Some Twitter tips

Twitter can be a wonderful way to drive traffic to your Etsy shop.   But if all you do is tweet about your shop, you probably won't get many people reading your tweets.  So, what to do?  No worries, here's some ideas about using Twitter:

Try to be interesting.  This is a difficult one, at least for me, to accomplish.   Coming up with something witty or humorous in 140 characters or less is a challenge, one that perhaps not everyone is up to.  So when words fail, go with pictures, which bring me to my next point.

Use Twitpic to post interesting pictures.  I enjoy seeing beautiful things, and you most likely do too.  Put some up, then tweet about them.  I always enjoy beautiful flowers and cute baby or animal pictures, for instance.

Retweet other's tweets that you find particularly interesting.  That is a friendly thing to do, and maybe they'll reciprocate and retweet some of your tweets.  Then you'll reach their followers, too.

I always try to thank someone for a retweet, RT in twitterspeak,  of my tweets.  It only takes a minute, but it's polite and friendly to do so.  I make a mental note of people who don't do this, and stop RTing their tweets.  Nobody likes to be ignored.

How do you know if somebody has RTed you?  Go to your Twitter home page, and on the left hand side, under "Home" you'll see @yourtwittername, which in my case is @DalkullanJewel.  Click on it, and you'll see all the tweets sent to you specifically.

There's more than just RT's here, there are also all the tweets that were directed at you.  You'll probably want to reply to them, too. 

Here's today's mystery picture.  Can you guess what it is?  I took this picture while on vacation with one of my beautiful daughters a couple years ago.  Happy times!!!

This is the first post of a series on Twitter.  Stay turned for further developments. Thanks so much for stopping by!

Great Shop Promo Advice from BrickHouseFabrics

I was doing some reading on the Etsy Forums the other day,  when I stumbled on this fount of great advice on promoting your Etsy shop from Barbara of BrickHouseFabrics .
Brick House Fabrics is an online fabric store that specializes in novelty home decorating fabric, and they carry fabrics that showcase a person's loves and interests, including  Braemore, Covington, Duralee, P.Kaufmann, Ralph Lauren, Robert Allen, and have Laura Ashley, Schumacher, Thibaut, and others.


Barbara was kind enough to let me blog about it, so the following is a quote from BrickHouseFabrics: 

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" BrickHouseFabrics says:
The first thing I would do is to step back.
Renewing does not work for me, and it is only good for people on etsy.  Here are my basics:

My basics for being found on the net, and places I use:

The shop title is searchable. Fill it w/ keywords about your product.

Get your announcements set for search engines: fill the first paragraph w/ keywords about what you make/sell. Move everything down below it- no one googles hello, or welcome.

Titles: the title should be what a person would google to find the item. 54-56 characters are pulled by search engines. Fill them w/ keywords. The first 2 words are the most important. Remove words like and, the, or, they lower searchability.

Reuse the keywords in the first sentence of the listing.

Give measurements in both inches and metric. I use an on-line metric convertor:
http://www.worldwidemetric.com/Measurements.html

Write the description as if there weren't a pic. Take the pics as if there weren't a description.

The thumbnail is crucial to being successful: the average buyer on the net spends 3-5 sec. before clicking or moving on. Take pics of everything about the item.

Use an photo editor: pic nik, picassa, photoscape are all free.
And use a tripod! It eliminates a lot of issues!

Artists- most people show a picture of the item very cropped. Take another one of the item on an easel- table or full sized, to give a sense of scale, and to let the buyer know exactly what they are gettting.

Make certain, if you sell internationally- to have a disclaimer that the buyer is responsible for all customs fees, duties, and import charges that are levied at the time of delivery.
I have it on every listing, and add a link to http://www.sloanefox.freeserve.co.uk/importukduty.htm

Make certain your policies are filled out, and your profile, and location.

Join twitter; even if you don't tweet- you can use twit pic to upload a keyword filled message, and link it back to the shop w/ Bitly. That message is searchable, and the link is good.

Upload items to Kaboodle.

