I'm Worried About Etsy:(

Etsy is running a fever and I think it's getting symptoms of an internal illness. Threads to spread the positive don't seem to be helping and might even be irritating the situation. Where there's positive you can always find negative, and vice versa. It's like all the positive that is being pushed at us to counter attack, is only reconfirming the few negative threads.

I'm worried because our customer base is mainly each other and I've never seen so many B'n'R threads in my life:( When I look at Time Machine 2, 99% of what I see are supplies. Weren't we supposed to be getting a completely different section for that and vintage? Or is that so 2008? Why do we feel obligated to push our products on each other instead of going with out a sale? I can't understand buy and replace. How about just buy it or don't, I'm an artist and if it doesn't work out on Etsy I'll still create. Even crazier than that, how 'bout, I should take the time to work on my own crap instead of wasting time trying to keep up w/this stupid thread and who's bought what from whom?

In other news...now I see we have this new community hub. Which I find funny because when I left a year ago they had just introduced the one we had previous to last week. But has anything really changed? I did find that there is a new voting section, but I'm not sure within all the Etsy gibberish and different branches on their site, how most people can even get to these items??

Now there are so many showcases on Etsy, Gift Guides, The Storque, Main one, all the categories/sub categories. Are we clogging up the Etsy arteries so much with different ad options, that we really aren't getting more item views but more money for advertising in Etsy's pocket? I can compare Etsy ad's to my Project Wonderful ads on this blog. Yes, I could add an entire side bar to my blog just for PW ads. No one's shop ad would be clicked on and there would be too much to read. I could raise my ad prices and make more money because of the availability. On the other hand, I could limit the ads to 4, (like I've done), and give those 4 people the best darn advertising their $.02-$.03 can buy! Do you see where I'm going with this? More ads on Etsy = less exposure. I would rather have a front page where you could buy a $100 24 hour ad spot then keep spending $7 here, there, everywhere, and mostly getting no showcase views. I've actually looked at my views before/after and there was no difference.

I've been spending a lot of time  in the forums again and what I see on there is desperation, anger, and sadness. A lot of people not having views, sales, you name it. People complaining about whining in one thread and patting their friends on the back for their half ass attempts at selling on another. Shops trying to one up each other in their personal knowledge of Etsy policies, instead of offering actual assistance/direction for newbies.  Everyone pointing the finger at everyone else, Etsy, and never themselves. Because if they did, they wouldn't be on the forums, they would be filling orders.

Now this all might sound negative to you, but I am coming from a place of business, not just hanging around the schoolyard. It's one thing to talk about being friendlier on Etsy and another thing to do something real about it. Instead of taking the time to complain about all the negativity, how about starting a free Top Site List, Etsy group, PIF, or doing a nice feature for someone on your blog with no strings attached? Instead of begging for sales you could spend some time on your pics, items, and general promotion ideas? There are a lot of us older Etsians that want to help you.

Let's stop trying to smooth the symptoms of sickness over. Dear Etsy admin, please stop medicating us w/new gadgets and advertising ideas, we are becoming sedentary and really need to get to the heart of our illness and fix the main problems. Let's strip down the whole site of all the bells and whistles, and revamp Etsy internally instead of throwing on more band-aids.

IMHO♥
Tara