Shownotes
How To Go From Idea To Business One Step At A Time
- Be your own biggest cheerleader.
- Take action. Take the steps little by little even if it seems impossible at the beginning. <-- So powerful!
- Put yourself out there.
- There are times when we need a little bit of help, so reach out to different people.
- Have the right products that people wanted to buy and learn how to get them in front of your ideal audience.
- Listen to feedback from potential customers.
- Learn how different platforms work and see which one fits for you.
- Know what your customers want to hear and how you can help them.
- Pinterest is a great way to get traffic to your shop or blog.
- With the idea pins on Pinterest, you can link affiliate links to them. You get followers with them, which actually lead people to come back to your main Pinterest page. It gets you more visibility that way.
Resources Mentioned
Naa Ardua's Contact Links
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Gift biz unwrapped episode 362.
Speaker:I dared to think that maybe one day someone could pay
Speaker:me, but to be honest,
Speaker:I still thought it was like a far-fetched dream At attentive.
Speaker:Gifters beggars,
Speaker:crafters of makers pursuing your dream can be fun.
Speaker:Whether you have an established business or looking to start one.
Speaker:Now you are in the right place.
Speaker:This is gift to biz unwrapped,
Speaker:helping you turn your skill into a flourishing business.
Speaker:Join us for an episode,
Speaker:packed full of invaluable guidance,
Speaker:resources, and the support you need to grow.
Speaker:Your gift biz.
Speaker:Here is your host gift biz gal Sue moon Heights.
Speaker:Hi there.
Speaker:It's Sue.
Speaker:And thanks for joining me here today.
Speaker:You may hear a hoarseness in my voice,
Speaker:in the intro and outro of the show.
Speaker:I caught a bug,
Speaker:not COVID luckily,
Speaker:but still decided to record because as the saying goes,
Speaker:the show must go on.
Speaker:I had to come into the office today anyway,
Speaker:because we're expecting a huge ribbon shipment this morning.
Speaker:Let me fill you in.
Speaker:If you're not aware.
Speaker:My other company is the ribbon print company.
Speaker:You'll hear more about it in the mid roll of the
Speaker:podcast today.
Speaker:Anyway, one of the products we offer to support our ribbon
Speaker:printing system is our own line of ribbon.
Speaker:In other words,
Speaker:we make our own not resell another brand.
Speaker:I created this line about eight years ago or so now
Speaker:because I wanted consistency for quality printing and what I found
Speaker:available on the market just wasn't doing it for me.
Speaker:So we took control ourselves with our brand of ribbon called
Speaker:pretty print.
Speaker:Anyway, when the ribbon comes in,
Speaker:it has to go through customs and my logistic company,
Speaker:of course,
Speaker:but then my office is in an older building in our
Speaker:historic downtown district.
Speaker:And I don't have an elevator great for working out,
Speaker:but not so great for ribbon delivery.
Speaker:Anyway, I need to hire a moving company to bring the
Speaker:boxes from the big semi up two flights of stairs to
Speaker:our office.
Speaker:It's a whole ordeal boxes and boxes and boxes.
Speaker:Thousands of rolls of ribbon.
Speaker:And it's heavy.
Speaker:Why am I telling you all this?
Speaker:I guess back to my raspy voice today,
Speaker:I have to be here.
Speaker:So I might as well get things done anyway.
Speaker:I can't wait for you to hear not a story.
Speaker:She's a perfect role model for us,
Speaker:portraying desire and determination.
Speaker:Once she sets her eyes on a goal,
Speaker:you'll hear her demonstrate this over and over again.
Speaker:She decides she's going to do something and gets it done.
Speaker:We discuss how she worked through her initial fears,
Speaker:the ones we all have about whether anyone will even want
Speaker:or buy our product to managing through a high profile first
Speaker:order, without having any systems in place yet mind you.
Speaker:Then she shares her experience of setting up her Etsy shop
Speaker:and figuring out how to go from complete silence on the
Speaker:sales front crickets to now over 10,000
Speaker:in orders.
Speaker:And gosh,
Speaker:there's even more so without me spilling all the beans,
Speaker:let's jump over and hear about this all directly from Noah
Speaker:Today. I am.
Speaker:So looking forward to introducing you to not,
Speaker:not only helps crafters learn how to use digital art to
Speaker:make handmade craft projects for their families and friends.
Speaker:While living in France as an ex-pat mom,
Speaker:she started making digital illustrations as a way to use her
Speaker:artistic skills and be creative.
Speaker:Every day,
Speaker:she saw that she could reach people with her art and
Speaker:help fellow artists,
Speaker:crafters, and small businesses with their projects.
Speaker:So she started creating SVG designs and selling them online.
Speaker:She now has over 10,000
Speaker:sales in her Etsy shop.
Speaker:Did you guys hear that 10,000
Speaker:sales all while still working a nine to five job?
Speaker:Now she runs her business as a full time.
Speaker:Mompreneur doing school pick-ups drop-offs and running a household from abroad,
Speaker:not a while.
Speaker:Welcome to the gift biz on wrapped podcast.
Speaker:Thanks Sue.
Speaker:I'm so glad to be here.
Speaker:I am really excited to hear all about your story and
Speaker:we're going to do that in one minute,
Speaker:but first I like to do something a little bit different
Speaker:and very creative here on the show.
Speaker:And that is to have you share with us a little
Speaker:bit more about you by way of a motivational candle.
Speaker:So if you were to envision a candle,
Speaker:that would be all you,
Speaker:what would it look like by color and quote?
Speaker:Okay. So for me,
Speaker:my candle would definitely be red.
Speaker:It might have some glitter in it.
Speaker:Glitter's good.
Speaker:You could include her In the motivational quote.
Speaker:That would be on,
Speaker:it would be,
Speaker:it always seems impossible until it is done.
Speaker:And that's a quote from nothing in Della and it just
Speaker:holds so true to me because there's been several times in
Speaker:my life when I always felt like things always seemed impossible
Speaker:and I'm sure everyone listening can relate.
Speaker:When the challenge ahead of you,
Speaker:whether it's something that someone else might say that it's a
Speaker:small thing,
Speaker:it's not a big deal.
Speaker:It still seems impossible to you.
Speaker:And people will tell you,
Speaker:you can't do it.
Speaker:Don't even bother trying.
Speaker:It's impossible.
Speaker:And then you actually take the steps and do it.
Speaker:And then you realize,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:it is possible after all.
Speaker:Oh, interesting.
Speaker:Because I thought you were going to take the approach that
Speaker:you were the one telling yourself it was impossible,
Speaker:but you're right.
Speaker:There's also outside influences that even if I'm originally,
Speaker:we have a dream and we're really excited and you know,
Speaker:we're in our little cocoon thinking about it.
Speaker:And then if we tell somebody about it and they are
Speaker:as enthusiastic as we are,
Speaker:that's horrible.
Speaker:The dream can get totally squashed.
Speaker:Yeah. They can be a lot of dreams,
Speaker:dream Stompers,
Speaker:dream squashers unfortunately.
Speaker:And sometimes you have to be your own biggest cheerleader and
Speaker:that can seem impossible at the beginning.
