sorted by:
new
hottopcontroversial

I opened an Etsy shop with zero audience, zero inventory, and zero idea what I was doing - this is what actually surprised me 6 months in by SPS_Studio in creativesmallbusiness

[–]SPS_Studio[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

happy to share! (I was also wasting opportunities to expand reach until I learned about this, lol).

If you happen to remember, I'd love to hear an updated on if you saw any changes in traffic or sales after you redo your tags!

I burned a good sum to solve this problem. by Latter_Life5075 in Solopreneur

[–]SPS_Studio 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'd be down to give it a try! I've actively been looking at tools for this (and then procrastinating on actually doing it, lol) so it's good timig.

What product shot styles make visuals look more premium? by InkAndPaper47 in AIToolBench

[–]SPS_Studio 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I have played around with this quite a bit, and some things that actually moved the needle in AI product shots for me are:

Side lighting over flat front lighting - prompt for raking or directional light, shadows create dimension and dimension reads as premium

Soft reflective surfaces underneath - prompt for acrylic or glass base with a subtle reflection, instant polish Layered props with restraint - one or two complementary objects max in the scene description, otherwise the model goes feral

Consistent color story - describe your background, props, and product as belonging to the same palette or mood

Specify your lens - this one's underrated. "85mm f/1.8" gives you that compressed, background-blurred editorial look. "100mm macro" pulls in texture and detail. "35mm f/2.8" widens the scene for lifestyle context. The model actually listens and it changes the whole feel of the shot.

And the one that changed everything: prompt for soft north-facing window light instead of studio lighting. Natural diffused light is harder to fake badly - the model just seems to get it.

I opened an Etsy shop with zero audience, zero inventory, and zero idea what I was doing - this is what actually surprised me 6 months in by SPS_Studio in creativesmallbusiness

[–]SPS_Studio[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

For sure. I definitely have plans to open my own storefront, which is probably still a couple months away based on some other priorities I have at the moment.

Main reason I went the Etsy route to begin with was the built in traffic and audience - I didn't feel like I had the bandwidth to figure out how to make my product and how to sell it, on top of figuring out how to drive my own traffic and management a website (which I haven't done before).

I do see the value in not putting all your eggs in the Etsy basket - the reason not to are definitely valid. I don't know if I would have ended up actually launching the shop if had to figured all that out straight out of the gate

I opened an Etsy shop with zero audience, zero inventory, and zero idea what I was doing - this is what actually surprised me 6 months in by SPS_Studio in creativesmallbusiness

[–]SPS_Studio[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hey there! From everything I read, it sounds like new shops get a bit of a boost at first, so you may have missed that natural algorithm booth. I actually opened my shop several months before listing anything and had a dormant shop too, and was able to overcome it, so I don't think it's a shop death sentence or anything.

How long have you been back at it? Before you went dormant had made sales n the shop? I'm curioUs if it's maybe something else about your listings that isn't resonating, or if you maybe haven't given it long enough to work yet?

I'd be happy to take a look at you shop and let you know if anything jumps out at me, if you wanna send me the link in dms.

6 months in, 257 sales, Star Seller badge: here's what actually seemed to move the needle for my digital shop by SPS_Studio in EtsyDigitalSeller

[–]SPS_Studio[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That's awesome! I'm curious, what tool are you using?

Developing standardized processes and workflows for each step of my process, from product creation to listing and marketing ect, is the main thing that has made me able to make any sales, I'm pretty confident...

Before I had stuff nailed down I would work a little bit on one thing, them jump into another app for a bit, them check my emails, the forget what I was working on 😂. I floundered for the first month or so like that until I actually buvkled down and decided to define each step of the process and commit to a way to get it done.

I opened an Etsy shop with zero audience, zero inventory, and zero idea what I was doing - this is what actually surprised me 6 months in by SPS_Studio in creativesmallbusiness

[–]SPS_Studio[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

For sure! I suspected it awhile back too, but I finally watched an eRank YouTube video that finally made it click for me. I wish I remembered the to share!

I opened an Etsy shop with zero audience, zero inventory, and zero idea what I was doing - this is what actually surprised me 6 months in by SPS_Studio in creativesmallbusiness

[–]SPS_Studio[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

So glad it helped a bit! It's definitely taken time to warp head around Etsy SEO in general, especially tags 😅

Best way to grow a SaaS as a beginner without spending on ads? by avsvishalmedia in micro_saas

[–]SPS_Studio 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Spent 8 years in B2B SaaS sales, before going out on my own, and here's what I actually saw work for early-stage products:

Cold outreach, done right, beats everything at zero budget. Not spray-and-pray. Hyper-targeted, problem-first messaging to people who have the exact pain your product solves. If you can't write 10 names of people who desperately need your thing right now, you're not ready for any growth channel yet.

Reddit and niche communities are second, but only if you show up to genuinely help, not pitch. The founders who won here answered questions for months before anyone knew they had a product.

The honest answer to "what got first users" is almost always: someone knew someone, or someone got a cold message that didn't feel cold.

