Where thinking has lead me

by Natalie 1 Comment

I’ve been trying to decide what to do with this oh-so neglected blog. I’ve been thinking and thinking about it for a very long time.

In that time I’ve come up with no fewer than 52 thousand ideas.

Thing is, I’m not so great at the follow through part. Making things even more difficult — not all of those ideas play well together.

When I started this blog my part-time job to kid ratio was 3:2. Now it’s 0:4. That’s no jobs, four kids. My sanity is saying it needs to become a 1:4 deal, cuz that would still leave some time for the gym. Mama’s got to have her gym time.

Absolute Truth Time

In all of my thinking I’ve come to rest on a few ideas that stand out as overriding principles. Things that are me to the very core.

Nerdy little me thinks email marketing is awesome
I am a crafty little maker of things
I think talented crafters should capitalize on their abilities
Crochet is my crafty passion, though I occasionally dabble in other arts (but if a sewing machine gets involved there’s bound to be some profanity)

And if these things are truly part of my core, then they should be part of the blog. Minus the cussing. Because really, I’m not a swearing kind of a gal.

So…

I’m going to post more often. Posts about crafty things. Posts about crafty business things. Posts about crochet. Posts about how to make your business grow. Posts about how to get along with Facebook and Etsy and Email Marketing and Pinterest. And probably a few random posts about nothing at all.

Hope you’ll join me.

Filed Under: Blogging, Etsy, Musings

3 Steps to More Repeat Customers

by Natalie 1 Comment

This year at Moxie Tonic there’s going to be a lot about email marketing. And when I say a lot, I mean, A LOT!!!! That’s because it’s one of the easiest and cheapest ways to market your business. And it’s one of the most proven methods; meaning…it actually works.

There’s also been a really exciting new development in the world of email marketing and Etsy. My favorite email service provider (the one I use myself), Aweber, is now offering some really cool email integration options for Etsy sellers. They’ve been kind enough to provide a post about the exciting ways you can use email to grow your business.

Check it out…

3 Steps to More Repeat Customers

Etsy has made it super easy for creative people to start their own business selling their handmade goods. But just because you know how to make something fantastic out of some cloth, doesn’t mean you know how to market it and grow your business.

Your goals for marketing will most likely revolve around attracting customers and getting repeat sales from customers. The easiest way to do both of these is through email

So what you need is a plan to get started on the right foot…

1. Get Customers To Become Subscribers

In order for you to email, you need a list of people to email to, right? And in order for you to get the most out of your email marketing campaign, you need to make sure you only add people to your list that are actually interested in your business. There are a couple ways to make this happen.

First, you can use an app to integrate Etsy with your email service provider. This will make it so when people purchase from your Etsy shop, they will also receive a confirmation email asking them to join your email list. This makes it easy for you to encourage customers to stay loyal to your store.

Another option is to put a sign up form on your website or on your Facebook business page. If you plan to offer coupons and discounts for email subscribers, you can let visitors know on this form as an incentive to subscribe. Most email service providers allow you to create sign up forms that can be easily added to your site, or will host a page where you can direct to.

2. Choose Your Shop’s Email Template

Unless you’re at the point where you can hire a marketing manager, you probably don’t want to spend too much of your time creating emails. This is where templates come in.

Most email service providers have pre-made templates, along with tools that allow you to customize them for your store. For example, here are two templates offered by AWeber.

Some tools will even allow you to connect right to your Etsy store, and you can select which products you want to feature and everything drops right into your template.

Once you’ve set up your store’s template, you’ll only have to spend minutes adding and changing the featured products before each send.

3. Set Up A Schedule

The only thing left is making sure your emails get out to their intended recipients!

An email service provider will let you schedule emails for the future and even set up a series of emails to go out at the intervals you choose.

Remember to communicate your planned schedule with your subscribers. If they know when to expect your emails and how often, there won’t be any surprises and they’ll want to stick around. A schedule isn’t mandatory, but is your subscribers don’t know what to expect, they may not like the uncertainty.

