A lot of you following me are interested in starting an Etsy shop, but I don't think it's for everyone. For a lot of you, your time is better spent somewhere else... and I talk about that in this video. Hope this video gives you some perspective ❤
This is all 100% true and agree. Thank you! Finally, someone who is keeping it real. Just my assumption, but I believe clickbait influencers talk about how they made x amount of money because they all started it when covid hit, and made tons of money at that time, but now its saturated and they prob aren't making as much money on it, so now they are selling courses and monetizing on social media now as their main source of income. Its misleading for people who want to quit their jobs and start side hustles. It takes A LOT of energy and time for sure! Not as easy as they say.
Glad you resonate with this! ☺️ The business niche on RU-vid is quite the place haha. I especially don't like the ones where they haven't done the business themselves but are telling others to do it.
Etsy took 70% of my commissions because they didn't believe my tracking number for my products were good enough...I'm looking for other alternatives because I'm losing more money with Etsy than anything else! Thanks for the video!
hey dina! i've been following your channel for a while now and you always provide such great information! so glad you mentioned having your own website vs selling on etsy. etsy is good but there's SO MUCH competition! driving traffic to your own site is the way to go. plus, you get to keep all the profit instead of giving a percentage to the platform you're selling on. again, great info! i always enjoy watching your videos!
Hi Dina! Thank you for your honest opinion. Your video has helped me to sort out my thoughts on my own business. I appreciate you saying all things from your personal experience.
You are amazing raw and honest. As a new RU-vidr I am ready to start a shop in my Niche. You have helped me to understand is this something I want to invest my time into and if so then I need to look at the long-term picture super informative video. I am extremely grateful.
This video offers valuable insights into Etsy shops and alternative business models. Could you share a real-life example of someone who transitioned from considering Etsy to pursuing one of the alternatives you discussed? What impact did this shift have on their journey?
She provides a balanced view of the pros and cons of selling digital products on Etsy, and offers helpful suggestions for those who are considering starting an Etsy shop. Like the vid!
I can think of one person who had an Etsy shop selling physical products, and then transitioned to selling on their own website AND Etsy still. The strategy they're trying to use is to create more content and make it a legit brand outside of Etsy so that they can drive traffic to their own website. Not sure exactly how it's going for them right now. But I'd say in general you have more control when you do your own thing and don't just rely on Etsy.
@@DinaLu That's a smart strategy! Diversifying and building your own brand outside of Etsy can provide more control and long-term sustainability. It's a way to reach a broader audience and reduce dependence on a single platform.
Hi Dina, thank you for creating this video. Actually, I really want to do some freelancing and earn money for my student life. But I don't know where to start or which website I can post my articles on because I'm afraid of being scammed. Do you have any tips and advice? Thank you
I think the problem is not with lowering the price because of competition, but adding more value so we can sell for a higher price. 🤔Going to test this out. Thanks for your videos- they’re very inspiring .
Hi Dina. I have been watching you since you opened your first Etsy shop. I am a 54 yr women and I must say I see your growth. I agree with this video. I have done everything under the sun to get my Etsy store thriving but still no sales since May. Recently I started dabbling in KDP publishing since August no sales. I feel very discouraged. I thought about Affiliated marketing but I just don't know how to do it. Do you have any advice on how you got started making money doing a affiliate marketing as this online stuff doesn't seem to be selling anything I've literally spent the last five months every weekend working on this cuz I still work a full-time job and no sales.
Hey Shelly, sorry to hear that! Starting a business has no guarantee of success or making money, but the more you try, work on it, and learn more, the higher the chances of success are. I've felt super discouraged too when businesses didn't work out or when I didn't get any sales (in my previous businesses), but I always learned something. For affiliate marketing, I literally just put links of products I use and love under my RU-vid video descriptions, haha. So my method of making money with affiliate program is to create content and build an audience (ie. RU-vid), and then recommend products I use and love (ie. put links under my videos). If you're looking for more support with starting a business, I do offer 1:1 coaching (details are in my video description).
Hello I love your content, I would love to become a content creator but where do you start, and how do you stand out? I would love to see a video of how you create content.
Thank you! I have some videos about creating content in my playlist called "my youtube/business journey." I also share a lot of behind-the-scenes on my instagram dinadlu!
Would love to have a video solely dedicated to the non-Etsy route and how you’d go about the strategy in detail. And just to confirm - I could create my products and build an Etsy shop as well as my own online store simultaneously, with the same products?
Yes there are many people selling the same products on Etsy and also their own website! That's a great video suggestion, but I actually haven't sold low-cost digital products on my own website before so I would only be speaking from theory and not from real experience. But my strategy would be to create some kind of content that is permanent or permanent-ish (youtube, blog, podcast), that drives traffic to my shop / an email list which then can sell the digital products. But creating content takes a long time so I'd rather sell something more expensive like a course that's $100+ and not little digital products that are $10-20. Hope that helps!
absolutely, thanks! will consider this point of view before i start creating - which is still gonna happen this year :) and btw you are one of my big inspirations@@DinaLu
Guys, do not forget about step № 0 before you start and watch tutorials: check the countries where Etsy actually works. Because you must prove this with your taxpayer number. Cool video, Dina!
Hi Dina, amazing video as usual! I have a question, I'm a tennager (almost 16) planning to start a digital products business on etsy. But along with this, I also have my school and entrance exam preparations for after 12th (we have entrance exams for universities in india). I'm heading towards being a designer so i think learning graphic design would be useful for me even for the business and for my main career. But like I mentioned, I have other things going on too so I wanted to ask if it is too time consuming? Like not the design or marketing part but the dealing with the customers part. Do too many customers message you personally on etsy asking doubts?
Good luck on your exams! I can't speak for all Etsy shops, but for my own Etsy shop, I barely get any customer inquiries... maybe like 3 times only in my whole life.
Hey Dina,💞 I have signed up for your email list and in recent one you mentioned about less views in comparison to others. But let me tell you get quality views just like your content and even no fake thumbnail or only promotional videos. Your videos really helps us. Thank You❤❤
Just wondering if you have ever thought about running a creative workshop on calligraphy. I'm thinking about running a workshop for my craft but I'm not really sure where to start
What do you mean a creative workshop on calligraphy? I used to actually teach calligraphy a lot in 2019 to 2022, and I still teach corporate team building calligraphy workshops. What's your craft? 🥰 I have some older videos called how to teach a calligraphy workshop on my channel, I think those will be useful for you even if you aren't teaching calligraphy
Is having your own site where you sell digital products something you would do yourself? I heard doing that would have it's own challenges such as handling payments; etsy and these other places already have built in payment methods with tons of security. I wonder how much more it would require and at what point it would be better than selling on etsy.
There are pros and cons to each, so it would depend on what my goals are. I started an Etsy because I liked that the audience was built in and it's easy to set up. The drawback is that you get less control, there are more fees, and the sales are not consistent. I might experiment with my own shop on my own website later on but for the moment I have another new project I'm working on haha
As always, great value in this video, thank you! I haven't started Etsy yet but I think my idea might work. I want to sell culinary photos sort of like stock images and making sure the buyer can do big prints with the jpeg image. And this is something I like to do so I think yes I will be able to make at least one listing per week. But I'm also wondering ifI can list them both on Etsy and on stock image sites like shutterstock, etc.
