← How to Sell Your Stuff on Etsy
How to Sell Your Stuff on Etsy
Ep 155 | The Crazy Potential of AI Tumbler Wraps and PNGs on Etsy – with BaileyDesignedCo
00:46:56
Three years ago, Bailey opened her Etsy shop selling PNG designs for sublimation tumblers—and since then, she’s become a top 0.1% Etsy Seller earning $45k per month with digital downloads. Today she's sharing how she uses AI to create tumbler...
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- [00:01]
Lizzie Smiley
Hey, my name is Lizzie Smiley and I absolutely love helping people connect with.
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Bailey
Their calling and all the tools they.
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Lizzie Smiley
Need to kick roadblocks and excuses right out the door so they can cultivate.
- [00:11]
Bailey
The life they dream about.
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Lizzie Smiley
If you want to launch, grow, pivot.
- [00:15]
Bailey
Or scale your Etsy shop, or you've.
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Lizzie Smiley
Always wanted to develop the mindset and.
- [00:19]
Bailey
Skills to run your own business, then I'm your girl.
- [00:22]
Lizzie Smiley
I've had that entrepreneurial spirit going strong since my very first lemonade stand and now I'm a work at home mama with multiple online companies and a full time Etsy shop. All while being present with my kids for the everyday chaos and most important milestones. On this podcast we'll talk about all things business, mindset, Etsy, creativity, dazzling our customers, and so much more. There's plenty of room at this table.
- [00:48]
Bailey
For you, so scooch on in and let's go. I'm holding nothing back.
- [00:52]
Lizzie Smiley
Welcome to how to sell your stuff on Etsy.
- [00:55]
Bailey
I'm so glad you're here. Hey guys, welcome back to the show this week. If you are new around here, I just want to give you a real big Lizzy Smiley hug and welcome. We're so glad you're here. We're so glad you're soaking up all the Etsy goodness and my total ADHD antics. Thank you, thank you for your service and tolerating me you guys. But we always have so much fun and today will not disappoint. I am vibrating getting off of the call with Bailey. She is so brainy and brilliant and generous and I love good humans like that. So I will introduce her more in a few minutes. Just a couple of things, especially if you're new around here. There are two main ways that I really really love to help Etsy sellers. The first one is my six figure secrets to getting started on Etsy course it is less than three hours long. It is everything you need to actually get started and understand how to be profitable on Etsy. It's going to teach you about SEO, it's going to teach you about trends and it's going to teach you about demand. It's going to teach you how to set up your listings for success. It is going to hold your hand. There's even a click by click shop setup section. So I'm going to show you everything that you need to know to get started. It is super, super crazy discounted right now. So now is the time to grab it if you want to get started on Etsy real soon and you want to do it the right way and save yourself lots of time. The other thing that I offer is a weekly membership. You get an email from me every Monday morning with a list of what the current trends are. Trends are so important to understand what's happening on Etsy because it's the way that you beat saturation. It literally makes saturation a thing of the past. If you understand what the trends are and you learn how to apply them to your products. Because people are always searching for what is hot, what is happening. And so I give you the download. You don't even have to figure out what they are anymore. Every week I'll give you a list and a video showing what they are, how they're applying, and it'll include five current opportunities for products. I do a mix of print on demand and digital products. And it is always things that are high demand, low competition opportunities. I have found where you and lots of like new shops are having success in that area and you could get in there, create a product for it and have a quick win, which I think is really critical to keeping people going on Etsy because entrepreneurship, it has its moments, right? So both of those things will be linked in the show notes. I would love for you to join me on either one of those projects. And now let me tell you about the lovely Bailey. First of all, she was on a previous episode, number 112. We covered very different topics and it was a great interview. So that's another one to check out. Especially if you really enjoy Bailey today. It doesn't really matter which one you listen to first, but Bailey is a top 0.1% Etsy seller. That's right. And coach, who now helps others create digital product businesses, resulting in scalable passive income. We love that. She was able to make $15,000 a month with one digital product shop on Etsy within three months. Oh my gosh, that's so fast. I forgot that. And has now tripled that monthly revenue, resulting in over $1.3 million earned on the platform. And implemented strategies to automate a majority of the business. And now runs several digital product shops. The way that her systems are so solid, she can do several things. I actually need. I need to ask her about that next time I talk to her. Seeing the success of her main digital product shop, Bailey went on to also build her new brand off of Etsy and created a digital product membership site for her customers that now has over 800 members. So what that means is she's selling her products that she sells on Etsy off of Etsy. As well in a membership that people pay for monthly, which is brilliant. This year, 2024, she launched her creative digital product Business Communities where she helps others learn how to sell designs on Etsy and their own sites. She also has her YouTube channel where she provides free educational content to her audience. She's a mother of four small children, so she believes in working smarter, not harder, in order to maximize her work time as efficiently as possible, and now teaches others to do the same. With the strategy she's been able to systematize. I almost can't say that word. Bottom line, totally brilliant, totally brainy. There is so much information packed in this episode. I'm actually learning from her right now because I'm about to launch another digital product shop just to see how much I can scale it to. And so she's the person I've chose to learn this. This too. So like multiple six figure Etsy seller right here. Choosing to learn from this million dollar Etsy seller. We're going to have a great conversation, so please help me welcome Bailey to the podcast. Hey, Bailey. Welcome back to the podcast.
