Selling crafts on the web

Selling crafts is a very popular keyword in the search engines, though surprisingly there aren't that many options available for people wanting to promote their craft business online.

With the credit crunch meaning more and more people are looking for ways to supplement their income, arts and crafts websites are likely to see a boom in the next year or so.

However, don't just settle for an eBay shop, there are some other much better options available which focus entirely on the arts and crafts community.

The web-based options available boil down to three different approaches:

1) eBay or similar general, browser-based online marketplace

2) A customised 'arts and crafts' website, specialising only in this area

3) Selling crafts by building your own online store for arts and crafts

This page will deal only with item 2 as options 1 and 3 are dealt with elsewhere on this website.

etsy.com

Probably the best known specialised outlet for selling crafts is etsy.com which bills itself as 'Your place to buy and sell all things handmade'.

At the time of writing, there are 170,000 shops based on etsy.com, from all over the world, selling crafts like:

• bags and purses
• candles
• ceramics and pottery
• knitting
• dolls and minaitures
• paper goods
• woodworking
• needlecraft

I did a search and found a couple of shops from my local city in the UK, and this website has certainly begun to be much supported that it was when I first discovered it and recommended it to a friend a few years ago.

Here are the key things it offers:

• You must sell something in the 'handmade', 'supplies' or 'vintage' general categories
• The big difference between a site like this and eBay, is that you must have made the goods yourself, you can't sell goods made by somebody else
• Potential buyers can place requests for items
• You can customise your shop, with a banner and announcements, but you can't use HTML in etsy.com
• etsy.com does not offer Paypal (big disadvantage these days!) but it will allow you to take online payments via credit cards
• There is a $0.20 (USD) fee (per quantity of one)

icraft.ca

A lesser know website for selling crafts is icrafts.ca which seems to attract listings mainly from Canada and the USA (as you might expect from the .ca domain name) but which does not limit itself to sellers just from those locations.

The UK is also well represented on the website and it's certainly something you should look at if you have homemade products to sell

icraft.ca is divided up into 'The Collections', broad headings which give the buyer lots of options as they start to burrow down into sub-categories:

• Artwork
• Crafts
• Jewellery
• Clothing
• Furniture
• Accessories

Sub-categories give you much more scope for your listing with much more diverse options like knitted scarves, keyrings/keychains, baby clothes, greeting cards, glass art and Amigurumi ... whatever that is! From the pictures, it appears to be little characters made by crochet - take a look, it's fascinating.

For my tastes, icrafts.ca has a much greater feel of a selling crafts website than etsy.com in that it has images all over the place of items that clearly haven't been mass-produced ... it really feels like an arts and crafts outlet.

Here are a few key points to be aware of:

• No reselling, all items sold must be self-made
• No commission on sales, but there is a registration fee ($25) and a tiered subscriptions system however the first 5 items are always free
• Each creator has their own personalised page and logos, prices, descriptions and photos can all be displayed
• There are some nice resource banners which allow you to cross-promote from your own website if you have one

folksy.com

For artists selling crafts in the UK folksy.com is probably a good site to look at as pricing is in GBP, though that isn't really a huge problem these days as the internet has made $-to-£ and £-to-$ conversions a part of everyday life.

I like the slogan for this website which is 'Cast, sculpt, cut, sketch, solder, mould, buy, sell, go!'

That's a pretty good description of what this website offers, and like the other two sites, folksy.com has its own system for categorising the many arts and crafts available, this time dividing by materials and practices.

Like icrafts.ca, wherever you turn on this website, there are pictures of handmade items which clearly have not been mass-produced.

It has a nice 'handmade' feel to it, and I don't mean that in a rude way, I mean that the 'feel' of the website is right for who it's aimed at.

Categories that are particularly worthy of note are:

• Robotics (is this a 'craft' these days?)
• Geek stuff
• Hacking (another fascinating craft, do check it out)

As with the other two websites aimed at people who are selling crafts, you get to use a customised banner and your shop has a highly visible RSS feed ... great if a buyer loves your products.

Here are other features of note:

• Uses Paypal and only Paypal
• Lots of very nice 'Folksy' banners to add to your blog or personal website to cross promote your online store
• Each shop has a 'biography' section so potential buyers can find out more about you and how you make your products.
• Non UK residents can't sell on folksy.com just yet, but they will be able to in the future
• It costs 20p to list an item on Folksy and they charge 5% commission on all sales (excludes postage costs)

5 tips for selling crafts online

Whatever website you decide to use to sell your products, and whichever method you opt for, there are a few things you should bear in mind before setting up your online presence for selling crafts:

1) Check out the fees structure ... don't throw away your profit on a punitive system which in effect, punishes your success.

2) Make sure you can show images of your work ... that's what will sell your unique products.

3) Look for RSS feeds on the site as this will encourage repeat customers who can easily subscribe to your products feed and get automatic updates when you've listed a new item

4) Do think about where you're selling and postage costs. There's no point buying sculptures for £10 and then paying £20 to ship them. Consider whether a UK or USA based site is best for you and your potential buyers.

5) Look for a website with a community, where you can exchange tips and ideas about what you're selling. Most people selling crafts work for themselves, but it's always good to have friends online to compare notes with.

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