If you haven’t tried email marketing yet, now’s the time! Email brings in more conversions than social media or search engines, and it’s easy to do. Your customers will no longer go off and forget about your business; they’ll get your up-to-date information and offers so they can keep buying from you again and again.

About the Author: Crystal Gouldey is an Education Marketing Associate at AWeber, the leading email service provider for small-to-medium businesses. Crystal’s spent the past three years teaching email marketers how to optimize their campaigns. She currently writes for the AWeber blog, which you can visit for more tips on marketing with email. Sign up here to get tips straight to your inbox.

Filed Under: Etsy, Marketing Plan, Uncategorized, Why Email?

The Blooming Baby Blanket Giveaway

by Natalie 2 Comments

Dying to make this fun little blanket? Win the pattern for free!!!

Just enter the contest through the form below. The drawing is open until Wednesday night, 11:59 pm, MST. Winners will be announced via email on Thursday morning. Good luck!!!!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Filed Under: Uncategorized

Your #1 Weapon Against Copycats

by Natalie Leave a Comment

It’s full on summer vacation at my house. And amid the laughing and the splashing and the good times, there’s a fair amount of yelling, fighting and the mother of all annoyances – copying.

Nothing one brother does angers the other faster than copying. It’s kind of funny to watch as the person being copied starts to smolder (and ultimately explode into a ball of rage) as his individuality is threatened.

Even as adults we need to be one of a kind. Only we can’t punch someone in the nose anymore when they copy us, or worse, copy our source of income.

I know you want to, though. I know I do.

But here’s the thing – what does it accomplish? Unless you have a copyright or a patent on your work, you have very little true recourse.

It stinks, I know. But since you can’t do much here’s what you can do:

Stop caring. Seriously.

Harder said than done. But if you spend all your time wringing your hands and scouring the web for the copycats – then they have won twice. Once when they stole your idea and again when you spend time hunting them down.

Your #1 Weapon is You.

You – your mind, your creativity, your skills — you are the only thing a copycat can’t duplicate. They can pick apart your photos and mimic your final product, but they don’t have the ability to come up with the next great thing.

You do.

And that is why it’s not worth wasting precious time and resources squashing the imitations. The real money is in your ability to develop the next best thing.

Take Steve Jobs for Example

Apple, arguably, makes the best computers on the market. But hundreds of other companies make a pretty decent computer for about half the price.

So Steve Jobs gets Apple working on a revolutionary way to carry around your music. And while everyone is out trying to make iPods Jobs moves on to the iPhone. While the rest of the world scrambled to make their phones as smart as Apple’s, Jobs again wowed the world again with the iPad.

There’s no way Apple’s sitting on their duff while everyone else makes tablet computers and starts eating their market share

The point is, people steal Apple’s ideas but regardless of the copycats, the company continues to thrive because they keep innovating.

And that’s what you have to do too. In your creative business you win against the copycats when you keep creating:

Put together the newest colors and styles.
Develop new options or come up with something altogether new.
Offer unparalleled customer services and a personalized buying experience
Shape customer demand by offering a product so remarkable, they never knew they wanted it, but now they can’t live with out it.

And when your competition copies that idea (and the will), blow them off and spend your time coming up with the next great thing for them to copy.

Filed Under: Etsy, Uncategorized, What Not to Do

Are You Making the #1 Pinterest Marketing Mistake?

by Natalie Leave a Comment

So, Pinterest…perhaps you’ve heard of it?

This handy site is the best thing to happen to creative entrepreneurs since the invention of Mod Podge.

Amazing, easy organization
Simple, accessible sharability
No prose required
Pictures rule the day

But as great as Pinterest is, far too many pinners are leaving money on the table when it comes to using Pinterest as a marketing tool.

Your Two Pinterest Hats

If Pinterest is part of your online marketing plan, then you have two important roles to play.

The first is curator.

This is when you get to gather amazing, beautiful photos from around the web and curate them onto your boards building an overall impression of your style and artistry. This attracts followers who connect with your style, which in turn builds your authority as someone with incredible taste, which of course increases your sphere of influence as you gain more and more followers.

