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When we wake up on Christmas morning, this is what we want to find under the tree from Etsy (better yet, just tell us it's debuting in January, messing with the site in December is usually bad news):
1. STATS - this was the overwhelming wish among our twitter followers and ourselves. We want to know where our customers are coming from, better yet, include the search terms they used to find us. A dropdown menu in checkout of 'how'd you find me?' might work, too. For now.
2. Multiple shipping options to the same country.
3. A fixed search. And the bow on top would be it's advanced search *swoon*
4. A customer service department with a phone number and dedicated email addresses that don't give automated responses, unless they're 'we received your email, we'll be back to you within 48 hours'.
5. DXO pinkslipped, oh yeah, we went there. This would do much to fulfill the wishes we heard - 'R-E-S-P-E-C-T', 'completely new staff', 'fire 'em all, hire intellegent peeps with ethics', 'truth and justice', and 'admins that don't patronize'. (ooh and give us Rob's head while you're at it)
6. Be able to search sold items, favorites, and just plain organize our own shit.
7. 'A week without cowls'
8. Coupon codes - this may be the top marketing strategy for 2009 due to the struggling economy.
9. A real API that isn't fucked with any time a new tool comes along so off-site tools can stop struggling to provide us with what you won't, but would be relatively easy for you to do.
10. A pony. Why not? We probably have the same chance of getting this as everything else above.
Even if they had the 8 nights of Hannukkah to fulfill our wishes instead of one morning, I bet they'd only give us knitted handwear, impractical decorative pieces, and over-rated tees with misspelled French. The first pair or set can be nice, but after a few years it gets old.
Think of us as a jilted lover - it's going to take a very big and very expensive diamond to get us back. If you want to that is...maybe you prefer the cupcakes over a more substantial meal. We probably have a better chance of getting all this if we addressed this to Santa Claus.
Monday, December 15, 2008
All we want for Christmas...
Posted by The Righteous One at 12:37 PM
Tagged: Christmas list, Etsy, features
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You are the best.
And I'd like gloves with fingers.
11. Europe as a shipping option. Please!
12. Make it absolutely clear that the site is using US Dollars (this includes the Etsy Mini), and make listing possible in other currencies. Apparently it's illegal to sell items to people in your own country but not use your own currency... Etsy has been told, but does sweet FA about this...
13. Include International Sellers (and buyers) in everything you do and do not think of them as second class citizens. Ta muchly.
Please, Santa, put me in the Gift Guides...
Oh no, never ask for a pony in the middle of things you really want!! Didn't you ever see the Verizon commercial??
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-prMb6BdNs
Now we're all gonna get ponies instead of shop stats!
Love this post! Think Etsy will take it to heart? Maybe they'll do a FP of Pony gear. ;-)
I'm up on AF now, and have moved my AdWords campaign... and OMG, I can see where the hell my views are coming from and how well my ad campaign is doing.
How about this, Etsy... go read the list of features that AF has or is working on (yes, they publicly show the list of features that are coming soon!) and do that. Just copy and paste their list and start implementing.
Etsy, you've almost lost me (I'm giving you through January)... although you've never truly had me.
I gotta say, for 75 people "working" for 4 years to "build" a site with something like 200,000 stores, there has been no real change, creativity, planning, or improvement in the "Etsy business model." Why bother?
Etsy has proven that their "ideal community" is just lip service; they had no intention of including sellers in their plans and just continue to wing-it based on their belief that more new sellers will pay more listing & re-listing fees and why bother with seller-satisfaction or retention?
After all, Etsy is all about the trend, trends wear out and fall off the cliff, but Etsy has worked a neat little, no-think forumula to milk those trends until they're good and dead. And that's about all they've done for 4 years. Just like a one-trick pony.
Etsy is bigger, but really looks no different than it did 4 years ago. The original "ideas" like the whole front page, showcases and gift guides haven't changed - they aren't bigger, better, or offer more opportunities for sellers on the site---------Etsy has tailored their tiny little site to cater to a tiny group of Etsy-Approved-Stores and left everyone else out in the cold.
The new handmade sites, and may The Force Be With Them, are setting up to include just about every seller-support-feature that Etsy STILL REFUSES to give its huge seller-base--------and, for heaven't sake, why bother? They got away with zero seller-support for 4 years.
For a site that bills itself as a platform for handmade and the artisan community, Etsy is strangely bereft of ANY CREATIVITY WHATSOEVER.
Okay, this is off-topic but right now on the front page the description for some "Pink Sugar Buttercream" is cut off and instead reads: "Pink Sugar Butt..."
That made me snicker.
Yay for cut-off titles on the front page!! Can my list include some Esy pink sugar butt please?
AMEN!
(make my pony a paint please)
Even if they had the 8 nights of Hannukkah to fulfill our wishes instead of one morning, I bet they'd only give us knitted handwear, impractical decorative pieces, and over-rated tees with misspelled French. The first pair or set can be nice, but after a few years it gets old.
*******
I want to put this to music and get it going on loop on MaryMary's blog.
I have to say that I'm very very pleased that this festive season my own independent shop has done vastly better for me than my Etsy shop.
