How to Review your Etsy Store

Hello Friends~

I wanted to cover this because I was surprised that I did not find that much information for digital artist out there. I found a few on physically shops, but I imagine those cost/stock are easier to see. If you are a purely digital artist, it can be difficult to see what products are actually selling or are you just renewing stuff because it went expired?

I set out to do this since I was doing that method, if it was expired or sold out, I just renewed it, whatever it’s not costing me much right? It’s a lot harder to see the cost of digital work. You have to factor your time differently. It was an interesting process for me to look through the items. It actually really inspired me to make some more stickers immediately.

So for digital items, I want to touch on things you should track/can see. First off, if you don’t have a mailing list, get one. I regret now having one immediately, as Etsy does not allow you to harvest emails from your sells, and the last thing you want to do is get banned. This allows people to join easily for sales. Which I currently haven’t done, also a missed opportunity. I just felt like this one was super important to mention. There are a ton of free services out there to use, MailChimp is a great one.

Etsy provides a lot of good information but I was surprised to not find a stat on how long it takes a listing to sell the first time. It would be nice to have an average to know if an item is going to be worth leaving up, alas, I couldn’t find a way to get this.

Just a reminder, this is how I went about it, I got a lot out of it so I wanted to share. I would love to see or hear how you review your stats/shops periodically to improve.

Find the Top Selling  Items

For me, I did this by section (at the time I had them listed by year) and did the top ones for each section. I was surprised to see hardly anything from this year has sold. This is my first time using art that is not my own, so I don’t know if that had anything to do with it or not, but it felt weird making them anyway so I may do less of those. They take WAY less time, but maybe they feel different in design, less love or something.

I was also super happy and surprised to see specific listings that were popular: My full sized tassels, Sailor Moon Kit, Bright Chalkboard kit, Cherry Blossom Kit, & BUJU Words for the week. I was happy some of my favorite kits were in there but surprised the BUJU one – I feel like anyone can make that in Word and print it. Maybe I should do a post on how to do that. It’s also funny because I want to do some seasonal tassles, I’ve just been uninspired, and more fanart packages. Like a Steven Universe kit.

I wrote down everything that sold 8 or more listings too; just so I could see what was working or wasn’t. Then I moved the 0 sale items to a new section called ‘Last Chance’ to give them until they expire to sale. After that, I will revaluate. Some of the glitter kits, while I love them, have not ever sold and they are from 2016. So I have to stop renewing those guys!

Something else I found I was doing that was silly was renewing things for 5 listings at a time. This is a waste of money, mind you small, for digital items. I should list them for 999 so they never sell out. So going forward I plan to do that.

I got a lot of inspiration and felt really thankful that so many of my listings sold multiple times, some of my favorites too! I actually was surprised some of my older kits (that April kit is super old) are popular, which tells me people like those features and I should include them in some kits (like a blog kit for example).

Revamped the Front

I think updating the front is a nice refresh every once in a while, it also lets people see you are active which can be important for a digital shop. I personally do this as a hobby and side thing, extra money is always nice, so showing people I respond to questions and will help them if they need it or want a custom item I think is important. It’s important to me that people are happy with their order and know how to print/cut it.

I also added that mailing list back in, I had it a while ago, and while I will do very little with it other than sales, I want to make sure people have that option if they want to keep in touch. Honestly, though, anyone can email or message me at any time, I don’t mind 🙂

I put a perma sale code on my new cover (I actually changed the shop name a bit as well) for orders over $10 which I think is worth it for me. If you spend that much, please take the discount!

Just little things here.

Figuring out my cost per Listing / Actual Revenue

This is hard, and I actually just did it this weekend. I wanted to wait until the price ‘increase’ to see if it affected me. For me, it takes about 2 hours per kit to make. On average, I’d say inspired kits take less time and effort, and sometimes I have to force myself and those are a bit more painful. Digital items are great for me because they take up no space in my tiny apartment, sell repeatedly and cost nothing to ship. So other than Etsy fees, 100% of the price is what I get back each sale.

So I figured out, it was $.20 to list & my financial tab says roughly $.31 goes to Etsy to sell an item. I was sorta confused by this (since Etsy says 3% before, and now 5%) but I researched it and Etsy also takes $.25 per item sold. So now that made sense. I honestly didn’t know that, so all the more reason to break this down.

So out of that $1.99, I get a $1.48. I decided I was going to raise my price to $2.15 in August so I sent out an email to my subs a week before, then I am raising them next week on Wednesday. SO this should look like this:

$2.15 – .5% (.11) – .25 = $1.79 per Listing

Also minus $-.20 to relist items as they come in, BUT as I said I am updating all my listings to have 999 Qty, so that should help there.

Whew Math, hope you are still with me. Now I live in Denver, so minimum wage is $10.20 (and going up). So I would need to sell any of these small items 12 times to earn the time it took it back (on average I said 2 hours).

I like digital items because I can sell them repeatedly. SO items that have sold 12 times have paid me for their time, yay! Other items still gotta work there.

But that is how I broke down the numbers. Most of my work is a labor of love and I make them for myself too, so I am 100% do a happy dance anytime someone buys a set from me. However, if you are looking to do this on the side as a real side hustle, these are things you should think about.

Time is important, and I personally value my free time at around $22/ hour currently (depending on the job). How did I get this number? I will do most other jobs, freelance, etc, for that amount, instead of lazing about at home. So, for me, it’s the price for my free time, and it is completely subjective to you. If you were doing X instead of Y, what would you lose? Essentially. Again, depends on the job. If you were to ask me to make you cupcakes or something, I’d probably do that for free, to an extent, as that is fun and I can eat them. If it’s fun and quick for me to complete, I do free things all the time for friends.

The final thing I want to mention is this is a great time to set goals (and put them in your calendar). Celebrate your sales, your shop birthday and definitely plan another review in the future. The only way to see progress is to measure it!

 

Anyway, so you hopefully can take this and apply to your shop. I would say the most valuable is looking at the items that sell and changing the ones that don’t. That is where I got most of my Todo’s. I have a good amount of Admin ones too, but I think this really helped me understand what people enjoy in the shop.

 

As always, I hope this was helpful.

Thanks for reading!

 

P.S.

Here is a quick todo list for those looking for some actionable items:

Etsy Revamp Todo

1. Get a mailing list (if you don’t have one)
2. Update the front images and store info
3. Go through and update Descriptions
4. Review Keywords – here is a tool
5. Figure out your income per listing
6. Review Prices (especially after this price change!)
7. Make a list of Best Sellers
8. Create a list of new ideas that fit in that best seller range
   1. i.e. If you sell Prints, maybe your plant quotes are the most popular, you can expand on that line then.
9. Create a coupon code if shoppers spend more than X amount (if wanted)
10. ANNOUNCE you did this! Share with people your process, people love that