Etsy Marketing: 5 Creative Design Ideas To Promote Your Shop

Running a small business has a firm place in the Top 10 hardest jobs anyone can do. But it’s also very rewarding and can be very meaningful. So there are more and more people choosing entrepreneurial paths all the time. 

And the rise of self-selling ecommerce platforms has only made this easier and smoother for the entrepreneurs of the world. 

If you are looking for a platform that centers on the creative world and is unique in its own respect, Etsy will be the first option you consider. Over the years, Etsy as a platform has grown multifold, bringing creators and their customers closer and closer.

This has made it super appealing to creative entrepreneurs and that’s meant increased competition. For someone working on creating unique and handcrafted items for sale every day, this competition can be disheartening. It takes a lot of mental and physical labor to run a business, and the competition is only an added burden on these creative entrepreneurs. 

So how do you deal with and keep your Etsy shop running? Well, the only way to get ahead is to take on the challenge and devise strategies to promote your shop on Etsy. And one of the best tools at your disposal is great design.

That’s why this blog from Kimp is here to give you a road map for creative design ideas you can use to promote your shop on Etsy. 

Etsy 101

Before we dive into the concept of promoting your shop on Etsy, let’s take a more in-depth look at the platform a little more. This is your home ground and the more you know about it, the beneficial it is for you.

If you think Etsy is a small platform where people come together to buy and sell handmade products, you are missing the big picture. Etsy today stands very close to many E-Commerce giants, including Amazon. The platform has 4.3 million active sellers and over 80 million active buyers as of 2020. This means it is actually quite a thriving community of artists, creators, customers, and small businesses.

Recently, Etsy also allowed big brands to sell on their platform. Now, this is a double-edged sword for creators and artists already on Etsy. This move can mean that many people who only buy from big brands will explore this platform and may discover you, too. But, this also means that a significant portion of the small businesses’ share will now go to big brands. 

Source: Statista

Keeping all this in mind, marketing and promoting your shop on Etsy is now more important than ever. 

This brings us to our next section. 

Etsy Marketing: An Overview 

You may wonder what marketing looks like in the context of an Etsy shop. Isn’t association with Etsy’s brand name and the consequential marketing that comes with it enough?

Well, we just saw how big your competition is, and Etsy will promote some shops to bring customers to the platform. But which shop the customer chooses is still in the air. Marketing your Etsy shop is the only way to ensure that you see consistent traffic and revenue on the platform.

Promoting your Etsy shop outside the platform: 

  • Generates a steady flow of traffic to your store 
  • Improves visibility among the million other sellers on Etsy
  • Helps you carve out an image and transition your business into a brand 
  • Speeds up your journey into a profitable venture

So what are the measures you can take to promote your Etsy shop? While we will explore the creative design ideas you can use, let us go over the basics of Etsy Marketing first: 

  • Optimize your Etsy shops with high-quality product images, clear and meaningful descriptions, and an FAQ section. 
  • Identify relevant keywords and tags for your product category so that you can make your Etsy shop SEO-friendly.
  • Establish a brand for your business. Branding is important for businesses of all scales, especially when you list on a competitive platform like Etsy. 
  • Link your external platforms such as websites, social media, and physical store locations, if any. This way, you can continue to build an audience outside the platform, too.

Now that you know why promoting your shop on Etsy is vital and the stepping stones to doing it, let’s get down to business. 

5 Creative Design Ideas to promote your Etsy Shop

Etsy in itself is an extremely visual platform. People seek this platform to find unique, quirky, and aesthetic products that other big brands and mass manufacturers can’t give them. So, it goes without saying that if you wish to capture Etsy’s client base for your Etsy store, you have to think visually too.

Much like any other retail venture, visual marketing can be your strongest weapon. By developing a treasure box of creative design ideas for your marketing campaign, you can shine like a diamond on Etsy.

Scouring our years of experience dealing with small businesses and designs that work for them in marketing, the Kimp team brings you this extensive list of creative design ideas. You can use these as the foundation of your marketing campaigns to promote your Etsy shop. 

So, with no further delay, let’s get started. 

1) Branding designs 

Let’s begin with the basics. If you want to promote your Etsy store outside of the platform and improve its visibility, you need a strong brand identity. Customers must be able to connect, relate, and recall the identity with ease. A good brand identity must be able to transfer the ethos and principles behind it into a strong visual identity.

Your visual identity or branding designs make your brand tangible, and something people can understand. As a creative shop on Etsy, which is such a creative platform, the expectation of your branding will always be high.

These branding designs will become your spokesperson and have to make an excellent case why customers must choose you.

  • Start by designing a logo that accurately reflects your brand’s personality, is meaningful for your business, and has elements that cater to your target audience. Be sure to think about where you’ll use your logo when you finalize the design. Not every logo looks good in every placement. 
  • Choose the brand colors, fonts, and imagery you want to feature across marketing materials to represent your business. 
  • Create branded merchandise and SWAG for your Etsy store to promote brand awareness among your customers. This can make you go from just another shop on Etsy to one of the most popular shops. 

Kimp Tip: Crafting a visual identity can be one of the most challenging tasks you have done. Because a brand design is more than your personal aesthetic. It is about forming a communication medium that can impress the customer in less than 10 seconds. Branding design is equal parts of your style and marketing knowledge.

