How to rank highly in Etsy search! - Etsy SEO/Discovery Workshop

so if you sell on Etsy the holy grail pretty much is to rank as highly in search results as possible and in this presentation today I am going to show you exactly how to do it the information I'm sharing today is directly from Etsy themselves they trained me and I am now sharing this information with you so I'm going to tell you the exact things that you need to focus on in order to improve your search ranking not only on Etsy but also on Google as well so I'm really excited to bring this to you this presentation was recorded on the 6th of November 2019 so if you're watching this a lot later on some of this may be not as relevant anymore but it's absolutely up-to-date and relevant as of that date and I go into detail about all of the elements that affect your Etsy search ranking all the things you can work on in order to improve your Etsy search ranking and your google search ranking in order to help your listings get found and to make sales on Etsy I've also put together a cheat sheet outlining all of the vital information that I share in this presentation if you would like to get access to that free cheat sheet head on over to great intercom /xc SEO and you will get access to all of that information laid out nice and neatly for you so you can keep referencing back to it as you're working on your Etsy shop and improving your listing quality which is the measure by which Etsy uses to decide on your search rankings so that's great and thrive com /xe SEO to get access to that chichi if you're new here please hit the subscribe button so you don't miss any further information that I am going to be sharing with you about how to improve your handmade business and make sure also to give the video a thumbs up if you enjoy it and like what you see today so let's get in to the presentation ok so let's get to it shall we welcome it to the presentation today we're going to be talking obviously all about Etsy SEO and this is just a quick overview of what's going to be happening here what we're covering today so we've got what is such an overview lets you search some pro tips for you we're also going to be talking about Google search and ads Etsy ads briefly and then at the end we're going to have a little quick activity so you should kind of consolidate what you've been learning now I'm going to be kind of in the corner of the screen we're gonna have the main presentation I also have a second screen over here where I've got the chat up so if you don't already have the chat window up you might want to bring that up because you can chat to each other answer questions I might ask you and ask me questions throughout the presentation as well using that chat window and I'm going to be checking it over here while we're going which is awesome alright now just be aware that I am going to be focusing on the presentation during the presentation period and then when we get to the end we're going to have a nice Q&A session so I might not be able to see your question as I'm going because there's really quite a lot of us in here but if I can't get to it during the presentation hold on to it and I'll try to get back to it you know when we get to the Q&A section of the presentation here now we have a lot to cover so I'm trying to keep this to about an hour basically and cover everything that I can now as I said well I should give you a little intro fast as to okay so if you don't know who I am my name is Jess Vanden my ethereal shop my Etsy shop is called a serial and I'm also the founder of Creighton thrive so I opened my Etsy shop in 2008 it was a hobby and I did it for a year and a half as a hobby and then in 2010 I went full time with my Etsy shop and then you know branch out from there had my own website now where I sell in 2013 I started creating thrive which is where I help other makers like myself and like you learn how to turn your head he'll be into a thriving profitable business so that is me I was really excited when it c reached out to me about doing this working with them to present this information to you because I think it's super super valuable and it's really awesome to get it direct from them direct from you know basically direct from the horse's mouth everything I'm going to be sharing today is information that it C has given me to share with you today in this presentation on how do you found in NC search and Google search as well so I'd love to know in the chat over there over here tell me who you are and what your Etsy shop is I would love to know who you are and what's your Etsy shop and what do you sell what do you what do you make what do you sell please share with us in the chat so I can have a bit of an idea of who's here and what everybody is up to basically so I'll have a look at that now we've got Kirsty from Kirsty sharp jewelry who makes handmade silver jewelry can hear me loud and clear actually I've got Cindy from one what you were home in fashion accessories pre-loved textiles tear jewelry awesome hey it's Betty in Clementine lazy dull Andre shout out to my driver circle Pete's awesome to see you guys here fantastic guys awesome alright so I might just keep the video off for this part of the presentation I'll bring it back on when I do the Q&A just to stop it cluttering up the screen so you can really focus on what I'm talking about so let's get cracking with that excellent oh we've got heaps of people here brilliant lovely to eat see you all okay cool so let's get on with it shall we alright so puts himself in the mind of your customer that is the number one thing I want you to be doing during this presentation today is putting yourself in the mind of your customer and really being aware of who they are what they're going to be saying looking for what they're looking for what words they're going to be using throughout you know everything that we're do everything that they're looking for what words are they going to be searching for that is the foundation of search is putting yourself in the mind of your customer and making sure that you are you know using the right keywords and the right titles and everything else that you should be able to use those words for your SEO in order to reach out to them okay so next also think about what influences your online purchase behavior because we're going to be covering not just you know the text that you're using but everything else that you're using to draw in those people and to get them basically into your shop that's what this is all about is to get people into your shop so have a think about that for me like when you are buying online I literally want you to put this from the chat when you are buying online what makes you click on somebody's item over somebody else's what's the main thing that will influence you to choose one over the other tell me in the chat right now I'd love to hear what it is for you yes a clear product photo it's ethical handmade and unique the item really speaks to you with color or style I love that beautiful photos good description photo first and foremost ethical and handmade awesome how all the items suits my preferences I like that that's cool okay lots of photos from different angles amazing photos are influenced if your friends recommended it cool thing all right so yeah there's heaps of stuff that can influence your behavior but I'm seeing some key themes here photos how will it suit your own aesthetic and like ethical handmade like that is what you're looking for and some recommendations money so yeah how much it's costing and toss