Speaker:But once you keep plugging along,
Speaker:you realize,
Speaker:okay, I'm taking these little tiny steps and I've reached this
Speaker:first milestone and I've succeeded and they can just keep going.
Speaker:And then all of a sudden you turn it around and
Speaker:you look and see how far you've come.
Speaker:Yeah. And I love the optimism.
Speaker:And what you're saying is it is possible.
Speaker:And gosh,
Speaker:what if you don't even try,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:and you live your whole life wondering,
Speaker:I'd actually rather try and not have it work and then
Speaker:decide to either adjust it or move onto something else then
Speaker:never to try.
Speaker:Oh yeah.
Speaker:I'm totally that way.
Speaker:And like,
Speaker:once we'll get to talking and I'll tell you a little
Speaker:bit about my background,
Speaker:I live by that.
Speaker:Like, I don't want to regret all the things that I
Speaker:didn't do.
Speaker:So I just rather maybe regret something that I did do
Speaker:maybe think about.
Speaker:And they say,
Speaker:oh, well maybe I shouldn't have done it that way.
Speaker:But at least I did it.
Speaker:Right. That brings up another thought.
Speaker:And I'm just going to say it here,
Speaker:even though it might come up in your story too,
Speaker:is if we run into barriers and let's just say something
Speaker:doesn't work,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:and everyone is afraid to use the word fail,
Speaker:but we know we tell ourselves that I failed at that,
Speaker:whatever that doesn't mean.
Speaker:You're a failure.
Speaker:That just means the one thing that you try didn't work.
Speaker:So it's not like you as a whole person are no
Speaker:longer any good could never succeed in anything.
Speaker:You just have to find your quote-unquote thing.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:So let's do this.
Speaker:Let's talk about your story.
Speaker:Just start wherever you'd like,
Speaker:where you think is the best place to start.
Speaker:Well in the bio,
Speaker:you mentioned being from abroad.
Speaker:So people might be wondering like,
Speaker:what does she mean by that?
Speaker:Well, why abroad as Sue mentioned,
Speaker:I am an ex-pat.
Speaker:So I'm an American,
Speaker:but I live in the south of France and I've been
Speaker:here for the last 15 years.
Speaker:I met my husband online and I ended up moving here.
Speaker:Did you guys have a back and forth relationship where you
Speaker:visited each other for a couple of years or something?
Speaker:First? It was really quick.
Speaker:So we visited each other,
Speaker:I'd say for less than a year back and forth.
Speaker:Like, that's why I say I'm not that type of person.
Speaker:Who's like,
Speaker:you know what?
Speaker:I would just rather jump and go for it then regret,
Speaker:like not having done it.
Speaker:Yup. We've established that you are a risk taker right there.
Speaker:Yeah. But we did chat for several months before either one
Speaker:of us got on a plane to go anywhere.
Speaker:Of course.
Speaker:Sure. You were still smart,
Speaker:but you were willing to try it.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:So now you're together in the south of France.
Speaker:So jealous by the way.
Speaker:But go ahead.
Speaker:Why can't we be doing this interview live?
Speaker:Like I think I just need to come and see you.
Speaker:Yeah, exactly.
Speaker:We might have to do that for the next one.
Speaker:Okay. So there you are.
Speaker:So I'm here and I'm just,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:living that regular mom life just somewhere else.
Speaker:I have two kids taking them to school,
Speaker:picking them up,
Speaker:dropping them off and also working an office job.
Speaker:And along the way,
Speaker:one day I go to pick up my son from school
Speaker:and I was talking to him,
Speaker:asking him,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:how's your day been?
Speaker:And he just seemed like not really himself.
Speaker:And he told me,
Speaker:oh, carnival is coming up and talking about it as like
Speaker:a parade festival that they have here in the month of
Speaker:February. So think about Halloween where kids get dressed up.
Speaker:But we do that here in February,
Speaker:like nowadays,
Speaker:like all the kids who like to dress up as like
Speaker:superheroes and things like that.
Speaker:And my son told me that he wanted to be Batman
Speaker:for the carnival parade.
Speaker:And his friend told him,
Speaker:well, no,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:you can't be Batman.
Speaker:Like that means on black.
Speaker:And so my son was like,
Speaker:who is mixed because my husband is white and he was
Speaker:just devastated.
Speaker:And so I said,
Speaker:don't worry about it.
Speaker:You can be whatever you want to be.
Speaker:I went to the craft store,
Speaker:I went and got him.
Speaker:Some felt made a mask.
Speaker:I'm like,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:on Pinterest,
Speaker:like looking up,
Speaker:how do you make a map?
Speaker:And now you're going to make the best darn costume ever
Speaker:right after that.
Speaker:Exactly. So I can make them as Cape and everything.
Speaker:He went a week later in his costume is so happy
Speaker:and so proud.
Speaker:I'm going to have a picture of him somewhere.
Speaker:And I was like,
Speaker:I will say,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:not to brag about myself,
Speaker:but I was pretty darn happy.
Speaker:Yeah. You can brag into,
Speaker:okay. With my homemade mom costume,
Speaker:I was pretty darn happy about it.
Speaker:So he went and he was just so excited that,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:he got to dress up as his favorite superhero.
Speaker:And it got me to thinking like,
Speaker:okay, well maybe his friend was thinking this because like,
Speaker:he doesn't see a lot of superheroes.
Speaker:Like at the time there was,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:it was before like Marvel had started introducing all of these
Speaker:like different multicultural superheroes because he just,
Speaker:he probably just doesn't see a lot of these different cultural
Speaker:characters in public and I'm thinking,
Speaker:okay, what can I do with my artistic background to change
Speaker:that narrative?
Speaker:And I just thought,
Speaker:okay, I can draw.
Speaker:So what can I do with that?
Speaker:I started looking online,
Speaker:how I could make digital drawings,
Speaker:because up until then,
Speaker:I had only been drawing.
Speaker:Like I've been painting on canvas.
Speaker:I've been drawing in sketchbooks.
Speaker:And it was a challenge for me because just like anything
Speaker:new, we kind of talk ourselves out of it thinking,
Speaker:oh, this is like the younger crowd.
Speaker:Like, you know,
Speaker:maybe you're too old to do this,
Speaker:but every night I would sit in front of my computer
Speaker:after the kids were in bed and just give myself 15
Speaker:minutes and say,
Speaker:okay, for 15 minutes,
Speaker:you're going to focus on this.
Speaker:You can do it,
Speaker:follow this tutorial.
Speaker:Even if it doesn't look perfect.
Speaker:Even if you have to like rewind a hundred times,
Speaker:just keep going.
Speaker:And I would do that for several months until I went
Speaker:on for like maybe six months eventually.
Speaker:So you were teaching yourself online through YouTube videos or I
Speaker:was using YouTube videos.
Speaker:I was using like tutorials that I bought,
Speaker:like different courses,
Speaker:just trying out anything that would work for me and seeing
Speaker:like what would stick.
Speaker:So eventually I started to make things that were,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:recognizable and not just like blogs.
Speaker:And I said,
Speaker:I opened up an Instagram account or I probably had my
Speaker:personal Instagram account at that point where I was just posting
Speaker:pictures of my family and things.
Speaker:And I was scared.
Speaker:I will not lie.
Speaker:I was scared to post my artwork because I was afraid
Speaker:of the potential criticism.
