Well, now… some of us (raises hand) are standing there with the lampshade on our heads wondering where the all the fun went.
I can understand the almost-rampant frustration on my primary selling venue about the cessation of basic accounts for no more than trial purposes.
To those who don’t know, you could have a completely free studio on ArtFire, where you could list and list and list and not pay any fees. It was the epitome of coolness in the handmade world. Yes, you had some limitations on your studio, and you did see some outside advertising in your studio, but to be able to list items and sell, and keep all the money? How awesome was that.
Come August 15, that is going away. From what I’m gathering, you can open a “basic” account and have a small trial period to get your feet wet. People who are already basic will get thrown into that same trial period. After the trial period, you will have to pay a monthly fee to stay on.
I pay my monthly fee, have since 2009, and have only made 36 sales. Yes, that’s frightening. I want so much to be quitting my day job to have fun doing what I love. But, when I start heading toward the window ledge, I think about this:
* I could pay a webhosting company a monthly (or yearly fee) to host my blank website. Maybe I would get a tired template or two to play with and spend tons of hours trying to figure that out. Um… me? Okay, you can get off the floor now; it’s not that hilarious.
* I could be paying a person to design and maintain my website to keep my content fresh and fabulous for the 21st century. Last time I checked, my name was NOT Bill Gates.
* I could pay an extra fee for an ecommerce shopping cart and – if I want to get fancy—merchant fee to accept credit cards. Again, my birth certificate does not read Sam Walton.
* I could be doing my own hours and hours of research about search engine optimization (SEO) and website optimization. With 2 kids who could care less where the money comes from as long as it arrives when they want it? I don’t think so.
* I could be play hit and miss on my descriptions and photographs. Ha. Word of advice: scanning your items on a flat bed scanner does not a good photograph make.
And then I could sit there and wait for the sales to come pouring in.
Are those crickets that I hear? Oh, no, that’s the economy praying to the porcelain god. Party’s over, get the heck out, don’t care where you go but you can’t stay here. Ugh.
Now, on ArtFire, I pay my monthly fee, and I get a company that's willing to help me through all of the above.
In one place, you get a decent website design and shopping cart. I get help with SEO, help with branding, advertising. I get great advice from people who've been there about photography, keywords, tags, promotion. Heck, I can even promote my other selling venues in my Pro Studio.
We both reap the benefits: ArtFire and I. I get traffic to my beautiful studio; they get traffic to their fabulous venue. I get potential customers who love my products; they get to help ignite that entrepreneurial flame and get potential customers. I get to connect with great people who are just like me down in the trenches; they get to find out about their “target” audience from down in those same trenches.
So, I’ll lean over here with that lampshade on my head while ArtFire yawns, stretches, whips out the vacuum and starts booting out the people completely passed out on their lawn.
When the world stops spinning so fast, I’ll go take a Bromo™, roll up my sleeves and dig in once again.
And guess what? The party will begin again.
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