Should you start an Etsy shop?
Opening an online store is exciting but can also cause some anxiety if you aren’t sure if it’s the right thing for you. I’ll go through reasons why you should and shouldn’t open an Etsy shop and hopefully by the end of this post, you’ll have a better direction of what to do and if you should start an Etsy shop.
Reasons you SHOULD
- It’s an inexpensive way to get going as an online entrepreneur and earn some cash. Setting up an Etsy shop is easy and quick. See our post “What do you need to start an Etsy shop?” And “How much is it to start an Etsy shop?” for more information about setting up an Etsy shop and its costs.
- Pretty much anyone can start an Etsy shop. As long as you are a real person, have an address and a bank account, you can sell on Etsy.
- Etsy brings in a LOT of customers. Like millions. They spend money on google ads and drive lots of traffic to their website. If you’re making money, they’re making money!
- Etsy’s platform is SUPER easy to manage. They have the best platform I’ve used (and I sell on Ebay, Shopify, and Amazon!).
- Etsy has awesome customers! In my experiences with other online shops, Etsy’s customers are the best and easiest to deal with.
- You make money!
Reasons you SHOULDN’T
- Lots of messages – Etsy makes it super easy for customers to contact sellers. Because of this, messages can pour in frequently. If you don’t have the time to get to these, customers will loose trust and not buy.
- You aren’t self disciplined or have enough time. You own your own shop and business which means you are the boss of yourself. Be sure to ship out products when you say you will, answer messages in a timely manner. If you aren’t self disciplined to take care of the customer, you won’t get good feedback and therefor, have lower sales.
- You don’t have a product to sell. But even if you don’t have product to sell, I’m sure there is SOMETHING you can learn to make to sell. I started on Etsy selling nail decals. Back then, I had almost no clue how to make a decal just a few weeks before I set up my shop. I learned quick and paid off my vinyl cutter within a few weeks of opening my shop.
- You want to sell something against their policies. These include items such as: Alcohol, Tobacco, Drugs, Animal Products and Human Remains, Dangerous Items: Hazardous Materials, Recalled Items, and Weapons, Hate Items, Illegal Items, , Pornography and Mature Content, Violent Items, and services (such as distance healing, spellcasting, etc), Also, counterfeit items, copyrighted items, etc are prohibited.
And that wraps up the reasons why you should and shouldn’t open an Etsy shop. Basically, if you can be self motivated, want an easy way to start a business to make some money then go for it!