You are already rocking the curator aspect of Pinterest marketing.

Next, you have to be an actual marketer – one who has a plan to capitalize on Pinterest authority, one that’s going to get a return on investment for her business or blog.

Here’s where it gets a bit dicey. The actual value you get from Pinterest is hard to quantify. You can’t really say, “100 people repinned my photo and therefore, I made 5 extra sales.”

What you can say is, “100 people repinned my photo therefore, I’ve had 100 marketing impressions.”

Well, you can say that IF your images aren’t buck naked.

Real Marketing Impressions vs Fake Ones

Marketing impressions only count if a viewer can easily connect an image with your name. The more times they make the connection the closer you bring them into your marketing sphere of influence.

If a fellow Pinner can’t make the connection between the photo and your business, you are missing out on the biggest opportunity Pinterest can provide.

Put Some Clothes On Already

Dressing up your photos for Pinterest is really, really easy. First you have to decide: what are you marketing? Your personal name, your business name, Etsy shop or blog? It really doesn’t matter what you use, just pick one and use it consistently.

Next, make sure every photo is identified with your name. Do this in two ways:

Put your blog/business/shop name in the title of the photo. When people pin your photo the title automatically fills in the pin description, tagging your photo with your business name.
Add a watermark or logo directly to your image, this way you are protected in case some overachiever adds their own pin description and erases your name.

If you want to see exactly how to do this, watch this quick video and then join the fight against bare Pinterest photos by never pinning another naked picture.

Filed Under: Etsy, Marketing Plan, Pinterest, Social Media, Uncategorized

Where I’ve Been, Why I’m Back & Where We’re Going

by Natalie 2 Comments

I’ve been an absentee landlord to this blog – checking in every now and again, but not making any updates or improvements.

Maybe you noticed?

Or not.

Either way, I have a really good excuse…

Not long after I started this blog and this business I started feeling crummy and spent a lot of time staring into this lovely pool of water.

By the time I started feeling better the corporate world came knocking. In exchange for my time and expertise they promised me untold fortune.

I didn’t realize my heart and soul was part of the bargain too.

It should have been a fun project, but after having tasted how much more rewarding it is to work with creative entrepreneurs it was hard to muster the same level of enthusiasm for the business world as I had in the past.

I made a vow. No more B2B, no more big companies, only small businesses run by creative entrepreneurs.

When my commitment to drudgery finally ended, the reason I spent the summer staring at the toilet arrived; via crash c-section, the little stinker.

The poor little guy really didn’t stand a chance. He came home at the height of RSV season to a house full of brothers – brothers that are kind and loving and doting and really, really good at sharing. Ten days after we left the hospital, we went back for another five.

Thankfully he made a miraculous recovery – just in time for me to realize I was the mother of four children,

and then,

and then….

But now I’m back. And it is going to be pretty awesome.

I’m focused. And I’m here to help you and deliver what this blog has always promised – sound marketing advice so you can create and sell and build your business and achieve your dreams.

Here’s a little taste of what’s new and what’s coming:

A refreshed About Page.
New social media button styles in my Etsy shop.
New ways to bring me on board as your marketing partner.
New posts coming every Wednesday, (starting today – but check back tomorrow for a bonus post – you won’t want to miss it, it’s about Pinterest).
A step by step guide to getting your items on the first page of Esty search results (without having to buy ads).

What else do you need help with? Now’s the time to ask…

Filed Under: Uncategorized

Seven Ways to Get Creative With Your Marketing

by Natalie 6 Comments

You’re creative, but is your marketing? Are you just doing what you see others do or are you infusing your message with a flair of its own — one that fits you, your style and your product?

Reaching outside the proverbial box is a great way to connect on a deeper level with your fans. It will draw the people who really get your products.

Take a look at your Facebook posts, your emails, your blog posts. Are they dry? Where could you spice it up and add some life and some of you? Because after all, that’s why people buy from crafters and artisans – they want a piece of you. Here are seven ways you can give it to them.

