Starting an Etsy store sounds easy… until you actually sit down to do it.
You open Etsy. Stare at the screen and think, Okay… now what? How do I proceed?
That was me a few years back when I was trying to start my Etsy store to sell some printables. At that point, I was already an Etsy user. I wasn’t a seller but a buyer. I used to buy various printables and handmade items through Etsy.
So, I thought, how hard could it be to sell my own product? I just have to create an Etsy shop and list my products. That’s it!
But I was wrong—not completely, but partially. Yes, creating a shop and listing products are definitely a part of the process to sell on Etsy, but there’s much more that I didn’t know about. And over the past few years, I’ve learned everything I could about selling on Etsy—some through my own experience and some through videos and blogs online.
So, in this post, I’ll share a step-by-step guide that you can follow to start a successful Etsy store of your own.
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Why Should You Start an Etsy Store?
Let me tell it to you clean and clear. Etsy isn’t some kind of magic, and it won’t make you rich overnight. Anyone who says that is trying to sell you something. It takes time and effort, but once you start getting sales, it will keep making you money for months or even years to come.
The best part about Etsy is you don’t need to create a website of your own to start selling. All you need is a product. After you have a product, you can list it for sale, and you’re ready to go. And it takes just a few minutes to list a product for sale.
Another good thing about Etsy is that it is a marketplace with millions of buyers from around the world. On Etsy, there are people ready to buy. So, you don’t even have to promote your products externally on other platforms or social media to get sales.
Your job is to create a good product and list it for sale. Etsy will handle the rest for you!
Step 1: Choose the Type of Product You Want to Sell (Physical or Digital Products)
There are two types of products you can sell on Etsy. Physical and Digital Products. They both come with their own advantages and disadvantages.
Handmade products, woodwork, clay crafts, etc. are examples of physical products, whereas printables, stickers, templates, etc. are digital products.
Physical products are comparatively easy to sell, as they have less competition. But they come with various other things like production of product, packaging, shipping, returns, etc. So, they are not that easy to sell and scale.
Digital products have more competition, as anyone can create and sell them. But they are easy to create and do not require packaging, shipping, returns, or anything. And the best part is, once you create a digital product, you can sell it forever without any extra effort.
Another important factor is that it costs basically no money to create and start selling digital products. So, most beginners start with digital products. It’s less stressful and highly scalable.
That doesn’t mean you always have to go with digital products. If you love making stuff with your hands, then physical products can be the best option for you!
Neither of them is good or bad. They’re just different. So, think twice before choosing the type of product you want to sell.
Check Out: 42 Best Small Business Ideas for Beginners.
Step 2: Decide What You Want to Sell
This is the most important part and also the part that most people get stuck on.
Because they want the perfect product idea. An untapped niche. Something that no one else is already selling.
But that’s not how it works. It’s the exact opposite. When you’re just starting out on Etsy, don’t try to find a unique product with no competition. Because there won’t be a set market/buyers for such products, and it will be really difficult to get sales in the beginning.
So, go for something that is already selling and has a huge demand. Some of the best-selling items on Etsy are:
- Digital planners
- Handcrafted items
- Wedding invitations
- Wall art
- T-shirts
- Stickers
- Canva templates, etc.
Check Out: 16 Best Selling Digital Products.
You Might Also Like: 22 Digital Products that You Can Create using AI & Sell to Make Money!
Yes, there will be competition on these products, as there are thousands of sellers already selling these. But don’t you worry!
To outstand the competition, all you need to do is find out some of the best-selling products in your category. Study those products and find out what they have, what can be improved, and so on…
Then, while creating your product, just make it at least 1% better than your competitor’s product. And set your product’s price slightly lower than your competitor’s. That’s it.
Do this to figure out what you want to sell. Instead of asking, “Is this too crowded?” ask this: “Can I make my version slightly clearer, cuter, simpler, or more useful?”
If your answer is YES, then congratulations. You’ve found your product.
That’s it.
In the beginning, don’t try to create multiple products catering to multiple niches. Just pick one product type (it could be only printables, only stickers, only templates, and so on).
You can expand your product catalog later once you start getting some sales and your store starts building some authority and trust.
Step 3: Create Your Etsy Account
This might be the easiest part in the whole process.
To create your store on Etsy, just go to Etsy.com and click “Sell on Etsy.”
Then, they’ll ask you some basic details about you. Like:
- Your email
- Country you’re from
- Your shop language
- Your currency, etc.
There will be more basic questions like these. Answer them all. Then comes the part where you need to choose a name for your shop.
If you’ve already decided a name for your shop, name it. Otherwise, don’t overthink it. Just make sure that the name is easy to read, easy to remember, and not already taken. That’s it!
Because your shop name doesn’t matter much, your product does. I’ve seen shops with boring names make serious money. So, don’t try to make it “extraordinary.”
I know it’s not relatable to the post, but I spent nearly 3 weeks just to decide a name for this blog. At that time, it was nothing for me, but now, I regret that decision whenever I think about it. I lost nearly a month just to decide a name instead of actually working. Can’t believe how stupid I was.
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Step 4: Setting up Your Store
At this point, your shop has already been created. Now, you need to set it up to get the best out of it.
There are three things you must add to your shop. They are:
- Shop Logo
- Banner
- A profile picture or brand icon
Many sellers take too long on this part because they want their logo to be picture perfect. Perfect text. Perfect color and everything.
But don’t make this mistake. Your product listing is the thing that people see while making a decision to purchase your product, not your logo or store name.
Make sure that your logo, banner, and profile picture—all three of these are clean and clear. It doesn’t have to be super fancy or overly complicated. Keep it simple and move on to what actually matters.