Speaker:Like what if someone laughs Yeah.
Speaker:And you're not selling anything at this point.
Speaker:You're just going to show the images that you had created.
Speaker:Right? Exactly.
Speaker:I'm with you.
Speaker:Okay. I just wanted to show like my friends and family,
Speaker:because I also had like some family members who were cheering
Speaker:me on too.
Speaker:They're saying like,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:we know you've done art your whole life.
Speaker:How come you're not doing anything now.
Speaker:So I also wanted to show and share that with them,
Speaker:especially since most of them are in America still.
Speaker:And you know,
Speaker:I'm here in France,
Speaker:so we don't get to see each other as much as
Speaker:we used to before.
Speaker:And at least with social media,
Speaker:we can still share pictures and things like that.
Speaker:So I posted up,
Speaker:started posting my images slowly but surely.
Speaker:And I was getting positive feedback and it felt so good.
Speaker:I can only imagine,
Speaker:cause you're getting reinforcement for what you've done.
Speaker:And you were proud obviously of your images or else you
Speaker:wouldn't have been posting them.
Speaker:Yeah, exactly.
Speaker:You were validating that people were resonating with the images.
Speaker:Had you already decided that if this was working,
Speaker:you would monetize this in some way or is it still
Speaker:just getting your creative passions out to people?
Speaker:I dared to think that maybe one day someone could pay
Speaker:me, but to be honest,
Speaker:I still thought it was like a far-fetched dream.
Speaker:I thought like,
Speaker:oh, you know,
Speaker:that's not real.
Speaker:Like artists don't get paid.
Speaker:It's only like a one in a million chance where someone's
Speaker:actually going to pay you to do artwork for them.
Speaker:So it was like this deep down this dream of mine,
Speaker:but I didn't really believe it at the time.
Speaker:Okay. So it was a concept of thought,
Speaker:maybe something,
Speaker:it just sat in the back,
Speaker:just kind of percolated in the back a little bit.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:So yay.
Speaker:People liked your images.
Speaker:So that's amazing what happens then People liked them.
Speaker:And then one day I get a DM from someone on
Speaker:Instagram saying,
Speaker:can you make an illustration for me of Michelle Obama?
Speaker:And I'm first I was kind of shocked.
Speaker:And I'm like,
Speaker:okay, I don't know this person.
Speaker:How did they find about,
Speaker:about me?
Speaker:And like,
Speaker:it's like someone who knows me,
Speaker:or this is like a joke.
Speaker:Is this like a prank?
Speaker:Because I was still doubting myself and my skills at that
Speaker:point. But it turned out it was a real person who
Speaker:did really want an illustration because he also had a small
Speaker:t-shirt company and he wanted to put that image on a
Speaker:t-shirt. So then I was excited,
Speaker:but then I was also panicking at the same time.
Speaker:Yeah. Cause now it's getting to be real.
Speaker:Exactly. It's like that thing that you wish for.
Speaker:And then you're thinking,
Speaker:oh, what did I get myself into?
Speaker:Do you know how he found you?
Speaker:Did you ever figure that out?
Speaker:He is actually was his cousin or his wife's friend knew
Speaker:my sister because they live in the same state in America.
Speaker:And my sister had done like some art summer programs where
Speaker:I think like his nieces or nephews had gone to,
Speaker:but we did not know each other.
Speaker:And we have never spoken.
Speaker:I think at the time,
Speaker:like the way the algorithm was like,
Speaker:maybe you were still being shown things from like people that,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:that know someone else that you know,
Speaker:and that's probably how he saw my drawings.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:So through kind of a distant connection on social would be
Speaker:the way you say it.
Speaker:But I think this is a point that I want to
Speaker:just stop and talk about for just a second natto up
Speaker:is that so often when we get started,
Speaker:we don't want to tell anybody what we're doing,
Speaker:where actually connections,
Speaker:word of mouth,
Speaker:or like you said,
Speaker:being connected on social and you showing things on social,
Speaker:whether it's Pinterest or wherever,
Speaker:some of those are the very first business clients.
Speaker:We get to be able to test out how things are
Speaker:going. So tell me what you think of this.
Speaker:But I think sharing a little bit of what you're doing
Speaker:with people who are in your immediate sphere is what you
Speaker:should be doing.
Speaker:You shouldn't just be keeping this a secret and then you're
Speaker:going to show it online to potential cold customers.
Speaker:You want to tell people what you're doing.
Speaker:Yes, exactly.
Speaker:That's what I tell my audience now is that it's fun
Speaker:to make things by yourself and maybe your little craft room
Speaker:and just keep those things to yourself and maybe give them
Speaker:out to like family members.
Speaker:But if you know that you have that drive inside of
Speaker:you, you know that you could actually make something out of
Speaker:it, you have to get over that hump and put yourself
Speaker:out there.
Speaker:Okay. So what happened with the Michelle Obama image At that
Speaker:point? I'm kind of mini freaking out because I'm like,
Speaker:oh, this is great.
Speaker:Yeah. Because it's also a known person image.
Speaker:Yeah. I can see why you'd freak out.
Speaker:I'm with you.
Speaker:I'm thinking,
Speaker:okay. Can I even do this?
Speaker:Is it going to be something that's actually going to look
Speaker:like her?
Speaker:Because in my head,
Speaker:so, you know,
Speaker:all of the negativity starts jumping out at me,
Speaker:but I convinced myself,
Speaker:okay. If this guy contacted me,
Speaker:it's because he liked what I'm doing and I can do
Speaker:this, but the next step was okay,
Speaker:how am I going to charge him?
Speaker:How's he going to pay me?
Speaker:I had no concept of like,
Speaker:how that could be done.
Speaker:And that's actually where Etsy entered into the picture for me,
Speaker:because it was his idea to put it on Etsy.
Speaker:And he says,
Speaker:oh, why don't you open up an Etsy shop?
Speaker:And you can make a custom listing for me and I
Speaker:can pay you that way.
Speaker:And I was just kind of like,
Speaker:oh yeah,
Speaker:yeah, sure,
Speaker:sure. I can do that.
Speaker:I had no idea how to do any of that time,
Speaker:But thank God you did.
Speaker:And not put him off and say,
Speaker:oh, you know what?
Speaker:I'm not ready for that yet.
Speaker:Thank you very much.
Speaker:I'm not ready.
Speaker:You just decided to dive in with two feet and figure
Speaker:it out.
Speaker:Exactly. So I'd just hop on Etsy and I start reading.
Speaker:Okay. How do you open up an Etsy shop?
Speaker:How do you hope your bank account with that?
Speaker:It wasn't something that was so impossible to do because I
Speaker:figured, okay.
Speaker:There's so many people on Etsy and Etsy was a platform
Speaker:that I had used already,
Speaker:but as a customer,
Speaker:not as a seller.
Speaker:And I opened up my shop just from this one customer
Speaker:who wanted a personal illustration from me.
Speaker:And it was amazing to me that I could reach someone
Speaker:on the other side of the world and start a quote
Speaker:unquote business.
Speaker:Because at the time for me,
Speaker:it wasn't quote unquote business.
Speaker:And what year was this?
Speaker:This was in 2017.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:So not that long ago,
Speaker:five years.
