Search Titles and Tags that Work!

Taken from the Etsy Forums...

HeyMichelle says Edited on Aug 13, 2011

Since Etsy’s default search has changed to Most Relevant from Recently Listed, many sellers are wondering- how do I make my listings more relevant? Well, fear not! We have compiled our top tips for boosting the relevancy of your items.

Just getting started? Be sure to read this Seller Handbook post first: www.etsy.com/blog/en/2011/putting-your-shop-on-top-etsy%E2%80%99s-m...

TIPS FOR IMPROVING YOUR RANKING IN SEARCH RESULTS

The best way to begin revising or evaluating your tags and titles is to start thinking like a shopper! Etsy’s most relevant search is built to connect shoppers with exactly what they want; so showing up at the front of the search results requires that your item (as defined by your tags and title) matches what a shopper types into the search box.

1. Put the most important keywords and phrases at the front of your titles. What are the most likely words and phrases that a customer would search for? Please see tips below for finding important keywords. Eg:
BEFORE: Lotus Blossom Pink and Yellow Children’s Dress.....
AFTER: Girls Dress - flowers....etc etc

2. Use a variety of strong keywords and phrases in your titles and tags, and vary what is at the front of the title (be sure to always use the most important keywords and phrases, though). Don’t name everything the same thing! Each listing is a chance for a buyer to find you, if you diversify your keywords you’ll be found by lots of different searches. For example, you might start off a few listing titles with each of your strong keywords or phrases, then use other great terms on other similar items in your shop. Eg:
Girls Dress - etc etc
Children’s Dress - etc etc
Toddler Dress - etc etc
----
Cufflinks....etc etc
Cuff links...etc etc
Steampunk Cufflinks...etc etc
Wedding Cufflinks...etc etc
Silver Cufflinks...etc etc

3. Use your most important, major search terms in your titles and tags. The top keywords found in your Shop Stats can help you find these. But they should always be evolving, so experiment with new keywords. More help with deciphering your Shop Stats here: www.etsy.com/blog/en/2011/etsy-success-shop-stats-insights/

4. Add more items to your shop on a regular basis! Remember, recency does play a role in search results sorted by relevancy to keep things fresh when shoppers use broad search terms that return thousands of results.

FINDING KEYWORDS AND PHRASES

1. Think about what a shopper would be searching for! What elements of your item would be most important to a shopper? What the item is, such as a necklace or hat, is often a great place to start. Try highlighting different aspects of the item...for example, if I’m looking for a painting for a specific space my living room, I may search by the size, colors or theme of the painting that I want. Try different types of terms and then check your Shop Stats to see what works.

2. Start typing what you sell in the search bar, with Handmade, Vintage or Supplies selected to find relevant search terms. Think of synonyms and try those as well!

3. Look in your descriptions to find keywords. Often you have some great ideas in there!

4. Brainstorm with others! They can often come up with terms you wouldn’t have though of. Ask people you know who would be in your target market, and ask other sellers on your Teams for ideas.

5. Use these resources to help think of keywords:
www.etsy.com/storque/make/guidelines-tips-tagging-on-etsy-281/
www.etsy.com/storque/seller-handbook/seller-how-to-tag-o-rama-with-...
Google’s Keyword Tool: adwords.google.com/o/Targeting/Explorer

GENERAL TIPS FOR GETTING MORE VIEWS WITH SEARCH

Showing up in a search result is great, but ultimately you want the right buyer to click on your item listing.

1. All views are not created equal! Remember you want to connect your items with the right buyers, not hundreds of uninterested buyers. So keep it relevant. Comb through your item listings. Get rid of the tags that buyers probably aren’t using to find this particular item.

2. Take great photos, since they will get more clicks in search. See the photography articles in the Seller Handbook for tips: www.etsy.com/storque/seller-handbook/the-etsy-seller-handbook-all-o...

