According to eRank, I have sold more items than 90.8% of Etsy sellers. A few days ago, I earned the Star Seller badge for the first time. Still, I am far from earning enough to live on. My shop had five sales last month. Even so, I think Etsy is a great place to start. Just don’t make it your entire business plan… and read to the end to learn how I recently tripled the traffic to my Etsy shop and doubled my conversion rate.

I began selling handmade items wholesale to local retail stores long before I began selling online and continue to earn the bulk of my income that way. Finding someone willing to purchase my items wholesale or give me consignment space means that people will wander upon my products every day that store is open. I simply need to stop by semi-regularly and refresh my shelves. I find it far less stressful than craft fairs (which require full set up and take down for every event).

Creating these business relationships is generally just a matter of looking for where your products fit in and talking to the owner or manager about how to make that happen. It isn’t exactly easy and often involves a lot of rejection, but with persistence and resilience a good product will eventually find a home.

Keep in mind that the deal each store offers will vary, but “wholesale” generally means 50% off retail price… so you must charge enough for your products on Etsy that you can offer local stores 50% off and still earn something for your time. I find the cost similar to the fees for online sales, marketing, and time to create listings, pack and ship orders.

P.S. Having an online presence (whether tiny or large) may help you get your product(s) on your local shelves. At the very least, it gives people a place to view all that you offer.

P.P.S. Some products may be extremely popular when seen in person and rarely purchased online (or vice versa). Trying different locations can show that sometimes the problem is not the product itself. It’s the presentation.

If you do decide to open an Etsy shop, click here to get 40 free listings and make sure you take your time and learn how to do it right. Watch free videos on YouTube. Learn about keywords and SEO. It matters.

Which leads me to my #1 tip: create your own website and/or start a blog at the same time. Writing about my products here and linking to my shop is the one thing I did that catapulted my views and increased my sales. Note: this happened even though almost no one read the blog posts themselves.

When you study SEO, you learn that having websites link to your products will help them appear higher in search results. I mistakenly thought that it mattered whether or not people read the blog posts and clicked on my links and waited many years to start. Don’t make the same mistake I did. Use your blog to explain your brand. Share your links. Yes, I have social media accounts (including a YouTube channel) too, but none of those have helped my Etsy shop as much as this blog.

I recommend absorbing as much free information as you can over hiring a coach or paying for a course… though I will say that I use the paid version of eRank to check my Etsy listings and find it very helpful. (Note: this is not a paid promotion for eRank in any way. There is a FREE version you can use but to get grades on your SEO (listing audits) you will want the basic version which is currently $5.99 per month.)

Good luck with your Etsy shop! Click here to start now with 40 free listings.