Speaker:We'll call it little less than maybe five years,
Speaker:depending on the month.
Speaker:Okay. Very exciting.
Speaker:And yeah,
Speaker:I mean,
Speaker:I think that first contact and you setting it up and
Speaker:seeing that the whole thing worked,
Speaker:I would imagine just opened up your mind to what is
Speaker:possible. It did.
Speaker:I was still shocked from him from the fact that,
Speaker:that it could happen and that we live in this digital
Speaker:age where things like that are common everyday events now.
Speaker:So did you and your husband have it like a mini
Speaker:celebration when it worked?
Speaker:It was already selling and I was running around like,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:telling everyone in the house,
Speaker:like my husband,
Speaker:like How exciting.
Speaker:Exactly. All right.
Speaker:So now what,
Speaker:So that I do illustration for him,
Speaker:he pays,
Speaker:it works out just fine,
Speaker:but then I have this shop and I'm thinking,
Speaker:okay, I need to start putting some other things in there.
Speaker:I can't have a shop with one thing and I start
Speaker:making clip art.
Speaker:And I think I had maybe 10 or 12 things in
Speaker:there. And I just kind of like sat back,
Speaker:folded my arms and just like waited for the sales to
Speaker:come in.
Speaker:So that is not what happened.
Speaker:It was crickets.
Speaker:Okay. Thank you very much.
Speaker:I've been talking about this actually,
Speaker:when this show airs,
Speaker:I've been talking about this a lot last month,
Speaker:so yes,
Speaker:keep on.
Speaker:And I'm so glad you said that you already saw validation
Speaker:with even that one sale,
Speaker:but you can't just put things up and expect people to
Speaker:know about it.
Speaker:Even in an established platform like Etsy.
Speaker:Okay. So no one's coming.
Speaker:Did you get discouraged?
Speaker:No, one's coming.
Speaker:I, of course I got discouraged and I was thinking,
Speaker:okay, maybe that was just a fluke.
Speaker:Maybe all the maybes,
Speaker:all the negativity started creeping up again in my head thinking,
Speaker:oh, you know what?
Speaker:That was just a fluke.
Speaker:You should just let it go.
Speaker:And just like stick to your day job.
Speaker:And it's just never going to happen.
Speaker:But then I started thinking,
Speaker:okay, you know what,
Speaker:all these other people who are on Etsy and I can
Speaker:go in their shop and see that they're making sales,
Speaker:there must be something to it.
Speaker:It is possible to do it.
Speaker:And I started looking for helps with sort of taking courses
Speaker:from other people who were at Etsy experts who were selling
Speaker:well on the platform,
Speaker:because I think we also tend to think that we can
Speaker:do everything ourselves.
Speaker:Sometimes you can.
Speaker:Sometimes there are some people that,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:they can just bootstrap everything from a to Z and that
Speaker:works for them,
Speaker:but that doesn't work for everyone.
Speaker:And I think there are times when,
Speaker:when we do need a little bit of help.
Speaker:So I reached out to different people,
Speaker:started taking their courses and learning about like,
Speaker:how do I get my product seen on Etsy even before
Speaker:thinking about how I get my products on Etsy?
Speaker:Did I have the right products on Etsy?
Speaker:Was I making things that people wanted to see and by,
Speaker:Oh, very good point.
Speaker:Like aligned with the audience who's on Etsy and what are
Speaker:they looking for Exactly.
Speaker:Up until that point,
Speaker:I was just putting out clip art that I thought was
Speaker:cute. And you know,
Speaker:I thought in my head,
Speaker:well, that's pretty cute.
Speaker:And there was like no cohesion to it.
Speaker:So it was like a whole bunch of different things.
Speaker:Like one day maybe I feel like drawing a rainbow and
Speaker:then the other day maybe I'll draw a hammer.
Speaker:It was just a mess.
Speaker:And I finally talked to someone and listen to their advice
Speaker:and they guided me in the direction of,
Speaker:okay, what kind of products do you see that are selling
Speaker:on Etsy?
Speaker:What kind of products do you want to make?
Speaker:What kind of audience do you want to attract?
Speaker:All of those different things that I think in the beginning
Speaker:you don't necessarily know and you don't know that you don't
Speaker:know it it's so it's good to get help to find
Speaker:out how to do it.
Speaker:So I changed my shop direction,
Speaker:completely started looking in areas where I could find people that
Speaker:were looking for the things that I was interested in making
Speaker:and things that they wanted to buy.
Speaker:I would go on Facebook and looking at different forums and
Speaker:just like,
Speaker:look at the questions that people were asking.
Speaker:Like they were saying,
Speaker:oh, you know,
Speaker:I can't find an illustration of a grandma or like an
Speaker:African-American grandfather.
Speaker:And I'm thinking,
Speaker:thinking, thinking,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:light bulb,
Speaker:this is something that you can do with that in your
Speaker:shop. Those customers are already there.
Speaker:So listen to the people that are making these requests,
Speaker:because that will get you the sales that you're looking for.
Speaker:And you know what,
Speaker:Sue, it worked.
Speaker:People started buying things from my Etsy shop.
Speaker:My SVGs started selling once I had like changed my shop
Speaker:to SVGs completely.
Speaker:So isn't it kind of amazing that when you offer what
Speaker:people want,
Speaker:you start getting sales versus this,
Speaker:trying to convince people that they want your product.
Speaker:Yeah. I mean,
Speaker:that's a huge point.
Speaker:I see.
Speaker:Because there are people who are makers can make a million
Speaker:different things,
Speaker:but until you validate that there's a market,
Speaker:people are interested in buying,
Speaker:not you pushing it and convincing them,
Speaker:but them being attracted to you because of what your products
Speaker:are, it's so much easier.
Speaker:Yeah. We make it so difficult when it doesn't have to
Speaker:be. Yeah.
Speaker:Oh my gosh.
Speaker:You are providing so many good points here already.
Speaker:I am so excited to keep going here for people who
Speaker:are on at sea.
Speaker:I'm going to guess.
Speaker:Cause I don't want to sit on this topic for too
Speaker:long, but I'm going to guess you also educated yourself on
Speaker:Etsy. Like how do you put keywords in?
Speaker:So people will find your shop and find your products and
Speaker:the imaging and all of that.
Speaker:You did all of their learning about that also.
Speaker:Yeah, definitely.
Speaker:Okay. Was there anything that was surprising to you that you
Speaker:learned as you were getting prepared for your shop on Etsy?
Speaker:Like any major,
Speaker:one single tip about selling on Etsy that you could share
Speaker:Other than,
Speaker:than listening to the feedback from potential customers,
Speaker:if you don't have any customers yet,
Speaker:and maybe your first customers that come in the door,
Speaker:I would also say learning about how the platform works.
Speaker:Like you were saying about using keywords and tags and all
Speaker:those things in the beginning.
Speaker:That was also something that I just completely ignored because I
Speaker:figured I don't need to know anything about that Etsy handbook
Speaker:guide. I don't need that.
Speaker:I can do this.
Speaker:I got it.
Speaker:But when I actually started looking into that and joining the
Speaker:Etsy forums and listening to other sellers and just reading the
Speaker:material that the platform puts out for people,
Speaker:it just changed everything.
Speaker:Okay. So good point first off.
