To suspect there are more sellers than buyers on Etsy?

[Wisterical]

Nobody I know has ever bought anything off Etsy. Do people just look at it to nick ideas and get an idea of how to price their own crafts? I'm asking because people keep telling me to list my own stuff there as it's selling well locally, but I'm not convinced it's worth the time, so wondering what other people's thoughts/experience is?

The fees are a bit breathtaking but it’s a good platform to start off on. You would also be eligible to take part in an Etsy Handmade Local event if there is one in your area.
I try and buy from Etsy first, before looking on Amazon.

How much are etsy fees?

OK so 15p per listing and 3.5%.

Much cheaper than Amazon and ebay.

Just had my ebay invoice for November fees- £790.

I make stuff and sell it on Etsy - I don’t make a fortune but I do better than most other sellers (I work P/T and make up to £800/m)

Two key things have made a difference: learning how to list stuff properly so people can find it (descriptions, tags, photos etc) and also using social media to drive people into my shop.

eagleray- great to hear of another seller.

Do you sell on other platforms too? Do you have a website?

I am struggling to cope with fulfilling orders atm. I have had to put holiday settings on Amazon because of the volume of sales.
I am trying to work out ways of changing my products that will require less work, so buying materials party made etc.

"partly"

Speakout - that's amazing! Can you tell us the type of things you sell?

I sell pagan/witchcraft items.

I buy on Etsy! Actually what I usually do is browse Notonthehighstreet for gift ideas and then see if the same seller has a shop on Etsy, they usually do & much cheaper too.

A lot of the sellers are buyers. I sell on etsy and I also buy on etsy. It is very popular in America and I have sales from all over the world. Selling on Etsy was a great start for my business and I love it.

unicorn- what do you sell?

It's encouraging to hear of success on etsy, maybe worth investment of time,.

@speakout I sell pretty much solely on Etsy, although I do occasionally sell directly on Instagram too.

My average item cost is £25 and customers buy more than one around half the time so it’s fairly low volume. On top of that, I have a fairly debilitating illness so try to keep lead times realistic (1-2w) as I mostly make to order.

The business started by accident but it’s saved my ass financially this year

eagle- good for you. That's great.

I am trying to steer this crazy ship atm.

Last year saw me make profits of £50K. I am working to maximum capacity, but I could easily see sales double if I could work out how to fulfill.

One of the key things for me has been understanding how social media platforms work. I have a FB business Page with a modest following (400 followers) but occasionally reach 5k people by sharing posts onto special interest groups that allow small business advertising, and recently I did a promotional video too which had masses of views!

@speakout that’s a fantastic achievement! It sounds like you need to get some professional advice so that your business is more effective - and I mean that in a complimentary way! I’m sure a lot of people crash and burn at some point due to success - do you think you could find the time to stop and take stock?

eagle- I appreciate your advice.

Yes I think I need help, I am a business novice, it's really a question of where to steer this beast. I am working to maximum capacity, and there are all sorts of issues to address.
I could sit still, raise my prices ( which will lower sales) and continue.
I could adjust my product line towards less labour intensive items ( I have had a few forays with success).
Move more towards social media, start a you tube channel etc.

At the moment I am just firefighting- keeping up with orders.

As a Mum to two teenagers and a carer to an elderly parent my time is limited.

Ive had some nice bits before but I've recently ordered something which never arrived and seller was an arsehole implying I was lying so I've gone off it.

Ooh I'm getting excited hearing about the successes!

Sounds like you need to hire someone to help, speakout.

Yes I need help.

I would ideally like to hire domestic help to free my time up that way, but my elderly mother has said she would leave home.

I buy from Etsy all the time. I've bought a lot of Christmas presents from there. I think you can't possibly know how many buyers there are on a site.

Since I end up buying a lot from Amazon at Christmas I have tried to do balance this out by doing other shopping from smaller female (just my preference) run businesses locally and on Etsy. There are some stunning things on Etsy and one of my favourite things to do is browse there. Over the years I've bought a fair bit of jewellery, art some textiles, even food products (some gorgeous chocolates as part of MILs gift this year - in fact everything she is getting is Etsy and it's lovely). I know a lot of the arty kind of people in my pottery classes also buy from Etsy regularly as we chat about it and at least one of them sells there and does reasonably well.

Just to add if you do have a business on Etsy (or even Amazon as I see some do) I would love to know your business name so I can keep you in my list of female led businesses. I won't rule you out if you are male either . If you want to pm me. As someone who crafts myself, I respect the effort that goes into handmade items and the prices that should be charged.

The analysis data Etsy provides shows that nearly half my views come from FB and Instagram, with the rest nearly all coming from Etsy searches.
So make sure your listings have relevant search tags and get out there on social media!

Pardon my ignorance, but whats the differnce between Etsy and eBay?

Different web sites.