winner will be announced here, and he or she will have 48 hours to respond with his/her mailing address. If a winner cannot be contacted or does not respond, another winner will be chosen after 48 hours.

This giveaway is open worldwide.

Have fun and good luck everyone!

Best finds of the week! Easter

Easter immediately brings to mind colorful eggs and chocolate bunnies.

But Easter means much more....People celebrate Easter according to their beliefs and their religious denominations.

I have to try to make such a beautiful egg:

Easter Egg Decoration - Nice Tutorial!

What a great idea for gifts for children

DIY Easy Cardboard Easter Basket

Are you ready for a party?

Many recipes for Easter

Just love it!

Easter Animals Finger Puppets

Oooooo....

Easter Bunny Hat and Diaper Cover

Happy Easter!

Day 19. Use Keywords Wisely.

OK, I think I got it. Search engines help us find information online, which means they help my customers to find my shop. So I’d better help them to help me :-) The best way to do it is to use proper keywords, because keywords are used to communicate with search engines like Google. It immediately raises two problems I have to solve: what keywords to use and how to use them.

Let’s start with the list of keywords.

Of course, there are many places where you can find tools to keywords analysis. One of the easy to use, and understand and also free is Google Keyword Tool: https://adwords.google.com. It has all bunch of different reports and even suggests its own “keywords ideas”. It is cool and really interesting.

I noticed that more popular keywords are specific. For example, instead of using “bracelet”, keyword “ men's bracelet” produces better results; “pearl necklace” seems to work better than a generic keyword “necklace”.

But how to identify exact wording which will be used? How someone is going to search for a new jewelry piece? I have not cracked that one yet. I think I will keep experimenting and keep an eye on the google’s tools. One thing I know for sure, no matter how much I want to see my listing on a first page of the google search results, I want to keep all my listing titles relatively short, meaningful and may be even funny; I do not want to include all my 20 keywords in the title only to help boost the search results.

Day 18. Boost Your Online Reputation.

Online reputation “is a combination of history and experience”. It makes sense and this is so natural – “bad” businesses do not stay around for a long time. How to distinguish between good and bad? I think customer’s experience determines that. So, the longer I’m in business, providing good customer experience the better my reputation. The real question though is how to boost it.

I think Etsy is doing quite a good job helping business owners to boost online reputation by allowing and encouraging buyers to leave feedback. More than that, usually this feedback will be posted without shop owner’s approval, which makes it much more valuable for other buyers. It definitely helps.

Lisa suggests using special phrases to help users notice best sellers: “You can help your customer find social proof on your business by using phrases such as, “best-selling,” “back by popular demand,” and “previously sold out” on items that have a history of doing just that. “ It sounds interesting and I’m going to try it. For instance, I have tutorials and kits which will be good candidates for this. Also some of my bracelets are relatively simple and I have sold quite a few items of some of them:

TUTORIAL Stylish bracelet