Many times, when I go to another seller’s profile to decide if I want to follow their tweets, I find tweet after tweet saying, “Buy my (whatever)…”
Does that approach work for you? Dose it move you to purchase from that person? I believe Sellers need to recognize that hitting the potential buyer over the head with a sales pitch isn’t a good use of the limited time you have to connect with your reader. It’s time to come to terms with what social media can and can’t do for you.
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| (Necklace by one of my favorite Etsy shops: Tiger and Hare) |
First of all, does your communication emphasize relationship building? I believe you'll become more successful with your Etsy sales if you concentrate on building a relationship with your followers/friends, circles, etc. Here are some ways to do that…
1. Don’t be a salesman. Refrain from peddling your wares to those you communicate with on the social media sites. (Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Blogs, etc…)
2. Focus on communication. Don’t talk to others. Instead, talk with others. Twitter is not all about you. It’s about communicating with others. If you are sending random messages out into the world saying, “I made a necklace. Buy my necklace,” people will see your avatar and ignore it.
3. Understand that buying is not impulsive anymore. On average most people must hear about your work several times before they decide to take a look or make the purchase. They may hear about it through your blog, through the occasional reference to it on Twitter, through a facebook post, etc. Instead of sending potential customers running by hitting them with the hard sell, just make sure you have good exposure for your work by participating in a variety of activities on-line, such as forums, blog parties, giveaways, or submitting your work to publications.
4. Don’t be frantic about marketing. Rather, spend your time building relationships with those who read your blog or those who follow you on Twitter or Facebook. Let them get to know more about you through your blog posts or tweets. Once they know you, they’ll start pulling for you in your Etsy endeavors, and will help to bring other readers to your blog and shop.
5. Spend some time on others. Blog or tweet about the accomplishments of others, talking to and commenting about others is a good way to build good relationships on line. Be generous on line and you will build good and lasting relationships.
By putting emphasis on helping others and reducing the effort of hawking your wares, you just might build the relationships you need for repeat purchases from your shop.
If you have some good indirect sales tactics, leave a comment for others to try.
Posts
Whenever I see a possible Twitter user to follow, I always check their tweets, and if the last page or two consists only of product tweets, then I don't follow. I definitely want to make a connection and interact! I like the soft sell as opposed to the hard sell.
ReplyDeleteOne of my best methods is to simply update my Facebook fanpage with pictures of my new work. I do this every month or two, and I just add a link to the piece in the caption, and often it leads to a few sales.
Recently I read an article which suggested that you pick the social platform you like best and stick with it; I think I like FB best. I didn't get a lot of results on Twitter, though I might pick it up again.
PS: love your blog!
Hi Laurel,
DeleteI agree, I have a hard time keeping all social media platforms current. Twitter is my least favorite I spent the most time writing this blog, then facebook. Thanks for stopping by and adding your comment. I sometimes wonder if anyone is reading my posts, It's so nice to know that you enjoy my blog.
Cheers,
Lori D.