Advertising

Advertising is something I've always struggled with. I just never know what will work and what is worth the money and what isn't. Small ads don't seem to bring in any traffic, while large ads can be rather pricey.

I recently decided to try a rather pricey ad. After advertising on The Knot for the last year with little to no results, I decided it was time to invest that money elsewhere. I was contacted by Bliss Quarterly, a local magazine, to advertise to local brides. The package included a 1/2 page ad, email marketing, a list of brides who attended the two spring shows as well as advertising on their site.

The magazine was handed out to each bride who attended the two spring shows and is available at some local stores in the area as well. The second show was last weekend, so I'm still waiting to see how this pans out. Once I have the bride list, I will be able to contact the brides directly.

Time will tell whether I do this ad in the fall, but I will say that I am very happy with the company so far. They were great to work with in creating my ad and I feel you really get a lot for your advertising dollars. This whole package was $350.

Have you done any advertising lately? What have you found that does/doesn't work?

Advertising/Marketing/Branding

I've been looking at different ways to advertise my shop and get my web address on all of my products. That way when I sell a product, it's like a little business card goes with every item :) Without my address right on the product, people may forget where they purchased the item and could easily lose my business card. Plus, if they give the item as a gift (which happens with my items quite often) they most likely won't pass along my business card. Here are some ways that I add my etsy addy to my products: *Stickers on the backs of my albums *Engrave my address on the backs of picture frames, plaques and other wood items *On any packaging I make, like my magnets shown below *At the least, I add a hang tag to items I'm not able to engrave on or add a sticker too. Like my wine glasses or champagne flutes Branding is also important when advertising your business. All of my tags (except my hang tags, which I still need to update!) match my business cards. They also match my blog and my etsy banner. I used to have my magnets on a large jelly roll pan for display. I recently decided to put my magnets in sets and add a card with them for advertising. Now my magnets have a little built in business card with them and they match all of my other cards and web sites. The stickers on the backs of my albums also match my business cards :) Put your web address and other information anywhere you can! Get your name out there! But remember to do this tactfully. Don't ever let your info take away from the product or distract from your product.