Secrets of Etsy SEO : All You Need to Know in 2020

Wondering how to make money with a hobby? It is actually quite easy. Create a profile on Etsy, upload the pictures of your handiwork items, optimize your store according to all the site’s rules, and that’s it. Congratulations, you have just launched your business. If you pay attention to our tips, you are going to enjoy a successful venture.

Background information: Etsy is an American Internet trade fair that was launched in the summer of 2005 by Rob Kalin. A 25-year-old hand-maker had been searching for a way to sell his products to his target market. Having found no adequate options, he decided to launch Etsy, the indie-platform that helps creative people to transfer their hobby into a successful business. The philosophy of the marketplace is compliant with its idea– find stuff you like and support independent vendors. This platform is not about consumerism, but rather the uniqueness and preciousness of every piece of handiwork. This is its main peculiarity.

Etsy is customized for sales of various hand-made products, vintage, and exclusive items. All products are conveniently organized according to categories: jewelry and accessories, clothes and footwear, arts and collections, products for home, etc. Users can spend as little as 5-10 minutes creating their own customized shop with a full set of e-commerce tools. In return, the platform charges a small commission for every uploaded product once every four months.

Launching Your Own Etsy Store: Step-by-Step Guide

Signing up on Etsy resembles registering a standard profile on social networks. It takes no more than 10 minutes if you already have high-quality photos and descriptions of your products. Let’s have a look at all of the stages of discovering the world of Etsy.

1. Registration of Your Store

Follow the link Sell on Etsy and you will immediately get to the page where you will be able to begin opening your Etsy shop.

Hit the button and enter your data: email, full name, and password. After that, a request to confirm your account will be delivered to the mailbox you have indicated. Then, finish your registration process. If you have a profile on Facebook or Google, it is possible to use them for signing up. After you have created an account, press the link Open your Etsy shop again and you will arrive at a page containing quick settings for your store.

2. Set Your Parameters

The platform will immediately suggest that you choose the language, country, currency, and phrase that is characteristic of you as a vendor. Don’t worry, your response won’t influence your rating and sales.

To continue, press the button Save and continue. 

3. Name Your Store

When you choose the name of your store, pay attention to the following four aspects:

1. If the name contains several words, they should be written together, and every word should be started with a capital letter. For instance, MyJewelryShop.
2. The name should be unique. If it is not, the platform will suggest options that have not been used.
3. The name cannot exceed 20 characters.
4. It would be great if the name of the store reflected its content. Do not worry too much about this, as in the future, you can change your Etsy shop name. However, there are some restrictions. You are only allowed to rename the store once every several months.

4. Add Products

After saving the name, you can proceed to the next step– adding the product listing. This is an obligatory step without which opening a store is impossible. 

Press on the plus on this page and all of the necessary parameters for you to add wares will open.

For every lot, you can upload up to 10 photos from various perspectives. Remember that the platform welcomes images of the highest quality. This is also beneficial to you as potential buyers will assess your products on the basis of their photos.

Then, it is necessary to fill in all of the fields (mandatory ones are starred *):

1. Product details: name, peculiarities, category, prolongation of the post publication term, type of product, description, section, tags, and materials from which it is manufactured.
2. Price and quantity. Here, it is also possible to add different variations, for example, color, size, and other options.
3. Delivery: Aside from the main parameters, the platform also asks you to indicate the weight and dimensions of the product.

Make sure that you have filled in all the fields correctly and press on the button Save and continue. Then, you can add another product and proceed to the next step.

5. Set Payment Acceptance

Before you set the acceptance of payments, choose the country in which your bank is located and carefully fill in all of the related fields. Etsy promises the confidentiality of your information and provides you with personal data protection.

6. Set Payments

The last step is adding a credit card on which commission will be charged. For the publication of one product, the platform charges $0.20 once every four months. After every purchase, the platform will charge 5% of the product cost and price of delivery.

Ready? Now, you can finalize the process of registration. Congratulations on launching your business on Etsy!

Are you stuck on one of the above steps? Try viewing a detailed tutorial on opening and customizing your store.

Useful life hack: For different types of products, it is better to register different stores. This will favorably influence its further promotion. From one account, it is possible to create several stores. There are no restrictions on this.

Avoid Fails: Why Some Etsy Stores Go Down the Drain

On the Internet, there are a huge number of stories about talented people who have lost their jobs and managed to regain a sense of purpose and secure a stable and high income thanks to Etsy. However, there are also lots of people who have failed. The reasons are trivial: lack of knowledge or absence of desire to develop one’s own business.

Typical mistakes during opening a store on Etsy:

1. Uploading low-quality photos. 
2. Incorrect or incomplete description of a product.
3. Lack of information about the store and vendor, or few numbers of listings.
4. The platform has no specialization, or the categories of products are too diverse.
5. A vendor does not take competition on Etsy into account and does not work on its SEO promotion.