1. Product Listings

Yes, describe, but also inspire the sale with your enthusiasm for your product. My sister-in-law briefly opened a shop selling fabric-covered earrings. She listed a gingham pair that she described as a picnic for your ears. Probably my all-time favorite listing.

2. Twitter

Are you an auto-tweeting machine, or do you let your hair down a bit? Don’t be one of those listing-only Twitters. If you are going to be on Twitter, be sure to hop on there and link to others and share more of you than your shop.

3. Facebook

Most people are pretty good about being themselves on Facebook. Once you have your first 25 likes don’t delay in getting your own URL. It makes it so much easier for linking because it is simply www.facebook.com/your-user-name. Here’s a tutorial on how to do it.

4. Pinterest

I’m so in love with Pinterest. I’ve never been able to keep track of all the cute ideas I see on blogs and Pinterest is the answer! There’s not a lot of marketing pics to pin out there (thank goodness!) so anyone who follows me is going to see more of my personality and style than my marketing credentials.

5. Your Shop Banner

I saw the best, most effective shop banner the other day from featured seller Rich Neeley Designs. It’s simple, it’s effective and invites you to take action. You better bet that Moxie Tonic’s shop banner is going to take on some of those qualities…email me if you want one for yourself.

6. Communications with Customers

Do you go into auto-pilot when answering emails and convos? Yes, you’ve answered the same question 32 times that week, but it’s the first time your customer or prospect is getting the answer. Whenever a seller gives me a personal response, with a thank you for my interest in their product, it immediately warms me to them and makes me more willing to open my pocketbook too.

7. A Little Note

Speaking of thanks – do you include a little thank you or a hand-signed note with your shipped products? It’s such an simple touch, but again, it’s those little things that help people feel like they are buying from a person instead of a big business.

Filed Under: Blogging, Etsy, Marketing Plan, Uncategorized

The Secret to Becoming a Craft Fair Diva

by Natalie 1 Comment

Craft fairs are perfect for so many things! If you are an online seller adding holiday craft fairs to your business plan can

Build a local clientele
Develop loyal relationships with customers
Show you how people react to your merchandise
Help you get a sense of what sells and what doesn’t
Move a lot of product in a short amount of time

But…

If you’ve ever tried selling at a craft fair, you know there’s always that possibility that you’ll sit there all day long and never even make your booth fee.

I’ve had booths where I’ve sold tons. I’ve had booths where I’ve sat there all day. I’ve also worked closely with craft-show promoters and organizers and seen what goes into making a truly great show.

Having seen both sides of the coin, here’s what I think:

Half of your success depends on you and your product.
The other half depends on you picking the right show for your product.

Making Yourself Into Top Seller Material.

Unless you sell food (soup mixes and veggie dips) you’ll never be the top seller at a show. Those vendors do big, big business since their product has universal appeal. But these few easy (and one not so easy) steps will go a long way to boosting your sales.

Have an amazing display:

Just like you slave over your product photos on Etsy, you should put extra care and attention into your booth display.

Skirt your table to the floor (it looks pretty and it’s functional since it covers up your boxes of extra product)
Fill in empty spaces with seasonal decor (but don’t get so carried away that it distracts from what you are selling)
Bring in extra light, lots and lots of light! (strands of Christmas lights are perfect for illuminating dark corners)
Create a variety of levels to display your merchandise with shelving or boxes draped with tablecloths

Wrapped up pretty:

Attractive packaging goes along way to attract the sale. Little touches like cellophane bags and professionally printed labels are indications that you sell a quality item, made with care and attention to the smallest detail.

Dress to impress:

Avoid the desperate salesman look. No one likes to buy from someone with even a hint of desperation. It’s way more fun to buy from someone who looks successful. There’s something reassuring about it. So dress up – even if the show is in a VFW hall that hasn’t been updated since the Great Depression – and look like you could be selling at Tiffany & Co.