Speaker:And I've heard this before that Etsy has a lot of
Speaker:really, really good support materials.
Speaker:So you can go right there and find it.
Speaker:And did you see that then when you were implementing those
Speaker:concepts and what you were learning that you saw traction and
Speaker:things started growing in terms of your Etsy sales?
Speaker:I did.
Speaker:And then I realized,
Speaker:okay, this is also another light bulb,
Speaker:like take advantage of the resources that they are openly sharing
Speaker:with us.
Speaker:There was another program that they said sent an email about
Speaker:called MCU,
Speaker:where if you're a current seller on the platform,
Speaker:they were looking for people to come and be at CU
Speaker:like you as an university coaches.
Speaker:And so I thought,
Speaker:okay, well,
Speaker:why not?
Speaker:Like I'm not the self-professed expert on everything,
Speaker:but they are reaching out to me as a potential seller.
Speaker:And maybe I can learn something from this too.
Speaker:So I did participate in it.
Speaker:And that was like,
Speaker:I think two years ago,
Speaker:but it was a great experience.
Speaker:So were you teaching something that you'd learned on Etsy as
Speaker:well as learning?
Speaker:Yes. I was teaching a webinar course on search on Etsy.
Speaker:So using SEO to improve your search results on Etsy.
Speaker:And the thing was like Etsy,
Speaker:like provided us with a lot of the information that we
Speaker:were going to be able to teach and they gave us
Speaker:the resources and we were able to also charge for this
Speaker:webinar in conjunction with Etsy.
Speaker:So it was a win-win for everyone.
Speaker:Okay. So how did you get over the concern about,
Speaker:can I do this?
Speaker:I know you said,
Speaker:well, I don't know everything about Etsy,
Speaker:but I know some things and I've started seeing success.
Speaker:I'm going to see they're reaching out.
Speaker:Did you just one day decide,
Speaker:okay, I'm going to do it and you submit it and
Speaker:you didn't think again,
Speaker:or did it take you awhile?
Speaker:Not Iowa has a lot more to share and we'll get
Speaker:to that right after a short break to hear from our
Speaker:sponsor. Yes.
Speaker:It's possible increase your sales without adding a single customer.
Speaker:How you ask by offering personalization with your products,
Speaker:wrap a cake box with a ribbon saying happy 30th birthday,
Speaker:Annie, or at a special message and date to wedding or
Speaker:party favors for an extra meaningful touch.
Speaker:Where else can you get customization with a creatively spelled name
Speaker:or find packaging?
Speaker:That includes a saying whose meaning is known to a select
Speaker:to not only our customers willing to pay for these special
Speaker:touches. They'll tell their friends and word will spread about your
Speaker:company and products.
Speaker:You can create personalized ribbons and labels in seconds,
Speaker:make just one or thousands without waiting weeks or having to
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Speaker:more go to the ribbon print company.com.
Speaker:Well, I'm impulsive.
Speaker:So I figured what's the worst going to happen if they
Speaker:sent me the email out,
Speaker:just cause it was just like an email from their newsletter
Speaker:and they're looking for sellers.
Speaker:And I said,
Speaker:okay, well,
Speaker:Hey, I checked the box,
Speaker:I'm a seller.
Speaker:They sent me the email.
Speaker:I'm just going to reply.
Speaker:I'm going to apply to become a coach and see what
Speaker:happens. And they said,
Speaker:okay. Yes.
Speaker:And then it was like the nervousness kicked into again at
Speaker:that point.
Speaker:Cause it's like the thing that you asked For,
Speaker:but now you've already committed.
Speaker:Yeah. I've committed.
Speaker:And I said,
Speaker:I'm going to do these webinars.
Speaker:And I'm like,
Speaker:oh, how do I set up like,
Speaker:oh, you know,
Speaker:slideshow webinar.
Speaker:But it was fine.
Speaker:The thing is like,
Speaker:I think we also talk ourselves out of doing things because
Speaker:it seems challenging.
Speaker:It seems too complicated,
Speaker:but when we're actually doing it,
Speaker:we realize it's actually not that complicated.
Speaker:Right. And I love the fact that you committed.
Speaker:Do you follow Mel Robbins?
Speaker:Do you know who that is?
Speaker:I have heard of her.
Speaker:Yeah. So she has this concept.
Speaker:It's 5,
Speaker:4, 3,
Speaker:2, 1.
Speaker:And virtually what it's saying is you have five seconds to
Speaker:talk yourself out of any decision.
Speaker:So for you with the,
Speaker:at T teaching like 5,
Speaker:4, 3,
Speaker:2, 1,
Speaker:just press that button.
Speaker:Don't even think about it again.
Speaker:The next thought's going to be,
Speaker:if you get accepted and then how do you make it
Speaker:happen? But if you give yourself too much time to rethink,
Speaker:you're going to rethink yourself out of anything.
Speaker:That's what our conversation right now is reminded me of is
Speaker:her 5,
Speaker:4, 3,
Speaker:2, 1.
Speaker:And then just a final question then I want to get
Speaker:off Etsy.
Speaker:Cause you have so much to tell us,
Speaker:were you able to then reference your store?
Speaker:So P you were getting additional visibility by being an instructor
Speaker:to, Yeah.
Speaker:And that's the thing it's like,
Speaker:they mentioned that in the email,
Speaker:but I think I was just so excited at the point
Speaker:that I was applying,
Speaker:but I did benefit from getting additional exposure to my shop
Speaker:being featured,
Speaker:I think in their newsletters for courses that were being offered.
Speaker:And I got to meet other Etsy,
Speaker:you teachers who,
Speaker:I still have a relationship with some of those people.
Speaker:So it was a good opportunity in all of those areas.
Speaker:Yeah. And the credibility positioning you as an expert too,
Speaker:because you're an expert at Etsy that also follows through with
Speaker:all the other things you do for your business.
Speaker:So you're an expert at your product also.
Speaker:It encompasses everything.
Speaker:Yeah. Okay.
Speaker:So tell us more.
Speaker:Let's keep going with what's going on with you.
Speaker:So now Etsy's up and running and how did you get
Speaker:the word out?
Speaker:How do you spread,
Speaker:continue from there?
Speaker:So as he was up and running,
Speaker:and then I don't remember where I got the idea from
Speaker:that or where I heard from that,
Speaker:I should start a blog to kind of support what I
Speaker:was doing on Etsy.
Speaker:I started my blog.
Speaker:And once again,
Speaker:it was like from ground zero,
Speaker:not knowing anything,
Speaker:making a ton of mistakes.
Speaker:And you think like at one point I would learn,
Speaker:like, not what you've already done,
Speaker:these mistakes.
Speaker:Like, why do you keep going back and making the same
Speaker:mistakes, but starting without knowing anything and then going back and
Speaker:getting help for that.
Speaker:So the same happened with my blog,
Speaker:where in the beginning there was no traction.
Speaker:There was no traffic.
Speaker:And I was just thinking,
Speaker:this is going to be great.
Speaker:It's going to send me so much traffic to my shop
Speaker:and crickets again,
Speaker:but I didn't stop from there.
Speaker:I went and sought help again,
Speaker:learned about how to get traffic to my blog and how
Speaker:I can use that in connection with my shop and promote
Speaker:myself. So it's like,
Speaker:it's a continuous learning process For sure.