it all right so lots of stuff so here's just a quick example of a shop you know have a look at this as it's going through what does that say to you when you see this shop what it what are some of the key words what are the things that jump out at you when you see this bright and fine fun bright happy colorful yep lot of color consistent branding absolutely yep yep yep how everything just looks beautiful together it all works together good photos they're bright and colorful absolutely so this is just an example of a shop that has it all together you know the branding is on point the photos are on point it's cohesive and if if you liked this sort of stuff chances are you would click on this shop and that's the sort of stuff that we're going to be looking at throughout this presentation today not just the nitty gritty but the overall yes awesome all right so let's get on with the details discovery is what it sequels this phase of the buyer journey so you know we all say maybe Etsy search or SEO whatever their term for it is discovery this is the discovery phase where people are trying to find you and trying to find what you do what can you create so discovery is what we're going to be talking about today and I have so much to throw at you it's really really awesome all right so let's get on with it we're going to talking about as I said how to get found in your Etsy search but also how to get found in Google search because there are differences and you need to be aware of those differences and making sure that you're you're doing both things both lots of things in order to get found not only in and see search the Google search as well and I'm going to touch briefly on organic search and ads towards the end of the presentation all right so the three keys here so these are the three keys of search engine optimization or SEO we've got keywords product photography and the customer experience so I'm going to be going into much more depth about these three keys to SEO today and I'm gonna be outlining oh well pretty much all the things that see the ads the algorithm uses to rank your items in their search now of course we don't we don't have the inside word from Google here unfortunately but we do know you know Etsy knows a bit about this so they've passed that information on to me and what really matter when it comes to your Etsy shop so Google search as well so we're gonna be covering that as well all right so keywords protic photography and the customer experience all of these things are important so here's our overview of the things that are most important number one titles and tags so obviously in the search results you know what you are using the titles and tags must match the bio search word of phrase so items that don't match the bio search word or phrase will not be included in the results seems obvious that we're going to get more into this as we go along we're going to cover attributes and categories because the information you provide in your attributes and categories actually is considered in Etsy search it's basically like having extra keywords so the things that you put in here are really important and also you don't necessarily need to double up with things that you put in here in your tags and kira and titles because they are being used by Etsy search as tags which is really awesome so it kind of gives you more options and more ways that you can get in front of people we're also going to at listing quality so what is listing quality Etsy search algorithm considers how well individual items tend to do in search so the quality of your listing basically comes down to how high or low it will rank in search and this can change and does change over time depending on your your behavior so what you do to your listing but also buyers and potential buyers behavior people who are clicking on your clicking on your listing coming through to your shop the more people who click on your thing in search even if they don't buy it the higher it will rank in search and of course if people do buy it that affects the listing quality as well and it will rank higher in search also so we're going to be talking about those elements of listing quality product photography now this is a big one the number of photos you upload does not directly impact your item search placement but using the 10 listing photos may increase your conversion rate and as we were just talking about with listing quality the higher conversion rate the better that that item will rank in search the more it sells the it will rank so while your number of photos does not impact you know initially where your item shows in search you know if you have one photo versus ten photos the person with ten photos is not going to necessarily rank higher in search however you're probably more likely to make a conversion which will mean that you will actually rank higher in search over time right so that is why stuff like that is important when it comes to your conversion and your sound Lisa those sound awesome all right customer and market experience all of this stuff affects your potential search ranking your listing quality so having good reviews a completed about section offering free shipping was in the US and having a shop policies can all help your placement in search so we're going to go deep into all of these elements so let's go into the details shall we all right so let's look at keywords to start with now just to clarify a keyword is not necessarily a single word it can be a phrase so jewelry would be a keyword but sterling silver jewelry is also classed as a keyword it's a longtail keyword it's a more specific keyword phrase but when we use the word keyword we're talking about either single words or keyword phrases just to clarify that so looking at article title you want to title that it includes the exact keywords buyers would use to search for your item do not get fancy or cute here this is not the place to give your items whimsical names that is a waste of space you can if you want to give your items of whimsical name you maybe can put it at the very end of the title or you can put it somewhere in your description but you want to be using this very important real estate by filling it up with keywords that your buyers will be looking for when it comes to finding your item it is as simple as that place the most influential phrases at the front of the title so the thing that you think will be most likely to be searched for or the most specific longtail keyword that you think will you know people will find your specific things if they're looking for your specific thing rather than a more general or generic keyword because if you're using a more generic keyword chances are you're competing against a lot more people right but at the same time you don't want to be using a keyword that so obscure that nobody's going to be searching for it so you have to try to find a middle ground here so the first few words in your title of the most importance I put the most important keyword there two to three phrases typically make for a good title according to ed C so they don't they say you know you have I think it's a hundred and eighty characters it could be 150 it's either 150 or hundred 80 characters but you don't have to use them all use only the keywords that you think are the most important and then put the rest of them in your tags and also your attributes and categories don't forget about those so two to three phrases they recommend that you separate them with commas so separating your keyword phrases with commas is what HC recommends and