With more than 7.5 million active sellers and 95.1 million active buyers, Etsy is one of the biggest marketplaces in the world.
That creates a good-news, bad-news dilemma for Etsy sellers. On one hand, they have access to a huge audience of active buyers, but on the other hand, they are facing fierce competition.
If you are an Etsy seller, you are probably wondering: How do you get your Etsy shop noticed?
The short answer is promotion. To stand out, you need to promote your shop actively. But here’s the thing: that’s easier said than done.
So, whether you are new to promoting an Etsy shop or you had some initiatives in the past, in this article, we’ll cover the what, why, and how of promoting an Etsy shop. Let’s dive in.
Why do you need to promote your Etsy shop?
No matter if you are looking for ways to create a small business or you just want to complement your 9-5 income, opening an Etsy shop is only half the job done. You need to actively promote your Etsy shop to reach the right audience and increase sales.
The only way to succeed on Etsy is to treat your shop as a business and dedicate more time to getting your shop noticed. Some of the benefits of promoting your Etsy shop include:
- Staying top of mind for customers looking for handmade products, gifts, and unique jewelry – By promoting your Etsy shop, you are building brand awareness—so even if buyers are not looking to buy something at the moment, becoming their top-of-mind shop for the products you are selling will bring you future sales.
- Getting ahead of the competition – Being an Etsy seller means you have to be on your toes, always looking at what your competitors are doing—and being better than them. Having better products, faster customer support or a more flexible return policy it’s not enough. If buyers are unaware of your store, all your efforts in creating the best experience go to waste.
- Creating a more predictable revenue stream – Instead of being at the mercy of the Etsy algorithm, you can turn the odds in your favor by actively promoting your Etsy shop. This way, you can create a more predictable revenue stream.
- Attracting new customers and retaining old ones – Promoting your Etsy shop will not only help you attract new customers but also turn one-time buyers into loyal customers. If a customer bought something from your shop in the past (and they liked the product!), it’s very likely they’ll purchase again. That said, you must make sure you get in front of them and encourage them to buy again.
- Getting savings from Etsy’s Share & Save program – Since a significant part of Etsy’s traffic comes from sellers promoting their shops, Etsy has created the Share & Save program, allowing you to save on Etsy fees when you drive your own traffic to your shop and listings. So when you are promoting your Etsy shop, it’s a double win—you get more sales, and you save on Etsy fees.
7 Ways to promote your Etsy shop to boost sales
If you want to promote your Etsy shop, but you’re not sure where to start, here are some ideas, best practices, and examples to get your creative juices flowing.
1. Promote your Etsy shop with email marketing
Having access to Etsy’s regular visitors is great. However, that makes you over-reliant on a third-party marketplace. Building your email list will help you decrease your dependence on marketplaces and regain control over your online business and your audience.
On top of that, the ability to promote your products and create email campaigns based on previous purchases can help you boost sales. The best part is that you can engage your email subscribers regularly without the heavy lifting. By using AWeber for email marketing, you can set up auto newsletters which automatically notifies customers after you list new products.
Etsy shop, Tattge, uses AWeber’s email automation feature to automatically generated newsletters to promote their latest products to email subscribers.
They set up this automation to send an email once a week. This email automatically pulls in the most recent new products that were listed. This is a great way to ensure Tattge never misses a sales opportunity with their existing audience.
Their email subscribers get an update with the latest additions to the Tattge shop, including images, prices, and a link to the Etsy shop where they can buy those products.
With AWeber, you can also get repeat sales with targeted messages by tagging customers based on their purchases. This allows you to send highly personalized messaging, leading to higher engagement, more loyal customers, and more revenue from your repeat customers.
2. Use social media
If you are not using social media to promote your Etsy shop—you are missing out. Today, people spend most of their free time scrolling social media, which creates a perfect opportunity to get more visitors to your Etsy shop. While there are many popular social media platforms today, Instagram and Pinterest are the perfect channels to promote your Etsy shop because they are highly visual and powerful social media platforms.
Instagram is one of the most popular social media platforms today, with over two million global users. The majority of Instagram’s audience (31%) is aged between 18 and 24 years, followed by 30% of users who are aged between 25 and 34 years.
If one of your goals is to grow your Instagram audience to promote your Etsy shop, make sure to post regularly because that helps you get a better reach. Another thing you can test is creating more reels. These short videos are very popular on Instagram and can help you get noticed by Instagram users who are scrolling through Instagram reels.
SoulisticRoot is an Etsy shop for natural bath, beauty, and lifestyle products, which uses Instagram to promote its offerings using high-quality product photography that grabs everyone’s attention.
Another popular social media platform is Pinterest, with more than 400 million monthly active users. Promoting your products on Pinterest will help you drive traffic to your Etsy shop, as 46% of weekly Pinners have discovered a new brand or product on Pinterest.
The platform is based on keyword search—so optimizing your posts will get you more views and, ultimately, more sales. Since Pinterest is also predominantly visual-based, using high-quality visuals will get you more eyeballs.
3. Optimize your Etsy shop
Another way to promote your Etsy shop is to optimize your product listings and improve your chances of getting noticed by Etsy buyers. Here are some of the tips that can help you optimize your Etsy shop:
- Add keywords in your titles – When it comes to Etsy product titles—simple is better. Add keywords in your titles and make it easy for shoppers to see what you are selling at a glance. Making your titles clear will get you more clicks, which will improve your search ranking over time.
