Etsy Holiday Boot Camp 2

Hi :-)

Okay, so the second part of the Etsy bootcamp is out, and the challenges are a little harder this time.

The first part was to brainstorm new product ideas. This article shows what sort of things will be popular this holiday season. I was super happy to see that 'things with a writable surface such as chalkboard items' were included in the list. Currently my range includes necklaces, brooches, cufflinks and rings. Over the next few weeks I'm planning to expand into bracelets and earrings, as well as a super-adorable homeware idea that I've had.

Christmas gifts also featured heavily. I'm going to be hard at work promoting my fun handmade jewellery-filled Christmas Baubles. They were already featured on Cuteable this week, but I think they might be getting lost in a sea of things tagged with 'Christmas'. I need to work on getting them seen by more people. They've had such a great response, I feel so blessed to be part of the amazingly supportive Handmade community x
The next challenge was to find which items are your most popular. I know that my chalkboard jewellery has the most views as they were featured on a large craft website last week. I checked out Craftcult to see what tags people were using to find my items. Pretty much the most popular tag people are coming to my shop under is 'PINK'.

I also discovered that although I tag all of my items 'UK', not one single person found an item in my shop using that tag in the last week. I'm concerned I might be wasting a tag on that - something to think about.

The final part of the week's bootcamp was the hardest part for me - Find a Bootcamp Buddy.

I'm quite shy...and to be honest, this 'reach out to another Etsian' thing was a little scary for me. I guess that's the whole point of doing something like this though...

Anyway, after much searching I have found the most perfect, adorable, supportive buddy! Lucky me! Alterity is a fellow jewellery maker residing in the US who uses collectible antique and vintage buttons to make fun, unique pieces. She has such a great little niche! Here are a few of my favourite things from her shop...

Pink N Black Charm Bracelet - $84.00

Check out the awesomeness of the buttons on this bracelet - black and pink is one of my favourite combinations.

Pewter Floral Antique Button Earrings - $17

So cute to wear daily, and the antique buttons are not damaged in any way by her techniques - so clever!

Okay, so goals for the week are:

• Finish prototypes for new chalkboard pieces
• Get baubles in a big crafty blog or magazine
• Add more *pink* things - I have a new design of embroidered jewellery going up this week, keep an eye on my shop because they are the sweetest, most fun things I have made this year, in all shades of pink, purple and turquoise.
• Talk to other UK Etsy sellers to see if the UK tag is bringing in more views/sales for them
• Build new friendship with fun holiday bootcamp buddy :-)

I'd love to hear your experiences and new learnings from the bootcamp so far. If you link me in the comments I'll be sure to check out your bootcamp blogs -I'm also interested in hearing whether you thinking tagging 'UK' is worth it.

Hope you are having a super-efficient day, I'll be back tomorrow with some fun new embroidered cards that I'm ready to show the world :-)

Katie x

Front Page Excitement

Hello lovely readers.

I have some excellent news. I was on the Etsy front page this morning!! Lovely Becci (from Momentsbymartha) took a screenshot for me (as did posh_doodles from flickr - thanks guys!) and here it is:

Can you spot me? I'm the centre of the bottom row, with my fab splodgy rings. You can purchase yours here. I'm so pleased! Seriously, I was jumping out of seat. The rings have received 20 new hearts and my shop has got 13 new admirers. Being on the front page has certainly boosted my creative flow, as a whole bunch of ideas came to me today sitting at my desk at work that I can't wait to get working on! I got paid today from my regular job, so I'm probably going to buy a printer so that I can print my own packaging. I love the idea of packaging and have been having some ideas for it recently, so I'll show you what I come up with!

Had some Etsy people round to my HOUSE believe it or not! Snapdragonbeads, momentsbymartha & lovealittle from the Handmade Oxford team came round to stuff the goody bags. I've been begging, stealing and generally hassling crafters across the world for their promotional items, samples, business cards and general stuff for weeks now, and had a huge pile of it in my living room. The girls came over and we filled the goody bags, they really are going to be a highlight of the day. Each has a bunch of business cards, notecards, earrings, phone charms, magnets, bookmarks. I want one myself, and I've been looking at the stuff for weeks! We'll be giving them out free to the first 200 people through the door to the fair, so you should most definitely make the trip and come along on the day, stop by my stall and say hi if you do! You can check out photos from the bag-stuffing day here, and don't forget we are still accepting promotional items, cards and anything you would like to be included. These bags are going directly into the hands of people who buy handmade, so don't miss out. We'll also be sending a number of bags with the best bits in to buyers for a number of high-end retailers, so it really is a great opportunity. Leave me a comment if you want more information, or you can email me at cakeadaykatie@hotmail.co.uk.