All of these errors decrease the loyalty of buyers and negatively influences the rating of a platform. The latter is especially impacted. According to Statista, in the previous year, Etsy had 2.5 million active users and its numbers are actively growing. There are too many shops on the platform and search optimization and advertising tools cannot be ignored.

How does Etsy SEO Work in 2020? How to Run a Successful Etsy Shop

What is Etsy SEO? Competent implementation of SEO for Etsy allows listings to occupy top positions in the results of searches based on certain requests. For ranking and displaying search results, the marketplace uses special algorithms. As it is written in the Etsy Seller Handbook, the process includes two stages: 

1. Requests’ comparison– the system recognizes keywords and selects all relevant results.
2. The seller’s rating– algorithms compare selected products based on different factors and place them in the order of significance.

Seller Handbook, etsy.com

In Etsy’s early dates, it was enough to regularly add listings, use keywords in names of products, upload high-quality images, and add detailed descriptions. After that, your products could occupy the top search results. In 2020, the rules of the game have changed. How can you get Etsy SEO help now? Today, Etsy is guided by the preferences and convenience of buyers. As a result, it is necessary to adjust the Etsy SEO strategy.

Etsy SEO Tips

Etsy competition is quite high. Here are some selling on Etsy tips to help you take on the challenge:

1. Take Customized Search Results into Account

Etsy search results are curated for the unique interests and requests of each individual user. Therefore, the system evaluates a range of behavioral factors before showing a certain product to a person.

However, something has remained intact from the company’s early algorithms. Properly optimized listings are placed at the beginning of all of the customized search results. Different users can see them at a different time.

For the same reason, it is no longer profitable to frequently update products. Previously, it was possible to pay $0.20 per lot, and it would be lifted in the search results. Now, it is better to spend this money on publishing a new product.

2. Prioritize Quality, Reputation, and Convenience

While displaying certain search results, Etsy takes into account the following factors:

• Quality of your products. Correct names (with keywords), full descriptions, relevant tags, and categories are all important. In general, if Etsy suggests filling in a certain field, it should be done. The quality is however influenced by the number of sales and quantity of refusals. If users often leave your page without finalizing a deal, something is obviously wrong with your product.

help.etsy.com

• The reputation of your store. The marketplace pays attention to how you service clients: how quickly you reply to questions, if you sell orders without delays, if you have strict sales rules, etc. Feedback from clients is also taken into account.
• Localization. Recently, Etsy has started showing products from the country of a user followed by items from other countries. If a store has a listing version in the language of the user, it is prioritized in search results. Therefore, multilingualism is encouraged.
• Quality and clarity of photos. Etsy is actively using artificial intelligence for the recognition of images. That is why listings with clear photos and limited clutter are prioritized in search results.
• Delivery. The platform welcomes free delivery because it is profitable for customers. If your competitors do not offer this option, you may not resort to free delivery. But in this case, you miss the chance of being prioritized in the ranking.

3. Use Different Types of Keywords in the Heading

A good listing name should include the words that are mostly searched by buyers. These can be high-frequency requests without specific features (for instance, female top), as well as niche word phrases (for instance, female top with pink 3D print). The first type of request is geared towards a wide audience and helps a product to be shown more often. The second type is quite a long phrase, which is why it is often shown as long-tail. It is field-specific and geared towards your target audience, i.e., people interested in that specific purchase. That is why the rate of sales is higher in niche requests.

The most profitable approach to heading is a high-frequency + low-frequency request. This name will give you an undeniable advantage in search results and will help increase sales.

Additionally, you can add various key phrases in the name. That being said, make sure that they are readable for users and understandable for search algorithms. Etsy dislikes complicated headings spammed with similar keywords. For example, you can write: “Female top with 3D print, T-shirt with 3D image, trendy summer top for girls, casual and fashionable top.” All these phrases sound natural and describe the product you offer well.

You cannot even begin to imagine the effect properly selected keywords can have on your success!

The case is from the Store QisaBags:

QisaBags sells original leather bags and purses. The founder of the store is a 23-year-old student from Georgia, Kato. The girl originally understood that it is hard to stand out from millions of accessories’ vendors. That is why at the initial stages, she had carefully studied the peculiarities of sales and promotion on Etsy, including Etsy SEO.

 Qisabags.com

Within a year, Kato had managed to sell around 1,000 products, while several lots had even received the status BESTSELLER. The girl has since opened a three-story workshop and delivers worldwide orders almost every day. Etsy business has become her main source of income.

4. Duplicate Listings

Etsy does not punish vendors for duplicates of products. This means that you can create copies and experiment with SEO settings. Never change the settings of a well-optimized listing. It is better to add one more using different photos and keywords. If you have several copies of one product optimized for different requests, you will increase your chances of selling it. Use this Etsy SEO trick to increase sales.

Do not forget about keywords in the names of listings, tags, descriptions.

5. Increase the Number of Outside Links

You should attract traffic to your store from all available sources: social networks, blogs, partner sites, emails, etc. Etsy encourages such activities with higher positions in search results.