like they said the rest can go in your tags your tags using a variety of specific descriptive keywords and phrases is what you want to do here making sure that you are again describing the product describe the attributes of the product what does it look like what does it feel like who would be interested in it why would they be interested in it like a lot of you said earlier about what something's handmade and eco-friendly making sure that you're getting those sorts of tags in there so think about style specific colors textures size themes and motives or all of those things are really really important and also where possible try to use variations in your titles and tags to increase the likelihood of getting found through different searches okay does anybody have any quick questions about that so far about our titles and tags remember to use your attributes and your categories as if they are tags as well so don't leave them empty especially those of you like me who've been on Etsy for a long time you might have old products that have been in your shop for ages and it's he's added a whole bunch of like attributes and things lately so that if you if you haven't gone back and actually edited those older products and added in all these attributes go do it because you're basically losing out on potential tags that could help your your item get found in search which is really really important and also use your stats to track which listings buyers are engaging with the most generally speaking you want to leave at least 20 or 30 days after making a major change to see the effects of it it can take up to 30 days for SEO changes to kind of filter through so don't be going in and changing stuff on one listing too often you need to kind of do your research and make the change and then give it time to actually work before you decide to change it again and very importantly when you're doing this sort of stuff focus on the products that I'm not doing so well don't mess with the ones that are doing well focus on you know it's really tempting to try to make your better products your good products even better but if they're already doing really well maybe don't mess with that maybe go and focus on some of the products that aren't doing so well and making sure that you're trying to get those elevated in search before you worry about messing with the stuff that's already successful okay so here's a few really interesting little tidbits of information for you there's no need to use misspellings of words as you search redirect shoppers to the correct results if they make a common mistake or typo so that's really awesome to know you know if you if you found that you had a misspelled keyword for five years you probably don't have to stress too much with Etsy has sorted it out so what you basically try not to do it but you know they you don't need to actually use a spot to put a common misspelling in I know people have done this in the past it seemed fix it for you don't add titles and tags in multiple languages and very importantly for people like me who sell jewelry this is true for regional spellings as well for example you don't need to include both jewelry and jewelry with the US and English spelling people do that for you too so that's pretty awesome to know so you don't have to waste tags on those regional spellings you also don't need to worry about plurals for example a search for Diaries would still be matched with listings with the tagged diary so it's e such as very clever it kind of figures all this stuff out for you and so you don't have to worry about wasting space in your titles and tags with these multiple versions of tags it'll do it for you which i think is awesome all right so let's briefly talk about well maybe not so briefly talk about product photography you have to use engaging click where the photos especially your first image your first the thing to remember about your first image is the majority of people are searching on their phone so if you're using the Etsy app or the Etsy website you know you want to pull up your phone and you want to look at how your item compares to everybody else's does it stand out is it click worthy does it jump off the page or does it just blend in with everything else that is what you want to focus on because the better you can make that photo the more click whether you can make that first photo the more likely someone is to click through to your shop and as we said earlier if they click through to your shop that increases the listing quality of that particular listing which means it will rank higher in search because more people are clicking on it it's kind of a positive spiral the more people click on it the higher will rank and more people will see it and so on and so forth so you want to make sure that first image is bright and clear easy to see and enticing then with the rest of your photos you encourage the purchase or the conversion so that is kind of the key here make sure that first photo is brilliant and then you use the rest of your photos to tell the rest of the story don't try to tell the whole story in the first photo that's not the idea what you want to do is entice people to look more closely okay so here's some more information on your product photos you want to display the product clearly give information about the size color and materials all of these things you should be doing into your description as well but the more you can put it in your photos and make it obvious the better because let's be honest we all know we shop based on photos that is the thing that really makes the difference so you've got to make sure they're top-class capture both the purpose and the feeling of the product help shoppers imagine the product in it their lives and use your style shots so you've got your main photo which is your you know your initial photo your primary photo and then your additional photos can show the item you know the front back inside outside whatever it may be and then these are a whole bunch of lifestyle shots that you can use your studio shot lifestyle shot scale shot detail shot a group shot a packaging shot and a processed shot okay if you're stuck thinking of what am I going to you know people often I often see people saying I don't know what to put in all those other photo slots right here you go there's seven different things right there that you can put in those photo slots okay so show up you know show a photo of your packaging have a photo of you working in your in your studio in your Etsy photos isn't you can do that it's fine it helps to it helps to reinforce whoops sorry about that it helps to reinforce your branding okay it helps people to fall in love with you and fall in love with your work that's what this is all about so don't be afraid to use those extra slots for these sorts of photos and you can just have stock ones you don't need to be you know you don't need it to be a photo of you making that exact item it can just be a photo of you working in your studio in general but showing a scale shot is a really really crucial one okay so showing how big or small the item is that is something I see a lot of people missing and you might put the size in the description but there's nothing like just showing the item you know being held or being worn or a cushion on a couch or whatever at work on a wall in the lounge room whatever it might be to just immediately show people the scale of the item and they can immediately decide if it's what they're looking for or not okay so the customer and market experience these are all