- [05:22]
Hi, Lizzie, how are you?
- [05:24]
Well, I've been looking forward to this conversation for weeks, so thank you for being willing to come back and talk to us.
- [05:29]
Yes. I'm so excited.
- [05:31]
You're doing a lot of fun new stuff, so we need to talk about it. Not to mention, actually this is kind of perfect timing because I am obsessed with all the work that you do and I love learning from you and I'm on the cusp of applying some of what I've learned from you. So I'm really excited to share that with the audience, tell them how amazing you are and like let you teach us.
- [05:49]
Sounds good.
- [05:51]
Okay. Okay. I'll try to turn down the giddy, but it's probably not going to work. So let's, let's start at the beginning, my friend. Tell us your background and your Etsy story. We had a previous episode, number 111, which I mentioned in the intro that people can go back to. But give us at least your Etsy story, like how you got started in this space and became so ridiculously successful.
- [06:11]
Yeah, so I've been on Etsy for a minute. I started actually in the handmade space. So I used to make the glitter resin tumblers. So those are the ones with epoxy and glitter and paint and vinyl and they take, you know, on average two times two weeks to make. And so actually got really popular with those. Had thousands and thousands of sales and working 16 hour days. So I mean, not to say that we didn't have success with it, but it was just something that was so not scalable. So that's how I had my first success on Etsy. And during that time I was, I always have to count, but I was pregnant with the third child and so I knew that I wasn't going to be able to continue with it because you're not supposed to be around epoxy, paint, all of that. So I started looking into other methods to sell on Etsy and that's when I found the sublimation tumblers, which is still a tumbler, but you just use a special printer and a heat press and you make it. It takes about five minutes to make start to fin. So again, we had great success with that. They were personalized, so there was a little bit of manual work, not just like being able to print out automatic designs, like a stack of 100 because we had to personalize them with people's needs. So that got to be a little time consuming. I ended up at that point hiring a brother. My mother worked with us, my husband was working in the weekends and at night, everybody, it was like all hands on deck. And again, it was just like not scalable. And so during that time also I added in print on demand for the same type of like personalized custom designs. And so that really did well too. So I was kind of like in this hybrid space of half handmade, half print on demand and I was still just like, oh, there's never any time. We couldn't leave, couldn't go on vacation because we were always filling orders. So then I was just like, you know, I started going down the YouTube trail of trying to find, you know, how the people were making the actual designs because I wanted to sell just digital for that same sublimation Tumblr product. So just out of a, like just cut off 100% all physical products in January of 2022 and just went all in on designing the digital designs for people to purchase and then still make their own tumblers from home or use them in their print on demand if they wanted to. And now given I have zero graphic design experience, there isn't any AI, big AI tool out there yet. So I'm doing this all like manually piecing together commercial graphics from like Creative Fabrica. Sometimes I would attempt to draw things on my iPad. They didn't turn out too well, but I had a few. So within three months though, my shop really did go viral. It is thanks to just finding really super trending unique Designs that were not available on the Etsy platform and posting things that just weren't available yet. And so that third month, which was March of 2022, we hit over $15,000 just that month from a three dollar digital product. So needless to say, we just, we went from there. We started running ads and I started building an email list in a big Facebook group to continually remarket to those people who were already buying the designs. So that's the Etsy story. That's. That's how I kind of progressed along the way.
- [09:54]
Okay. And as someone who also started in the physical space, working ridiculously long days and having to stop because of the chemicals and getting pregnant, I mean, I cannot believe the parallels. How crazy is it to get the Cha Ching and your work is done? Like you don't have to go do any more work for a digital product. Is it the best?
- [10:11]
Yes. Yes. It is such a relief to know that you. And especially now that we can just create in these huge batches and just upload all at once. And you just know that you're not worried about inventory or running to the post office. Because I was always late, you know, trying to get orders shipped by 5 and like throwing the kids in the car, making sure so that they wouldn't be late. So yeah, way less stress. You don't have to worry about that.
- [10:39]
Oh, you know what I am curious to ask you about, Bailey, is like profit margins. Were they pretty good on the tumblers? Were you able to hire help when you had that grind going? Or is it just. Was that part of the problem?
