The Work From Home Blog

When you think about selling your handcrafted goods on the internet, it’s hard not to think of Etsy. They allow anyone to list their handycrafts even without much knowledge about opening an online store and it’s free to list with a low commission on sold items. Although Etsy takes care of the technical aspect of listing your wares online the promotion and success of your shop is up to you and without going this extra mile it is easy to be disappointed. Below are some tips to help you make more money with Etsy.

Read up about Search Engine Optimization

Although Etsy is a popular marketplace you still need to do some work yourself to drive traffic to your shop. You can do this by improving your shop’s position in search engines for certain keywords that your customer is likely to search for. Try to think of the best possible words to describe your shop and your items. What would a customer search for to find you? Your shop title, section names, item listing pages and shop announcement should contain these important keywords.

Can’t think of keywords? Use a keyword suggestion tool.

Read more…

If you are a crafty person who designs cards and wedding invitations WeddingInviteLove.com may just be the site you are looking for. It is a bit like a directory of wedding invitations, designed in a way to help the customer find just the right product for their wedding. The site does not mention how much fees or commission they take if anything, but it is worth a look. It could be a great way to promote your wedding invite business, the site is nicely designed and focused.

Etsy is a popular site for creative individuals to sell their products. The site is growing exponentially, and buyers and sellers are both flocking to it in droves. Number of sales on the popular website continue to soar. Last year the company sold over 180 million dollars worth of products and hundreds of sellers regularly use it as a place to make a full-time or supplemental income. Read more…

As Twitter gets more and more popular there are many new services popping up for the Twitter community. One of the latest is Twee Bay – a free service you can use to buy and sell items using Twitter. There is the option of listing as an auction or as a classified and payment is handled by Google Checkout. Although the service is new it looks like something with a lot of potential.

Your business card can have a powerful effect on your small business. Being such a common thing, it can sometimes be taken for granted and even somewhat neglected at times. However it can be your visual brand, the thing that people will make decisions about you by before they even meet you. The more likely it is to portray the right image and be remembered the more likely it is that you will be getting some new (and possibly even more importantly repeat) business.

There are many places on the internet you can go to for inspiration when it comes time to design your card. Design blogs as well as the Flickr business card images set being some of them.
There are some amazing examples of what a little bit of creativity can achieve.

Whether you choose to hire a professional designer or design the card yourself, the procedure is a whole lot more affordable then it used to be. Printing a business card (or even poster printing for that matter) can be done online these days for a few cents per card (no more expensive print shops!) so there are no more excuses not to go out and get the best cards your small business deserves.

Many people who are trying to get a home business off the ground feel that creating a web site is confusing and possibly quiet expensive. As well as the prohibitive cost it can also be a fairly lengthy process. Whether you choose to have your site professionally designed or take on the learning curve required to learn how to build a web site, it can take longer then you are willing to have to wait.

It doesn’t have to be this way however and even if you have limited web site design knowledge to build your own web site and can not afford a web designer there are still options available. One service that is quiet good value for money is the “Build It Yourself” service offered at buildyoursite.com (take their service for a free test drive here ). Create your own web site with the site builder that comes with over 4,000 industry specific templates. You can use them “as is” or customize them to your needs without having to be an expert. Also included is a domain name and hosting for just $9.99/month which is a pretty good deal.

With the design and hosting out of the way it leaves you (and your money) free to concentrate on marketing your business and new web site.

I was planning to make a post about online marketplaces to sell your handmade art and craft items but I came across these two posts from At Home Mom Blog which I think do a fantastic job of summing up just about every place on the web. If you like to create crafty things and are wondering how to go about selling them then check out the following two posts, you won’t be disappointed.
Where to sell your crafts online part I

Where to sell your Crafts online part II

This is just a very quick post today, it is school holidays here so I don’t have a lot of time to post until next Monday.
Below are a few alternate sites to Craigslist (free classifieds) which you may not have heard of.

Kijiji – called Gumtree in some countries, run by Ebay
ClickaPost
Zikbay.com

There are many more good ones out there no doubt. Do you have any favorites?

These are just some ideas on how to sell more with your direct sales business. If you have more ideas I would love to hear them so please leave them in the comments.

1) Set up a stall at craft shows and fairs
2) Hold more parties where people can buy your products
3) Always carry a product sample with you and work it into conversations with everyone you talk to
4) Fundraisers
5) Always follow up with your past customers. Read more…

If you run a web site or blog, you might be familiar with the work and effort involved in running a competition where there are prizes to award. ContestMachine is a new widget that hopes to solve this problem by automating much of the process. You can read what exactly it can do here. It is free to use for up to two contests per month. If you need to run more promotions then you will need to pay a fee.
Found via TechCrunch