It's so much easier to run my business using an infrastructure that has fantastic functionality, great stats, enormous control over how I run the outlet, which is constantly being improved by those who built it (thanks Shopify!), etc..
It costs less too! And I've not seen a single cowl on the front page of my site either.
Dear God YES...ALL that...especially the cowl-free week! How many cowls can one person own? Based on the amount of heavy knitwear on Etsy, I'd say global warming is a myth...or maybe it's just that the glaciers have slid into our front yards...
7. 'A week without cowls'
word. who buys/wears these damn things anyway?
Cowls are nice for people in cold climates - practical cowls, not eye covering ones or loose knit ones or 1000 of them.
But the constant promotion...wth?
I just found that comment to be pretty funny :)
And to beat the theme of all Etsy all the time, have you noticed how many front pages are now 100% picked by Etsy Admins? (Except for those money-eating-no-imagination-down-the-rabbit-hole-Showcases?)
Why, Etsy even makes up most of their own FPT's. Why pick from the queue that sellers create? Why, they all look like Etsy Admins picked them anyway!
Funny One, you've got it right. I worked for a massively successful web development company that started with two people in 1998; they are world wide 10 years later. My current workplace started with five people and just $39 in sales on its first day open...but determination, belief in a dream and trust in its employees has made it a huge, successful business.
I just don't get why Etsy can't be as big and successful as these two companies. I guess no one is interested in bringing out or living up to its potential. Makes me sad! Cuz I knew if old job's two founders or new job's five founders had started it, it would be simply amazing.
for once i agree...
artfire is looking better and better.
Etsy has ignored transparency from the get-go and it's going to doom them.
They don't think like a Web 2.0 company, and soon Web 2.0 is going to be passe :)
Go, Art Fire!
And to beat the theme of all Etsy all the time, have you noticed how many front pages are now 100% picked by Etsy Admins?
_____________
There is an incestuous FP ring operating. I just did some cross checking and O M G, the same people are picking the same people. It is a clique to which I obviously do not belong. An admin is heading it up. One person even picked an item from their other shop and it made the FP. And one sock puppet. I have to stop looking at this stuff and thinking too hard or I am going to vomit. This is all with admin's blessing too.
Sorry, they've already lost me... I might keep my Etsy store open, but I'll only list a few items there. Everything will be on Art Fire.
Administrators that email you back within a day? Who visit your blog and write comments? Who are open, honest and polite?
A community where the second you disagree with someone, you don't get your head bitten off?
Yep... Art Fire, you had me at "no listing or selling fees" and your ability to conduct searches in a manner that is not ridiculously stupid.
Jen
a week without cowls, he hee YES
Etsy is starting to look so conservative and blah...I'm scared
That's it, Betsy, you've nailed it. Etsy is truly conservative, reactionary and middle of the road -- for all it thinks it's being indie and hip.
It has the same repressive effect on creativity as Stalinism.
ArtFire looks like it's going to be a looser, more accepting place, and that's good. I can do without the Handmade Mafia deciding for me what's trendy and what's not.
Why not just ask for the $27 million the losers got! We're just as likely to get that as anything!
I think no favoritism would be a great prezzy! Course they want water in Hell too!
I'd rather see stellaloella go! I never seen one person in my whole life eat so many shit samwiches! Doesn't she ever get full?
I have to say since taking my listing fees and putting them into advertising for my own own my sales are way better than using that shithole site with all those shit samwich eaters!
Funny, but sadly so true! I agree.
Also how about a less confusing Check Out? Just the other day I had a new buyer, she almost gave up completely, she was so frustrated!! (I personally never had trouble, but obviously it does happen)
And a big DITTO on the NO FAVORITISM! So sick of that!!
I would love to NOT see cards that were actually made in factories instead of by an actual person. that'd be nice.
also, i want acces to a treasury.
10 for 10 ladies. Nice. & an added 'oooooh, damn, I hope they are talking about who I am thinking about' for this.....
"over-rated tees with misspelled French"
because I am sick of seeing his crap. Are you sick of seeing his crap too?
Great blog!!! I have started an artfire site just because all of the same old same old on Etsy. Everywhere you turn it is the same. Oh HUM!!!!!!
But the way buddy!! I have gloves with fingers and would be glad to make you a pair.!!
"A real API that isn't fucked with any time a new tool comes along so off-site tools can stop struggling to provide us with what you won't, but would be relatively easy for you to do."
They've been pretty good about offsite tools, actually. Publishing data that Etsy keeps private, and then acting all immature and weineyish about it is pretty lame, sorry.
"They've been pretty good about offsite tools, actually"
Are you kidding? Sellers ask for certain tools (like stats) for 3 years, with Etsy all the time saying "we can't, we can't". An offsite tool (usually from sellers or their spouses) say "yes, you can, because we did. We'll even do it for you...for FREE"
Inevitably Etsy happens to change the API so it doesn't work as well. What are they trying to hide? They're our stores and these are tools they've been promising since the get-go. And tools that admin are able to use for their own shops!!
Been pretty good my ass
LOL!
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