- Use tags and categories – Etsy allows sellers to add up to 13 tags to a product listing—use all of them. Unused tags are missed opportunities. Remember to use multi-word phrases and natural-sounding language. Categories can also help you get more shoppers, that’s why you need to be specific. Listing down the most specific subcategories will boost your chances of being seen on Etsy. For example, being specific by using “minimalist earrings” is much better than just using “jewelry.” You can even get more specific by using “minimalist earrings studs,” “minimalist earrings set,” or “minimalist earrings hoops.”
- Focus on high-quality photos and videos – Humans are highly visual beings. We are hardwired to give more attention to visual information. So, if you want to get noticed, you have to create outstanding visuals for your Etsy shop. Creating high-quality photos and videos will not only enrich your Etsy shop but will also give you more assets to promote your shop across channels such as email and social media.
- Incorporate keywords in your listing descriptions – Instead of copy-pasting your title in the listing description box, ensure you write a few sentences that further describe the product, giving customers all the important information they need. Always aim to incorporate relevant keywords in the first few sentences of your listing descriptions.
- Improve your listing quality score – Etsy’s goal is to give customers what they look for while creating a delightful experience for them. That’s why Etsy’s algorithm rewards shops that are pleasing customers. What does that mean? Your product page has to be the answer to customers’ queries. Elements like customer rating, how often your product gets a “favorite” or even a purchase, and pricing can influence your listing quality score and your ranking.
4. Advertise your offerings
You can always go beyond the common ways of promotion and invest a couple of bucks to boost your Etsy shop visibility with paid ads. Based on Etsy’s advertising and marketing policy, there are two types of ads—Etsy Ads and Offsite Ads.
Etsy Ads
You can Increase the exposure of your listings using Etsy’s paid promotion. Etsy uses pay-per-click advertising, and the term “ad” will appear beside your goods in search results. This means that you will only get charged when a customer clicks on your ad.
Offsite Ads
Etsy purchases offsite advertising from a network of providers, such as social networks and search engines like Facebook, Google, and others. Since these providers have a huge audience, Offsite Ads can help you increase traffic and revenue.
The way Offsite Ads work, Etsy pays all of the upfront costs of advertising on the third-party providers, and if that advertising includes your listing, and a buyer clicks on it and then buys from your shop within 30 days of that click, you will be charged an advertising fee.
5. Organize a giveaway
Giveaways are a great way to attract more people to your Etsy shop. You can organize a giveaway by yourself or find another shop that makes complementary products and partner with them for a joint giveaway. That way, both shops get noticed by everyone who wants to participate in the giveaway.
To get more people to participate in your giveaway, use email marketing and social media to spread the word. One of the Etsy shops that uses giveaways to promote its brand is Natural Amor. The seller of natural products, most known for its hand-made soaps, organizes giveaways from time to time as a way to build brand awareness and increase the number of social media followers.
6. Leverage the power of nano and micro-influencers
Influencer marketing has become one of the most popular ways to promote a business. However, despite the misconception that influencer marketing is only for big, well-known brands, the rise of nano and micro-influencers has created an opportunity for small business owners to increase their reach by using influencer marketing campaigns.
The main difference between nano and micro-influencers is the size of their following. Nano-influencers are social media users with 1,000 to 10,000 followers, and micro-influencers are content creators with 10,000 – 100,000 followers on social media.
Because of the size of their following, nano and micro-influencers can help you reach a niche audience more cost-effectively while driving high levels of engagement. PlannerKate is a very popular Etsy shop selling journaling and note kits, washi tapes, stickers, and much more. To promote its Etsy shop, PlannerKate works with micro-influencers that have a very specific audience—planner lovers, which makes them the perfect customers for PlannerKate’s products.
7. Offer a coupon
Etsy allows sellers to use coupons to promote their products. According to Etsy’s advertising and marketing policy, a coupon is a code that can be redeemed for a discount on an item or free shipping. Coupons can help you build customer loyalty by inviting them to shop again from your store or incentivize your social media followers to use the discount and shop for the first time.
Coupons are not displayed publicly, so as a seller, it’s up to you to create, promote, and distribute coupons. You can also create special codes for different channels, such as “Instagram10” or “Email15.” This way, besides offering specific discounts to your social media followers or email subscribers, you can also measure the effectiveness of different channels.
And there you have it—7 ways to promote your Etsy shop, build brand awareness, get in front of a wider audience, and ultimately increase your sales.
Build your email list
Building your email subscriber list doesn’t need to be daunting. Give your customers and shop visitors multiple ways to sign up to stay in contact with you:
1 – Etsy’s guidelines allow you to add a link to your landing page on your About page of your Etsy store and in your Shop Announcements.
2 – Update your Message to Buyers with a link to your landing page. This is a short note that is included in the Etsy order confirmation email that your customers receive after purchasing.
3 – Promote your newsletter on your social media channels. You could offer a discount code for anyone who signs up to your email list.
4 – Include a card when you deliver a physical product encouraging your customers to sign up for your email list. Include a QR code that sends customers to your landing page.
When someone purchases from your shop, they are your customers. So keep giving them opportunities to opt in to receive communication from you and build your email list.
Ready to promote your Etsy shop and boost sales using the power of email marketing? Sign up for AWeber and get started today.