Do I Really Need Social Networking for My Artisan or Handmade Online Shop?

As a follow-up to an IndieCEO post on social networking, "Social Networking: Time Waster or Business Builder...," I received a couple of excellent questions from Infused Moments. Be sure to check out her very cute shop!

In my original post referenced above, I talked about networking sites like ning, IndiePublic, and other handmade and artist communities outside of Facebook and Twitter. Infused Moments asks:

• What about social networking sites like Twitter? Would that be a good one to have and maintain?

• What if you have an account on one of these social networking sites, could you just use that one or should you create a whole new one that is all about your online store?

• What kinds of edits should you make everyday on your networking sites? Like about sales, new products, etc..??

This may be a long blog article but it is important information to consider, especially if you are new to online selling and social networking.

Overview

As an overview, I present these marketing subjects from a strategic level, since that is my profession. However, there are many articles on the web that discuss the tactical efforts for social networking and specifically for Twitter and Facebook for handmade. Search and you will find some great and useful information. A good start is to search on handmadeology.com.

It is important to look at your business from a strategic, big-picture viewpoint. It is the difference between being in the clouds or being in the weeds. 

If we step back and look at the big picture of what we are doing with social networking, how much time it takes away from creating, and how it might affect our overall sales in the future (clouds), we can decide what to do on a daily basis to get each individual sale (weeds).

Social networking accounts on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn have come to be expected for a business presence, both in the handmade community and in the corporate community. When our market niche expects something, we need to be there no matter the level of activity. I would suggest that a handmade shop needs to be branded on these sites with at least account profiles for business pages, even if consistent participation is not possible.

Business or Personal?

• What if you have an account (personal) on one of these social networking sites, could you just use that one or should you create a whole new one that is all about your online store?

Because the strategic objective is to brand your business shop and bring in “likes” and followers within your targeted customer base, your “business” activities need to be in your “business” name.

There is nothing wrong with inviting your personal friends to like and follow your business pages/networks and there is nothing wrong with deploying business information through your personal channels to a small degree. However, keeping your business just that…..business, is the professional way to manage your shop’s branding. It also allows you to actually target your niche customer demographics.

In other words, if you make cute widgettes for young women in the 19 to 26 age range, then those are the people you need to find online and bring them into your networks. If you make children’s items, find the decision makers - moms - and participate in “mommy” networks.

Another example is that of my GalleriaLinda brand handmade jewelry, I know that my buyers tend to be in the 30 to 60 age range and are usually career women or highly active in local communities. I have joined several online networks for local businesses and career women because that is where I will find this demographic.

Which Network is Best to Start?

• What about social networking sites like Twitter? Would that be a good one to have and maintain?

It is my opinion that Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn are the first and best strategic networking sites to have a profile account because these accounts are expected by consumers when they discover your business. They want to go somewhere online to find out the whole story. If you have a branded website like my GalleriaLinda Jewelry website, they will look for that first. If not, then they will go to these others.

Consider your profile on these accounts as a mini-business card that, depending upon the site, can expand into your mini-brochure. This will provide branding SEO and can bring in friends and followers from your niche community of sellers and buyers.

If you had to only choose one, my opinion is to have a business page on Facebook. Facebook provides a platform for you to have a mini-network all your own.Many selling venues have Facebook page code so you can even sell from your Facebook account. You can interact with people, invite them to like, and generally be the friendly chatty shopkeeper, while branding your business and nurturing potential customer relationships.

Twitter is a good way to get your links in front of a lot of people quickly, especially if you use hashtags. If you send out a tweet about a new listing with a link, just put #handmade or #yoursellingvenue to push your link out to hundreds of others over and above your own numbers of followers. Just be mindful of the 140 character limit. Twitter is social so be sure to "talk" to others to nurture relationships, comment on their links and retweet information.

With shop RSS feeds, you can set up feeds to Facebook and Twitter so every time you list one or two items, it feeds automatically to both with links to your item. Pretty nifty! I use http://www.twitterfeed.com that can feed to a variety of networks. There are others as well.

Why Update Profiles?

