Etsy or Artfire? You help me decide.

Hey guys, I don’t really have much of a blog for you today.  I’ve been busy sleeping, making horrible smelling gluten-free cupcakes and frosting from the package, and making a new shop logo I am actually happy with for once.  Now I just need to update some things in my policies, take some pictures, upload descriptions, and I’m in business baby!  I hope to have more details on that very soon.  But I do have two things for you lovely peeps.  First an awesomely done stop motion doll video with my fave cover of Raidohead’s “Creep”.  Have a look.

Creep (Radiohead) - Scala & Kolacny Brothers from Alex Heller on Vimeo.

One lonely doll's desperate attempt to be accepted.

Next up is a poll.  If you want to just skip the lengthy babble that follows and just vote in the poll, feel free to.  It’s pretty self explanatory.  All others interested in what I have to say please continue to read.    I’ve been hesitating putting this poll up for one reason or another, but I really want to know what you guys think.  I have accounts made on both Etsy and Artfire, but I don’t know which to open shop up at.  I know Etsy has the traffic and Artfire is SLOWLY up and coming.  But either way I’d have to market myself to get any traffic at my shop, so it’s not really a traffic thing for me when it comes to the doll items.  But I also want to make human items too.  In this case I think the traffic Etsy has would play a big part in me selling those items.  I’ve been checking both sites’ page rankings and while Etsy is 100 something Artfire is like 1000 something I believe.  Not really good when trying to sell in a big market.

Now my reason for wanting to use Artfire is because listing is free.  I’d kind of like to make some money before trying out Etsy.  But if the traffic isn’t there then I won’t make money anyway.  However, on Etsy to keep being seen you have to constantly relist or just list every day an item or two.  I could do the daily listing but I don’t want to do the relisting.  That is just to expensive for me in the end.  I’m willing to put a few bucks investment into Etsy to try it out.  I know my products will stay listed for 4 months and that’s plenty of time to promote and have deals to sell.  I just worry if I don’t make any money on what I am trying to sell that my shop will flop, but I guess that’s the risk you take when you attempt this kind of thing.  I honestly thought I had everything figured out, but after certain things I’ve read about both places I’m still up in the air.  *sigh*

When I think of Etsy and Artfire I see Artfire as being Myspace and Etsy as being Facebook.  For those of you who don’t understand, Artfire allows you to make your own shop up and use colors and backgrounds and you can even have a music player with your own music playing on your shop page.  You can have pictures of your dog, cat, Aunt Mae in your shop as well on your bio.  Now this is just all gaudy to me.  Really gaudy and not professional at all, kind of like Myspace that let’s you put up any backgrounds, music, pictures, etc. that you want…one of the reasons I closed mine.  Now Etsy on the other hand is all business all the way.  Same uniformed look for the most part, allowing you some customization in the forum of a profile picture and banner.  Very similar to Facebook.  I like the organized look of it and the cleanness of it.  I truthfully like everything about Etsy, except a few things.

Your items aren’t listed in search engines, you have to do it yourself from what I read.  Now here’s the thing, I don’t tend to use search engines to shop for handmade.  I tend to go to Etsy and sometimes Artfire directly and search for items that way.  So does SEO really matter in this count?  Do a lot of people search through Google for a handmade Blythe dress or fingerless gloves?  The way people talk it seems so, but I just don’t feel that’s the case.  Artfire does list items in search engines, even for basic accounts, but of course pro accounts get more acknowledgement.  Etsy doesn’t do that at all, so it makes me wonder if that would affect my sales.

Another thing that bothers me about Etsy is lack of customer support.  I’ve heard it can take days to weeks for you to hear back from Etsy when you have a problem.  I don’t like that.  I want help when a problem arises, not when it’s convenient to Etsy.  I mean you are giving them a cut of your sales so they should be very forthcoming with the help.  I’ve even heard cases where you won’t get a response at all.  Ummm…how is this good business?

Another thing about Etsy is they are seriously lacking in the sellers tools that Artfire and other sites already have.  That doesn’t work for me.  I like the things that Artfire has to offer for sellers, but of course that is if you become pro.  At this point both sites are even for me on that case, and I did think about becoming pro, but I just don’t like their attitude that if you are basic you are not considered one of the team really, and more of just a moocher.  Which makes me like Etsy more on that count again because no matter what, if you sell or buy on there you can participate on everything the site has to offer.  It makes for a nicer community to me.  So I am on the fence about which to go to.  I know I should just do both, which I was thinking do Artfire first and then slowly move to Etsy and then decide.  But then again I could just bit the bullet and jump into Etsy feet first and just really promote and work up my shop there.  So that is where you come in lovely readers.  If you have gotten this far, thankies for reading or just jumping ahead to take my poll. 

Looking For Suggestions Which site would you suggest I sell on? Etsy Artfire view results

I like the poll.  It’s kind of cute.  I may try more interesting polls in the future.  But back on topic now.  Taking any and all suggestions or stories of experience if you’d like to share.  Thankies in advance and I will talk to you all soon.  Having a bad tummy day so I want to lay down and ride it out.  *sigh*  I need to get out of this house and have some fun, maybe that will get me out of my funk.  Bye for now peeps, and have a great start to a wonderful week! 

Loves ya,
Mouse