What I Learned from Running My Etsy Store — One Year Later
I tried Etsy for a year and this is how it went.
I’ve had prior experience running a store on a marketplace. Marketplaces can actually be really good for business. They bring together sellers and consumers and the marketplace has a huge audience usually so the potential to earn a lot is there.
My first experience was with eBay. I love eBay because when you sell your product, you get paid instantly via PayPal.
Next was Amazon. I started hitting the ground running with Amazon, dropshipping leggings way back in the day. I earned a little over $2,400 in my first two weeks.
Then, Storenvy was tested. I earned $25 in my first week and a steady $1,000/month a few months afterward. This was the marketplace that helped me set on a path to quit my 9-to-5 job for entrepreneurship.
In between this I tried Etsy here and there but it never quite worked out. I had the most success on Etsy this last time I tried it for a year.
My experience…
My experience running an Etsy store
Etsy is a confusing beast. Confusing for sellers at least.
It’s a marketplace for handmade products. You can get away with some things that aren’t handmade like print-on-demand sweatshirts, tees, hats, mugs, etc.
For the most part though, it’s for the handmade market.
I started selling digital artwork with inspiring quotes.
They had quotes like:
- Girl Boss
- Carpe Diem
- The future is female
I made the artwork pretty easily using Canva. I popped them onto a stock photo picture frame and put them up in my store for a few bucks each. I had dozens of these art prints.
I thought the store was really stunning.
I designed a custom store banner and had all my pages as professional-looking and attractive as possible.
The digital art prints sold a few copies.
All in all, less than a dozen sold and that’s because that industry is so incredibly saturated on Etsy.
If you see the results number in the upper right hand corner of that image above. It says 418,000!
Whew, 418,000!
That means there are over 400K items on Etsy that match or similarly match the search term “digital quote art print” that I typed into the search bar.
That’s a big clue that it’s way too saturated.
You want that results number to be as low as possible because it means you’ll have less competition.
You have to pick something different to be able to succeed on Etsy today. That’s my experience and personal opinion, at least.
I ran that business for nearly 6 months before I pivoted and decided to switch to selling another kind of digital asset, social media templates.
First Etsy Store vs. Second Etsy Store
The first store was digital quote art prints. The second store was Pinterest social media templates and lists.
Here’s a look at some of the type of templates I was selling in the second store (these are not mine, just a clip from search results):
This was in a less saturated niche and I thought I had a nice spin on my designs which would make me stand out. I ended up selling even less of these templates than the digital prints.
You can see the results number here is 467 which is way better than the 400K+ results in the previous niche I tried.
I was selling lists of Pinterest group boards primarily and they were niche-focused. So, group boards for moms, teachers, business, crafting, home decor, travel, etc.
Group boards started becoming less important on Pinterest so that probably contributed to the poor performance in sales, too.
My try at Etsy Ads
I even tried Etsy ads on the second store!
And, I continued educating myself on Etsy as much as possible. I was in Etsy groups on Facebook, I was listening to all the Etsy gurus on YouTube and Tik Tok, trying to improve my results in the store.
I was determined and I knew I could do it.
But, I failed.
Let’s get back to the ads talk a bit.
Here’s how ads work on Etsy (and on many other platforms).
It’s not that you just turn on ads and you can get instant results. Your products have to be good. They have to be interesting to buyers and provoke them to take action and buy.
For Etsy ads to work, your product has to be already selling. It has to be doing well on Etsy and then the ads can act as a boost to amplify your growth.
If you’re not making sales in the first place, ads will do nothing except drain your wallet.
I learned this the hard way.
My results
As you can see from store #1 and store #2, I failed.
While I did make sales and I tried really hard for a year, it was a total bust.
I want to mention that I was promoting on my blog and social media as well so it wasn’t a “set it and forget it” kind of situation on Etsy.
Continuous learning and education about Etsy selling, promotion and marketing, and building brand awareness through my online network were all done throughout the process so I could continue to build up this business.
As I mentioned earlier, I think for Etsy to work, your products need to be unique.
Back in the day, it was a lot easier on sellers but now, Etsy is incredibly saturated.
I saw a YouTube video of a brand new seller do very well, making thousands of dollars upon opening due to her unique product.
She created t-shirts that had a political parody relevant to current events at the time. Her products sold fast and did very well. Her products were one-of-a-kind and unique.
If you have something unique to sell then I think an Etsy store can really work.
Have you been on Etsy? What was your experience?
I hope you enjoyed reading this. If you’d like to support me as a writer, consider signing up to become a Medium member. It’s just $5 a month and you get unlimited access to Medium.