Step 5: Creating Your First Product
This is the part where excitement hits its peak and some doubt starts to creep in.
You start thinking stuff like, “Will someone actually buy this?”, “Oh, I didn’t find the font I wanted to use,”, “What if it sucks?” and so on.. Believe me, after I created my first printable, I had mixed thoughts about it, but I listed it anyway.
These thoughts are super common, and every new seller has them. These thoughts will only get cleared once you get your first sale. That sale will automatically answer all these questions.
I’m not going in-depth about creating products in this post. It will get way too long, and I’ve already published multiple posts on creating different products to sell online. Here are a few if you want to check them out:
How to Create & Sell Canva Templates? (Complete Guide)
If you’re creating physical products, what and how you create it depends on the product. But in case on digital products, you can use Canva to create products like printables, planners, templates, stickers, arts, etc. and Google Docs to create eBooks. These are the most commonly used tools to create digital products.
Focus more on making your product useful than making it look good. Usefulness of the product is more important than its look.
Before creating your product, ask these questions to yourself:
- What problem does this solve?
- Who is this actually for?
- Why would someone choose this over others?
If you have a clear answer for all three of these questions, then you can start creating the product.
Step 6: Listing Your Product on Etsy
Here’s the thing. Your product can be the best out there, but people won’t know if it’s good or bad unless they buy and see it. So, it’s your product listing that buyers see to find out how good or bad your product is. And if your listing is confusing, people won’t buy.
Your listing should clearly explain what the product is, who it’s for, how to use it, how they’ll receive it, and the right way to use the product.
If you can explain these things clearly, then your listing will surely convert lookers into buyers if they’re actually looking to buy.
You can use bullet points in your listing to explain things more clearly. And make sure to write your listing in as simple and friendly language as possible.
Simple, short, and clear listings get twice as many sales as lengthy and complicated listings.
PRO TIP: You can upload your product to ChatGPT, give it the details of your product, and ask it to generate an SEO-optimized product title and description that is easy to understand and clearly explains what the product is all about.
Here are the three most important things you need to focus on while creating your product listing:
I) Photos
When your listing starts to show up on people’s feeds or search results, only three things from your product gets shown. One is your product title (name), second is your product photos, and third is the price. And the most important out of these three is definitely photos.
Let me tell you this clean and clear. No matter how good your product is, if its packaging isn’t good, then it won’t sell. So, bad photos will kill a good product because photo acts as the packaging of your product.
And good photos don’t mean you have to hire a photo studio to take the photos.
For digital products, you can use mockups, show previews of the product, or show how it’s used. You can easily create these online using tools like Canva or other free websites.
For physical products, you need photos of your product. But they don’t have to be professionally taken photos. Your photo needs to be clean, clear, and should show your product from top to bottom. That’s it. You can easily take these photos from your mobile phone’s camera.
Here are a few more things you can consider to take even better product photos:
- Natural lighting
- Clean background
- Multiple angles
Check Out This Step-by-Step Guide to Start a Blog that Makes Money.
II) Pricing
When you’re just starting out, pricing your product too high or equal to your competitors won’t be the ideal decision. So, start by pricing it slightly lower than your competitor’s pricing. Later, when your product starts getting some sales, you can increase it.
See how much other sellers are selling the same item for and decide your price accordingly. If someone is selling the same printable you’re trying to sell for $9.49, then sell yours for $9 or $8.5 or even $8.
Let’s say your product starts appearing on search results. It gets shown with dozens of other similar products. Other products have hundreds of reviews, but yours doesn’t have a single one. At that point, if the price of your product is lower compared to competitors, then the buyer will most probably click and check out your product. They will surely check out some other best-selling products too. And after checking, if your product offers the same thing as the best-selling ones but at a cheaper price, then the buyer will surely opt for your product.
That’s why you should price your product slightly lower in the starting phase. But once you start getting some sales and reviews, you can increase it.
III) Etsy SEO
The word “SEO” might sound too complicated to some, but don’t worry. It’s way easier than you think, and I’ll explain everything you need to know about it.
People search for products they want to buy on Etsy using words. If someone wants a monthly budget planner, they’ll type “monthly budget planner” in the search box and search for it. Such search terms are called “keywords.”
And SEO basically means using those similar terms people are searching for in your product listing (i.e., product title, description, tags, etc.). That’s it. Nothing more.
You can either find such search terms manually or use ChatGPT to find them and also to create an SEO-optimized product listing. Using ChatGPT makes this process so much easier and faster.
Step 7: Improve & Repeat
This might be the best way to scale your Etsy store.
Once you start getting traction on your Etsy store, find out which listings are getting views and which ones aren’t. Which ones are getting more conversions, and which ones are getting fewer conversions?
After finding these things, see what the better-performing listing has that the listings with fewer views or conversions don’t. The better-performing listings could have better images, maybe the listing description might be more SEO-optimized or something else.
Then, make changes in your underperforming listings by taking notes of the better-performing ones. This way, you can improve your product listings, reach more people, and get more sales.
Not just this, find out which of your products are getting the most sales. Then, create new products that are similar to them. Because such products have already worked for you and have a high chance of working again or getting sales.
Wrapping it up
So, this was a step-by-step guide that you can follow to start a successful Etsy store of your own. First, find out what you want to sell, create your product, set up your shop, and start selling. That’s it. Nothing complicated.
Go and create your first product to sell on Etsy. Then, create your store and list it for sale. Don’t think twice, don’t think about making it perfect, just create and list it.
You’ll learn more by doing it yourself than by reading blogs or watching videos. If the product doesn’t come out to be good, you can delete it later.