Picking the Right Show for You

Not every show – even really big, highly attended shows – are right for you and your product. You will greatly increase your chances of doing well if you hunt down shows that attract the right clientele.

Assuming you make hand-crafted items and don’t resell anything, these are some things to look for in a show:

A jury process
An absence of resellers and direct marketers
Longevity
Strong advertising presence
Recommendations from other crafters

Shows that jury their vendors and adhere to a strict policy of hand-crafted items only are the best shows for you. They have built their reputation on being curators of excellent merchandise and have a loyal following among buyers willing to pay for quality workmanship.

If they’ve been around a while (I like to see 10 years or more), if you’ve seen their advertising around town (on street corners, in the newspaper, etc.) and they come recommended by other crafters, chances are this is a solid show.

Ultimately, paying a booth fee and potentially a commission is a gamble – a bigger gamble than listing online. But if you do your research, you’ll reduce your risk and increase your opportunities for selling lots and lots of your stock.

Your challenge this year as you shop at craft fairs is to scout out which shows meet the criteria. Find out who organizes and promotes the show and be ready to contact them after the New Year. Some of the best shows fill their shows in the springtime. Happy craft-fair hunting!

Filed Under: Creative Process, Etsy, Marketing Plan, Uncategorized

Tutorial: How to Add A Linky Button & Box to Your Sidebar

by Natalie Leave a Comment

This is another post for my fabulous Etsy shop customers who are dying to know how to add their linky button and make it connect to their site. It’s a lot like adding social media buttons, you just need a few basic pieces of code.

Step 1 – Get what you need

There are two basic parts to any code that hot links an image to a web page:

Your image
The URL for the page you want to direct people to when they click on it.

Start by visiting the page you are linking to and grab the URL from the browser bar. This could be your Etsy shop, your blog home page, a specific post on your blog, your Facebook page, etc.

For this example I’m using my Etsy shop.

I also need to tell the browser where to find the image for my button. Where you host the image will depend on your blog platform.

WordPress

In the Dashboard go to “Media” and “Add New”
Choose “Select Files” and highlight the file name of your button.
Once it uploads, copy the “File URL” onto your clipboard and “Save All Changes”

Blogger

Blogger is a HUGE pain in the rear because it doesn’t self-host the images. That means you have to use a photo sharing site like PhotoBucket, Picasa or Flickr. Each one of them has a different process for uploading and finding the link. I think the easiest to use is PhotoBucket – so if you’re not wedded to a site yet – open a PhotoBucket account.

Once you upload your image to the photo sharing site, you need to find the “File URL.” This is in different places on every single site. A lot of times you’ll have an option to “Share” your photo – the file URL is often found there (like in this example from PhotoBucket).

Even though I can’t tell you where exactly to find your image URL, there is a fail safe way to know if you’ve got the right one:

Once you have the URL, open a new tab or window in your browser.
Paste the image URL into the browser bar and hit “Enter”
If you have the right URL, your image will appear in the top-left corner of the window.

Step 2 – Build Your Code

Now that you have the Page URL and the Image URL – you are ready to build your HTML code. It’s the same for WordPress and Blogger and any website in the world.

Get to where you want to have your button appear – if on a sidebar you’ll want to edit a Gadget or Widget – you also need to be in HTML mode.

Now all you need to do is cut and paste this code below:

<a href=”YourWebPageURL“><img src=”YourFileURL”></a>

After “href” – paste the URL you are linking to in between the quotation marks. Make sure you leave the quotation marks there – they are part of the code. Do the same for your image after “src”.

It will look something like this:

<a href=”http://www.etsy.com/shop/moxietonic?ref=si_shop“><img src=”http://i1177.photobucket.com/albums/x347/moxietonic1/MoxieTonic_ADButton.jpg“></a>

When displayed it will look like this:

Step 3 – Adding a Linky Box

Now that you know what pieces of information you need to customize the link and the image, you can cut and paste this code, which will make the linky box appear underneath your button. Just substitute out the fillers for the Link and File URLs and you ‘ll be set.

