Let's talk about advertising - erinf115

Last week in Chat we were talking about paid-for advertising, and how effective (or not) it is for Etsy sellers. A few of the chatters in the room mentioned that they had experience with ads, and I've asked them each to answer a few questions about what they learned. Here's the first reply, from member Erin of erinf115:

Q.  Where did your ad/s appear?
A.  I ran a two week ad on Craftopolis in May and just a few days ago gave Facebook ads a try, and ran an ad for 3 days.

Q.  How long the ad/s run?
A.  With Facebook you can tailor to run as little or as long as you like, and set a daily budget so you won't exceed how much you like to spend. You can cast a wide net, or a tiny one, by targeting your audience.

It's a very interesting tool and I'm just starting to noodle around with it in the past couple of days. I recommend to everyone to take a peek and see what it has to offer!
Craftopolis ads run by the week.

Q.  What did the ad/s cost?
A.  With Facebook, you set how much you'd like to spend, and you choose if you'd like to pay per "impression" (how many times they put the ad on "out there") or per click (if someone actually clicks your ad and gets taken to your shop or Facebook fan page) I chose a very small amount of $4.00 per day (something like $.60 a click) just to get my feet wet and see what the results would be.
With Craftopolis, a two week ad ran for $22.00.

Q.  What results did you expect? (views? clicks? hearts? convos? sales?)
A.  With both Craftopolis and Facebook, I wasn't sure quite what to expect. I chose to do them as a "test" - and expected views to go up and perhaps some sales.

Q.  How did you measure your results? (Google Analytics? Other tools/sites? Observation?) How did the ads do? Were they effective quickly and/or over time?
A.  For Craftopolis, I did this a few months ago before I had Google Analytics set up. I went to Craftopolis and Craftcult to check my views and hearts. My views skyrocketed, as did my hearts.  Before the ad ran, I averaged about 2 new shop hearts a day.

When the ad ran, I jumped to about 7-9 hearts. My views skyrocketed as well (this was pre-Google Analytics for me though, so I don't have the history anymore) The thing is, though - you are advertising to other Etsy sellers, not necessarily your market - so I assumed that that's pretty much where it would end, with more hearts and views, but it was a bit more exciting than that. I suddenly noticed a big influx in treasuries that I was included in, which turned into more hearts and views. And then, two weeks after the ad ran, with much more exposure and many more hearts, I had the best month of sales since I started selling in February of 2010.

Q.  Would you advertise again?
A.  Oh yes!

Q.  What, if anything, would you do differently in future advertising?

A.  I am not sure that advertising on Facebook is helpful. I did read an interesting thing in the forums recently, that linking a Facebook ad to your Etsy fan page on Facebook will help get more fans, but linking folks to your shop doesn't seem to work for most.
I noticed a slight bump in views on my Google Analytics over the three days that I ran my Facebook ad, but nothing like the huge influx when I ran my Craftopolis.

Q.  Anything else you'd like to add?
A.  I would like to add my Twitter success story too. Now, Twitter isn't necessarily advertising, but when I first signed up for twitter I began searching for people twittering about The Tudors, (Henry VIII, Anne Boleyn, Elizabeth the Ist, etc) and then I 'followed' them and sent them messages with links to my Tudor and Elizabethan line of product. This was a pretty bold-ish move, as it can be seen as "spammy" but I found a woman who runs and amazing historical blog called The Anne Boleyn Files and she fell in love with my Tudor sachets of the Six Wives of Henry VIII's Royal Badges and bought all 6, and then asked me to make a larger Anne Boleyn Royal Badge framed wall hanging

When I sent them to her she brought them to an event she was running called the Anne Boleyn Experience which was an event at Anne Boleyn's childhood home, Hever Castle, in Kent, England. For me, this was as if I was starring on Broadway. It was such an honor, she displayed them there, and explained each of the wives Royal Badges and their meanings in a pre-dinner talk, and told me the people who were there fell in love with them too! I just sold another full set of all Six Wives to an attendee of that conference, and a week later she bought an Elizabethan piece as well. Twitter has led me to my largest sales and shouldn't be ignored as a wonderful advertising tool (and it is free!)

Up next, we'll talk about advertising with BigSkyArtworks.