- [10:50]
So they wasn't as good with the glitter resin tumblers because those are pretty expensive to make because you have to buy epoxy and then you have to have all of that equipment, which is a lot of equipment. And so it wasn't very good on that. Now it is with sublimation tumbler because you can get those for so cheap. And then it's really just you're calculating your ink and then like your printer overhead cost, so. And then a heat press isn't too bad. So much, much more room there. Which is why I was able to hire a brother and my mom. And then I didn't pay my husband, but he just had to help, so there was that free help.
- [11:31]
Okay, this is so that's, that's so interesting. I love the, I love the parallel of our stories. I just have so many questions. What about like in the sublimation and PNG space, which is where you, you do a lot of teaching And I think we obviously as Etsy coaches we both hear all the time about market saturation and there's too many people already doing that. And gosh, as I've, as I've recently been diving into like really studying trends and trend combining and being able to apply them in different product spaces, I, I think that the opportunity is insane still. But I'd love for you because I've never done sublimation or png. That's my next project. Is there space for new sellers in that area on Etsy? What are you seeing?
- [12:09]
Yes. So like you said, I get this all the time. So what I like to talk about is number one, sublimation is so the space, the craft of sublimation is so much bigger than what people just usually equate it to. When you think sublimation they're usually thinking skinny tumbler designs, kind of like the ones I have back there or they're thinking a T shirt design. And so you know, they're limited by that. When really the sublimation space has hundreds of products that oh my gosh, I.
- [12:40]
Didn'T even know that. I thought it was just tumblers.
- [12:43]
Oh my gosh, literally hundreds. So a lot of things like I'll post in my group all the time, I'll be like this is a design for a mouse pad or a wind spinner or garden flags. And just people think, people don't really understand like that pretty much anything. If you think of print on demand, if you're familiar with print on demand and all of the products like that Printify carries, pretty much all of those types of products are available for sublimation crafters to purchase. And I mean there's huge, huge suppliers, wholesale suppliers here in the US that people can purchase from. So I always recommend just if you want some inspiration, go to like a sublimation wholesaler supplier and just look at all of the products that they offer and then you can also start designing for some of those because there's actually a lot of space on Etsy for low competition products like that that haven't even began to be tapped into because people are so focused on what the most popular is right now, which is the 20 ounce and it's actually not the most popular. There is a better one that is more low competition but people don't like to design for it. And that's actually those 40 ounce tumblers. I don't, it's like the Stanley thing, but there's a sublimation version. So that's actually the most popular product Right now on Etsy. So if you are new and you're looking to like break into the design space for these, look at those other types of products because there's a lot of open space. And then the other, I mean, just taking away the product thing. When you look at the designs, the reason why it can never be saturated is because literally every two to three months, these designs change, the styles change. We're moving into only designing right now for like Christmas, Thanksgiving, and all of my Christmas designs from last year are not necessarily relevant because the design styles are different this year. So now I'm all about creating, you know, whatever is. What is it called? The new like Matisse style, which is like a form of art that is getting, gaining huge, huge popularity right now in the sublimation space. So it's just like applying whatever is new and trending to the sublimation space, whether that is 20 ounce designs or not. So that's why I just think there's. There's so much open room.
- [15:09]
This is so crazy. So let me tell me if this sounds wrong. Are you basically saying that sublimation is essentially like print on demand at home?
- [15:17]
Yes. Yeah, it's exactly what it is. Wow. I try to, Yeah, I try to explain this. Like I. And the. And it's so huge. Like you're familiar with like cricut and silhouette and vinyl, right? Like SVG people. So sublimation is equally as big. And usually when you get sick of being an SVG crafter and like cutting and vinyl, you move to sublimation because you're done like cutting and weeding and all of that. And it's just sublimation is definitely. It has some learning curves, but yeah, it's huge. And they have tons of products you can create for. And yeah, they. The majority of people do all of these from home. And then that's why we're essentially in a B2B market. Because the people making all of these crafts or these at home print on demand things, they're selling these in their own towns on their own shopify sites. Some sell on Etsy, they sell in their craft markets and fairs. So you really are operating more as a B2B when you are selling the digital designs to submit crafters. That's why there's such a big market for it.
- [16:21]
Okay, but why are people pushing back on the 40 ounce tumbler? I feel like that's all I like to drink out of. Why wouldn't that be in demand? I don't get it. I don't get It.
- [16:29]
So it's the design process. You can't just like throw it in your AI tool of choice, like you can with a 20 ounce design, and it just like pop out. You actually have to create two pieces, which is for the bottom part, which is that smaller tapered part. And then they're both two different sizes. So you have to create them at two different sizes, which is a pain. It is. And then you cannot automatically mock these up with like an AI mock up tool. Like you can in bulk with the 20 ounce because it's two pieces. So it just takes a little bit of extra time. And most people don't want to do just, you know, a few extra steps so they avoid them.
- [17:08]
Okay. Because otherwise you're basically throwing your dimensions into your AI tool. And it's kind of. It's like creating it for you and there's little that you have to do. Whereas now you have to kind of splice it. Right. And then apply it to the lower part of the tumbler as well.