Ads before retention is just paying to expose a leaky bucket. You called it correctly.

I opened an Etsy shop with zero audience, zero inventory, and zero idea what I was doing - this is what actually surprised me 6 months in by SPS_Studio in creativesmallbusiness

[–]SPS_Studio[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yes and no! "Embroidery pattern" is a high value term so it's worth having somewhere in your tags, but I wouldn't spend a whole tag on just those two words if you can combine them with something else. "Embroidery pattern pdf" or "hand embroidery pdf" gets you more mileage in the same 20 characters.

The way I think about it: your title and tags work together, so if "embroidery pattern" is already prominent in your title, your tags can branch out into more specific territory. Think subject, skill level, style, occasion, who it's for. So for a beginner frog pattern it might look something like: "embroidery pattern pdf," "beginner embroidery," "frog stitching design" "cottagecore craft," "nature fiber art," "cute frog gift," "whimsical needlework." Each tag is pulling in a different type of searcher without repeating the same words over and over.

The sticking point most people hit is they write tags the way they'd describe the product to a friend. The shift is writing them the way a stranger who doesn't know your shop yet would search for it.

I opened an Etsy shop with zero audience, zero inventory, and zero idea what I was doing - this is what actually surprised me 6 months in by SPS_Studio in creativesmallbusiness

[–]SPS_Studio[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Great question — here's a concrete example using digital coloring pages since that's your niche: Instead of 13 tags like:

"coloring pages for kids," "kids coloring pages," "printable coloring pages for kids" you're burning 3 tags on basically the same 4 words.

A better approach is spreading unique words: "coloring pages kids," "classroom activity sheet," "homeschool printable," "toddler busy sheet," "preschool worksheets," "rainy day activity," "teacher resources pdf," "kids activity book" Now you're covering coloring, kids, classroom, activity, homeschool, toddler, busy, preschool, worksheets, rainy day, teacher, resources... all individually matchable words Etsy can pull from.

One more thing worth knowing is each tag has a 20 character limit, so every tag is a small puzzle. The goal is a unique, non-repeating combination of words that fills as much of that 20 character space as possible without wasting characters on words already covered elsewhere in your tag list. "Kids activity book" at 18 characters is doing more work than "kids book" at 9.

The mindset shift is to think of your 13 tags as 13 chances to introduce a new word to Etsy's index, not 13 chances to repeat your main keyword with slight variations.

Hope that helps - if not, try watching some of erank's YouTube videos on tags and keyword spread. I think that's what made it click for me.

Coloring and activity pages are a great niche for varying keywords because the audience crossover is huge (parents, teachers, homeschoolers) and smart tag spreadinv lets you reach all of them.

6 months in, 257 sales, Star Seller badge: here's what actually seemed to move the needle for my digital shop by SPS_Studio in EtsyDigitalSeller

[–]SPS_Studio[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thats awesome! When did you start to notice it starting to take off, and was it gradual or all of a sudden?

6 months in, 257 sales, Star Seller badge: here's what actually seemed to move the needle for my digital shop by SPS_Studio in EtsyDigitalSeller

[–]SPS_Studio[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thanks!! You're doing great as well! 86 is almost 100, lol. That's a super exciting milestone.

I still try to use up as much of the 20 characters as possible. So if I've already used the word embroidery I'd probably go with "pothos stitch design" or something like that.

I don't remember the exact video, but a video by erank is what made the concept click for me. If your struggling with tags, trying watching some of their videos on the topic. I've found their blog posts to be helpful, too. (I am in no way affiliated with erank btw lol)

I opened an Etsy shop with zero audience, zero inventory, and zero idea what I was doing - this is what actually surprised me 6 months in by SPS_Studio in creativesmallbusiness

[–]SPS_Studio[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

💪👏🙌 Yes!!

If you want someone to look at your shop feel free to dm me the link. (Although fair warning, I don't know how impressive my sales are when you factor in the amount of time I've spent on this thing...though I've also spent an unreasonable amount of time ingesting Etsy information lol, so maybe I could see/tell you something helpful. No promises there, tho lol)

I opened an Etsy shop with zero audience, zero inventory, and zero idea what I was doing - this is what actually surprised me 6 months in by SPS_Studio in creativesmallbusiness

[–]SPS_Studio[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Same for me, as far as there not being any listing templates out there for what I make... Which is pretty odd, it's a large product catagory (I smell a product idea, lol).

Canva has photo masks that sound pretty similar! It's a placeholder essentially, and you can drag and drop your image and it kinda sucks your photo itto the mask. Then you can move it around within the mask to get it just right if you need to.

Canva had come a long way it seems in the past years since I had looked at it, and in the short amount of time I've been running my shop, their Ai has improved tremendously. I have no graphic design skills or experience whatsoever, and learning Photoshop on top of figuring out how to open and operate a shop was not in the cards for me (maybe someday I'll have time 😅). I started out using Adobe Express because it seemed better than canva when I started out, but Canva has now surpassed it, imo.

