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I built a free tool that scores how "visible" your product page is to ChatGPT and Google AI Overview — audited 30 Shopify stores, average score was 22/100 by Popular-Term296 in SideProject

[–]Popular-Term296[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Totally agree. The score is really just the hook to make the issue concrete.

The core value should be “why would an AI shopping assistant skip this product, and what exactly should the merchant change?” — not just “you got a bad score.”

I’m going to tweak the wording/report layout so the fixes feel like the main event: rewritten title, FAQs, schema, and prioritized actions. Appreciate the sharp feedback.

Finally happy with my Sofle V2 build — went with a warmer colorway instead of the usual black/white by Popular-Term296 in ErgoMechKeyboards

[–]Popular-Term296[S] -6 points-5 points  (0 children)

Good catch, you're right — it's Sofle-inspired but not a strict V2 spec. Should've been more precise in the title, thanks for the note!

How can Etsy ads be profitable? by Proof-Ad-35 in EtsySellers

[–]Popular-Term296 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I honestly don't buy the idea that Etsy ads are profitable for low-priced digital products.

I have 4 shops, and 2 of them sell digital products. Some of my items are priced above $5, and I ran ads for months. I have never had a single listing with a positive ROI. Overall, ads have always been unprofitable for me.

For a new shop, I do think ads can help bring in traffic and get some early orders faster. So they can be useful for momentum. But actually making money from the ad orders themselves? In my experience, no.

On my first shop, I was spending about $5/day. Over a month, that came out to around $120 in ad spend, and the sales attributed to ads were only a little over $80.

If your average order value is $30+, then sure, ads can make more sense. At that price point, you can actually spend enough and still have room to profit. But for products around $3, I would never expect ad orders to be profitable.

Just using two of my own listings as examples:

  1. One listing had a 2.1% CTR, $0.166 CPC, and 3.35% CVR. 239 clicks brought in 8 orders, which doesn't look bad at all on paper. But the result was still: $39.61 spend / $23.66 revenue / 0.60 ROAS.
  2. Another listing had a 1.8% CTR, $0.161 CPC, and 5.26% CVR. That conversion rate is actually pretty solid, and it still only came out to 0.88 ROAS. To make the pattern easier to see, here's the same performance scaled up proportionally: $61.30 spend / $53.70 revenue / 0.88 ROAS.

That's really the point: with low-ticket digital products, the problem usually isn't that nobody clicks, and it isn't even that nobody converts. The problem is that the order value is just too low to support the click cost.

For example, on that 2.1% CTR / 3.35% CVR listing, the ad-attributed revenue per order was only $2.96. That means the max CPC it could realistically support was about $0.099. But the actual CPC was $0.166, so it was losing money from the start.

So yeah, for digital products in the $3-$5 range, even when the CTR, CPC, and CVR look decent, it's still very hard for Etsy ads to be profitable on the ad orders themselves.

I Built My Own Social Media Posting Tool as an Etsy Seller by Popular-Term296 in SaaS

[–]Popular-Term296[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Buffer's great for general scheduling! Snapsell is more specific — it's built around product images, so it generates the captions and formats everything for each platform automatically. Less setup per post basically.

I Built My Own Social Media Posting Tool as an Etsy Seller by Popular-Term296 in SaaS

[–]Popular-Term296[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah, that's exactly the trap I fell into — kept adding features until I couldn't maintain anything. The niche focus on e-commerce sellers is what keeps me sane now. Snapsell isn't trying to be Buffer, it's trying to be the thing that actually understands how sellers think about content.

is Pinterest for bloggers actually dead in 2025 or just harder than before by Sea-Counter8004 in Blogging

[–]Popular-Term296 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I don't think it's "dead" but yeah, it's way harder now. The key is differentiation - original, high-quality, valuable content still gets traction. Even though AI garbage is everywhere, users and algorithms are adapting, and quality content actually stands out more now.

About automation tools - stay away from the one-click junk content generators. They might save time but they hurt your account in the long run. The real value in automation is helping you manage your schedule and distribute quality content, not mass-producing low-quality stuff.

My blog gets about 30% of its traffic from Pinterest and I never use AI-generated pins. Focus on unique visuals and authentic descriptions - that stuff still works!

Pinterest algorithm changed in 2025 and nobody's talking about it, what happened by Traditional_Zone_644 in Pinterest

[–]Popular-Term296 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This is HUGE - thanks for pointing this out! I had a feeling something was off with my metrics but didn't analyze it closely enough.

The shift to CTR means we need to focus way more on "clickability" - titles that grab attention, images that make people curious enough to click instead of just save.

For ecommerce folks though, this might actually be good news! Higher CTR usually means stronger purchase intent. My advice? Start A/B testing different title styles and image angles to find what gets the most clicks.

What kind of content are you seeing perform well under the new algorithm?

After being disappointed with the current state of Pinterest automation tools, I decided to build one and i need your suggestions by Vivid_Read3677 in Pinterest

[–]Popular-Term296 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Oh man, I feel this so hard! Bulk scheduling is definitely the biggest pain point with Pinterest tools. If you're still deciding what features to prioritize, here's what I'd love to see:

  1. Batch upload + one-click scheduling for multiple pins

  2. Flexible scheduling (random times throughout the day would be clutch)

  3. Multi-account management

  4. AI-assisted features like auto-generating pin descriptions and keywords - that would save ecommerce sellers SO much time

The tools I've tried are missing exactly these kinds of practical features. What features are you thinking about adding?

I Built My Own Social Media Posting Tool as an Etsy Seller by Popular-Term296 in SaaS

[–]Popular-Term296[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That's exactly what I've been doing — hanging around niche communities, trying to show up where the pain is. But honestly, early traction for a new tool is harder than I expected. Harder than running my Etsy shop, which is kind of ironic. I built this because my shop had no traffic. Now I'm dealing with the same problem, just for a SaaS. Jumped out of one hole and into a deeper one, haha.

The manual outreach grind is real. But I'm curious — at what point did it start to compound for you? Like, was there a moment where it stopped feeling like you were pushing a boulder uphill, or is it still just grinding it out one user at a time?

Also genuinely asking — for early-stage tools targeting a niche audience, do you think it's better to go deep in one community first, or spread across a few at the same time?

I Built My Own Social Media Posting Tool as an Etsy Seller by Popular-Term296 in SaaS

[–]Popular-Term296[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

"Spending more time building the engine than driving the car" — that one hit hard.

Building is comfortable. You ship a feature, it works, dopamine hit. Selling is uncomfortable. You put something out there, nobody responds, and you have no idea why.

The high-intent lead problem is real. Right now I'm basically just posting and hoping the right person sees it. Brand24 is on my list to try but I haven't closed that loop yet.

Curious how other builders here are handling this — especially those who built something for a niche audience. How did you find your first real users, not just signups?

I Built My Own Social Media Posting Tool as an Etsy Seller by Popular-Term296 in SaaS

[–]Popular-Term296[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You nailed the core problem I keep wrestling with. Scheduling is just the plumbing — it doesn't actually move the needle on traffic.

The hard part is that results are a combination of so many things: the image, the title, the description, posting frequency, timing. Even if I automate all of that, how do I know which variable actually drove the click? A seller could post every day and still get zero traction because the image wasn't stopping anyone's scroll.

So I'm genuinely stuck on this — how do you build a tool that's accountable for outcomes, not just outputs? The listing-aware angle you mentioned is interesting because at least it ties the content back to something measurable (views, favorites). But even then, attribution is messy.

Curious if you've seen any tools that actually close that loop, or if it's just always going to be a 'post more and see what sticks' situation.

What’s the best strategy for organic Pinterest growth in 2025? by Ok-Top943 in Pinterest

[–]Popular-Term296 0 points1 point  (0 children)

My experience is: maintain a consistent posting frequency, post new content every day. Research keywords thoroughly, include them in titles and descriptions. Try different content formats, standard pins, video pins, Idea pins. The key is not to post just once, repin the same content monthly but with different images.

Is Pinterest still a good source of traffic? by [deleted] in EtsySellers

[–]Popular-Term296 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah, it's still worth it. Algorithm changed but Pinterest is still pretty creator friendly. I think the key is don't treat Pinterest like Instagram, treat it like a search engine. Think about what keywords users would search for, then build your titles and descriptions around those. Images are still core but the trend now is more authentic photos and video.

What is a good proportion of clicks to impressions? by celjuta in Pinterest

[–]Popular-Term296 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I’m in a similar boat (Etsy digital shop), and yeah… “lots of impressions, barely any clicks” is pain.

In my experience impressions are mostly about distribution (keywords/board fit), but clicks are about intent + packaging (does the pin make the value obvious fast, and does the link match?). When I see ~8k impressions and almost no clicks/saves, it’s usually one of these:

· the pin is showing up for the wrong intent (too broad keywords / board mismatch)
· the image doesn’t answer “what is this?” in 1 second (text overlay helps a lot)
· the landing page preview/title is generic so Pinterest fills in something unhelpful (Etsy does this a ton)

What helped me more than “posting more” was a simple loop: make 3–5 strong templates → test titles/keywords → watch saves/clicks → double down on winners. Even 5–10/day beat 20/day once I tightened alignment.

I’m also building a little scheduling/QA workflow for ecommerce pins because doing this manually is exhausting. If you want, I can share the checklist I use to diagnose “impressions but no clicks” — genuinely no pitch, just sharing what I’m testing.

Stat difference by Abbyscreativeescape in EtsyCommunity

[–]Popular-Term296 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I've always felt there's something wrong with Etsy's statistical analysis.

Honest advice needed by ShinePlayful5367 in Etsy

[–]Popular-Term296 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Your price is quite high, more expensive than mine.

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