things that will actually increase your listing quality okay so that's why we're covering them getting great reviews will increase your listing quality the quality of your shop overall but also that the listing quality of your item obviously that has been reviewed so just a few quick ways to get good reviews respond quickly to customer questions but you know you need to sleep don't don't be done too crazy with this I'm a big proponent of having work hours and working in work hours so responding as quickly as is able for you don't beat yourself up if you can't be constantly on switched on do your best to accommodate a buyers needs within reason and within reason of your policies build a good relationship from the beginning with a thank you message on purchase this is one i added because this is something that i have found to be the number one thing that has helped my shop to get good reviews and to have good relationships with my customers is basically killing them with kindness right from the outset so when i get a sale I send my customers a detailed thank you message it's like four or five paragraphs long it is not short and it just goes in-depth about you know why I'm so thankful they choose to shop with me how they're affecting my life in a positive way I even mentioned my kitty cats in there and you know and then I talk about in detail what's going to happen you know how long it's going to take for us to make their item the fact we're making it from scratch just for them I talked about in the shipping you know how long it's gonna take to get to them if they want to upgrade to tracking I put in an option in there remember you know it's not you're reminding them of all the details it's not that you know if you get my free shipping it's not tracked if you want to upgrade here you go and then I finish off sort of saying if at anytime you want to talk with me I'll get back to you within 24 hours I'm excluding weekends I actually literally say that I set expectations as to when I'm gonna be communicating with them so they're not you know if it's Saturday afternoon and they're going to be seeing that go oh yeah she doesn't work weekends she'll get back to me on Monday so you're setting expectations and then at the end I give them a little you know if you want to find out more about me here's my Instagram get 10% off here's my only sort of thing so that when I made that change many years ago that has been the number one thing that it's affected my relationship with my customers because I'm immediately being a real person and I'm immediately extending a hand of kindness and friendship to them and so many of them I won't be back and say oh that's so wonderful thank you we're so glad to support you but and then if something goes wrong down the track they're way more likely to be understanding and actually reach out and contact me rather than just opening a you know opening a case where that see or giving me a bad review because they already feel like they know me as a person so I think the great reviews that is my number one tip is start the relationship of well with good expectations and everything will go well from there okay the next one is offering competitive shipping now this is going to be different for everybody obviously if you are shipping to the US and you offer free shipping you will get a boost in search results we all know that by now this does not affect your search results in anywhere else so if you're selling anywhere else having free shipping it doesn't give you that boost okay you want to be thinking about how competitive is my shipping versus other people's but also we you know you have to cover that shipping costs don't undercut yourself so just be aware of that completing your About section this doesn't have to be hard literally just upload a couple of quick photos and write a paragraph or two about who you are what you do and why you do it and most importantly a lot of people seem to miss this one why I should care why should I care about what you do why will it be a positive thing for me so you know share that with them in your About section as well but don't overthink it just if you haven't got this completed fill it in because having it completed is what matters when it comes to ranking better in your search okay so have it filled in having a shot policies completed this is really important as well you must have these completed to get the little extra boost in search so just go through and make sure that they're all done and you know if there's extra stuff fill in the faq section as far as I'm aware that doesn't have any effect on search but it's just really useful and yeah having all these things completed gives you a shop a boost in the search Chris you just said can you share how you add the option for track shipping after purchase I literally just tell them I can send them an invoice for the upgrade so you can you can either you know add a thing on Etsy or you can just send them an invoice for the upgrade and I'll do that I do that alright so we've talked there about Etsy search let's talk about Google search and some of the differences between them we've got tiles and tags similar to how search works on Etsy Google will scan our listings titles and tags to determine whether it's a relevant search query or not attributes and categories can also be scanned for keywords when Google's determining whether or not the relevant to a search query now this is the different the key difference Etsy does not look at your item description when they're ranking you they look at your titles your tags your attributes categories Google does so this is where having your item description set up well is important because Google will search your item description to rank you okay so repeat the most important keywords from a listings title in your description especially in the first 150 characters this will help Google system to see that the listing is relevant to a query containing these keywords so you have those keywords in your title and then also in your listing description now don't just don't write like it's a computer try to work it into a sentence okay so whatever the keyword is that you had say I've got oxidized sterling silver wedding ring might be my in my shop it might be a keyword then in the first sentence on my description I'm not just going to literally write oxidized sterling silver wedding ring I'm going to say this men's oxidized sterling silver wedding ring is perfect for thee you know modern groom or something like that so you're just going to take the keyboard and put it into a human friendly sentence and do the same thing in that first one hundred and fifty characters so while it's not so important for Etsy search it is very important for Google search so make sure that you are doing that well and you want to be doing this you want to have unique descriptions now this is where it gets a bit tricky if you're selling on Etsy and your own website because you might be if you should if you're doing that try not to have the exact same title and description at least the beginning of your description because if you do it's you know it could it might come up in Google as duplicate content which gets pushed down in rankings so try to kind of tweak it a little bit so it's a little bit different in both places okay so item description your shop sections can help your SEO in Google so basically Google will look at your shop section and then look at what's underneath that you know internet hierarchy so that will it'll go okay well this is a ring a wedding ring it's in