- [17:20]
Yeah. You have to create them on two different, two different files. And you have to supply the customer with two different files and they're different sizes. And then you have to take that extra step and then mock it up as well. So that part can't be really automated. There's like some Photoshop actions out there that will be speeded up a little bit, but it's not fully automatic.
- [17:40]
My mind was blown last night. It was the wee hours of the morning. We're talking like 1:30am and everyone's asleep and I am in bed binging through your YouTube channel because of this project that I'm getting after because your YouTube content is insane. And I didn't even realize you can bulk mock up. When I saw that Bailey, I. My jaw was on the floor because I come out of like the space for my signs. I manually had to mock up for Print on Demand. I manually did mockups for everything I've done in the digital space. Manual mockups. And I'm just like, this woman is on a whole different level. This is crazy. So I'm over here like, oh, I can do 40 ounce tumblers. I don't mind the menu. I'm clearly used to it. My bigger concern would be like, oh, because I've never done sublimation and I'm not really trying to get into that. I'm not trying to actually sublimate myself, but I'd be all about creating designs, but it would be like the tapered part of the, of the tumbler that I wouldn't understand. Like how does. Cause does that need to be different too or is it still just a flat design?
- [18:40]
No, it is tapered and I actually created a template for it. It's just a canva frame. It's on my shop, on my Etsy shop. And it actually comes with the top part too. So that's very easy for people who don't understand how to make your own template for that.
- [18:58]
You a good idea for me. It's not a good idea for me to do math ever. I'm just going to come to you every time I need to do math.
- [19:04]
Yeah, yeah. You just drop your design in the template and it's formatted and sized for you and then you just save it. So that's, that's the easiest way to create them though. You can make your own template if you want, but I wouldn't recommend it. It's pretty time consuming.
- [19:20]
Oh, that's great. I already know what my next Etsy purchase is. Is that in the Bailey Design Co Etsy Shop?
- [19:26]
Yeah.
- [19:27]
Okay. So people are allowed to know about that one. Okay.
- [19:29]
Yes.
- [19:30]
Right. Yes. Okay, good. Because we protect. I protect Etsy sellers around here. My audience though, happens to be lovely. We just know that the Internet is also full of people who will steal. So.
- [19:39]
Yes, no. My Etsy shop has been on YouTube all over for the past year of my own doing and other people's doing. So it's very public.
- [19:48]
Okay. Yeah. And I know, actually it would be probably good for it to take a second and share what you would about that because I think sometimes I get a little pushback about when people want to keep their shops confidential. But a number of my friends who had big Etsy shops and shared them because they were kind of pressured to. To prove that they were, you know, they were having the results. They said they were, but then they were. They were. There were plenty of honest people who just wanted to see that. But then they had all this unnecessary traffic that hurt them and then they had. They did have a couple of bad players who were copycats and they lost their businesses over it. So I have. Did you have a hard time with that? Bringing it to the public? Would you do that again or recommend it?
- [20:23]
So it wasn't my ch and I would never have brought it public. Had several other YouTube channels share my shop before I was even on YouTube myself. So what happened was last year when the 20 ounce design, like create these designs and make thousands a month type of videos became very popular on YouTube, my shop was shown several on Several channels as proof of look at how much this person is making, look at what she's doing. And it's a digital download and all of that. And I actually didn't even know about it until I did start seeing a few things in my analytics, kind of tons of tons of more visits to the shop. And then I actually had someone reach out who was a member of my digital design membership and she was like, did you know your shop's all over YouTube and they're showing how to do what you do? And I was just like, no. So then I started looking into it and I had already created my course at that point to help other people do what I do sell digital downloads, but I hadn't marketed it through YouTube or made videos or anything. And I, at that point I was kind of like, you know, I think that I am going to go on YouTube since it's already public anyway, and actually just share what it really takes to build this level of shop and show that it wasn't. You don't just put up tons of designs and expect the types of results that I got. There was a lot of things like email marketing and Facebook group and things like that that went into. And then also just being very vigilant about staying on top of those trends and things like that. You can't just put up any design and expect it to sell. It has to actually be good, you know. And so that's actually how I got on YouTube was because I just wanted to share. No, this is really how it works when you want to be this level of seller. And so that's when I started doing all the videos.
- [22:19]
No, that's so helpful. But also, you know, to tell. To tell the audience, like, it's a good idea to keep your shop confidential. And now, I mean, for when I use Everbee, they have a wonderful feature where it blurs out the name and the details of the shop. And I really like using that. Any chance I can to try to protect sellers from this exact. Because especially in the digital product space, it's too easy to duplicate.