• What kinds of edits should you make every day on your networking sites? Like about sales, new products, etc..??

When I talk about updating your profiles frequently, this is to make sure that your profiles and branding are more SEO friendly to come up in searches. Google loves new content and ranks it higher than stale content with no activity or change. Any minor change you make to the content or by switching out photos refreshes it and deploys it out into Internet land one more time.

If you are active on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, you will not need to update your profile itself if you are tweeting and posting, which is your updated content. If you are inactive, then it is a good idea to tend to your profile once a week.

It is an SEO strategy to be found more readily online and in searches. These updates can be minor tweaks, a series of planned tag lines you switch out, an introduction to a new type product, or just a mention of what you are working on and when customers can expect to see them in your shop. It does not need to be extensive – replacing a sentence or an avatar or photo is fine. Consistency is the key. 

Conclusion!

Now for the big question that we all want to know!

Will these social networking sites bring in sales? 

The quick nutshell answer is….yes and no. It depends!

It depends on so many variables, such as your product, your followers’ demographics, and your consistent network activity. Many sellers say they do get sales through Twitter and Facebook and they work them hard. The key is having people follow you who are interested enough in your product to buy in the first place (your niche customer demographic). And THAT is the puzzle.

Thank you Infused Moments for the great questions that can help all of us!

Pricing Your Handmade Products Can Be Challenging

Pricing my Gallerialinda handmade beaded jewelry is often challenging. There are many thing to consider, such as hard costs of materials, time, markup for retail, and a phantom price that the market will bear. So, your costs + time + markup may not equal price that sells the item.

Usually, after figuring out my whole cost formula, I will then search the Internet for similar items using similar materials to see what is listed and if I can, research what has been sold (although some venues will not show the sold price). From there I will throw a dart at the board and come up with a price that I think is market-friendly.

Here is a great video from Dr. David Weiman on pricing your jewelry. It will translate to any handmade item you create and is worth viewing.  He makes a case that artisan, handcrafted jewelry makers should charge more for their jewelry, because the right buyers will pay more for it.

It is all about marketing to your specific buyer that loves artisan products. That is the key!

Strategic Trends for Online Selling and Handmade Communities for 2011

Everyone is talking "trends" these days. The new year always brings about predictions and opinions on what our world will look like and how our business will fare in the coming year.

Here are some specific strategic trends that relate to online sellers and the handmade community as "solopreneurs." You can read the enhanced article with details on FoxBusiness.com.

Wishing you a profitable 2011!

1. Organic, green initiatives and renewable energy will continue to be among the hottest investments and trends.
2. Financing will continue to be difficult into 2011; most small business will turn to non-bank asset-based lending and pay more on the amount borrowed. Lenders will screen out businesses that don't have a solid business model. 
3. Unemployment will continue to rise. Small businesses will continue to lead innovation in the marketplace.
4. More Fortune 500 companies will market to women specifically. 
5. The distinctions between online and offline will become irrelevant. 
6. Brands will have to play well with others, as companies have less and less control over how, when, where and with what other products their brands are experienced.
7. We will need to move from thinking about individual products to thinking about cohesive experiences and must continue the evolution of integrating online and offline brand experiences.
8. We have to get into the mind of our customers so that we are delivering brand experiences where, when and how they want them. 
9. Increase in apps usage as more and consumers use smartphones in their business as well as their personal life. 
10. Cloud computing can be a phenomenal innovation for working collaborations to enable solopreneurs and small firms to work in real time to leverage resources with great efficiency. 
11. People will talk less and text and e-mail more.
12. Solopreneurs who took jobs to survive in 2008 and 2009 will relaunch their practices or other new entrepreneurial endeavors. 
13. The number of networking groups you can join will continue to increase, forcing those groups to be more strategic about their message and the value they provide.
14. Allowing information seekers to replay webinars and live events at their convenience will continue.
15. More peer-to-peer business planning. Because of the need for prompt business idea validation and feedback, startups may emerge as key components of business planning for next-generation entrepreneurs. 
16. Business plans will start to appear in a more compact and digital form., making them more accessible to potential funders, mentors and potential customers.

