Q4 Tips & Tricks for Etsy Sellers

I was asked by Printify to put together a post for their Facebook group giving my tips and tricks for Q4. I thought it would be good to post here too.

If you’re interested you can join Printify’s FB group here.

As someone who mainly runs Etsy stores, a lot of these tips are going to be focused on Etsy. But the general ideas will be useful regardless of where you sell.

Mindset

The first tip I want to give you is to get your mindset right. It’s Q4, and people spend money, a lot of money. Pretty much everyone is on the lookout for gifts they can buy people. Customers and revenue are out there for the taking, all you need to do is present products that people want to buy (easier said than done, I know). Most of my sales are made in Q4.

Customer service

Be ready for questions. Once Q4 rolls around, the number of questions and general support messages I get triples! So be prepared for this, set auto-responders up on all platforms where you can. Also, there are a lot of crazies out there, be prepared for those too, and don’t take anything personally.

Promotions

Take part in the Etsy site-wide sale events. These have always been a good way of getting extra sales for my stores. The main one this year is coming up soon, between November 18-30. To take part you just need to run a sale during these dates for at least 20% off.

Thumbnails

The first thing a customer is going to be exposed to, make them good! I’ve always found modelled mockups convert best. If you’re selling Christmas themed goods, make the thumbnails Christmas themed too.

Using Ads

This mainly goes for Etsy Ads, but this probably applies to other ad platforms too. Only use Etsy ads to boost your current best sellers. I’ve tried many different techniques for Etsy ads and the only way they’re ever profitable is by just advertising my best sellers!

Collect emails

Okay this isn’t just specific for Q4, but it’s one I rarely see mentioned. Collect your customer’s emails, with their consent of course! Building an email list of supportive customers is one of the most profitable things a business can do.

Manage expectations

Be upfront and clear about production times. Keep the production times on Etsy up to date with what Printify communicates. These are used to create delivery estimates on your listings. There’s no point in creating angry customers that go on to leave bad reviews, as these will hurt your business further down the line.

Communicate

Is an order late? Update the ship date on the order, and let the customer know. Has a customer ordered a color that is now out of stock, let them know! Are USPS experiencing delays, let them know! You get my point, customers love when you have great communication, even if it’s bringing negative news.

Use the momentum

Once the craziness of Q4 is over, use the momentum created in Q4 to propel your business into 2023. This mainly applies to Etsy, but I’m sure it applies elsewhere too. Etsy will have data on your listings and this can determine where you rank in search, keep your store fresh and keep posting new listings! This will signal to Etsy that your store is still active and will also notify all those new store followers you got in Q4. Remind all these new customers that you still exist, and maybe even send them a coupon thanking them for shopping with you.

If you had a successful Q4, you will also now have tons of useful data, including what your best sellers were, which keywords your customers typed to find your items and store, and where those customers came from. Use this data to determine what to focus on and what to not focus on for 2023.

Hopefully you found something useful here! If there are any questions you have that you think I might be able to answer, leave a comment and let me know. And feel free to subscribe to my YouTube!

YouTube Update

Speaking of YouTube, I’ve been very flakey with my postings. I’m very aware, I am trying to get more consistent with it.

Producing videos is very time consuming, especially editing. I’m trying to fit it into my schedule but unfortunately other things are taking priority currently.

I’m leaning towards one video every two weeks, and more if time allows. This schedule will start in 2023 after the craziness of Q4 is over.

I’ll see you in my next post/video!