- [22:38]
Yep, Exactly. Yep. I always recommend do not share your shop. In our communities, we have a rule not to share your shop. Your watermarks don't, you know, because it's not. Because we don't want to support you or see that, you know, what you're creating or anything. It's for their protection because, you know, with the conversions, you bring in a ton more of extra views and visits and no conversions, well, that's going to drag down your listing. And the overall shop score. So yeah, it is 100%. Keep your shops private.
- [23:13]
Are you a print on demand or digital product Etsy seller who's tight on time or still learning all of the Etsy secrets? I totally remember the days of having no idea what product to create next before I learned how to make those informed decisions. So I can really identify with where you're at. I know how stressful and frustrating it can be to just create listing after listing and see little to no results. You wonder what you're doing wrong and just you just want I'm going to tell you what to create that's actually going to sell. Where are those opportunities? So let me give you a leg up with my weekly trends and opportunities report. You just join my membership and every Monday I'm going to send you an email with a list of exactly what is trending right now with a video tutorial showing you how I found those trends and how to apply them in your shop. We're taking guesswork and time, extensive time off of your table. I'm also going to send you five print on demand and digital product opportunities that are growing in demand right now, helping new shops make sales and still have very low saturation in the marketplace so your tight schedule, your newbie status doesn't have to hold you back anymore. I'm going to help you earn while you learn. You can grab my free demo to start and see an example of what the weekly trends and opportunities email looks like right from the show notes. See what you're going to get and I will see you on the inside soon. Yeah, for those who might be new here, here's what that means. So the conversion rate is how many views views you get on a product compared to how many sales you get out of those views. And that tells Etsy how popular your listing is and gives them a sense of like should we show it to more people? Because the more people we show it to, the more time it converts and sells. Well if there's a bunch of traffic that's going to just look and see and they're not intending to buy, then it starts to tell the Etsy algorithm that oh, lots of people want will look at this and they'll click on it but none of them are buying it. So we shouldn't be showing it to as many people because they want to show like Etsy wants to make their money too. So they're going to show things that convert. So just a little, a little kind of like algorithm lesson there for those of you who are who are new and trying to understand that. Bailey, thank you for being willing to share on that. I think that's really important to hear like a balanced perspective on. Talk to us about your favorite AI tools. What are you really enjoying working with right now and then your process for kind of creating new products.
- [25:23]
So I'm bad because I like to experiment with lots of tools. So right now I've narrowed it down to 3 though I still use Mid Journey from time to time. That's the one that I got started out on originally and probably use them, you know, for a good six to nine months before even trying a different one. So I'm very good with Midjourney though it has a very particular style. So I will say that it can't do a lot of the things that some of the other ones can do, which is why I now use both KITTL and then I use my designs. Because within my designs you can choose between Dolly3, ideogram flux and stable Diffusion. So that's. They kind of have, you know, the best platform that if you're looking to just choose one so you're not all over the place, you'll get the best bang for your buck there. Plus they have a lot of tools that, you know, if you're looking to be an all in one place and actually move those digital designs over to Etsy, you can push your Etsy listings straight from there. So they have a lot of capability. Yeah.
- [26:31]
That's crazy.
- [26:33]
And you can mock up within there automatically. Like you can Bulk mock up 100 designs at a time and then push those all to Etsy at one time.
- [26:41]
So this is my designs?
- [26:43]
Yes.
- [26:44]
Do you affiliate for them?
- [26:46]
Yes, I need your link.
- [26:48]
Holy cow.
- [26:49]
And they're trying to just really implement everything that you could possibly need to run your Etsy business in one place. So have the AI tools have the editing capabilities in there, your ability to upscale and then ability to mock it up and then send your listing to Etsy. So you could really get away with just the one tool if you want, if you like those AI generators. So if you are stuck on something like you love Mid Journey, you can always pull in your Mid Journey design into my designs and have it do the rest. So there is that option too.
- [27:25]
Look at. I am chomping at the bit. Let's talk about mistakes that new sellers make in this space like get help. Protect us from some of the. I was going to say oof does because I'm in Wisconsin, but only four people are going to know what I Mean, what are the mistakes we need to avoid? Bailey?
- [27:46]
This is, you know, and this goes back to all types of products that are sold on Etsy. And this is just not doing your research first. Like, just jumping in and creating all types of designs with AI because it can be very distracting and fun. And you think, you know, you see all types of AI generations that does, just because they're all out there on, you know, like the forum or the community page of Midjourney or Ideogram or something like that. Just because there's all of these really cool designs that doesn't translate it into actually selling on a sublimation product. Because they do have a very specific, usually very, very specific keywords that are trending that you know, that are specific to the niche of a Tumblr rep. And then you even go even further into the actual design aesthetic. So some of the really popular ones are, you know, very like natural watercolor type designs work really, really well. And then things that are, like, customizable, so where the crafter has the ability to put someone's name on it, those tend to do very well. So we. That's probably the biggest thing I see is just new sellers thinking that, oh, just because I can create something super fast with AI and it looks cool, that won't necessarily mean that it will sell. Because you still have to understand the sublimation product space and what those people are looking for. Because again, at the end of the day, those people buying the designs, they're buying that to sell to their customer. So if you understand the final buyer and like, what's going on in pop culture or trends or anything, you know, that's just trending right now, you will usually have a better grasp on what will sell to that final customer, and then you can make your design.