Do a Squidoo lens about your shop:
http://www.squidoo.com/how-to-use-the-etsy-module

Then do another about your things, your craft, whatever, and link it back as well.

These are all fast, free ways to do some promoting.

Also remember- the net works off of new. Once a month change the announcement, or titles, or shop categories. If you do a lens, or publish anything on the net, make certain to tweak it, or add to it, even a RSS feed, anything to keep those bots happy and coming back for more!


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Here's another sample of just one of the gorgeous fabrics available at BrickHouseFabrics:

Wonderful advice, and all things you can do for free!  I'm a major fan of Twitter, I've found great info there, made some internet friends, and bought some lovely items from people I would probably never have know about otherwise.

Hope you've found something in this post to help you achieve the success with your Etsy shop that you're working towards!  Wishing you prosperity and the joy of creativity.

Crouching Bunny, Hidden Rodent

My darling hubby took some pics in the garden this weekend, and I thought you'd like to see them.  He focused on the animals that enjoy the backyard.  We have a lot of different kinds of plants, and having a varied habitat attracts a wide range of insects and other animals.  At least, that's what I try to tell myself when I don't manage to get out there and weed, lol.

Here's the famous "Crouching Bunny, Hidden Rodent.  He gets those beautifully shiny eyes from all the flowers he eats.  Lots of vitamins.

Do you like Autumn Joy sedum?  The bees and butterflies sure do.  Here's a little bee enjoying his morning nectar.  In my opinion, nectar's got nothing on a steaming cup o' joe, but to each their own.

This amazing butterfly has such beautiful markings.  I would have thought it was a kind of moth, but I would be wrong.  I never have figured out the distinction between moths and butterflies, outside of the fact that butterflies don't wreck havoc  with my winter wardrobe.

Thanks for stopping by and visiting my garden. 

Pocket Shop Widget!

If you're like me, you're always looking for new and fun ways to market your Etsy shop.  And the kind folks at CraftCult have come up with a great new widget.

To see what it looks like, take a peek to the right of my blog, it's the black widget that looks like a cell phone.  Pretty cool, yes?  And getting your own is as easy as pie, and completely free (yeah!).

Just click on the "Pocket Shop" logo at the upper right of the CraftCult page.

Then you just follow the simple directions -- enter your Etsy shop name, pick your preferred background, follow the detailed instructions, and when your done, just cut and paste the code and follow the directions to install it in your blog.  It's really easy to do, honest!  :)

Pocket Shop is compatible with the following blog formats:

Blogger, Typepad, Tumblr, self-hosted Wordpress blogs, and your own website.

I really like my new widget and hope you'll have fun with your new "Pocket Shop" too!

My Latest Projects

I've been working on some new additions to Dalkullan Jewelry lately. That, and a secret project, which is going to be a gift -- I'll be blogging about that after I've given it to the intended recipient -- don't want to spoil the surprise. :)

I'm planning on doing more jewelry in solid 14K yellow gold. Here's a picture of something that's currently available at Dalkullan, my Hammered 14K Solid Gold Earrings. I completely handcrafted these earrings, and its a lot of fun to anneal and shape the metal using a couple of my favorite hammers.

I'm working on a couple of pierced earring styles in solid gold, one will be set with gorgeous Tsarovite Garnets. Tsarovite Garnets are an incredible green color, simply gorgeous gems! I'm very excited to be offering these lovely and luxurious gems at Dalkullan.

There is also a genuine Ruby and Pink Sapphire ring, set in opulent 14K yellow gold on the drawing board. I'm thrilled with this ring, in fact, I'm making the first one for myself. Ruby is my birthstone, and I've always wanted a ruby ring. Maybe you've always wanted one, too. ;)

If solid 14K gold and genuine Rubies are out of your price range, no problem. Here's a pretty ring, with a lab created Ruby, set in handcrafted sterling, at a very affordable price. The Ruby and Sterling Ring.

There are other new adornments on the way at Dalkullan Jewelry so be sure to check back for the latest info.

Thanks so much for dropping by, it's been grand having you here!