3. Don’t sound like a robot. Remember, showing up in search results isn’t everything. You’ll also need to connect with your buyer when they find your items, so don’t just fill your titles up with a string of keywords. Find the right balance that works for you.

Our biggest tip? Go slowly with making changes, and use your Shop Stats to see what is working before making more changes in your shop.

Here is a great relevancy tutorial for Vintage from Etsy Admin:
http://www.livestream.com/etsy/video?clipId=flv_fca3e617-4c05-4b25-9953-2a43d3729f99

Finding Your Google Page Rank

First...Find Your Google Page Rank...by click on this link and following the instructions...

www.prchecker.info/

Then find out what the Ranking means...

favillephoto says

You can check your google ranking by downloading the google toolbar, it has a ranking tool on it..... Etsy itself is only a 7. 10 is the highest, and only HIGH traffic sites like facebook and google are a 10. 80% of websites on the internet are a page rank 0, so having a page rank above 3 is rare. Unless you have hundreds of page views a day on flickr or thousands on facebook, I doubt that your page rank is that high.
favillephoto says Edited on May 8, 2011

For most small business endeavors, a PR2 or PR3 is about as much as you can ask for. You're actually doing well if you even have a page rank at all. No one actually knows google's algorithm exactly for calculating page rank. Heck, I don't even think most people at google even understand it, but from what most experts have determined, each level of page rank is exponentially harder to achieve than the last. So, it takes twice as much work to get from a 1 to a 2, as it did to get from 0 to 1, and it takes 4 times as much work to get from 2 to 3 as it did to get from 1 to 2, and so on and so forth. A great example is Etsy. The main page of Etsy itself is a PR7. And, you could imagine how many people know about Etsy and visit Etsy and link to Etsy and it's still far from the max of 10. So, if you're sitting at a 2 or 3, be happy with yourself. You're doing good work! That means that when someone does a google search with your keywords, you'll be listed before all of those 0s and 1s out there.

Then figure out how to raise that ranking....
If anyone is interested in RAISING their page rank, it's alot of work and takes time, but most of what determines page rank is your incoming links. What websites are linking to your website, or to your etsy store. You get some credit just based on the quantity of websites that link to you, but you get the MOST credit from having other higher page rank sites linking to you. One of the best ways to improve your page rank is to have a blog that is a higher page rank than you write a blog post about your company or store, and link to it. That will get alot of immediate traffic, but, you'll also permanently get credit for that link from that higher ranked site.

What is a good bounce rate...

First what is a bounce rate?
The formula used to calculate bounce rate is:

Bounce rate = total number of visits viewing only one page / total number of visits

A bounce rate is when someone clicks on your page, and exits right away. In other words, it's the percentage of people that don't explore your shop past the first page that they go to. The lower the bounce rate, the better.

Here is an explanation of how to evaluate your bounce rate that I thought was well stated. From Etsy forums:
SavoyFaire says

Lots of questions lately and may look bad but isn't really or I don't see it that way but let's discuss and look a bit further.
My bounce rate is pretty high and always has been but my length of visits grows all the time. Here is info if you wish:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bounce_rate
It says:
Over 50% bad
Over 30% cause for alarm

Over 20% good

Let's think about what this really means however after looking at your GA:
Visitors
Visitor loyalty
Length of visit

0-10 seconds has always been high for me thus making my bounce rate so high but I think that is great! Those are new to your site or those that click just to glimpse could be anyone. What it means to me is that I am pulling in a lot of new people who are curious enough to click one of my items! If this was low, I'm not pulling in anyone! No one is interested enough to peek. I'd rather high than low right? Could be other sellers checking what I listed or spammers or anybody. Don't count that as negative just not what we should focus on.

What about someone who has a 20% bounce rate? That means no new people are looking! The same people go and stay for long periods of time. Fine if you want all repeat buyers! You are not enticing - your listing are not making people click!

