These are my tips for starting a small, Etsy business like I did. I am the Co-Owner of a self-made company North Pacific Co. We specialize in making accessories and apparel that is inspired by our home, British Columbia.
These steps were a crucial part of growing our company, so I’ve simplified and compressed it down below.
Build your brand.
You can take inspiration from others, but make sure you still keep it original. Figure out what you want to sell, what your brand looks like (logo), and know your competitors. The small business community is extremely large and diverse. Make sure you aren’t “stealing” someone else's brand. Have an idea of what you want to be and know why you’re doing this in the first place. Write up a mission statement or some variation of that, so you can always come back to that. For example, our mission statement for North Pacific Co, is “Products inspired by home; Clear, Simple, Grounded” Keeping everything under that umbrella will make your company look more professional. It can also help if you’re in a rut and trying to decide where you want to take your company in the future.
For North Pacific Co, we worked on looking at products we wanted to release, as well as our logo design, company colours and making a social media account. Instagram has been a really good tool for “getting out there”
2) Make yourself known.
Like I said before- the small etsy business community is saturated, so it might be a little hard make your company known. We started off by making an instagram account and following people who were like us, and who were mainly small business owners. We also stayed up to date on our instagram posts by posting everyday and adding snaps on our story throughout the day. Obviously online sales are ideal, but no one will visit your online shop if they don’t know who you are. We decided to attend markets and started off by selling at smaller, elementary school markets. We slowly worked our way up to the bigger markets and that was ideal because we had some experience before just jumping into these huge, busy markets. Also at a lot of these larger markets, you have to apply and then the market organizers review your social media and choose you based on how professional your brand looks. While attending these markets, we explained to people our brand and who we were. Make sure to print out a ton of business cards, as some people who aren’t interested in buying may still be curious anyways. As we attended more markets, people started to recognize us from our logo, clothing design, and even just our faces. Markets and events are a big part of become well known.
Part 2 coming soon!