6. Do Not Forget About Competitors

As in every business, on Etsy, it is recommended to trace the activity of stores with similar products as you. Search for a product you are interested in selling and carefully study the platforms that sell it. Which prices and delivery terms do they offer? How do they present a product? How many products have they already sold?

You can create a separate file in which you will record at least two main parameters of competitors’ activity: the number of products they sell and the number of listings they add. It is also possible to analyze the turnover and an average level of income in a particular niche.

All of the necessary figures can be found on a competitor’s store profile.

It is also useful to visit social networks and blogs of colleagues. There, you can see how they promote their platforms and which proposals they offer.

A more serious approach implies using special SEO tools to analyze competitors in your niche.

7. Dedicate Time to SEO

After introducing SEO on Etsy, do not do anything with your listings for 4-6 weeks. SEO takes time. In one month or month and a half, you will see real results of your work and will be able to adjust settings if necessary. Until that time, you’d be better off working on social networks and other means of promotion, adding new listings, and improving customer service.

Now you know how to sell more and successfully on Etsy. These tips for selling on Etsy will help you in the promotion of your store.

Useful SEO Tools for Etsy in 2020

The success of an Etsy business directly depends on the development and promotion of the store. Fortunately, there are special services that help to properly present products, get advantages over competitors, and increase the position of listings in search results. One can use free Etsy SEO tools, or it is possible to choose paid versions.

Three Effective Etsy SEO Tools: 

1. eRank – This is one of the most popular platforms for Etsy vendors. It searches good keywords for product descriptions, tracks the activity of colleagues in selected categories, traces the positions of a store in search results, and provides convenient analytics with all of the important categories. It then compiles reports and provides recommendations on how and when to sell a certain type of product. The standard package is provided with certain restrictions and can be used immediately upon registration. The PRO account is available for $9.99 per month.
2. Seller Way – Look into this service if you are interested in increasing the popularity of a store and its sales. It enables investigation of trends, evaluation of competitors, and increasing the effectiveness of listings by means of selecting better keywords, categories, and tags. With its help, it is also possible to quickly calculate current and expected revenue. Basic functions are available for free, while a full package cost is $11.99 per month.
3. Marmalead – This tool provides computer-assisted learning capabilities. Based on a thorough analysis of search requests, it compares and offers the most suitable keywords for the products’ description. It forecasts which keywords will be trending in the upcoming season. It also provides pieces of advice on how to quickly optimize a listing to increase its positions in search results. The service can be used for $19 per month or $15.83 if you register for a full year.

All of the above services provide useful recommendations on the selection of keywords and meta tags. However, remember that they do not provide ready-made solutions. Running a successful Etsy business is a creative and complex process.

Additional Etsy SEO Tips to Attract Traffic

SEO for Etsy sellers is an important factor that makes it possible to optimize the growth of your store’s popularity. You can increase your business strategy with additional actions as well though. Here are some hints on how to do this.

Increase Variety of Products

On Etsy, there are no limits on the number of listings. In fact, the more listings you have, the better it is. From the perspective of a customer, it looks like this: having found your product with a search, a client goes to the store and sees that they have a choice. The interest and loyalty of this potential buyer will then increase immediately. It will also be easier for you to experiment with various SEO settings as every listing can be set for different search requests.

Respect Your Customers

Etsy is geared towards the comfort of clients. This is an obvious hint to sellers: improve your service! First and foremost, it will help you gain a positive reputation and increase the loyalty of your customers. Additionally, the marketplace likes and promotes stores that have a lot of satisfied clients.

Useful life hack: solve all problems in favor of your clients. Is the parcel lost? Has the client confused data? No matter whose fault it is, send the order again. It is better to get positive feedback and a five-star rating instead of undermining your reputation because of one unpleasant case.

Make Accidental Buyers Your Loyal Clients

Loyal customers are the key to success on Etsy as the algorithm takes this into account when ranking. Feel free to encourage buyers with various advantageous offers: discounts, bonuses, small gifts, customized cards, etc. You can announce promotions on your page using the function Shop Announcement. Help your customers become your friends, and you will see how a small venture can grow into a profitable business.

Do not Build Your Business on Cheating

E-commerce does not forgive mistakes. If your product does not correspond to photos and descriptions, negative feedback, as well as a decrease in search results, is guaranteed. If you use irrelevant keywords, your listing will be lost among the other lots.

If you are cheating, this will directly influence the rating of your brand. Therefore, do not promise more than you can do. Moreover, it is more beneficial for you to surpass the expectations of a client than to just sell them any product. 

Advertise Your Brand

In addition to SEO, utilize the advertising tools of the platform, i.e., Etsy Ads and Offsite Ads. The first is intended for the promotion of selected listings directly on the marketplace. Offsite Ads is a new tool that has been launched this year. The service makes it possible to advertise products on Google Shopping, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and Bing. The payment for the service will be charged only in the case of a real sale, not for just a click on an ad.

Your store on Etsy should not be treated as a passive profit option. If you are not working on its development, it will bring only losses and vice versa. With a competent approach, your hobby can become the source of regular high income.

Good luck!