New Look - Revamping for 2011 - And New Graphic Resources for You

I have been in an updating mode - a rework of "the plan" for 2011 for all things online: shops, blogs, profiles, etc... Here is IndieCEO's new banner look! I am rethinking shop banners and avatars too. It will take some organization to get all of them changed on all the networking profiles.

Large corporations will update their logos and look every 5-10 years. Even if they keep the same images, they will freshen them up a bit for a current look.

With the IndieCEO banner, I wanted to achieve an artistic look, but a current look and a bit edgy. The image of the hands reminds me of potter's hands. The grunge text adds to the edge and the great mix of deep colors contrasting with selected lighting adds drama.

Here are some free graphic resources I use for all my work and hope you will find some uses for these too!

There are many free fonts to be had online but I seem to keep going back to fontsquirrel.com as they always have what I need - quick and easy.

For free textured backgrounds - especially the grunge backgrounds, I just love LostAndTaken.com and use them frequently.

For your holiday shopping pleasure, there are new, awesome, "off-the-wall" earring designs in GalleriaLinda's loft shop on Zibbet. And, a 10% off - free US shipping promo too! These are great inexpensive "Secret Santa" gifts gatherings at work, clubs, groups, or church!

Wishing you a great holiday selling season!

'Tis the Season to Know Your Customer

 

We are into the heart of the holiday selling season! Although I am prepared as I can be for my tiny business, it always sneaks up on me. Preparations in July for year-end holidays just seem unnatural, but necessary!

The concept of "knowing your customer" has been introduced many times in this blog, as this is the heart of your business. 

To make more sales, you must bring your product to your target customer - to where they work, play, and live. Through advertising and exposure direct to those who are interested, you eliminate the waste of effort and money.

IndieCEO recently wrote a guest post for the Zibbet blog about this very thing. Read more to find out methods you can use to figure out the customer profile for your product. 

Fun Software Training Even I can Afford

Oh my. Does software training sound dry and boring to you? Expensive even? Homework-esque? Drudgery?

Well, I have a resource for you that I have used since the late 90s and just love it. www.Lynda.com has been offering online video training for a long time and is well established. I have watched them grow over the years and am amazed at their current 910 courses.

Starting out with the basic business and graphic software, they now have a tremendous line-up of expanded titles that touch Selling on eBay, Making Money with Podcasts, and OpenSource.org. There is a treasure-trove of good, fun, video training to be had at Lynda's!

There are several payment plans but when I get a hankerin' for software training (and...I do), I will pay the $25 monthly fee (no contract) and have fun for a month then stop the subscription. Then, maybe I will pick it up for a month the next year. For that one fee, all 910 training titles are available to YOU!

If you do it this way, to get the most benefit, you will need to be organized for that one month. I actually schedule "appointments" on my calendar to carve out time to do this. Each course has a course outline that you can view along with free video peeks into certain chapters.

As small businesses, micro-business, and especially us "kitchen-table businesses," it gives us an economical way to keep up-to-date with software and skills that will help us manage our own businesses. It will also make us more marketable in the workplace. 

At Lynda's you can:
– Stay current and keep skills sharp
– Learn innovative and productive techniques
– Access over 910 online courses, 24/7
– Learn from experienced instructors
– Gain confidence and marketability
– Learn at your own pace: Stop, rewind, replay

Have fun!

Art Photography and Editorial Photography

(All photos in this blog post are ©2010 Copyright John Evans, All Rights Reserved)

There are many uses for interesting photos and just as many perspectives on how photography should be presented.

I wanted to share some great photos from a friend of mine, John Evans, who is a real estate agent, specializing in Florida land.

John amazes me with his "eye" for photography that allows him to capture the the real feel and flavor of the land he is presenting. You can read more about John's photography on the GalleriaLindaShowcase blog and view additional photos of John Evans' in this post.

Purists in the art photography community will say that these photos (or any photo) should be able to stand alone on their own with little or no Photoshop editing. I agree that is absolutely the goal for art photography. Art photography presents that highly creative and technically skilled photographer, who has the critcal creative eye for composition and knows how to capture rich colors, lighting, and focus of the subject. Art photography sometimes makes my jaw drop with appreciation of those skills.