Speaker:And so I'm thinking what you learned is SEO and directing
Speaker:people over to the shop,
Speaker:things like that.
Speaker:Yes. Definitely learning about SEO,
Speaker:learning how to use social media,
Speaker:like things like Pinterest to get traffic to my blog and
Speaker:my shop,
Speaker:Facebook learning how to use video.
Speaker:So all of these things,
Speaker:it's like little by little,
Speaker:these little nuggets were coming and adding on to like,
Speaker:whatever you established in the beginning to help grow everything.
Speaker:I think what I'm continued to hear from you.
Speaker:And I get the fact that you say that I should
Speaker:have learned,
Speaker:but that's just your nature,
Speaker:right? I mean,
Speaker:I see it.
Speaker:You do,
Speaker:or you have an idea,
Speaker:you decide to do something and you get started,
Speaker:right. And then if you see that it's not working,
Speaker:then you go back and figure it out.
Speaker:But at least you've started something versus thinking about it and
Speaker:thinking about it and thinking about it.
Speaker:And I guess that's what I really want to underline right
Speaker:here is you might not know everything,
Speaker:but taking that action to get started is so important.
Speaker:So with the blog where you then putting it on your
Speaker:own website,
Speaker:or where was that content residing?
Speaker:So, yeah,
Speaker:the blog is like completely separate it's on WordPress.
Speaker:Once again,
Speaker:that was something I started out on a different platform and
Speaker:eventually migrated over to WordPress.
Speaker:And WordPress is like 41.
Speaker:Doesn't know about that.
Speaker:And probably going to mess up like how to explain it,
Speaker:but just,
Speaker:it's like,
Speaker:it's an independent place that you can have your blog.
Speaker:It's not sitting on like Etsy or something else like that.
Speaker:Cause that's,
Speaker:he does give people the opportunity to have a blog with
Speaker:them, but I didn't want to go that route.
Speaker:Is it a wordpress.org
Speaker:site? Not wordpress.com.
Speaker:I always get them mixed up.
Speaker:It's the one that's independent.
Speaker:And the one that like you have to pay for hosting,
Speaker:I always get them mixed up like wishes,
Speaker:which, Okay,
Speaker:so that's dot org,
Speaker:which is important.
Speaker:So WordPress is a platform where you can build your whole
Speaker:website. If you'd like,
Speaker:I'm just talking for people who are thinking of starting a
Speaker:blog. If you go wordpress.com,
Speaker:you can't do anything else with it.
Speaker:Like you can't add shopping carts or actually build out a
Speaker:full functional website.
Speaker:So if you're considering a WordPress account,
Speaker:make sure it's wordpress.org,
Speaker:but just not.com
Speaker:for sure.
Speaker:Big warning saying,
Speaker:unless you just want to write and put things out there
Speaker:and that's it.
Speaker:But if you want to build it further,
Speaker:which those of the listeners,
Speaker:people who are in business.
Speaker:Right? So yeah.
Speaker:wordpress.org. Wonderful.
Speaker:So now you have your Etsy site and you have your
Speaker:WordPress site where you're putting the blog,
Speaker:how you deciding what your articles were going to be,
Speaker:what you want to write about.
Speaker:That's where SEO comes into play.
Speaker:Not only SEO,
Speaker:SEO, and also what my customers want to hear and how
Speaker:I can help them.
Speaker:So sometimes they would come from customer questions,
Speaker:like questions that I got from people about how to use
Speaker:an SVG,
Speaker:what kind of machine they can use it on.
Speaker:Just things like that.
Speaker:And it's also questions that I would see in different Facebook
Speaker:groups that I was a part of where people would have
Speaker:a question or an idea or something that they were maybe
Speaker:stuck on.
Speaker:Some of those turned into like my biggest blog posts.
Speaker:Yeah. And I've taken a look at that and you have
Speaker:a very well built out library of blog articles.
Speaker:So how often are you adding to your blog right now?
Speaker:I will say now recently,
Speaker:since I've just started going full time with everything.
Speaker:Because up until now,
Speaker:up until like the end of last year,
Speaker:I was still working part-time in the office for someone else
Speaker:and then working on my business.
Speaker:And so I was putting in maybe about two to three
Speaker:blog posts per week.
Speaker:Wow. And now I look back and I'm like,
Speaker:how did I do that?
Speaker:Because even now,
Speaker:when I think I have so much time,
Speaker:I'm like,
Speaker:I can get out just to,
Speaker:That seems like enough for me though,
Speaker:with all the other things that you're doing.
Speaker:Because not only do you want to write the article,
Speaker:just like a website when you were talking about putting your
Speaker:product on at sea,
Speaker:and then you have to tell people,
Speaker:if you write a blog article,
Speaker:you also have to tell people you have to market the
Speaker:article too.
Speaker:Right. So it's not just writing it and putting it up
Speaker:because again,
Speaker:people aren't going to read it unless they know it's there.
Speaker:I want to tell you,
Speaker:so I do get help with the writing part of it
Speaker:because I knew I wanted to leave my job.
Speaker:And I knew I needed to get more traffic and get
Speaker:more sales and to do that,
Speaker:I said,
Speaker:okay, I have to like get help from the outside.
Speaker:So I do use a content writer to help me write
Speaker:the blog posts.
Speaker:So that person does that.
Speaker:And she actually write the majority of the posts.
Speaker:But even then,
Speaker:there's still a lot to do.
Speaker:There's still a lot like putting in the pictures,
Speaker:putting in video,
Speaker:formatting, everything,
Speaker:adding affiliate links,
Speaker:choosing the titles.
Speaker:It's still a lot of work even with a content writer.
Speaker:Yeah. And the whole strategy of what are the articles going
Speaker:to be about and all of that.
Speaker:No, you definitely need help.
Speaker:And there's nothing wrong with that.
Speaker:This is part of the overall strategy and you're still providing
Speaker:value to your audience and it's still coming from YouTube.
Speaker:Cause I know you read them before you let them go.
Speaker:I mean,
Speaker:you have to see them.
Speaker:So yeah.
Speaker:That's all good.
Speaker:Okay. So let's talk about the entrance of Pinterest in particular.
Speaker:I have to tell you not about our audience is so
Speaker:interested right now in Pinterest.
Speaker:You know,
Speaker:it used to be everything,
Speaker:Facebook, Instagram,
Speaker:all of that.
Speaker:And I'm not knocking it.
Speaker:You know,
Speaker:there's a lot going on over there for sure.
Speaker:But Pinterest is becoming more and more of something that people
Speaker:are like stopping in their tracks and paying attention to now.
Speaker:And it sounds to me like you've been looking at Pinterest
Speaker:this whole way.
Speaker:Oh yeah.
Speaker:I love Pinterest.
Speaker:Like if I can put like a big red heart,
Speaker:everywhere interests.
Speaker:And even though it's recently gone into a lot of changes
Speaker:because of other social media apps that have come along,
Speaker:like tick talk and now everyone,
Speaker:it like,
Speaker:oh, you've got to do a video.
Speaker:I still support Pinterest.
Speaker:And it still supports me.