the category of wedding rings hey that must be pretty relevant right so make sure that your shop sections are descriptive not fluffy ambiguous phrases you know for example homewares versus for your nest like for your nest super cute google doesn't really know what that means so they're talking about birds you know so use really descriptive words in your shop sections and you know you can have a lot of shop sections so try to break your stuff down as much as possible I think I have like I think I have all of my shop sections actually just redid them you recently so I have like four or five different like wedding ring shop sections I've organized my running rings versus I've got like oxidized ones map wedding rings hi Cheyenne wedding rings not only because when my customers see that like all I'm looking for a high shine wedding ring I'll click on that category but also for search purposes it is nice and nested right it's it's really descriptive this is high shine wedding rings is what is in this section and then everything in that is a sham wedding ring and so you're boosting your search relevancy via that backlinks this is another good one so when other websites link to your shop or to your listing this boosts your site's reputation and can have a positive effect on your google search ranking so we all know that there are dodgy people out there who buy backlinks don't do that none of you are going to do that it's just good you know if you're getting featured on blogs or you know you have your own blog or other people or faithful wherever if basically the more links pointing to your listing and to your Etsy shop the better because Google will then say well people that people are linking to this it must be quality so then it will get a boost in search results so using backlinks is helpful for that and you put up photography a few important piece here with this it's reviewed by the search system use high quality images avoid cluttered backgrounds and watermarks Google does not like watermarks so if you're putting watermarks on your photos and you're shooting yourself in the foot when it comes to Google rankings because it doesn't like watermarks it will down list your ranking okay so don't be putting watermarks on your pictures if you want them to rank well so don't use words or phrases that are irrelevant to your item we kind of briefly touched on this earlier but let's just come around to it because it's a really important point don't use fluffy words don't use words that are not descriptive of your item at that so you know if I have a necklace called I don't know the Circe necklace is one of my necklaces nobody's gonna be looking for a sassy necklace I don't know what it's called they going to be looking for a wire wrapped circle necklace for example because that's kind of what it looks like so you want to be using those descriptive titles and key words do not as I said earlier don't waste space on the fluffy things that don't actually matter when it comes to search again let's go right back to beginning put your self in the mind of your customer literally think what words are they going to be typing insert and in what order in order to find what you are selling that is what you need to focus on what words are they going to be typing in to search to find your item so those are the things you need to focus on absolutely so writing original content using keywords in your listing description keeping the shop sections legible and specific avoiding watermarks and cluttered backgrounds and don't buy links obviously okay so let's briefly touch on Etsy ads here I'm not going to go into the into too much detail but just to clarify the promoted listings are shown at the top in the middle of Etsy search results Google Shopping ads are shown at the top of Google search results so that's where the ads are being shown if you are using ads and here's a few tips with ads if you choose to use them considering the seasonality so rather than you know some of you might just have all of your products switched on you might want to save your money and only promote seasonal products like at this time of year Christmas Thanksgiving type stuff if you're in the u.s. you know promote your most unique products because they're more likely to rank well and show up using concise titles will help them rank higher as well avoiding the watermarks again Google will not serve as ads if they have water my images if they have watermarks on them so literally they will not show you your item if it has a watermark in in the ad section so that's a really important thing to know experimenting with your budget works best for you and using your stats to gain relevant insights so give you a campaign this is kind of like SEO right you need to give time give it at least 30 days before deciding you know what is what start small start you know with the dollar or to see how it goes start with you know your best products you know sure it's a bit weird but what I do or what I've done in the past is I've actually turned ads on for some of my best sellers because let's think back to listing quality remember what we're talking about earlier if something is getting clicked on more often that listing quality will increase in organic search right so if you're you're promoting the stuff that's already got selling well and showing up and people are clicking on it it's kind of a win-win situation where that that item is getting clicked on more often therefore in organic search it's going to be ranking higher not just in the ads so consider that when you are considering running ads okay so here's a quick activity for you after all of that this is an item from my shop I've given you a few pertinent details two things number one have a go at writing a good keyword rich title remember two to three phrases separated by keyword are separated by commas that are very descriptive of the item what keywords would you be typing in to SEO we will search in order to find this item and I'm also curious as to which image you would choose as the main image and why so it's just a little exercise for you have a crack at that what would you what sort of title would you write and share with us in the group chat thinking about those words what would you type into a search bar to find this item so we've got simple black mens ring yeah that's awesome from a sling nice one matte black wedding band nice unusual wedding ring I like it recycled handmade black wedding ring so we're seeing all of these free is coming through wedding ring the color back that it's made from recycled silver yep custom size black wedding ring so remember you want to be using two to three phrases so how could you kind of get more information into that title while having a couple of different keyword phrases in there so most of those ones you guys have shared so far would be like one of the keyword phrases oxidized sterling civil wedding ring yep that's pretty much how you put and then I also have like black or gray dark gray or gunmetal like specific colors that describe the color because it's it's kind of black but it's also kind of grey it's kind of gunmetal so you can kind of play around with those different variations on the term so that people find it easier to find cool charcoal that's a nice one yeah black men's wedding ring wide matte charcoal silver band love it matte black wedding ring como recycled sterling silver comer custom sizing yep excellent black wedding ring , oxidized sterling silver wedding band , custom sized black cream yeah absolutely brilliant so look there's so many