Hectic Week

My Dad had my teenybobble this weekend, so I was meant to be relaxing. Getting up at 6am every morning is still a daily shock to my system so I had a great sleep on Friday night. I went to the craft shop on Saturday and got some new square bezels, and talked to the guy about putting up a sign for the craft fair that I am in the process of organising with a few fellow Etsians. You can find out more information, sign up, and find out the latest goss at the blog and our brand new flickr group. We are still accepting table reservations, although Jewellery spots are now filled.

Also, in regard to the craft fair, we are working hard to have some great promo bags to hand out to customers. Our minuscule advertising budget is being stretched to breaking point in order to buy up some cute reusable shoppers, but we need to fill them. I have offered myself up to be in charge of receiving the goodies, and we have had loads of interest so far. We really want to make these bags a great promotional tool for Etsians and Folksy users across the globe, so I thought you might interested in a few tips for sending in promos.

• Contact me directly for the address. I'm just reluctant to put it out here in the public domain, but send me and email to cakeadaykatie@hotmail.co.uk, flickrmail me or convo me on Etsy and I'll send you the address.


• Quality is preferable to quantity. We will be using every single promo we receive (provided it has not been damaged in the post or have some hideously obvious flaw) however, you will reach customers more with 10 fab samples, than 100 badly printed flyers.


• You may choose to include: a small sample (a teeny pot of something, some earrings or a charm, a little notecard, any tiny doodad!), a coupon for money off at your online store, a flyer or business card. If you do decide to use more than one of these options, please remember to keep everything nicely bunched together. A whole load of plastic isn't very economical, but a little paper bag tied with a nice ribbon, or some other way of packaging to make it like a weeny gift for the bag-getters could really boost your business.


• I will be photographing each batch of promos that I receive. Bags will be carefully co-ordinated to include a range of samples and business cards. Don't freak out if you can't afford or don't want to include a sample, business cards can be just as good!


• Any bags left over (although, let's be honest, who would say no to a free bag stuffed with goodies?) will be donated to the next UK Team craft fair.


• We don't need to receive the items until mid October, but remember, this is international shipping we are talking about. I wouldn't post any later than the end of August from the USA. A couple of people have said they are going to start filling a flat-rate small shipping box between now and then, with little samples and anything else they find that may promote their business, this is a great idea!


• If you have any further questions at all, please do not hesitate to contact me. I check my email religiously throughout the day and night (I have a baby - I'm up at totally random times!) and I will endeavor to respond quickly.

I know this is a bit of a meaty entry, but just a couple more things! I have been designing and thinking hard about the direction that I want my jewellery to take this week. I have created these fab rocky charms, they look great as a bracelet, plus I used one to make this gorgeously girly-rock necklace. Check out that platinum chunky chain!

I'm going a bit wacky, and currently these are ONLY available in my brand-new Folksy store. I have yet to get a sale on this fab UK-based Beta site. If you are my first sale, I'll throw in a cute ring free of charge - so you should definitely get shopping!

Folksy

Folksy is a brand-spanking new site for crafters to sell their wares from a UK standpoint. I think this puts us UK crafty types in a stronger position than before, as we have somewhere to purchase our wares under our own currency.

The thing is, I'm not sure that it's a great idea to split my selling up anymore over different websites. I did apply to Trunkt but was rejected, which dented my confidence slightly. I mean, at least four of my last Etsy sales have been Ukers. If they no longer bought from my Etsy site, I wouldn't be featured in Pounce, or the Time Machine on there, plus my sales total wouldn't go up. So I'm not sure. What I might do is use Folksy, but increase my prices slightly on there. I have been thinking of doing this anyway, but the extra work that it takes to maintain a whole extra selling site is definitely worth the extra 20p or so that I'm thinking of adding to my prices. Then, I can keep the Etsy prices low and hopefully still encourage sales there. Of course, all this will be pretty irrelevant when my website launches in September, but I still hope to use Etsy and Folksy to get my name out and about in the crafting community and also try out new prototypes of things to sell in batches.

I think that will work out fine. So, basically, if you decide to treat yourself something kitsch and colourful, it is definitely better to do via Etsy. Unless you fancy doing in via Folksy. See? I am all confused now.