Now back to length of visit: Early on my 61-180 seconds and more were all tiny amounts of course as I was new. Now about 40% is down in the longest periods of time near the bottom AND my sales have really increased per week! That shows people are staying, looking at more of my items and pages AND buying! That is really what we want right? Let the 60%+ windowshop as that's what that is. As long as I see good numbers down in those more lengthy time slots I know I am keeping their attention. I doubt many left my shop up then went to sleep! lol

Also note that my 11-30 seconds and 31-60 are very low now. Used to be much higher. Meant I got them to look, read a bit then they moved on and didn't buy. Those are the levels I would be more concerned with.

I'm looking at this in a positive way instead of gloom and doom or more negative like the articles are stating. I believe (as past data analyst) that we need to look more indepth and consider all data not just 60% is bad!

Really want to know how you're doing?
Keep a log for a while to track. Make the columns of these time amounts across a page then start records week by week or month by month of what % are under each. You'll see a trend and growth in those high amounts of time spent. If not, then you know you need to change the scheme of your photos, use props, models, henchmen, puppets, catchier titles whatever to get people to click then write great descriptions!

Not:
Blouse
size M
Out of cloth

But with a bit more info or descriptive and key words!
More than one photo! Geesh that always disappoints me.

This is how you can spot your shop is dying ahead of time! Thereby you can react.

In any case...
Embrace all this info GA provides!
Food for thought!

Lexi Lewis of starletstyleantiques read this article and had these helpful comments to add:

I always love your blog! So informative! I tried to leave a comment, but my iPad
slowed the typing down (prob because I was getting too long winded lol) .

It's hard to get really low bounce rates in a marketplace like Etsy. Especially
when you are selling vintage jewelry. Very few shoppers just browse through an
entire shop. typically, they are searching for something specifically, so they
find your item in search results or through a treasury, and if you are lucky..
They may click one of the thumbnails for the next or previous items if it
catches their eye. That why it's important to rearrange your shop or list
similar items in succession, so if someone is looking for rhinestone brooches,
the thumbnails will show two more items they would potentially be interested
in... Not say, a lamp and a figurine of a little boy, LOL.

Input from the peanut gallery, for what it's worth!
Xoxo
Lexi

Google Analytics: Visitors Report Explained

This article has been edited...

Google Analytics Basics: The Visitors Report

By Whitney Wilding

March 28th, 2011

...Remember that analytics are just numbers that represent events on your website. Knowing what those events signal about potential problems on your site, and where to go from there, is up to you.
....this post provides a list of definitions here for the “Visitor” section of reporting, and explores what each metric might be trying to tell you.

Visitors Overview

The Visitors Overview Report provides you with some general information about the visitors that come to your site, such as how many there are and how they interact with the site. You can access the view by clicking on the “Visitors” selection in the Dashboard menu of your Google Analytics account. Below is a sample screenshot of how the “Visitors Overview” screen looks. The “Visitors Overview” features metrics for site visits, absolute unique visitors, pageviews, average pageviews, time on site, bounce rate, and new visits. Let’s go through each metric to break down what it means and what the data could possibly be telling you.

Visits

What it Means: Provides you with the total number of visits to your site for a given period. The time frame is shown in the upper right-hand side of the active window and can be changed by clicking on the arrow to the right of the current dates, and selecting new start and end dates from the calendar.
What it Tells You: This provides you with a general overview of how well your site is being promoted. This can be affected by changes in your marketing efforts such as PPC, SEO and offline marketing.

Absolute Unique Visitors

What it Means: Absolute unique visitors accounts for the number of distinct people who come to your website during a particular time period by counting each visit only once within a selected date range. It recognizes the uniqueness of a visitor by using cookies...
 What it Tells You: This can help you to get a more accurate representation of how many individuals visit the site, how often they are coming back and what pages they view on the site.