things but use we're all coming up with slightly different variations on it some of them are found absolutely fantastic haha see that's a good question Lisa but if it's a man's wedding ring why ever pick up a woman's hand on a non wedding ring finger because at the time when I took that photo that's all I had he's like this is this is a case of working with what you've got I think in most of this is one of my kind of earliest wedding rings in most of my listings I managed to rope my husband in to you know have taking a photo on his hand but sometimes you just got to work with what you got and at that time I was like I just need I just need a scale photo that kind of gives you an idea of the size of it on a hand I actually have quite big hands for a woman as well so but that's an excellent question Lisa that would be the sort of thing where you go I probably want to update that and I probably you know should have a better one and the photo here where it's with a woman's driving ring set especially one of my customers photos so this is another cute one as well the positive side you know my husband brilliant yeah and that's the thing like I market this is a men's wedding ring I wear one of these rings literally on that finger that is in that photo I haven't ripped that ring on my finger that I wear all the time so there you go yes if your customers send you like if customers upload I love what Kirsten just said I saw it as hinting it didn't have to be a wedding band that's a really good point if customers upload photos to your reviews you can put them in your listings people so if they're if they are played a particularly nice one because because they've already uploaded it to Etsy they've basically said here it is I've made this public so you can then take that picture and put it in your listing to fill up some of those extra slots and show it in real life if it's a quality photo obviously um or if your customers sent like this one was sent to me by my customer just via email or combo or whatever and then I asked them hey it's such a beautiful photo can I use it in my shop as a listing photo and they said yes so that's a great thing to do as well so yes main photo which one would you guys pick as the main photo here I should have numbered them for you sorry middle photo is the main image top left the customer one middle photo lots of middle photos middle or top left top left middle yep so the interesting thing here and this is something to consider and I see people doing this sometimes the photos where it shows multiples think very yes think very carefully about using a photo like that as a main image because the main image should represent because the thing that the person is getting those additional photos with multiples are just kind of style shots you know showing what the ring like a couple of the rings look like together it's just a little bit interesting but you don't want to confuse them into thinking they're getting three rings right so yes stick with the the one photo I love what Krista said about the main photo it shows the angles unique styling and a sense of style yeah so oops I didn't mean to click that so that the middle photo is the main image I use and have used for many many years this this particular ring actually got in that seat Design Awards a couple of years ago as a finalist and I think it's because of that photo because it is unique and different and even though I took similar photos with some of my other rings there's something just something about that particular shop that worked and that's it's always interesting and frustrating isn't it when you you take a photo and it's like that's perfect you can never seem to really replicate it again which is frustrating so yeah awesome work everybody that's fantastic so you definitely got the clarity there about about the keywords and titles and things like that so let's move into question and answer time here I'll turn my video back on all right so who has questions for me please throw them in my direction and I'm happy to answer them for you about anything they're covered in there I do want to let you know just just briefly we're gonna come back to this slide but I am going to put together a cheat sheet on the details of this I haven't finalized it yet because I wanted to take any questions and any details that didn't come out before the so basically you guys are helping me here with this if there's any particular details or tweaks or questions you have for me to clarify anything here I'm going to add that in as well but I'm going to put together a free cheat sheet of this information and I will send it out to you just go to this Creighton throg comic /hc SEO pop your email in and I will send that to you once it's finalized sometime in the next few days so yes alright so here we go question about duplicate content from Cass at the bottom of each listing I have a large paragraph about mate order improved shipping info and here may process I'm wondering if I should slightly tweak this in each listing so it's not typical content casts I do exactly the same thing the key is that first 150 characters okay so especially with Google search that first paragraph as far as I know now I'm not a Google search expert however as far as I'm aware as long as that first paragraph is unique and you have unique keywords phrases sentences in that I think it's okay because that's the most that's what Google looks at as the most important piece of information right so that is what we want to worry about not the additional content because that that you know i think that the extra content is really really important for people to know and I do exactly the same thing so that would be my what I would think about that from my knowledge Jill we don't if we don't know for free shipping I have a heavy product or pottery will we shop and search you will absolutely show up in search like don't get so stressed about the free shipping thing because it's only a small part of the overall overall algorithm so think about everything I just shared with you today the titles of your tags your attributes your categories your listing quality is affected by also your about page being filled in your policies being filled in all of those things work together yeah if people are clicking on your listing if people are purchasing the listing literally all of those things go into its you're deciding where to rank your product so that the free shipping thing is only a small part of that okay so if you can't afford your can't offer free shipping and that's fine you will still show up in search it just might not be quite as high there might be a little difference between where you could potentially show up if you offered free shipping versus dinh and remember again I don't know feel you're just selling within the US but it's only within the US it doesn't affect it in other countries evermore I've seen a lot of people focus on storytelling in the description for example who doesn't remember baking with their mom in the kitchen great new memories with these those you love with this apron set hmm is this something that should be in the first pair not necessarily it depends on how well you weave your keywords into it right so if you are weaving your keywords into this little story it can absolutely be the first few sentences but if it's a bit fluffy and it doesn't mention the keywords then put it a bit further down and make sure that those first few sentences are keyword rich again this is important for Google search rather than Etsy search because that search doesn't