Look up “make money at home” ideas in any magazine or on any website these days, and you’ll often see that they suggest that you could learn how to sell on Etsy. If you’ve never heard of this strange thing before, you really should start now. No matter what you are – an artist or craftsman yourself or just someone who’s really into art – you’ll find that this online marketplace is great for those who have handmade art to sell and those who like to buy it. If you’re someone who makes art yourself, if you have vintage stuff in the attic at home to sell, you’ll find that learning how to sell on Etsy can really be profitable.
Etsy has been around for quite a while now – they have half a million sellers selling about 8 million items at any given time. And last year, they sold half a billion worth of knickknacks. Isn’t it amazing that a place that sells handicrafts can actually get that far?
So what can you sell on this website? Well, going by their top 10 list, fine art, great custom-made clothing and jewelry, homemade jams and preserves, handmade soap, sculpture, furniture and cakes and pastry are top-selling items. If what you have to sell is handmade and not made by a professional brand name company (or made by someone other than the seller), it’s probably safe to sell it there.
Learning how to sell on Etsy is a bit more complicated than merely signing up for an account. Of course, you can just sign up for an account, put in your PayPal account details and a credit card number for verification purposes, and you’re ready to sell. But that doesn’t mean you’ll actually sell that way, because most craftsmen on Etsy take a lot of trouble creating a beautiful custom storefront with a banner and everything. And they put a lot of effort into photographing their wares in an attractive way. Once you’ve taken care of details like this, you’re pretty much ready to sell.
Does it cost anything to be a seller on Etsy? On some other websites that allow sellers to sign up and sell, the commission they charge of the sale can be pretty high – as high as 35%. On Etsy on the other hand, it’s a tenth that – 3.5% of every sale and 20 cents to list every item. They square up every account at the end of the month.
When you sell on eBay, you don’t know that you’re dealing with a huge conglomerate it won’t take the time to answer anything you ask. That’s not the way you are treated at Etsy at all. It’s a place where they sell handicrafts – and you can expect a sense of community. You have lots of tutorials, you get lots of help at the forums, their support is pretty good, all in all.
Photo by Spin Spin 
