Handmadeology

In the second part of Planning for Facebook, we will explore four more categories: Invitation, Promotion, Seasonal and Visualize. They will also help you organize your business and creative information in clear and logical streams for quick and engaging updates when you need to catch your Facebook likes attention.

We all know that maintaining a lively and exciting Facebook page is a great marketing tool for your handmade craft business. So, you create your page, spread the word about it, attract your first likers and then you post your first status updates.

If you are serious about getting your brand recognized, getting your items in the right hands or getting samples out of your items please, please, please make it worth your time and money. Goody bags, basically, if you’re gonna do ‘em, do ‘em right!

One of the keys to maintaining success is the mentality of it. It creates an illusion for not only myself, but those I meet. One of the keys to keeping people thinking about you is to appear to have something no one else has–especially some inner light no one else has.

‘If only a celebrity wore my item or purchased from me… that would get me so much attention and sales!’

As handmade businesses, we want a lot of bang for our advertising buck. I am as attached to the dollars in my Paypal account as you are to yours, and so I’m happy to answer questions about my strategy and share my wins and losses. As handmade business entering the advertising world, we have a few options for cost-per-click ads

Do you have a business blog? Have you considered it, but thought it would take too much of your time? Once you have a blog built, it is fairly easy to maintain and if you are simply using it to help build your brand, you can post as few as 1-2 times per week, however, you may find that you enjoy it so much that you choose to connect with your readers more often.

Meet Roselle of Etsy shop Seaside Rose Creations and how she found her niche! Her shop transformed into perfection when she mixed her painting skills with shabby decor and collectibles.

Decision paralysis is when there’s a decision that needs to be made, like where to start on making your wreath patterns, but there are so many choices that you get stuck, not knowing which choice to make. So you do nothing. You stop. You become stagnant.

I really enjoy finding a new purpose for something that would otherwise have gone into the trash. Either for protection of my workspace or for working it into my creation, potential garbage turned purposeful really makes me happy.

Get to know Amy of Funamals. This is a tale of painting at an early age, and her love for animals helped her achieve doing what she loves to do! She makes custom pet portraits, and fun animal watercolor paintings. Her work appears on other items such as necklaces, greeting cards, and water bottles!

This is for anyone who has an idea, a passion and a desire to do something that scares them. My advice? Start small, start somewhere, start today.

Many of us selling handmade are trying our hand at Twitter. Us noobs have looked up “Twitter Etiquette” in an attempt to “get” the 140 character limiting social network. There are some typically common threads of advice we’ve run into. The two main ones I’ve come across are thus:

If you have been in business a while or are getting yourself together to begin on Etsy, craft shows or through some other means, you need to be mentally and physically ready for the challenges and rewards ahead.

Starting out a crafting business can be scary. Most of us start online through an Etsy shop (or something similar). A great way to gain exposure for your company is to showcase at local craft shows and fairs. It’s an opportunity to network and give customers a chance to see, smell touch your products.

Etsy has jumped on board the Pinterest bandwagon and has now placed a ” pin it ” button on every listing page.

It’s pretty slow for retailers right now, in stores and on-line, no money left to be spent, no traffic. You can keep yourself busy taking back holiday returns, marking down the leftovers, and preparing for your fiscal year-end inventory, but there isn’t much business to be had. T

January is the prefect time to sit down and make a list of business goals for your Etsy shop for the new year. Whether you want to take the leap with a new products or are looking to grow your existing product line, planning out what you want to accomplish can help you stay motivated and on task all year.