If you feel that marketing is not your strong suit, you can try a Kimp Graphics subscription to get all the branding + marketing designs package you need to promote your store. 

2) Custom Illustrations 

Nothing says that you are creative more than a custom illustration. As you may know, a custom illustration isn’t just about a particular visual style. It’s a unique visual interpretation of your brand’s personality and principles. So including custom illustrations in your branding and marketing design will surely set you apart from your competitors.

The top marketers in the world consider custom illustrations to be a strong branding and marketing tool. As these are unique and personalized to your brand, they help you create an irreplaceable image in customers’ minds. 

Custom illustrations also humanize your brand while adding a fun element. If you are a store that sells handmade items and unique craft products, these are initiatives your customers will appreciate. 

Moreover, custom illustrations come in handy for marketing materials, store design, animated videos, package design, social media content, and so on. Have you noticed the cute animated hands and animals on Etsy’s about page? Those are custom illustrations, and do you not agree that they make the web page so much better? 

Source: Etsy

Kimp Tip: Custom Illustrations are highly engaging and interactive when done well. Working with a professional graphic designer can help you combine the principles of art and design to create something aesthetically pleasing and relevant to your brand.

Read our guide on brand illustration systems here to understand how branding benefits from illustration. And consider signing up for the Kimp Graphics subscription to get access to graphic design services and custom illustration services too, at no additional cost. Book a call with the team now to learn more!

3) Catalogs and Curations 

As much as spreading brand awareness for your Etsy store is important, shining a light on your product range is more important. After all, your products are your USP. These products make your store different from other brands on Etsy, so your promotion activities must definitely center on them.

Now, there are many ways to spotlight your products, but the most effective of them all is product curation. Curation can often beat creating from scratch in the content game, and there is no reason that an Etsy store will be any different. 

It is the easiest way to feature a lot of your products that are either from the same category or have a common thread. But you cannot just do a product roundup as everyone else does if you want to make your curation shine. So, try to: 

  • Create GIFs or short-form videos that feature a collection of your best products. 
  • Craft a product catalog with all the products in their best high-resolution pictures. You can use your existing photographs or have them sourced up for better results. 
  • Compose a flat-lay design of the products for social media and other marketing channels. 
  • Create an animated video to present the products uniquely and engagingly.

Kimp Tip: If you have a physical store, you can use these designs in posters, flyers, or pamphlets too for local marketing. This will improve your reach even more across the various channels. These product catalogs can also go with your orders to existing customers to encourage repeat sales. Just tuck them in the box or package and away they go.

4) Video Marketing 

Take any social media platform, and video is easily the superstar there. Facebook, YouTube, Pinterest, Instagram, and LinkedIn have shown us that videos help you reach more customers than any other content design.

Videos can also improve the reception and effectiveness of your product pages, Google listings, and newsletters. No promotion strategy is as effective as it can be without videos because of their massive popularity.

But you may also wonder if you run an Etsy store, what possible videos can you create that apply to your audience? Well, we are glad you asked.

  • Some of the most popular video ideas for Etsy stores are product guides, tutorials, or the typical how-to content. The insight into your creative process makes the audience connect with you deeply. 
  • You can create trendy topical content on Instagram Reels, Pinterest, Snapchat, and Facebook to amplify your reach. These can feature your products, you as the founder, or a mix of both. 
  • Social proof videos that feature customers unpacking your orders, sharing reviews, testimonials, and their experience with your store. Social proof is the most effective way to convince a customer on the fence and what better to do it than via video. 
  • You can also create video ads for social media, Etsy-in platform advertising, and other digital ads. Video ads have the best ROI for ecommerce ads and are not something you want to miss. 
  • Product videos for the Etsy store can also be an effective use of video in your promotion strategies. Videos convey complex information with ease than any product description can. 

Looking for affordable video design and editing services to create engaging and high-performing videos for your Etsy store promotion? Book a call with the Kimp Video team to find out how we can help. 

5) Memes 

If you want to go viral on social media to make your Etsy store a runaway hit, we have just one word for you: Memes. Contrary to popular opinion, memes are more than just sharing a humorous take on a popular situation. Memes can truly change the face of your Etsy store. 

Memes are one of the most shared visual content forms on the internet. Most people converse more in memes than in actual sentences. And so they hold the power to make your Etsy store a household name in no time. 

But how to do that? For starters, you have to create branded memes that are not just funny but promote your business, too. Product placement in the right meme template can make you an internet sensation in no time.

It can take a bit of experimentation to land on the right combination of design elements and copy, so take your time, get creative and have fun with it. Over time your metrics will help you see where you’ve struck gold.

Enhance your Etsy Marketing with designs from Kimp 

Your creative juices and energy are the soul of your Etsy store. That’s what makes your products unique and a must-buy for your customers. So, don’t waste it on figuring out each and every one of your marketing designs.

Outsource your designs to professionals who do this day in and day out. Like the teams at Kimp Graphics and Kimp Video. And free yourself up to focus on growing out your product line while your promotions become a cakewalk.

Sign up for the free trial now. And pay just a flat monthly fee after that.