Photos that come across my desk are used in my designs for glossy magazine property brochures, such as the one for John's Lake Disston, Florida parcel of over 3,600 acres. They are editorial in content and use. Some photos I receive from the agents are even "artistic" in the layman's definition, but require editing for print purposes. Many are questionable for use at all!

The photos you see here are indeed heavily edited in Photoshop for output on a variety of commercial printing equipment. The original photos would have had much less impact without the editing.

The photos we use have to look good to a layman's eye; satisfy the client, the agent, the marketing team, and the broker.  The photos in these brochures are the conduit that sparks the reader to want to see more.
 
I work with dozens of land real estate agents who take their own photos of property listings. Most photos are "ok" but must have Photoshop editing in order to be used at all.

John is one in a million when it comes to property photos. He is not a professional photographer, but is an emerging amateur photographer who can take his photography to the next level!

Run Your Business with Open Source: Illustration Software

If you are an illustrator with no funds for Corel Draw or Adobe Illustrator to further your passion for drawing, here is a GREAT open source vector drawing program.

There are so many free sources online at this time that one could literally run a graphics business on freeware and open source software for business apps and graphics apps.

Scalable vector graphics are those that you can draw in a software program that can be resized without losing quality. Professional illustrators will use the likes of Corel Draw or Adobe Illustrator to draw their images, then save as .jpg (or other) to be used online or in print media. However, the native file in the software retains the ability to resize up or down to create sharp, quality graphics.

I have not used inkscape because I have the other two, however, reviews say that it truly rivals the Corel and Adobe Illustrator programs.

Give it a try and have fun! http://www.inkscape.org/

TWITTER: Know Your Social Media Limitations

I had an interesting question sent to me on Twitter recently. This person could no longer follow anyone and thought Twitter was having issues!

For those of you new to Twitter, there are "following" limits. Did you know that? Not many people new to Twitter do and it would help if they did.

Twitter Help offers this:

"If you've reached a follow limit, you can help yourself by reducing your following number until it resembles your followers number. Since the follow limit is based on followers/following ratio rather than time, you'll have to un-follow people before you're able to follow again."

Reducing your following numbers is easy with third party utilities - there are dozens. I like to use Dossy's Twitter Karma as I find it easier than the others. You can find more by searching on Google "Twitter Unfollow Tool."

You can follow IndieCEO/GalleriaLinda here and I would love to have you as a twitter and Facebook buddy!

IndieCEO Blog - http://www.twitter.com/IndieCEO
GalleriaLinda Handcrafted Jewelry & Beads - http://www.twitter.com/Gallerialinda
GalleriaLindaLoft Vintage Jewelry - http://www.twitter.com/GalleriaLoft

GalleriaLinda's Facebook Page: http://www.facebook.com/gallerialinda

Edit, Edit, Edit....Make it Work!

If you watch Project Runway on TV, you will know these words well!

Project Runway is a show of fashion designer contestants that participate in design challenges in hopes of becoming the big winner. Tim Gunn, the designer-contestant-overseer, reviews all work in progress and frequently says "Edit, edit, edit...." and always ends with "Make it work!"

And so it is that this is good advice for everything we do. As online sellers especially, we need to "Edit, Edit, Edit....Make it Work!" in all areas of our business.

I took this thought to heart the other day and made a plan to edit my shops and inventory. It is time! On iCraft.ca/GalleriaLinda where I sell my handcrafted contemporary beaded jewelry, I have some jewelry designs that have not sold and are a year old or more that really do not represent my evolving design point-of-view (another Project Runway buzz word).

Pictured above is my evolving design perspective today and in the days to come, I will be selecting older items to either deconstruct and reuse materials, donate, giveaway, or place on another venue as clearance.

We must keep our shops fresh and current to where we are today and this is a journey, not a destination. I see that every six months an inventory audit is needed and GalleriaLinda's handcrafted jewelry, vintage jewelry, and bead shops will be doing that!