really care about your description but Google search is important as well so yes with that first what you've written I wouldn't use that because you're not putting the keywords as the very first sentence you could rephrase it like more like this this this floral patterned apron set made with eco cotton blah blah blah will help you create new memories because who doesn't remember baking with mum in the kitchen right so reorganize it so that the keyword phrases are at the beginning and you can weave them into the story you know perfectly how this is frustrating in a perfect world I'd list items in two sections for example necklaces and also say seaweed collection any tricks for cross-linking within the shop yeah this is frustrating I really wish I'd see what allow us to list in multiple sections but they don't so forget about the seaweed collection use necklace like you want it again remember you try to use those and let they like literally look like seaweed that might be might be something you can use but try to focus on those descriptive terms and phrases first making sure that your sections are descriptive again thinking about the sort of key words that Google would be or Etsy even would be using yep you stuck to item types rather than collections absolutely so basically you just you can put your collections in your description like just say this is part of the series collection somewhere in your description because you might be talking about that in your marketing right so when you're launching a new collection on Instagram you know whatever you might say hey this is mine in seaweed collection or you could put you could put it at the end of your title potentially like seaweed collection if you wanted to it's if you want to use that space is what I'm saying like it might it might be better used with a more a keyword that's more relevant so I'd probably write crosslink yes so what you want to do is in your description link to you the earrings so in your description for your necklace because why let's see it doesn't allow outside links it allows inside links so if you put if you put in your item description for the necklace if you put checkout their matching earrings here and put a link it'll have be a live link to your earrings in your shop so do that that's a really important thing to do when you have matching things or a collection of things make sure that you cross link yeah it is the way to do it so you want to be doing that cross linking it's nice when you have a different shopping cart software that kind of does it automatically or you can put it in back or you can put multiple links in there but that's the best way to do it is to put the cross links in for the specific things all right any more questions for me lovely people I'll just scroll back and make sure I haven't missed any I think the most important thing here is that it's complex but it's not rocket science there are all these different elements that go into your listing ranking and you can only do the best you can do you know having your shop fully fleshed out looking professional is very very important because Etsy will take you more seriously in listing rankings and in shop rankings so make sure to get all that stuff done make sure to have an About section filled in your policies filled in make sure that that's all looking nice okay have a nice banner a quality banner have yeah profile photo and a logos that are on brand all of this stuff matters when it comes to people's purchasing behavior and the more conversion do you make the higher ranking search okay so you want to do all you can to ensure that your shop is ranking highly in search because it is professional and put together okay Leanne I've read numerous times that your tags should be an exact same order as your title does this really make any difference do you mean the words within the tags like oxidized jewelry or you know sterling silver jewelry or jewelry sterling silver is that the sort of thing that a yes and exit from what they have taught me and I've passed on to you here they say make sure that the keywords are written as yours as your customers would enter them in okay so I think it does have somewhat of an effect if you have the keyword written in the right order but I think the most important thing is that you have the right keyword in other words you have the right words there so I wouldn't overly stressed about this too much just just try to think naturally what would people type in like look what I just said there would people type in sterling silver ring would they type in ring sterling silver I would hazard that 90% of people would type it sterling silver ring because that's how you would say it in language right so just try to create titles and tags that are kind of proper grammar instead in the way that people would expect them to be said and do your best with that but I think the most important thing is that the terms are there within the right keyword again remember when you're doing your titles if you're separating keyword phrases with commas then that's going to be seen as a keyword phrase okay so use those comments in the right places to separate out actual keyword phrases and some of you had some really great examples of those earlier on we sort of chunked different different types of keywords that people might be looking for in different keyword phrases awesome all right please come up it shoots and leaves have we all read that is it function one Wagner the classic grammar book that is um that is a fantastic book I remember reading that back when I was at uni cuz I did a whole subject on editing in my arts degree so that was a great book you've got a no results found page for the URL great and thrive duck calm slash it's the SEO I literally just set it up before this so if it's not working now it will be working very shortly after it I did test it so I don't know why it's not working but I'll double-check that and get back to you guys I can't get back to you once I'm gone I'm gone it will be there so hopefully it will be working if it's not working right now thank you for telling me so I'll go double-check it any more questions lovely people happy to answer them oh yeah that's why I'm here as I said remember for those I can see a whole bunch of new people here so hello to all of you if you've missed some of the presentation I will be publishing a replay on my youtube channel and on my podcast so YouTube channel is youtube.com forward slash jess van den and my podcast you can just find over at korean thrive comm if you're not already subscribed to that please do I have an episode every week where I share it worked for Lisa awesome maybe too many of you would try nice yeah so I do a weekly podcast for those of you who aren't aware and I interview make you successful makers and I also just do solo shows where I share stuff from my ten plus years running a handmade business no it's been longer than that now eleven years my goodness gracious me of running a handmade business especially an Etsy shop as well so I teach a lot of stuff about that okey dokey all right any last questions I'll get another minute or two before we wrap up happy to answer anything if you weren't here at the beginning do you have any quick questions oh thank you so much I appreciate that even more just said thanks for 10 years and congrats on 10 years yeah it's kind of crazy things and I've been by the end of this year this is 2019 as of like January next year I will have been self-employed for 10 years which is I think an even bigger milestone so I'm really