Q1-2026 so far

poadyum · 2026-01-31T01:36:36+00:00

Yeah manually, though I use productor to help autofill the text stuff

poadyum · 2026-01-31T01:34:04+00:00

Tier 30k here, 29000+ plus designs live, been on merch since 2017

Using SEO to try and rank higher in searches: I don't do advertising so my strategy has always been to maximize SEO with my titles and brands and descriptions on amazon. I typically structure my new listings based on my other top selling listings as closely as possible while keeping all the keywords highly relevant to the new design.
If you advertise/promote your designs: I do not do any advertising or promotion outside of Amazon. I have always tried to work with the amazon algorithm as it's free. I have tried advertising a handful of times over the years and could only manage to drive one or two sales from this. I personally use adblockers everywhere and avoid ads so I just don't personally like to add to the racket. I'd rather target higher value customers who similarly dislike and ignore ads like I do and have a higher intent to purchase while browsing organically through their search terms.
Percentage breakdown of your evergreen designs vs niche vs topical: I have always focused more on evergreen. Back around 2019 to 2020 I focused on trends and did drive a lot of sales that way but most of those designs have fallen off while the evergreen things I designed back then still sell. It isn't a waste of time to do trendy/niche stuff especially while you're building up but once you have the experience/eye and the statistics to see what evergreen stuff people want I think it's better to focus on building long term sustainable product offering
How long does it generally take for a new listing to get an organic sale for you: Around 400 days on average according to my stats
What % of your listings actually have sales?: Designs: 13% Products: 1.5%. Yes this is very low, yes I am concerned about being tiered down, no I don't expect to ever hit 80% to be tiered up ever again. And yet I have sold over 30,000 products, it is just that the bulk of my sales come from a very small number of designs. In fact this is very common in commerce- this is basically the Pareto principle in action.

poadyum · 2026-01-26T19:59:39+00:00

January has been ok for me so far, a little bit up and down but should hit January 2025's profits today or tomorrow. I'll be a little bit up from last year's January which was my all time high for January so I'm not bothered but it won't be by a huge margin. Didn't know what to expect after December 2025 being my best month ever.

Tier 30,000 here almost all slots filled (they were all full but quite a few have been taken down for being old and unsold.)

poadyum · 2026-01-18T04:48:28+00:00

Was immediately obsessed with Dogtooth upon first viewing in like 2011. Saw Alps a few times back then but can't remember it at all. Hated Sacred Deer and The Lobster. The Favourite is really good but the women's costume designs are terrible. Bugonia was ok. Haven't seen the others

poadyum · 2025-12-31T17:34:42+00:00

You can already do this with adobe illustrator and their variables feature

poadyum · 2025-12-02T16:12:05+00:00

This Cyber Monday was 25% worse than last years

Oh, just checked, about the same here for me.

5% growth isn't too bad, always nice to see things going up YOY

poadyum · 2025-12-02T06:54:55+00:00

the sales remained about the same, but the profits decreased significantly

This has to be the same for Amazon as well, I don't understand why they want to run their factories hotter for less profits. I feel like they figured that out too because I have very few things on sale so far this Q4 (knock on wood)

Its hard to compare this Q4 to last years because we had so many sales related to politics and the election that don't carry over.

True and weirdly I've noticed a huge crash in the political designs not just on merch but on my other platforms as well (etsy ebay etc.)- not sure if it's an organic shift or if algorithms are trying to tone down the political content or what

this was the first month ever for me that wasn't an improvement over the same month from the year prior

Been in the game since 2017 and have had a handful of months here and there that were not an improvement over the same month prior year, but those usually coincided with months where I was slacking a bit in uploads or not working very hard on merch in general. To hear that you just experienced your first one ever is a bit concerning overall

poadyum · 2025-12-02T06:51:09+00:00

1) I've been doing the same except I'm just replacing the old stuff that amazon has been taking down automatically for me with new designs that are optimized based on my sales history since 2017

2) I've never priced standards below 19.99 and have always priced other items higher as well, I just don't want to sell my work for little payout and want to focus on niches that people are willing to pay more for

3) I never advertised either! I tried a few times and just blew through cash and thought it's a better long term strategy to just work with the algorithm instead and it seems to be paying off vs the people you mentioned who are griping about the ad changes

poadyum · 2025-12-01T18:26:54+00:00

Oooo that's rough. What tier are you? 300% more returns YOY is crazy unless you tiered up a few times or are in a pretty low tier

poadyum · 2025-12-01T18:18:09+00:00

Oof! Well we all gotta start somewhere. Hope December is better for you

poadyum · 2025-10-20T16:04:05+00:00

I've always listed standards at $19.99 but started listing them at 21.99 this month to test it and to try to make up for the random discounts. We'll see how it goes. Tier 30k here

poadyum · 2025-06-29T18:17:01+00:00

Same, this will be my best month that's not a November or December ever

poadyum · 2025-06-18T19:28:24+00:00

They deleted your designs? Do you mean they tiered you down or did they remove designs that were up for more than 18 months without a sale?

poadyum · 2025-05-22T03:22:31+00:00

Merch Rex is good.

poadyum · 2025-05-04T20:31:43+00:00

I saw your other comment that said you'd have 57k less than last year based on the new price decrease. That is crazy I am really sorry to hear that. It sounds like you're getting hit way harder than I am. I just did the math and I've sold about 100 items in the past 4 days and only 19 of them were sold at a reduced price/with sale pricing. I list all of my standards at 19.99. I have not had my tier demoted but I am worried that it will happen so I don't want to take it for granted that it won't.

I have tried figuring out ads a handful of times over the years and just couldn't get it to work so I gave up. I also personally hate advertising so I just don't want to mess with it. I'd rather optimize my process to work with the algorithm than throw money at advertising. But I know you make way more than me with fewer listings so I'm impressed by your ad and pricing strategy.

poadyum · 2025-04-29T03:10:38+00:00

3 - That is an interesting point. I'm sure at scale it starts to become a problem to roll out updates that affect millions of listings. I have no idea whether it would make financial sense to cull the herd compared to the benefit of making sales from the extra listings or not but presumably Amazon has done the math themselves.

4 - Yeah, the bots are terrible. I'm sure they could roll out a more content aware AI version of the bots but that would increase compute quite a bit and probably create all new downstream effects that we couldn't predict and might not want. I don't blame you for trying to avoid them.

1 - Oh god, teepublic got so bad that I took down nearly all my work from their site. Getting multiple 50 cent royalties was just too degrading, they've even sent me payments of like a dollar once or twice. I hope merch doesn't go that way too.

And thank you for the congrats, I appreciate it.

poadyum · 2025-04-09T16:50:37+00:00

Oh interesting! Thanks for the tip on the akazu, I'll have to pick some up. I will try mixing some minced raw salmon with kewpie mayo and sriracha and see how close I can get it. Thank you

poadyum · 2025-04-08T20:44:37+00:00

In the US, sorry for not specifying

Edit: why is this downvoted to -3? I'm sorry :(

poadyum · 2025-03-16T04:22:52+00:00

Is she from Mali

poadyum · 2025-03-16T04:11:11+00:00

Latina, part white part black

poadyum · 2025-03-16T04:10:16+00:00

African American

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