- [29:35]
Okay, my brain stopped a minute ago because you were talking about selling them customizable designs. So what kind of file are you giving them for? That is like a Canva template.
- [29:47]
So people make them that way. You can offer them that way. I personally don't. Mine usually are still a PNG file and they just have a blank spot where someone goes in and adds it to Canva and then they add their name or their quote or whatever. But there are some people who sell them as a Canva frame, and then those are usually popular with people who want to do, like memorial photo tumblers. Because if it's built as a Canva frame, you can drag your picture in and it will format it correctly. So those are really popular.
- [30:19]
I was imagining like fonts and the licensing nightmare and then the Canva Pro situation with fonts that would have happened. And then I'm just like, wow, maybe we need to get Steven Chin to figure out how to make this work for the. Hello, Custom to be able to change the font. But again, I think the licensing could be an issue. But I love your idea of a blank space when they want. When it's going to be a font.
- [30:42]
Yeah. There's also speaking of customization, too, though. There's a whole subset of people who sell these design. Who sell custom digital designs, meaning they do the custom work and they charge anywhere from 10 to $15 a design. And if you're fast, like, you just. If you add a. Like you need to add Sarah on there and add a little quote. I mean, you can get, you know, 10 or 20, 30 of these done in an hour. And if you're charging 10 or $15 per design, I used to do this. I mean, it is a good income. So if you. Most people, again, that's just extra effort. You know, do you want to offer that type of customization? And some people do full custom. Like, they just want a picture or an idea of what they want, and then they create it and they send it over. Etsy now has that option where you can do customizable digital, and so. And then you fill the order just like you would physical. And so there is that option for people who want to actually make more than just like two or three dollars, but then they're, you know, using their time to do so. Yeah.
- [31:47]
You have VA do something like that, though. That's like, repetitive work. You could. You could train someone to do it. That's definitely fascinating. Bailey, of course, you sat there and did all of that where. I don't. You are amazing. I. I don't know how you do it. Oh, my gosh. What do I want? What else? I have so many other questions that we can't get to all of them. Can we talk about what you're seeing trending right now? Design concepts? I'm just super interested and excited about trends at the moment. I'm wondering if we're seeing some of the same things because you're in a kind of a different space.
- [32:13]
Yeah. So the big ones right now, and it's actually transferring very equally between print on demand and digital. Is that coquette style, which is like the pink bows, pink girl, soft girl aesthetic is what that is. And so that. And when you take that and basically turn anything coquette, you're probably going to have success because it's just a. You can apply it towards, like, say, a nurse, and then that takes. You can then create that for all of your occupations. And we are seeing that do really, really well. Again, that Matisse style, which is a form of painting, like the artist paintings, and making designs based on that, and those are tending to do very well in the positivity and Christian space. So you're thinking, like, here, apply that design concept with Bible verses or positivity or affirmation type quotes. And those are super, super trending right now. And then you have just, like, new. We always see this. Every few months, you'll see a new animal pop up. Oh, my gosh.
- [33:25]
Opossums. Are you seeing possums and raccoons?
- [33:28]
Raccoons, yes. They're going crazy. And I mean, like last year it was highland cows. Probably even a little bit further it was highland cows. But right now, those raccoons are just, like, popping off. So make anything with a raccoon. You might have some success.
- [33:50]
It's really funny. No, it's. This is. It has been so fun doing the weekly trend report because I'm shocked at how much things change in a week. I'm shocked at what I see and how we can watch things emerge really, really early if we stay on top of it. It's so fun. Oh, gosh.
- [34:06]
What about.
- [34:07]
Is there anything. Does anything work kind of evergreen or is this. You're just riding the trends all the time in this kind of space.
- [34:12]
So, I mean, we have your evergreen pillars. And I mean, usually they're just like, occupations, things like the Christian niche or things in the positivity space. But it's more so about taking whatever the current style design is and applying it towards those. So we kind of are writing the trend thing a lot because, again, like I said, people in this space want new designs all the time. And so that's good for us because it always means we can just always be designing something for the next best thing. You know, as far as, like, I mean, you have, like, the customizable ones for. I even consider, like, wedding ones to be like this or bridesmaids ones, because those are usually pretty stable because it's usually just floral. And then you add a name or something, but those are pretty stable. And then, of course, all of the hundreds of occupations, but then you can take those, like I said, and apply them to a new design style and then just have the ability to do hundreds more designs.
