I am pleased to introduce you to etsy’s latest advertisement from their new “truth in advertising” campaign:
Truth in Advertising
I kid, of course. Etsy would never be a part of anything that involves honesty!!!
First, before I get started, I would like to recommend that those of you who have had issues with etsy contact the Better Business Bureau of New York and file a complaint. It’s not like etsy will care, but it is best to have these complaints recorded!! Please take a few minutes to file, as they record these complaints for our fellow consumers to review! Save others from the hell we’ve had to endure…
So, I have been reading up on some of the latest etsy-alternatives and learning tons from various sources, but mostly from this awesome blog.
I’ve been working on setting up shop on ArtFire.
So far, I am happy. I’ll share some pros and cons based on my experience so far.
- They have a beautiful studio interface which is reasonably customizeable.
- They have amazing Customer Service.
- They encourage a positive atmosphere and aren’t reliant on favoring suck-ups
- Their integration with Google Product Search and Amazon Wish List is amazing!
- They allow as many tags as you wish
- Titles are far less limited, allowing more detail – allowing for better search engine visibility
- Descriptions, promotional text and inventory are much more simple and
- Integration with Google Analytics rocks my world. You can see where everyone is coming from! What is working and what is not, and they allow you to view this in full detail.
- The studio set-up is much more intimate and customizable than etsy’s generic bullshit
- Payments are integrated with PayPal, Google Wallet, Amazon Checkout, as well as an optional paid credit card merchant account – should you choose.
- They have easy-to-use, simple widgets which allow for simple promotion and integration with your own URL or your blogs with a quick checkout process which makes purchasing simpler for buyers.
- I’ve barely gotten to know them and I am falling in love… I will add more as I get to know them better
- I have had a few questions and got a super-fast response from a very personable customer service representative… something you would NEVER find on etsy.
- You can post an unlimited amount of items
- They have an area for your gallery of past items so you can showcase those that you’ve sold, and are proud of, but are no longer available. I love this 🙂
- They assist with SEO
- Promotion options rock!
So, there are some negatives, although none of them are comparable to the cons you’ll experience with regretsy
- Adding products is a bit tedious.
- They don’t have any way to export your items to an excel spreadsheet or another marketplace.
- They don’t receive nearly enough traffic… but, some word-of-mouth advertising can change that!
- I’ve been on there one month and I have only made 2 sales. That is significantly lower than the sales I was making when I was on the shit-hole, however, I have experienced far fewer customer issues!
- The graphics on the main page seem a bit amateur (which may only annoy me as a designer).
Overall, my experience has been awesome (other than the tedious listing process). The cost for my shop is $11.99/month, but they have other alternatives.
I have also dabbled in the marketplace known as Supadupa.me
My experience with them was short-lived, as it is rather expensive and low-traffic, but I will describe below.
- The interface is AWESOME. I absolutely love it!!!
- Adding new products and variants is super simple
- You have many different themes, which are all customizable, to choose from
- They allow complete html customization
- They have different price tiers to choose from
- Their customer service was fast, responsive and polite.
Of course, my experience was short-lived due to a few reasons
- There was absolutely NO traffic. I received no views, no sales… nothing.
- Promotion options were confusing
- html customization was confusing (and I am a web designer)
- The fees were quite a bit high, even on the lower end of the scale
I wouldn’t necessarily recommend it, but that is only my personal opinion.
**Update: Since I wrote this blog, I was contacted by the awesome folks at supadupa.me who gave me some great tips on marketing my shop. They were sincerely concerned for the success of my boutique and that gives them major bonus points in my book. Thanks, guys!
I have begun to sample ecrater and storeenvy. Both of which offer free boutiques to users!
So far I have enjoyed working on StoreEnvy, but it’s a bit soon to make any educated remarks (stay tuned!!)
eCrater also seems like a nice place to live, but I am just in the beginning stages of my review (more to come soon!!) They’re both simple to use. The interface is less tedious than ArtFire, ad eCrater seems to get a lot more traffic. I am looking forward to getting a bit more established so I can report!
I am aware of Big Crater, Silk Fair and Shopify, all of which are not free and I have yet to sample. Please share your thoughts and experiences with any of these online marketplaces if you have used them, as I would love to hear which you think is the best!! And if I missed any. I need to find a new comfy home for my boutique!
Thanks all! I look forward to hearing your thoughts!
ineptsy 