Chances are that if you’re reading this post about selling crafts it’s because you’ve heard that search engines are important to your craft business but you need more information.
Happy to oblige!
Search engine traffic (traffic being what we call people visiting your craft site) is free – always a good thing – and should be as a result of someone entering relevant information into Google, Yahoo, Bing or whoever. As a result that visitor should be highly targeted. In other words they should already be pre-qualified as someone who is interested in what you craft items have to offer.
Obviously good news – and important because it’s much easier to sell to someone who wants what you’ve got!
But if you’re selling crafts you’ve got to have time to actually make them! Many crafters have other pressures too. Most of us have to prioritize in some way, so how much time should you pay to getting into the search engines and ranking well?
As much as you can – but I understand there are limits. To grow a business beyond your local area you need the internet but you don’t want to be spending all day in front of your computer at the expense of your craft work.
So although Google and it’s competitors can be a great help, concentrating on SEO (search engine optimization) is not your number one goal. Spreading your craft marketing efforts by using a number of tactics will pay off better in the long run – and actually help your ranking too.
A craft blog is naturally more search engine friendly than a traditional website so if you haven’t got one, get one! It doesn’t have to be one or the other, it’s a simple addition even if you already have a substantial site.
Then look at article marketing, which will provide the search engines with valuable content and you with more free traffic. Look at you linking strategy because the search engines also judge you on who you link to and, more importantly, who links to you. Did you know that a comment on someone else’s blog can frequently look like that blog linking to you in the eyes of the search engines? So craft blog commenting can be another valuable free tool.
Selling crafts successfully on the internet is not about finding a secret, it’s about doing a number of things a bit at a time. If you can give half a day a week to marketing your craft site your rankings will improve surprisingly quickly. If you can give less then your rankings will still improve – they’ll just reflect the amount of time you are able to give. Every little helps. There’s only one bad way to do this – and that’s not to do it at all!
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