- [35:17]
So the endlessness of it is so exciting. And again, this is me Coming into this conversation thinking all sublimation was, was literally like tumblers, I didn't think it went beyond Tumblr. So now I'm just, I'm very excited about it. Yeah. So you're talking about trend combining. You're, you're taking the things that are, that are always popular and combining them with something that is new and that is a way for people to feel really seen and to see your listing image and go, that is for me, that's like this person was in my head, I have to have it. And that's, that's game set. Yeah. What are your thoughts on like Etsy ads? Do you, do you recommend Etsy ads?
- [35:53]
I do if you have a performing store or listings already. So I personally did not run them until I had organic major success. Then we took that ad spend and put it on those very high performing listings which did only 10 exit. So I believe in it. But I think that you should have proof of concept, proof of sales first because most people come into this as brand new sellers. They are not designers. They don't have an eye for trending things yet. And so they are in, they need to be in that practice mode. Just list and design practice. Practice makes perfect and you will eventually get there if you keep, if you just don't stop. And then once you start seeing, you know, more traction on that, I say usually just look at it. Is it, was it the design itself, like the subject or was it the style that you did it in? And then just keep repeating that across other niches or design styles like that and then put ad money on it. And I always say just, you know, do it, just build upon it, start small and you can keep just increasing it. Because if you do that and not just, you know, put $100 a day on all your listings without having any conversions yet, it will waste your money.
- [37:14]
Lizzie Smiley
Hey.
- [37:15]
Bailey
Hey.
- [37:15]
Lizzie Smiley
You guys coming in hot with a pro tip? Are you ready? Do you use special fonts, graphics, SVGs or other digital goods to create your products or run your Etsy business? You need creative Fabrica. So for years in my shop, I walked that fine line of either using stock fonts and graphics that were right there on Canva. And I had a ton of trouble differentiating myself because let's be honest, everyone else was using them too. Or I had to go invest a ton of money, sometimes hundreds of dollars to buy them direct from a designer so I could create something extra unique and stunning. Right? And don't even get me started about the whole factor of making Sure. I had a commercial use license so that I could use it for business. It was a whole, whole nother expense and hassle, to be honest with you. But I have since found a better way, and I'm letting you in on the secret. Okay. Enter Creative Fabrica. You guys, getting a membership to Creative Fabrica has been a game changer for me. Okay? I've literally saved thousands of dollars. I'm able to create faster because I no longer have to scour the Internet for what I need. It's very convenient. Not to mention I don't have to wait for my budget to allow for a new digital asset before I can create something new. I have this membership. I can just access it whenever I want. So what is it? Creative Fabrica is a website where you can access unlimited digital goods for just 9.99amonth. Like $9.99.
- [38:42]
Bailey
This.
- [38:43]
Lizzie Smiley
My jaw drops because this is. This is an insane deal because everything comes with a commercial license as well, which means you're allowed to use them legally for profit. And I have to chuckle because this is.
- [38:54]
Bailey
This is less than I used to.
- [38:55]
Lizzie Smiley
Pay for just one font before. Y'all, like $9.99 for access.
- [39:00]
Bailey
Okay?
- [39:00]
Lizzie Smiley
They have over 6 million fonts, graphics, and other digital resources that you will have full access to at any time. It's essentially like. Like, to be honest, this is like the top Etsy sellers best kept secret that you are now privy to. Welcome to the family. Did I mention you belong here? You belong here. And on top of that, Creative Fabrica. So they discovered this podcast. They reached out to me, and they were like, lizzie, we want to offer your audience, like, a special. A special little perk. I'm just like, well, we love that. Tell us what it is. So now you guys can get one month free. You can get a free trial for up to 10 downloads, and you can test drive it and see if it's a good fit for you. Like, I literally pay my own membership. I love it. So if nothing else, like, take a free trial, stock up on some fresh stuff for free. Thank you, Creative Fabrica. And if you love the service as much as I do, it's just $9.99 per month to keep it going. And you can also cancel at any time, no questions asked.
- [39:55]
Bailey
I love that.
- [39:56]
Lizzie Smiley
I love it when they do that. So if you want to jump in on the sweet deal, just go to howtosellyourstuff.com creative again, that's howtosellyourstuff.Com forward/creative, and you can Grab that free trial. I'm so excited you guys to share this with you because this is like one of those pieces to the puzzle that can just change everything. It can just up the whole game. So just like let me know how it goes. Okay?
- [40:26]
Bailey
Never ever, ever turn it on the entire shop, especially for a digital product shop. Yes, I agree with everything that you said totally. But it's, it's interesting in this, in this space it changes up a little bit. So what about social media? I mean I tend to tell people figure out Etsy first but ultimately for building more of a legacy company business, I think social media can be great. What do you think? Do you recommend it? Which platforms do you like?