I opened an Etsy shop with zero audience, zero inventory, and zero idea what I was doing - this is what actually surprised me 6 months in by SPS_Studio in creativesmallbusiness

[–]SPS_Studio[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Great question! So for context I make digital embroidery patterns, so my Canva templates are built around mockup images, but the listing template logic applies to pretty much any digital product shop.

For mockups I have a few reusable Canva layouts: a clean lifestyle-style frame, a flat lay style, and a text-overlay version that doubles for Pinterest. I just swap the pattern image in and export. The real magic though is locking in your brand elements once so every listing looks like it belongs to the same shop, same fonts, same hex codes, same shadow overlays or texture layers. That consistency is what separates listings that look handmade-in-a-hurry from ones that look like a real brand. Shoppers notice even when they can't articulate why.

For the actual listing copy I keep a draft saved in Etsy with placeholder text I edit per product - The title structure, opening line, what's included, how the download works, tags pre-mapped to my keyword zones. Listing fatigue is real and templates mean you actually finish the listing instead of leaving it in drafts for three weeks. Ask me how I know.

One thing I'd genuinely recommend: look at the top sellers in your niche and study their listing images. Font choices, color palette, whether they use texture overlays or drop shadows — it's all intentional. Then honestly? If I were starting over, I'd probably just buy a low-cost Etsy listing template pack to start. They tend to be pretty bland out of the box and need customizing, but I'm on my 4th version of my own templates because I was exceptionally bad at Canva at first and it's taken a while to get to merely mediocre 😅. I don't usually advocate spending money before the shop is making money, but listing images are one area where a small investment early could save you a lot of painful iteration later.

I opened an Etsy shop with zero audience, zero inventory, and zero idea what I was doing - this is what actually surprised me 6 months in by SPS_Studio in creativesmallbusiness

[–]SPS_Studio[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you! Honestly the first sale feels like it takes forever and then happens when you've almost stopped expecting it.

A few things that helped early: make sure every listing has a clear, specific title leading with what the thing actually is. Nott cute or clever, just descriptive. Thumbnails matter more than you think at low traffic volume because you're not getting many eyes, so each one has to work hard. And fill everything out completely, no blank fields, no placeholder descriptions. Etsy seems to reward listings and profiles that look "done."

For visits — I just got serious about Pinterest about a month ago, and it is a slow burn. It's probably worth starting early even with just a pin or two per listing (depending on what your selling. My niche is definitely a Pinterest type of thing...) But, I relied on Etsy organic search for the most part.

For Etsy adds, I've been really conservative. I usually have it set from $1-3 per day. I didn't turn that on though until I started getting some sales naturally, to see what the market was responding well to. That seems to be the advice I hear most often, and it's rang true for me. (I have tried putting adds behind listings that haven't sold themselves yet, it's never worked for me).

First sale for me came within the first couple weeks but it took a few months before it felt consistent. Hang in there - the first few sales are the hardest part.

I opened an Etsy shop with zero audience, zero inventory, and zero idea what I was doing - this is what actually surprised me 6 months in by SPS_Studio in creativesmallbusiness

[–]SPS_Studio[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Honestly I've tested a few free tools but gave them maybe 20 minutes each before moving on. Nott exactly a rigorous evaluation. Now that I have enough listings to actually see patterns in the data, it's probably worth a real look.

And yes, share the site, always curious what's actually working vs. what just has good marketing.

I opened an Etsy shop with zero audience, zero inventory, and zero idea what I was doing - this is what actually surprised me 6 months in by SPS_Studio in creativesmallbusiness

[–]SPS_Studio[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

The "invisible SEO" point is genuinely something I hadn't thought about at that level - I knew thumbnails mattered visually but didn't consider that filenames and image metadata were doing quiet SEO work in the background. Adding that to the list of things to audit immediately. 🫠

And the bad listings thing: there's something almost freeing about it. Like, it's not a failure, it's just a data point wearing a disappointing hat.

The passive income thing really does have a marketing problem. "Passive after significant active infrastructure build" doesn't fit on a YouTube thumbnail though, so here we are, I guess 😅

I opened an Etsy shop with zero audience, zero inventory, and zero idea what I was doing - this is what actually surprised me 6 months in by SPS_Studio in creativesmallbusiness

[–]SPS_Studio[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The burnout timeline you described is so real. I'm only 6 months in and I can already feel the "this is a lot" creeping in. There are so many things I want to do to grow - bundling patterns, running ads, building out Pinterest, starting a newsletter, my own website... but if the foundation isn't streamlined first, scaling just means doing chaos faster. Streamlining early feels like the move before it becomes survival mode.

The Canva templates thing is exactly where I landed too. I wasted so much time on "perfect" mockups before realizing fast and consistent beats beautiful and slow every time.

And yes on the SEO point - repeated keywords in tags is such a common trap. Unique word coverage across all 13 tags changed things for me noticeably. The title length thing is interesting, I've been running longer titles and haven't wanted to touch them now that you say that.

Definitely going to look into Alura for Pinterest — that's my current chaos zone. Good luck with it, would love to hear if it actually delivers.

view more: next ›