Pageviews

What it Means: Total number of pages viewed on your site, as triggered by the Analytics tracking code. This takes into account when a visitor refreshes the page or navigates away from a page and returns to it within the same session – each of these will be counted as a separate pageview.
What it Tells You: This number doesn’t necessarily help to give you an understanding of your site’s performance, but can be a measure of traffic load information for server purposes.

Average Pageviews

What it Means: Represents the average of number of pages viewed per visit on your site during the time period. It’s determined by dividing the total number of page views within a time frame by the total number of visits for that same time frame.
What it Tells You: This number can give you some indication of how qualified your site traffic is or how effective your site content is. If you have a high number of average pageviews, then this can be an indication that visitors are interacting with your site. This can be the result of targeted traffic landing on your site, having effective content on the site, or a combination of both. However, if the average pageviews are low, the reverse is true. In that case you will want to review your traffic sources and if the content on your site is meeting prospects’ expectations.

Time on Site

What it Means: Measures the average amount of time spent on your site per visit.
What it Tells You: If there is a high time on site then this may be telling you that prospects are engaged with the site content. This can be used as a measure of visit quality for your potential prospects. Similarly, a low number here tells you the same thing as a low number for average pageviews: take action by reviewing your traffic sources and site content for scent and relevance. Note: high time on site could also reveal potential usability issues on your site. If people can’t easily accomplish their task(s), time on site will be high. You want time on site to be “in the middle;” too low is a problem and too high is also potentially a problem.

Bounce Rate

What it Means: Often confused with exit rates, the bounce rate actually measures the percentage of visitors that leave your site from the first page they land on (i.e. their entrance page, or landing page).
What it Tells You: If you have a high bounce rate, this could likely be an indication that the content on a landing page is not relevant for your visitors or that there is a loss of scent from the ad copy to the landing page. Analytics Evangelist and author Avinash Kaushik jokes that bounce rate means “I came, I puked, I left.”

New Visits

What it Means: New visits shows the percentage of visits (sessions) to the site that have landed on the site for the first time (vs. repeat/return visits) during the same period.
What it Tells You: This metric tells you about your success/failure in bringing new prospects to your site (via your marketing efforts) with the hopes of converting them. In order to grow your online business, you’ll need to acquire traffic that is “new,” but remember that cookie deletion impacts this number, so use it as a proxy, not an exact number. Also keep in mind that there’s nothing wrong with “Return Visitors,” as they often convert better, buy more, etc.
Each of these metrics just skims the top layer of all the site performance data available to you through your Google Analytics account, but is useful for highlighting some of your core problems and determining where it is prudent for you to dig deeper. For instance, a low time on site in combination with a high average page views may indicate that visitors are bouncing around your site a lot and aren’t successfully finding the information they seek. You can start to triage that problem by looking into your site navigation. ...

Marketing -To Do List - When Sales Slow Down

What To Do When You Have Nothing To Do

1. Check Out Your Views, Hearts, Sales, Analytics

Analyze these and learn from them. Here's a list of questions to ask yourself: 

What items in my shop have the most views, hearts, sales?

What colors in my shop have the most views, hearts, sales?

What patterns in my shop have the most views, hearts, sales?

Is there a relation to a certain type of photo and high views, hearts, sales?

Where are my visitors coming from?

What keywords are they searching to find my shop?

What time of day and week day are they visiting the most on?

How long are they visiting my shop? 

How many pages in my shop to they visit?

Click on this post for how to get this information: Etsy Shop: Sales Stats, Daily Views Comparison, & Where are the Visitors Are Coming From

2. Redo Your Photos

Take this time to reshoot all your photos. Use natural light, plain backgrounds and test out different camera settings.  Or make a light box. All of these ideas a no cost or low cost. Click on the following blog posts for help in improving your photos.Etsy Shop: Sales Stats, Daily Views Comparison, & Where are the Visitors Are Coming From  and After the Right Camera...You Need the Right Lighting and Photos with Personality and The Final Touch: Photo Editing .

