Friday, April 16, 2010

Hittin' The Books

How does having no sales in three weeks affect you? It motivates me to dig deeper, to find out if there is something I can do to improve my chances of getting my stuff noticed out here on the world wide web , then I am determined to find it and do it!

This week I have been reading and studying every bit of information I can about SEO - that wonderful term we all know and *love* - Search Engine Optimization. [Insert scary music here].
Reading and studying is one thing. Understanding and implementing is another!

I have been on Etsy just over a year now and I have attempted to read and understand SEO from the very beginning. I confess, it has taken me this long to just begin to get a slight handle on it. Often I find an article that looks promising and as soon as I get 2-3 paragraphs into it, I realize I haven't heard a word I've read and instead I'm thinking about the dishes I need to wash or the garden I need to weed.

Here's what I've learned so far about SEO, in a tiny nutshell. When you give an item in your Etsy shop a title, make sure that title contains the most important keywords for Google to find. For example: I make lots of necklaces with skeleton keys so the most important search keyword would be "skeleton key". I need to be sure to include that in my title. Then I also need to be sure the first part of my description repeats the same keywords, and also I need to repeat them in my materials and in my tags. I can't explain why, but I know repeating those keywords is important - it makes them stronger. Stronger is good. It means chances of your item being found in Google searches is better.

So I will be spending the next however long it takes, working on all my listings.
Here's to hard work paying off in sales!!

6 comments:

  1. I think that I just see that word and despair and frustration well up in my brain! How you described what SEO is made a lot of sense to me though, that is basically how I understand it. I wish you much sales luck. I haven't had sales in longer than a month I think so I'm trying to find places in my community to sell my work. Hopefully, that will work out.

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  2. Brain-melting for sure!!! I'm just sticking with the very rudimentary understanding I have!

    Thanks for the good wishes Lia!! I wish you the same!

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  3. I feel exactly what you described. Now I feel I have some fellow feelers like me in the wide world out there. I am just beginning to scratch the surface of these things - key words, SEO, Social Networking..bla bla bla. In a way it is much easy to sell face to face. I am in the same boat buddy. This is my first visit to your site.Take care. Dita

    from: http://www.alankarshilpa.etsy.com
    http://www.alankarshilpa.blogspot.com
    http://ww.bead-z-mommys-business.com

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  4. I forgot to tell you the most important thing - - You have beautiful jewelry:)

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