- [40:51]
I'm the same thing, same bo. I say get a handle on your Etsy Shop first but from the beginning I kind of contradict myself I guess and say have it set up where you know that long term if you want to scale this, you're going to either need to add in email or some form of social media, whether that is Pinterest or usually a Facebook group for sublimation. Because there's already just like thousands and thousands of people in sublimation groups on Facebook. So they hang out on Facebook. So you want to be there. Which is why I have a group of over 10,000 people. So you can really. And I did this because in an effort to protect myself and know that long term I didn't just want the Etsy Shop, which is, I was able then to, you know, market my new digital design membership which is the same Etsy files just on my own site and they pay a monthly membership. So having that Facebook group and that email list, I was immediately able to just be like, hey, I have this. It will save you a lot of money. And we were able to get hundreds of members that way right away. So it definitely has its benefit though if you are struggling, if you're someone who struggles with doing a whole bunch of things, just focus on Etsy and then add in one thing like email or one social media platform. Don't try to do five of them.
- [42:13]
Do you recommend Pinterest to start with?
- [42:15]
I recommend Pinterest if you want to be as hands off as possible because you can basically do that or have a VA do that super easily and it doesn't require yourself or I mean you're literally just pinning mock your mock up photos is what you're doing. So that is the easiest way and you just figure out your keywords from there which are very, very comparable to what you would use on Etsy anyway, so you should have that set if you're doing your SEO. Right.
- [42:44]
In that last episode that I interviewed Bailey, it was number 112 if you. I'll link it if you want to go back and listen to it. But we talked about how Bailey took her Etsy shop and turned it into, I think it was five different streams of income, like not just Etsy, but she. Was that the right number? Is it the right. Is it five?
- [43:02]
Yes, it's five. Technically, yeah.
- [43:04]
I won't let you go into it now, but I thought that was such a fascinating conversation for someone who wants to scale and understanding how you can spin it off into all of these offshoot like adjacent businesses. And you should go back and listen to that if you want to hear about it, because I will not keep making you talk. Bailey, what resources are you excited about right now that help to support Etsy sellers? I know you've kind of moved away from the course space, so I really love what you're doing.
- [43:28]
Yes. So I currently don't sell a course anymore. I am focusing primarily on communities too, specifically. And that is just basically because what I see with new sellers is that they need more than just to be handed a course and expect to see results when they don't have either some form of either communication with peers or people in their same position doing the same thing. And then also it gives me the ability to. As Etsy, we all know, changes things on the fly with their algorithm or with whatever the next thing might be, it's very hard to keep a course current. And so I find that with the communities, when something changes, I can just share that information right away with everybody. So everybody is like, not losing time and money or they don't, you know, understand how this is going to affect their particular type of products or stores. So it really works just to be able to have that constant communication with people. And then it also gives people like a major sense of accountability. I think with a community like that, in ours particularly, we do all types of design challenges. And this really, really helps new sellers who have never listed something be able to get 10 listings up within a short amount of time, because they're motivated by what we're giving them as far as the tools in the group to get that type of traction going. Because as I said before, the sooner that you can have a win, the more likely that you are to keep going if you're seeing some type of progress. So that's what they're 100% built for, is to get that new seller going and in the right direction.
- [45:11]
I love that. This is like. It's like your personal trainer for your business. You've got your. It's like you've got your gym buddies keeping you on top of it. That's really brilliant. That's really brilliant. Bailey. Where can people find you and connect?
- [45:26]
I do have the main community, so that is hosted on school or you can check out the YouTube channel. And that is really the two main places that I'm at all the time.
- [45:39]
I will make sure and link all of that. And thank you. You're always just so willing to share, so open, so generous. And I'm. I'm so grateful that we. I get to work in a space with you, but also to be buddies.
- [45:52]
Yes. It's been so great.
- [45:55]
So, yeah. Thank you so much, guys. If you have been hanging out with us this whole time, good job. You made it the whole way through. Although this was. This was really good, I feel like I could go another hour and I won't make anyone sit through that. But I enjoyed it so much. So thank you for hanging out with us. I hope you're having a wonderful week. And until next time, go make something awesome. Take care, guys.
- [46:14]
Lizzie Smiley
And that's a wrap on this episode of how to Sell youl Stuff on Etsy. Thanks so much for hanging out with me today. If you're looking for more resources, head on over to howtosellyourstuff.com where you'll find podcast show notes, all the links from today, today's episode, the blog, courses, coaching, and more.
- [46:34]
Bailey
If this episode was helpful to you, awesome.
- [46:37]
Lizzie Smiley
The greatest compliment I can receive from you is a rate, review and subscribe on this podcast.
- [46:42]
Bailey
Not only will it allow us to.
- [46:43]
Lizzie Smiley
Connect again on a future episode, it lets me know I'm providing you with value and helps other people find this content more easily. From the bottom of my heart, thank.
- [46:52]
Bailey
You for your support. Have a great day and see you next time.