Black Friday WEEKEND DEALS!!

Place an order today at JesseJanes.etsy.com and use PROMO CODE "Blog Fan 09" and get 10% off your total order in addition to FREE Worldwide Shipping! -


Check out these great new holiday pendants:

My two cents on etsy success

I'm nearing 3400 sales. Cool huh?

This is a post I added in the etsy forums in response to the question: "Over 100 sales? Share what you think has attributed to your success!"

Great photos, awesome customer service, cool packaging, renewing and having a large variety of items to choose from all add to success.

Something I would like to add is the vital importance of communicating with your customer - I can't tell you how many items I have purchased from other sellers on etsy and never received an email or convo acknowledging my purchase with a thank you and letting me know how soon it would ship. This is a real pet peeve of mine I guess.

With every sale, I convo the day of the purchase if the buyer already has some feedback, if not, for new buyers I email them, thanking them for their purchase and letting them know there items will ship out shortly.

Because of this initial communication, I can't tell you how many customers email me back when they receive their items and let me know how happy they are. This simple practice creates repeat customers because they know there is a real person behind the storefront.

Also, this gives the opportunity for the customer to let me know if they experience any problems with their order, so that I can take care of it immediately - EVEN if it's not my fault. I want happy customers, so they want to keep coming back.

I do a lot of promotion outside of etsy. Facebook works and I have to say that I have made a lot of sales from using Twitter. I don't spend that much time out of my day to do these. My blog however suffers from my time constraints. I would like to be more actively blogging.

I know a lot of sellers do not have good results from showcases, but I do have a lot of success with the Main Showcase when I do them.

Also, having a good product, with good quality is important. I know there are a lot of other sellers on etsy who sell scrabble tile pendants. Some sell for higher prices, some for lower. I choose what I am comfortable with. I also try to define my shop through it's differences.

I started a site for sellers called Coaching Handmade. It's a membership site with live classes, a great resource library and forum for sellers who are looking to enhance their sales. I've learned a lot and I share my experience and knowledge with other sellers as well. I think it's important to keep learning and stretching ourselves to succeed.

I wish everyone continued great success and a fabulous holiday season!

What time is it?

It's time to check out another fabulous handmade artist!!

This time it's : Timeless Inspirations

Look at this beautiful Blue Shell & Pearl necklace-- I love the colors... such depth.


Oh -- there's earrings to match! How cool is that?

You just never know what you might find when you spend a few moments on Etsy!

We've Got Paper.... well - not me.

I'm talking about "We've Got Paper" etsy shop. They have fabulous paper!! I love this shop!


Look at this great Ivy design writing sheets that come with envelopes. Writing hand written notes or letters is such a lost art. With email, IM chats and forums, etc we write digital notes instead. Having beautiful writing paper like this will make you want to write letters.

Julie, the maven behind all this fabulous printed paper is a 29 year old stationary design. She writes, "I got my first penpal when I was 7 years old, so I've been writing letters for about 22 years now."


Go visit her shop-- it's worth the trip!

Social Media time warp...

WOW! There is not enough time in a day to keep up with my 'day job' and promote, promote, promote.... Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Etsy forum, blog posts...

I supposed I need to eat, sleep and actually create some product in between all those tasks. LOL!

To top it all off, a pre-Mercury Retrograde computer hack problem! I had to save as much as I could to my external drive and then reinitialize my desktop computer. What a mess! I think I managed to save all pertinent info, but who knows until I go looking for something.

The challenge is finding all my photos. I have so many photo folders, even under the main 'My Pcitures' folder, but they don't all seem to be there when I go looking... yuck.

I suppse that's good incentive to take new photos, huh?

Artfire Rainbows

Easter's a Hoppin'

Orange you Blue?

Why Brand Your Business?

More and more people are leaving the job market and creating their own business, whether by choice or necessity, so the competition continues to expand. Therefore it is increasingly important to stand out among your competition. You want your business to be memorable!

Customers remember images and feelings that are evoked more than just a name on a business card. What type of feeling do you want your business to evoke in your customers / clients? How do you want to be remembered? Do you want to be the first one your customer thinks about over your competition? Of course you do. But what do you want to be remembered for?

• Your excellent customer service?
• Your winning smile?
• Your product?
• Your prices?
• Your logo?

How are you different from your competition? What makes your business special? Ask yourself these questions and then look at the answers. Maybe you are already projecting a particular image. It is cohesive, or is it sloppy? Do you even have an image? Do you have a brand name? Do you have any sort of identity?

What about your services? Does each one have a different look, feel and image, or does it tie into the image of your business? Can you look at your services and see the brand name, image or theme running through each description? Choosing to use the same logo on all your materials, sticking with a consistent color theme and playing off a specific theme is part of branding.

For example, a recent episode of Taking Care of Business on TLC television highlighted a company that custom designed baby gift baskets. Their logo, color scheme and theme were brought together to expand their image. The professional business mentors assisted the owner with creating press releases and media kits for his baby company that were done like birth announcements. This created visual interest, continued the theme of the company and along with the logo and color consistency, the branding was top notch. As a result, he had several articles written about his business in key magazines that target his specific market.

What about your company? Does your image reflect your product? Do your customers recognize you by your business name or a product name? Are you consistent with your marketing message? These are ALL important questions whether you are starting a business or looking to expand your existing business. So, ask the questions, listen to the answers and create a plan for branding your business!

Random Acts of Curiosity

Alice In Wonderland

Looks good enough to eat....

Delectable goodies from Artfire sellers that look good enough to eat...

Check out this spotlight and many others at found-handmade.blogspot.com

...into Twilight....

Twilight inspired creations by Etsy & Artfire Sellers.

Something Beautiful...

I've just added a beautiful new pendant to my shop, several in fact, but I really love this one:

I'm calling it 'Limesicle' because it reminds me of a lime flavored popsicle!! I just love the color!

I really like this one too, " Purple Mirrors". I guess it's because of the color combination. I enjoy pairing lime green with purple. I haven't added the Purple Mirrors to the shop yet, maybe tonight.

I am in the process of setting up a wholesale catalog. One nice thing about living in a seasonal tourist state, there are a lot of area gift shops to wholesale to.

I also just created a new gift packaging for the pendants - decorative pillow boxes. Each pendant sold comes with a pillow box to package it for gift giving. Here's an example: