Years ago, I used to take a lost wax casting class and then sell the charms and pendants I made in my class on Ebay. At the same time, I was selling my work through local art shows and sold wholesale to a few boutiques. Back then, on-line selling was not nearly as big or as competitive as it these days. Ebay, in fact, was just about the only game in town when it came to finding a venue to sell via the web if you didn't have the money or expertise to create your own web site.
Now that is not the case. There are tons of networks (Etsy, Artfire, Zibbet to name a few) where you can set up a shop in minutes. Now, whether or not you sell anything is another story. Since I am a teacher, I get a chunk of the summer off from my "day job," so one of the goals during my summer break was to whip my little Etsy shop into some kind of shape, and along with way, I have found a number of helpful resources so I thought I'd share some of them with you:
- A big deal over on the Etsy forums is to have other people critique your shop. We also do this on the Jewelry Making forum on this site as well. The Etsy Business Tips blog has a post called the "Etsy Self-Service Critique" where you are offered a way to critique your own on-line shop by ticking down the long list of the most common shop issues such as photographs and descriptions.
- Speaking of the Etsy forum, one member included tons of helpful links in one post, entitled (appropriately) "GIANT List of Helpful Links." Obviously, you may not have time to look at every single link in this super long list, but I have found a few helpful items there.
- In the Jewelry Making forum, I post about a very cool site that ranks Etsy shops by sales. Once other members went over there and started looking at the top jewelry sites, many of them supplies actually, this thread started to include some interesting information about whether or not top shops are really "tops" when it comes to making a profit.
- Finally, one of the big issues with selling on-line, no matter if you have your own web shop or are part of a network, is shipping. How much do you charge? How do you figure this out? What about shipping internationally? A blog called Go to Great Panes has a slew of information and related links in a post entitled "Shipping."
Comments
An incredibly helpful set of resources there. I don’t sell via Etsy or any of the prebuilt sites, but even the self-service critique has a lot of useful advice that applies to any web seller.
As a lot of those places mention, photography is key. I want to cry every time I see a seller with great work, but out of focus images. Even with a basic digital camera (or hell, even a cell phone), there’s no excuse for bad photos. Learning how to focus your camera properly is essential and simply picking up the manual would solve 90% of the problems.
http://digital-photography-school.com/how-to-make-a-inexpensive-light-tent has a good tutorial on building a lightbox out of cardboard and paper. I have a similar setup on a bookshelf in my studio and take all my product photos that way.
Thanks for the link. A light box is great for photographs. I got one finally when working on my last jewelry book and kicked myself for not buying one sooner. I got the whole kit, which included some wonderful lights on amazon for about $100. It was well-worth the investment.
Thank you for all of your helpful sites. Those of us out here that are trying to get in are greatful!!!!! Your advise is always something helpful to read. I hope you never stop. Thank you again,
Sally George
Bullhead city, Az. 86442
Thank you, Sally!
Thanks for your article! I’ve been looking for a place to sell my jewelry. I’m going to give Etsy a try!
Good for you Deb. It is a lot of work, but definitely more convenient (IMHO) than creating an entire on-line shop yourself.
I just started to like my work. Im beading for personal fashion now and its going well. I use Persona’s online beading @ http://personaworld.com. Loved the article because I’ve been getting a lot of compliments about my bracelets and might start selling if I can!