<center><a href="YourPageURL" target="_blank" title="Click to link to ENTER YOUR PAGE TITLE HERE"><img border="0" src="ImageURL" alt="Title of your Image" /></a></center>

<center><p><textarea rows=”4″ cols=”20″ name=”Button code-source” readonly=”readonly”><center><a href=”YourPageURL/” target=”_blank” title=”Click to link to YOUR PAGE TITLE HERE“><img border=”0″ src=”YourImageURL” alt=”Your IMAGE title” /></a></center></textarea></p></center>

My code would look like this:

<center><a href="http://www.etsy.com/shop/moxietonic?ref=si_shop" target="_blank" title="Click to link to Moxie Tonic on Etsy"><img border="0" src="http://i1177.photobucket.com/albums/x347/moxietonic1/MoxieTonic_ADButton.jpg" alt="Moxie Tonic Button" /></a></center>

<center><p><textarea rows=”4″ cols=”20″ name=”Button code-source” readonly=”readonly”><center><a href=”http://www.etsy.com/shop/moxietonic?ref=si_shop/” target=”_blank” title=”Click to link to Moxie Tonic’s Etsy Shop“><img border=”0″ src=”http://i1177.photobucket.com/albums/x347/moxietonic1/MoxieTonic_ADButton.jpg” alt=”Moxie Tonic Button” /></a></center></textarea></p></center>

And it’s going to render like this:

Trouble Shooting

The image won’t display

The number one cause of this problem is failure to get the right URL for the image. Test your URL in a blank window – if it doesn’t pull up your image, you’ve found your issue.

Go back to your photo sharing site and look at your sharing options. Make sure you are only sharing your image, not the album. If you cannot find a URL for your image, try right clicking on the image and choosing “copy link location”. You may not have that exact option (it depends on your operating system), but you’ll have something close.

The link doesn’t work

This happens most often on Blogger. For whatever reason, Blogger will add extra symbols to your URL that break the link. Go into your Gadget and “View” the HTML code. If you see a bunch of numbers and percent signs after your URL – delete the entire url and cut and paste it again. The clean-looking URLs – like http://facebook.com/moxietonic – is what you want to strive for.

This same thing can happen to the Image URL – so be on the lookout.

If these two suggestions don’t solve the issue, send me an email with your code and I’ll take a look at it.

Filed Under: Dose of Code, Tutorial, Uncategorized

Halloween Printable – Free and Shareable!

by Natalie Leave a Comment

Are you a last minute crafter? A brightest-fire burning kind of a planner?

I totally am. So while most crafty sites have been sharing Halloween goodies for a month now – I’m just finally getting around to it.

Today I want to take a break from the marketing and promoting and instead I want to have some fun!

So I made these printables that I’m going to use for the murder mystery dinner I’m hosting tonight and the cupcakes I plan to make with my monkeys this weekend.

Candy Nugget Labels

Ok – I have to admit on this one I’m going to tear my hair out. I’ve been trying forever to make sure this printable will print right on any format. This is my first time doing a free printable and obviously there is a little secret that I don’t know about.

Free Halloween Printable for Candy Wrappers

But when they do work – they are very, very cool!

So here’s the pdf: HalloweenLabels_MoxieTonic

And here’s a Word doc: HalloweenLabels_MoxieTonic

All you need is Avery Labels 48860 (1″ by 2 5/8″) and a bag of Hershey’s Nuggets.

Halloween Cupcake Toppers

I can, however 100% guarantee that these will print perfectly. Yippee! The circles are sized for a 1 1/4 inch circle punch (there’s a tiny bit of bleed so you don’t get any white edges) .

I used Stampin’ Up’s scallop punch for the backing, but any punch 1 1/2 or bigger will work.

Download it Now: HalloweenToppers_MoxieTonic

Have a happy and safe Halloween!

P.S. If you are dying to be serious today, you can catch my post on Finding Keywords for Etsy Relevancy Search over at the funnest little party site – CatchMyParty.com.