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Alternatives to Etsy Ranked

Alternatives to Etsy: Six Marketplaces Ranked

The tumultuous first half of 2017 has left many handmade businesses wondering about alternatives to Etsy. Changes at the top, layoffs, and a spate of new “experiments” all add to the normal level of uncertainty among sellers. It’s never a good idea to rely on a single sales channel for your business, but the question is what to supplement Etsy with? Setting up your own website gives you the best insurance, but marketplaces have their benefits as well. Read on to see how some of the top marketplaces compare to Etsy in terms of quantity, and quality, of customer traffic. Is one right for you? Continue reading “Alternatives to Etsy: Six Marketplaces Ranked”…

Lift Off Summit Logo

Lift Off Summit is Coming!

What’s the most thrilling moment when you start a new online store? Making it public and sharing it with the world might be your answer, but there’s one more moment that’s even better: making your first sale! Too often website and online store projects are 100% focused on launching the site and lose sight of the website’s #1 job, making sales. So I am excited to announce a free, online event dedicated to helping online store owners get their first, and many more, sales: the Lift Off Summit.

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Etsy Changes Make me Question Everything

What Makes Etsy Changes so Controversial?

Etsy changes things about their service all the time. Just about the only time they aren’t testing or introducing changes and new is the Christmas season. There’s nothing unusual about this—technology companies are always developing their products and services to improve them or keep them competitive. Shopify, for example, releases piles of new products at their annual Unite conference, and WooCommerce issues major updates at least once a year. But there is one way in which Etsy is different. When WooCommerce and Shopify make changes, it makes their users cheer. When Etsy makes changes, it makes their users furious.

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An Abandoned Shopping Cart. Someone send someone an email.

Abandoned Cart Emails are the Least You Can Do

Abandoned Cart Emails are the first automated email you should set up for your online store. Even though they might only work 15% of the time, that’s 15 orders out of every 100 abandoned carts that you wouldn’t have gotten otherwise. But there are also other emails you can send to past or potential customers in order to reduce cart abandonment and increase repeat business. Since I know that you can’t do ALL of them right away, I’m going to list them in order of importance, and at the end I’ll give you some links to get you started. Ready? Let’s go.
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Emotional Barriers to Growth - It's All in Your Mind!

Emotional Roadblocks to Growth: Breaking Through the Top 5

Sooner or later every solopreneur runs up against some emotional roadblocks to growth that threaten to hold their business back. Two common roadblocks are not feeling like you’re ready to make a big change or give up control over part of their business’s operations, and feeling like you don’t have the money (or aren’t comfortable taking out a loan) to invest in products or services that their business’s future will rely on. Even if you know that both steps are necessary to keep your business growing and thriving they are HUGE mental and emotional humps to get over. So what’s a solopreneur to do? Continue reading “Emotional Roadblocks to Growth: Breaking Through the Top 5”…

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