Speaker:It's the biggest traffic driver to my blog and to my
Speaker:Etsy shop as far as social is concerned.
Speaker:Interesting. And so share with me a little bit about how
Speaker:you're using the platform and what you're doing with it.
Speaker:In the beginning,
Speaker:I would pin straight from my Etsy shop.
Speaker:I don't know.
Speaker:A lot of people may not know that they have this
Speaker:feature in Etsy,
Speaker:like in your back end of your shop,
Speaker:you can choose like social and then you can pin things
Speaker:from your shop straight out to Pinterest.
Speaker:And that was working well for me.
Speaker:But then once I started using my blog,
Speaker:I wanted to like add more to that and I would
Speaker:make pins.
Speaker:So basically like the same with it,
Speaker:you have a post on Instagram or something like that,
Speaker:but I would make the pins using an outside resource like
Speaker:Canva and then post that onto my Pinterest boards.
Speaker:And I realized that they were getting a lot of views.
Speaker:People were saving them.
Speaker:People were clicking on them.
Speaker:And coming back to my blog,
Speaker:reading my articles,
Speaker:getting my tips and I was just getting a lot of
Speaker:traffic from there.
Speaker:So I just kept going with that.
Speaker:So I would make what they call static pins would have
Speaker:charges like non-moving images.
Speaker:And then I started doing videos and the videos,
Speaker:like they weren't complicated at the beginning of this,
Speaker:just like slideshows that I would just download as MP3s.
Speaker:And before I felt I might be getting a little too
Speaker:technical or maybe not.
Speaker:No that's okay.
Speaker:Okay. Yeah.
Speaker:I would just download them as little MP4 and pin that
Speaker:onto Pinterest as well.
Speaker:And that just kept getting more traffic,
Speaker:but recently they have shifted over to what they call idea
Speaker:pins. It's sort of like what Instagram is doing with reels
Speaker:and what tick-tock has.
Speaker:And I think even Facebook is doing reels now.
Speaker:So there's still pins,
Speaker:but they don't link out to let's say your shop or
Speaker:your website.
Speaker:They kind of keep people on the platform,
Speaker:which people aren't used to Pinterest doing that because Pinterest before
Speaker:in the past,
Speaker:it was more of like a search engine,
Speaker:then social media,
Speaker:like people go there because they're looking for something.
Speaker:So they have things on their homepage that they've already searched
Speaker:for before.
Speaker:Or they just type into the search bar.
Speaker:Let's say that they're planning a wedding or they want to
Speaker:shop for like decorating their house.
Speaker:And they want my candles or like reeds.
Speaker:And they would type that in and it would get all
Speaker:of these pins.
Speaker:And then before people were able to click on that pin
Speaker:and go straight to your shop or straight to your website
Speaker:or straight to your blog.
Speaker:And now with the idea pins,
Speaker:you can't necessarily do that well at this time that probably
Speaker:could change in the future,
Speaker:but it does have other benefits to it.
Speaker:You can link affiliate links to them.
Speaker:You get like followers with them,
Speaker:which actually lead people to come back to your main Pinterest
Speaker:page gets you more visibility that way.
Speaker:And from what I've been hearing,
Speaker:this hasn't happened to me personally,
Speaker:although it's the idea pins are still working great for me.
Speaker:Like I'm using them and I'm benefiting from the affiliate link
Speaker:side of it.
Speaker:But people that I've heard about are getting sponsors.
Speaker:Like they're getting sponsorships by working on Pinterest.
Speaker:They put their idea pins up and maybe like there's some
Speaker:brand that sees it and they think,
Speaker:okay, I want to work with you with my,
Speaker:I keep going back to candles candles on my mind,
Speaker:but maybe they make handles.
Speaker:That works for me.
Speaker:They make candles and you have a blog,
Speaker:like maybe you're like a mom blog or something and they
Speaker:want to sponsor you.
Speaker:So it's like,
Speaker:you don't only have to be on other programs like Instagram
Speaker:or tick talk to get sponsors.
Speaker:You can do that on Pinterest as well.
Speaker:And they've also got this live option,
Speaker:which I'm hoping to get into.
Speaker:So for right now they're picking people who they want to
Speaker:choose to.
Speaker:Basically you get a slot to come on to Pinterest and
Speaker:demonstrate live something that you do.
Speaker:So for me,
Speaker:it would be digital drawing maybe for someone else who has
Speaker:a cooking blog,
Speaker:it would be coming on.
Speaker:They're making a recipe like maybe your favorite chocolate cake.
Speaker:So they are picking certain content creators right now to do
Speaker:those live videos.
Speaker:That is like my Pinterest love.
Speaker:Okay. Well,
Speaker:I think you should watch your emails because when they start
Speaker:asking for people,
Speaker:you just have to click the button right.
Speaker:Immediately, and then you're there.
Speaker:So quick question,
Speaker:I'm not understanding what an idea pin consists of that.
Speaker:So I w best explained it by,
Speaker:it would be like a real,
Speaker:because from what I've seen on Instagram,
Speaker:like, I don't use Instagram that much anymore.
Speaker:I just use it like as a consumer and not so
Speaker:much as a creator,
Speaker:but they are like continuously scrolling.
Speaker:Is that right on Instagram?
Speaker:So you look at one of them and they're usually video
Speaker:because like everyone's pushing video and you'll look at it and
Speaker:they'll be the same thing on Pinterest.
Speaker:So it'll look like an image or a video,
Speaker:most likely video of someone demonstrating an idea of like how
Speaker:to make something or how to do something.
Speaker:Or maybe like a shortcut for something for a tip.
Speaker:And it'll have maybe three or four or several different panels.
Speaker:So like you can click to see the different pages scrolling
Speaker:by. And then as soon as it's finished,
Speaker:you can save it.
Speaker:You can click into it to see that creator.
Speaker:Otherwise, if you don't do anything,
Speaker:the next idea pin will just scroll up on your phone.
Speaker:It'll just keep going.
Speaker:So the same way tick-tock does the same way Instagram does.
Speaker:Okay. But then there's no text content there.
Speaker:You can have text content.
Speaker:So the same way that you do on the other platforms,
Speaker:you can make your video and put text in the video.
Speaker:You can be talking in the video.
Speaker:There's sound that can be added to it,
Speaker:But no clickable text,
Speaker:then We are,
Speaker:there are no clickable links.
Speaker:Okay. That's it.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:Oh, you know what,
Speaker:before I say that,
Speaker:but I did mention that you can add clickable links that
Speaker:are affiliate links,
Speaker:but you can not add links that are clickable to your
Speaker:own website or your shop at the moment.
Speaker:Okay. But obviously people can track back to your board and
Speaker:your Pinterest account.
Speaker:Yes, exactly.
Speaker:Okay. How do they know that it's an affiliate link versus
Speaker:your own link?
Speaker:It won't pick it up when you're making the pin.
Speaker:At least for me,
Speaker:it may be different in other accounts,
Speaker:but, and from what I've heard from other creators,
Speaker:when you go and enter in the link,
Speaker:it won't accept it.
Speaker:It won't stick to it if it's not.
Speaker:Okay. Interesting.
Speaker:The very interesting,
Speaker:I'm actually going to have somebody on a several weeks from
Speaker:now to talk more about Pinterest.