3. Tweak Your Descriptions

Have a peek at your convos.  What are your buyers frequently writing to you about? Sizes? Shipping details? Questions about customization?  For every buyer that contacts you there's probably a dozen out there that won't.  So make sure you are answering your buyers questions in your item descriptions and your shop profile and shop policies.  

http://www.etsy.com/storque/how-to/best-of-the-etsy-forums-20-questions-your-buyers-are-asking-7024/

Take this time to tell your story in your item descriptions and shop profile.  

4.  Double Check Tagging

Go through all your item listings and make sure you are using all 14 tags.  Make sure each listing has a tag that relates to color, size, style, motif or theme, texture and size. For vintage jewelry make sure you have these tags: jewellery (British spelling), team tags for treasuries, eco-friendly, ring size, vintage era (ie. 1950s, Victorian, Modern), solid (for solid gold), genuine (for genuine pearls). You can put as many words as will fit, separated by spaces and they are all searchable individually.

         5.  Start a Blog

Or create a few posts for a friends or Team blog.  Already do this?  Are you twittering?  Try something new and see if you like it.  Check out the twitter tutorial post. Entry Level Twitter

6. Have Fun

What have you wanted to do for a while, but haven't given yourself the go ahead?  Go and DO IT.  A long bike ride, a weekend trip, a new sewing project for yourself.  But wait. That's not it.   Take photos, blog or tweet about this.  Share it with your friends, family, fellow Etsy sellers, etc.  Plan on documenting this little adventure on flickr, twitter and your blog.  This will be a nice break not only for you  but for your readers and friends. 

This post was taken and heavily edited from https://docs.google.com/View?id=ddjtktcp_145fhnddzc4&pli=1.

Etsy Shop: Sales Stats, Daily Views Comparison, & Where are the Visitors Are Coming From

EASY   If You Just want to Look at Your Etsy Shop Sales and Your Orders (Daily or Monthly)

Click On Your Account->Orders -> Click on Sales Stats

HARDER   If You Want to Check Out Unique Visitors, Page Views, Items Hearts, Shop Hearts on a Daily Comparison
Check out Craftopolis . You need to give access to your etsy shop info and to your google analytics info. Please see next paragraph for setting up Google Analytics.

How to Get Your Google Analytics Set Up for Your Etsy Shop

From Etsy Help

Etsy Web Analytics is a powerful set of web traffic tracking tools and reports, powered by Google Analytics. Etsy Web Analytics allows Etsy sellers to track metrics such as pageviews, site visits, popular content and page referrals. This is a free service available to all Etsy sellers, but it requires a separate account with Google.

Step 1: Getting Set Up
To create a new Google Analytics account, visit http://www.google.com/analytics/
Here are some helpful hints during signup:

• When asked for your Website's URL enter Etsy's URL (www.etsy.com)
• When asked for your Account Name enter your Etsy shop website address (shopname.etsy.com)
• Hit Continue when you arrive at the page titled Analytics: Tracking Instructions
• Once you arrive on your account overview page, locate the tracking code which appears to the right of your shop website address. It will appear in this format: UA-XXXXXXX-X.

If you already have a Google Analytics account you can instead login, click on Analytics Settings, and then choose Enter New Profile.

Step 2: Enter Web Property ID
Then you can enable this feature by going to Your Account > Options > Web Analytics. Enter your Google Analytics Web Property ID in this format: UA-XXXXXXX-X. Click Save.
You should be all set. To view your Analytics, you must sign in to your Google Analytics account. Since Google Analytics works on a delay, you may not see data in your reports for up to 24 hours.

HARDEST How to Find Out Where Your Views are Coming From ...and other things....on Google Analytics 

This video will get you started witn understand google analytics. It was produced byTim Adams.  Handmadeology .

Alternative Video made by Google
Beginning Analytics: Interpreting and Acting on Your Data (You Tube Video)