looking forward to celebrating that you're all very welcome I was just really really happy to be able to bring you this information directly from Etsy themselves you know this there's so much out there and so much information flying around about Etsy search and what's what works and what doesn't work and a lot of speculation so I just want to reiterate that everything I've shared in this presentation today is literally directly from Etsy you know they put us through a training program and and and gave us this information to share with you so yeah I just I'm really happy to be able to bring this information directly to you because I think that's gonna make a big difference knowing that it's relevant and knowing that it's relevant now things will change you know they might change things a year from now and it might affect how search works but what you want to do that's the other link I wanted to give you where is that I actually have a printout over here as well speaker notes but see if I can find it you've probably most have you been there before I can't remember the exact link my head but it's basically the Etsy search these pages oh yeah the ultimate guide to Etsy search that's what it's called so literally just ghost just type that into Google the ultimate guide to Etsy search it's a page on Etsy that they update whenever they change anything from whenever they change anything about the it's a subject search algorithm they update that page with the information so in the ultimate guide to Etsy sir it's what you want to look for and it's a page on Etsy itself so it's you know somebody else using that phrase it's not go to edit see themselves and that will always have the most relevant up-to-date information about their search algorithm so glad you listened to the podcast ever and you enjoy them oh Lisa thank you so much that's lovely yeah I also have another podcast which is a collab podcast with a couple of other maker teachers like myself called the business of making podcasts if you don't listen to that you can head on over and listen to that as well and we basically it's a little bit more irreverent than my podcast it's basically the three of us having a chat every week about something to do with in my business and it can get a bit a bit crazy at times but we have a good time and we hope our listeners listen to it as well yeah it is but it's a really fun thing to do I love doing my own podcast but the business of making is a whole another level of fun and we we get into it as well thank you so much everybody if you haven't already head on over to grants right complet slash at CSP put your email Ian and I will send you that free cheat sheet with the details and highlights of the presentation today so you've got all of these little details you know things about Google not showing you photos you've got watermarks and the fact that you don't have to put misspellings in to your tags or regional Spelling's you know those are all little details that you might not have been aware of but they can help you to make sure that you're not wasting space in your tags with the relevant tags that don't matter so I'll have all of that information in there for you thank you all so much for coming live it was really really fun to chat with you all today and I hope to see you around in my ecosystem at some stage shout-out to my driver circle member gsella I will obviously see you in in the membership community and if you don't already follow me on Instagram hit me up at create and thrive on Instagram and let me know you know if you want to DM me on Instagram I'd love to know like your number-one takeaway from today or just share it with you here what's your number one take way the number one thing that you learnt that really is going to stick in your head or that you're going to go work on now and you're going to update what is the kind of thing that went oh I didn't know that or oh wow I can change that really easily and it will have an effect on my search rankings so let me know what that number one takeaway is because I think how kind of thinking about it and really clarifying that few cells can be incredibly useful and also make a note make a note in your diary or on asana or Trello wherever you wherever you keep track of things make a note to keep lookout for that cheat sheet and also make a note of whatever that our ha thing was no fluff in titles use keywords so so important that's a really good one Lisa and kind of turn it into a little bit of a mantra for yourself when you are working on your SEO whether you're creating new products whether you're updating old products using those key learnings is really really valuable because I want you guys all succeed I want you all to do well and remember that I think another important thing just briefly remember that keywords titles tags they're all really important but you can have the best titles and tags in the world but if your photos aren't any good no one will click on it you can have the best title some tags in the world but if you don't have good policies or an about page people will be a little hesitant to buy from you your tiles and tags can be the best in the world but if you don't have photos that clearly illustrate the you know product itself people will be less likely to convert and buy from you so with the whole ecosystem right titles tags those things are very important but you have to look at it as a whole ecosystem your shop you have to look at the whole picture your branding make sure things are cohesive and the more that you can elevate your entire shop and the entire look and feel of your shop the better your conversions will be and the Bene of conversions will be the better your shop will rank and it will be that positive upward spiral so every little thing that you can improve on will make a difference to your success on Etsy awesome thank you so much everybody I really appreciate you being here and coming and learning with me today so I will catch you all hopefully elsewhere online again at current rival Instagram or you can follow me on youtube youtube.com forward slash Jets and dan and I share video is there a few times a month so this is me signing out if you have any follow-up questions again hit me up on DMS and Instagram and I'll try to help you out with those have an awesome day or evening good luck with your Etsy shops and bye for now and that's it I hope you found that really helpful and it's giving you lots of ideas on how you can improve your etsy and Google SEO to make sure that your listings are ranking as highly as possible in a search and remember to get that free cheat sheet head on over to create and thrive comic /xe SEO and get your paws on that so that you can use that to reference while you are working on improving your all these things I'm just saying Dan and I'll be back again very soon with another video that will show you exactly how to improve your handmade business thanks so much for watching and bye for now [Music]

Channel: Jess Van Den

Views: 70,123

Keywords: selling handmade items, how to sell on etsy, selling on etsy, etsy tips, how to sell your crafts online, sell handmade items online, selling online for beginners, etsy shop, how to sell on etsy for beginners, how to sell on etsy 2019, jess van den, create & thrive, create and thrive, etsy mistakes, survive christmas season, etsy search engine optimization, etsy search algorithm 2019, etsy seo 2019, etsy selling tips, etsy seo, etsy seo 2020, etsy seo tips 2019

Id: 1bR4GSyY_-A

Length: 65min 54sec (3954 seconds)

Published: Mon Nov 25 2019