Speaker:So that'll be interesting.
Speaker:And as always like these things change,
Speaker:like these platforms keep changing.
Speaker:So you're talking about what your experience is good in the
Speaker:moment. And obviously Pinterest is a platform overall is working so
Speaker:well for you.
Speaker:So I love hearing more.
Speaker:I keep marking little cliques in the Pinterest column because so
Speaker:many people talk about Facebook and Instagram all the time.
Speaker:Right? Yeah.
Speaker:People love Facebook and Instagram.
Speaker:I mean,
Speaker:I still use Facebook a lot.
Speaker:I do like live video on their Instagram.
Speaker:Not so much just because for me,
Speaker:I'll tell you that the reason why I really use Pinterest
Speaker:is because it's long lasting.
Speaker:I can pin something on there and I keep getting traffic
Speaker:from pins that I made three years ago.
Speaker:And that doesn't happen for me on Instagram.
Speaker:Yeah, No,
Speaker:I totally agree.
Speaker:I just started using Pinterest maybe just about a year ago
Speaker:now. And the platform is just so much different.
Speaker:It feels actually much better to me to,
Speaker:I don't know,
Speaker:cause I'm not going after and pursuing follower counts.
Speaker:I'm looking at,
Speaker:who's looking at my pins and all of that.
Speaker:You know,
Speaker:we've had some,
Speaker:there have really taken off too,
Speaker:which is good direction.
Speaker:So for everyone who's listening,
Speaker:if you have not looked at Pinterest,
Speaker:go back and look at some of the podcast episodes I've
Speaker:already done on Pinterest.
Speaker:Listen to what nada was saying right now.
Speaker:And definitely at least consider it for your business for sure.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:So what do you see happening next for you?
Speaker:Like where are you going?
Speaker:What are you doing?
Speaker:What's your plan now that you're full time.
Speaker:Now that I'm full-time there sounds so weird,
Speaker:but I'm loving it.
Speaker:I'm focusing a lot on my blog because that's where I'm
Speaker:getting a lot of success that see,
Speaker:of course it's not going anywhere.
Speaker:I still have my designs and my drawings over there.
Speaker:And then I also have a course that I am also
Speaker:focusing on because I have people that once they read these
Speaker:articles on my blog,
Speaker:for instance,
Speaker:they're asking questions and it's like,
Speaker:I can't answer all the questions in the comment box.
Speaker:This is too much.
Speaker:So I want to promote my course to people,
Speaker:get them to get the help that they need with that.
Speaker:And eventually maybe also create their own shops and maybe start
Speaker:a side hustle of their own or start a full-time business
Speaker:of their own.
Speaker:And maybe possibly grow that into like a larger community of
Speaker:women as moms that were just like me in my place.
Speaker:I think of where I was a couple of years ago,
Speaker:if I can help as many of those women in that
Speaker:position that know that they want to do something with their
Speaker:creativity, but they just don't know how so I'm focused on
Speaker:trying to reach more women like that.
Speaker:I love that learning from someone who has already done it
Speaker:is the absolute way to go.
Speaker:And not everyone has your skill about just not being exactly
Speaker:sure how you're going to it,
Speaker:but knowing that you want to do it and going forward,
Speaker:not everyone will do that.
Speaker:So having you as a resource who can help them,
Speaker:I think is going to be really,
Speaker:really valuable to a lot of women,
Speaker:love that you're doing it.
Speaker:I look forward to hearing what happens more with that,
Speaker:the courses already available as you're expanding it,
Speaker:they'll just be more to come is what I'm hearing.
Speaker:Wonderful. Well,
Speaker:where can people go online and see all this?
Speaker:They can find me at paper flow designs,
Speaker:which is P a P E R F L O designs
Speaker:with an S on the end.com.
Speaker:And of course you'll find me also on Pinterest and Facebook,
Speaker:all under a paper flow designs.
Speaker:Wonderful. And I suggest to everybody go take a look at
Speaker:her Pinterest account so you can kind of merge what you're
Speaker:seeing then with what we've been talking about here.
Speaker:So that is fabulous.
Speaker:So not,
Speaker:oh, thank you so much.
Speaker:I appreciate you coming on the show,
Speaker:sharing all of this,
Speaker:your story is so interesting.
Speaker:And I just love what an action taker you are.
Speaker:So hopefully we have like pushed out that vibe to others
Speaker:who are thinking about they're wanting to do something and it's
Speaker:time for them to take action.
Speaker:Just do it.
Speaker:Definitely Wonderful.
Speaker:Any final comments for our listeners here?
Speaker:I would say just like Susan said,
Speaker:let's just do it.
Speaker:And what I mentioned with my quote before,
Speaker:it always seems impossible until it's done.
Speaker:Like, keep that in mind that it seems impossible.
Speaker:Like that mountain seems high,
Speaker:but once you just start from the bottom and take those
Speaker:little steps,
Speaker:you'll look back and you'll be looking at the bottom of
Speaker:the mountain and thinking I have done it.
Speaker:Wonderful, fabulous way to end the show.
Speaker:Thank you so much again for being here with us today.
Speaker:Thank you so much.
Speaker:It always seems impossible until it's done so true right now
Speaker:to his story is one of encountering and overcoming business development
Speaker:challenges, something for all of us to recognize.
Speaker:It's not just you who faces obstacles and it doesn't mean
Speaker:you should stop.
Speaker:It only means you need to find the way past it
Speaker:just like natto does over and over again.
Speaker:Up next Saturday,
Speaker:I have a really special show coming your way in honor
Speaker:of international women's month.
Speaker:I know you're going to love it.
Speaker:Thank you so much for spending time with me today.
Speaker:If you'd like to show support for the podcast,
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Speaker:Something new you've learned or suggest a topic you'd like to
Speaker:discover more about.
Speaker:Just add it as a review on whichever app you use
Speaker:to listen to the show.
Speaker:I read everyone personally and absolutely use suggestions as guidance for
Speaker:new guests and topics.
Speaker:I know on some apps,
Speaker:it can be really confusing to figure out how to leave
Speaker:a review.
Speaker:So here's a link that might help you out gift biz,
Speaker:unwrapped.com forward slash review.
Speaker:Thanks in advance.
Speaker:There are other ways to show support for the podcast too.
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Speaker:and even more.
Speaker:They all feature logos,
Speaker:images or quotes to inspire you throughout your day makes a
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Speaker:this podcast and now be safe and well.
Speaker:And I'll see you again.
Speaker:Next time for the gift biz unwrapped.
Speaker:I asked,
Speaker:I want to make sure you're familiar with my free Facebook
Speaker:group called gift is breeze.
Speaker:It's a place where we all gather and our community to
Speaker:support each other.
Speaker:Got a really fun post in there.
Speaker:That's my favorite of the week.
Speaker:I have to say where I invite all of you to
Speaker:share what you're doing to show pictures of your product,
Speaker:to show what you're working on for the week to get
Speaker:reaction from other people and just for fun,
Speaker:because we all get to see the wonderful products that everybody
Speaker:in the community is making my favorite posts every single week,
Speaker:without doubt.
Speaker:Wait, what aren't you part of the group already,
Speaker:if not make sure to jump over to Facebook and search
Speaker:for the group gift biz breeze don't delay.
