Crafty Computer Night Tuestorial - Part 2

Last weekend, our team member Imelda of Sunset Shutterbug hosted a Crafty Computer Meet-up at her house. She gratiously wrote a little entry about the event.

"Jumping on the bandwagon of meet-ups, Saturday afternoon a couple fellow SF Etsians and I got together for a crafty computer session at my apartment to work on our shops and get to know each other. Michelle of The Elegant Sparrow, Eko of Eko Jewlery Design, Talia of Mycrob and Korie of Seaglass Reinvented and I fired up our computers (or iPad) and talked shop. We discussed all sorts of things and we walked away with extra tips and advice to help improve shops. Here are some tips that came up during our meet-up.

Re-listing - Korie's shop has been open on Etsy for barely a month and she made 6 sales during that short time! She credits re-listing 3 times a day to keep her shop relevant.

Facebook - Several of us are on Facebook and we use it to help market our shops, new items and other things that may interest our fans.

House Parties - Michelle recently sold her jewelry at 2 parties, one in LA and another in Washington. To her surprise, she sold a number of items at each event! Great way to connect with new customers and expand your clientele. This would be a great idea during the holidays!

Twitter - Can't afford to re-list every day? Use it to promote your items without spending 20 cents. And use those hashtags for Etsy teams your apart of. They can retweet you and help promote you to their followers.

Lightbox - Make one or buy one. I just made mine this weekend and I only spent 99 cents on the poster board.

Tagging - Use Etsy Teams in your tags! If someone finds out about SF Etsy and searches for the team in Etsy, your item will show up in a search if you put the team name in your tags.

Instag.ram, Flickr & Pinterest - Great ways to give your work exposure!

LinkedIn - Great way to professionally network with other sellers, especially if you hold a day time job in addition to running your business.

Etsy Teams and Etsy Forums - Meet and talk with other members! Post in your Etsy Teams and in the Etsy forums. Buyers also read the forums and the more active you are, the more people see your shop. Your customers may be your peers or a buyer who likes to read the forums. You never know where your next customer will come from.

Local Businesses - If you know someone who owns a business, talk to them about setting up a table and sell for a few hours. Especially if they get a fair amount of foot traffic. This would be even better if they're holding a launch party for a new line or product.

Fundraisers & Auctions - If you know of an organization or school that frequently holds auctions or fundraisers, you can donate your item as a way to help get exposure for your shop and also help raise some money for a good cause.

We all had a really fun time and the 3 hours just flew by! I hope we all get to meet each other again and stay connected. It's always fun getting to know other local sellers and geek out on our shops. Here's to more SF Etsy meet-ups!"



Thank you to our team member Imelda of Sunset Shutterbug for a great write up.

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If you're an Etsy seller in the San Francisco Bay Area, contact Katy or Steph about joining SFEtsy!

Crafty Computer Night Tuestorial

With the new year comes new changes to your Etsy shop...refreshes and updates. Especially if you're paying attention to some of the current Etsy Newsletters with hold a whole slew of information on updating your Etsy page for the new year.

It's all a bit overwhelming to me. I mean...I get so lazy during the year that I end up with a mish-mash of products, lack of thought in my tagging and over all a huge mess. I'd like to say it's all because I'm just so busy creating new art all the time that I can't be bothered with my Etsy page... but it's really just laziness and because I'd much rather go to craft events than update my page.

So, I got an idea... why not have the event come to my house? I clearly needed some motivation to get some updates on my Etsy page completed... what better way to do that than to invite some Etsy people over for wine, treats and a computer workshop?

Last week was the first of many (I hope) SFEtsy Computer Craft Nights.

Here are the basic "rules", tips and tricks to a night like this:

- Provide a place to plug in for all of the invitees: Some people won't use the plugs, but some will require it. Plan ahead and don't invite more people than you have outlets.

- Determine the # of Attendees: Be sure to really be clear about the number of people you're able to house in your home. No need to over-pack your space just to allow as many Etsians to come over. And be sure to let others know when you've reached your max capacity... there's always next time. My house is a small Jr. One Bedroom. So I was only able to have up to 6 people. I think it was the perfect size when we had just 4 of us because discussions were more intimate and everyone was able to speak to the group.

- Comfortable Seating: I'm lucky to have a Pottery Barn sofa and two vintage wing-back chairs to have people lounge on...there was plenty of space for all attendees to stretch out and take over a corner of the room.

- Nibbles are Key: Never make someone work without a cookie to munch on. You could do a pot luck if you'd like. I didn't expect my attendees to bring anything...but they did and we had tons of food and a glass of wine for each of us.

- Discussions: Let's learn from each other about the process we use to update our sites. Do you use Photoshop or Photoshop Elements for photo re-touching? Do you have any questions on white-balance or color correcting? By the end of the evening we had all also liked one another's Facebook pages as well. Networking AND getting work done - awesome!

- Clean Up is a Breeze: Wow! There was literally ZERO to clean up. Unlike the past craft nights I've had...where I'm left with snip bits of paper, glitter all over, wet paint, dirty brushes and a giant craft mess... this was so easy. Everyone came with a computer, and no one left one behind. As the host, the only thing I had to do was set out some snacks and then pick up the snacks that weren't eaten.


- Introduce Your Kids & Animals: I think it's important to remember that we all are humans with allergies or personal space issues...and very few of us know each other personally. Therefore, if you're a smoker, have kids or you're a pet owner - put that out there in your invite. There's no shame in letting people know what they are getting into before they walk through the door.

We had a great time discussing tagging, best practices, Facebook Marketing strategies and getting to know each other during our meet up at my house. I've noticed that since I sparked the idea through our Google Group, many other people have also chimed in to say they are looking to do something similar. I think this is so great!

Here are some photos I snapped of my event last weekend.
Look! Collaboration and Working together as a team on something! That's Eko and Talia. I had never met Talia before, but I just love her stuff. She's the owner of http://www.etsy.com/shop/mycrobe. With her is Eko... her jewelry is here: http://www.etsy.com/shop/ekojewelrydesign. She has such lovely things in her shop.



Here you see Rebecca Saylor and myself....well, my Photoshop screen as I update images for My Etsy...but I swear I'm behind the camera. :-) Rebecca is starting up a new shop. So we talked all about all the wonderful things that she has been creating. She just recently decided to do Etsy almost full-time. We were all ubber excited for her and the new adventure she's on.



Let me know if any of you end up doing another Computer Night and want to feature some of your tips and tricks in the team blog. Have fun Networking!

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If you're an Etsy seller in the San Francisco Bay Area, contact Jen from Mama's Magic Studio about joining SFEtsy!