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Seven Ways to Get Creative With Your Marketing

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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

Six Quick Things You Can Do To Make Your Blog Spiffy

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Photo Credit: BoomChick - Click the Pic and Visit Her on Etsy

If you have an Etsy shop, you probably have a blog. How’s it looking right now? Spic and span? Or is a little housekeeping in order? Here are six quick things you can do to instantly improve the look and feel of your blog.

#1 – 14 is the new 12

No, not dress sizes, sorry. Font size. More and more people are reading blogs on smaller and smaller devices. Boosting your font size up a couple of points will also boost your readability.

#2 – Go mobile

Speaking of small devices – adding a mobile theme to your blog is really easy. Your blog will automatically detect if someone is using their phone to view your blog and switch to a mobile friendly layout.

For WordPress I recommend the WPTouch plugin (it’s what I use). On Blogger, go to your dashboard and select the “email & mobile” tab. Then click “Yes, show mobile template.”

#3 – Spring clean your sidebar

Ads, badges, blog bling – it all has its place, but if it’s flashing and moving and spilling down your sidebar it’s distracting your readers from your main goals. Time to declutter!

Prioritize your sidebar and keep only the things that make you money or increase your readership and social proof. Highest priority should go to your email newsletter form, social media buttons, sites you’ve been featured on. Don’t forget to link to your Etsy shop.

Other people’s blog badges don’t make the grade in my book. But if you want to be a nice, other-people-promoting blogger – dedicate a whole page to blog badges and link to it in your sidebar or top navigation bar.

#4 -Don’t harsh the bloggy buzz.

In the blog world, there’s nothing worse than reading an awesome post and having to go through the bloggy version of airport security before leaving a comment.  Gag! CAPTCHA and other spam catchers that make the reader do the work – these are total comment killers.

Spam comments are equally annoying for the blog owner, so the Askimet plugin for WordPress is totally worth the 5 bucks a month. Blogger has an automatic spam filtering system where they send suspicious comments to the spam box and your readers won’t see them. Google rolled this out last year, pretty much making CAPTCHA unnecessary.

#5 Get in the left lane

I don’t know how the center-justify craze got started, but I am on a one-woman mission to end it once and for all! For the love of Pete, please left-justify your blog post content. I know that centering everything is super fun and cutesy, but it is sooooooo much harder to read.

Because I didn’t want this point to just be a peevish rant, I asked my optometrist (ok, so he’s also my husband) why reading centered text is so hard. Here’s his professional take:

Centered text only works well for listed items, where they eye isn’t doing any back and forth motion. When you are reading sentences and paragraphs, your eye wants to go back to the same place on the page each time it starts a new line. Since centered text starts in different places the reader ends up losing their place and getting frustrated.

#6 Try some fun web fonts

Have you discovered Google Webfonts? It’s super easy in Blogger – they’re right there in the design tool. You can also download them and use them in Word or Photoshop.

WordPress is a bit trickier…but if you are dying to know how to install them, let me know and I’ll make a post. I use them for my headings and subheadings and I used them for a blog overhaul I did for Constant Chatter.

 

Filed Under: Blogging, Etsy, Social Media, Uncategorized, What Not to Do

The Hermione Granger Guide to Creativity

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Photo Credit - Nan Lawson Illustration on Etsy

Hermione’s charm as a smarty-pants, know-it-all gets Harry out of more scrapes than one. And it’s all because she took the time to read Hogwarts, A History and just about every other book in the library.

As a blog writer and online business owner, the challenges you face won’t threaten your life but hitting a creative roadblock will certainly threaten your business.

Unlocking the power of endless ideas

If you are struggling to come up with blog posts or product ideas or are feeling down-right uncreative, the very best thing you can do for yourself is to drop everything and read.

Reading has a magical way of unlocking your thought processes. Not only are you stimulated by the material but it opens your mind to new ideas and greater possibilities.

Part of the magic lies in removing yourself from your current dilemma or the stress of running a business. Solutions to your problem will flow through unexpected channels when you are focusing on something else.

Some of the best methods for unlocking a never ending stream of ideas are:

  • Reading something outside your normal genre: If you’re a craft blogger, try reading some personal finance or business blogs. If you love fiction, try an autobiography. Different schools of thought open new and fresh ideas faster than staying with the same old stuff.
  • Read a variety of media: Try the newspaper, magazines, online publications, books – gather them all up and notice the different styles and approaches to delivering material to their audiences.
  • Read something purely for fun: Escape into something you absolutely love and where all your cares will evaporate as you soak in your favorite story. When you return to the real world your refreshed mind will be ready to race right past the roadblocks threatening you.

Trust me, you have time

There’s a difference between not having any time to read and not making the time to read. Did you see President Obama’s reading list for his summer vacation? It was massive. If he can find time to read, then so can you.

For those times you really struggle to find a few minutes to sit down and read, try:

  • Keeping a book on your bedside table and reading for 10 minutes before you go to sleep
  • Listening to books or podcasts on your iPod when you clean house, make dinner, commute
  • Reading a chapter-book to your children

 So…what are you reading? How is it making you more creative? Can you guess what I’m currently reading?

Filed Under: Blogging, Creative Process

The Secret Recipe to Blogs that Sell

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Blogs are a lot of work. Blogs take a lot of time. Blogs require dedication. Blogs can drive traffic to your shop. Blogs are not a tell-all of your innermost thoughts, feelings, hopes and dreams.

Well, not if you want to actually sell your craft, they aren’t.

If you are running a blog as part of your marketing scheme no one cares what you ate yesterday. You’ve got to give readers a reason to keep coming back.

Heaping spoonfuls of value

A good portion of your readership is creative people. Speak their language with tutorials and crafty ideas they can try at home.

If you become a resource, people will [Read more...]

Filed Under: Blogging, Uncategorized