Author: katherinebrianneparilli
Quarter 4 is Here: What Will it Bring
It is officially the beginning of quarter 4. It would be great if that meant that an instant switch would flip and sales would dramatically improve. Unfortunately that is not the case. If there will be a real pick up, it probably will not happen for a few more weeks. Hopefully, even though the sales are not to expect to reach full swing until November, this month will prove to be better than last months single sale.
Thankfully today I did make a sale, but it was only for $3. So only getting 1 sale would be a real kick in the budget under normal circumstances. But since this is my first real shot at making some meaningful q4 or quarter 4 sales, I have been putting every ounce of spare energy that I have into stream lining production so I can make and list as many items as possible. I figured if I could just cut down the time to create the listing pictures by 1/3, that would at least mean an extra 1-2 products a week, and on a really good week an extra 3-4.
If I can get an extra 5-10 sales over this time last year, the effort would stand a chance of paying for itself and maybe a few other items. But with each listing costing $0.20 each, I really need those extra sales to cover the cost. Twenty cents might not be much to some, but twenty cents here and another there can quickly add up to a couple of extra bucks. And when you have almost nothing, it does not take long to become a really big deal.
Besides worry about not being able to make enough sales to at least break even and maybe purchase a couple of small items to improve my shop for next year, I would also feel really discourages as I have put a whole lot of energy into this project. And I have been working extra hard to get as much done as I can before my health crashes. Even now the muscles of my head are getting so tight that I cannot relax them. I would love to be in bed, but my the extra work has brought back my queasy stomach so it is harder to get a good night sleep.
But all of it would be worth it if my shop would start to make that turn towards profitability. It does not have to make a big bump, even though I would love it if it did, but at least if it could make a big enough turn that where there was zero sales I made 3-4, where I made 1 I now got 4-6, and instead of 8 being my best month it was now 16-20 that would be some type of measurable improvement. One that would at least allow me to cover all my etsy fees including ads, and probably even 1 or 2 other expenses.
Yes I would like more, but even that small boost in sales would give some meaning to what I was doing, and some hope that after a much needed break, my next effort will take me closer to my first major goal of earning enough to cover all of my business expenses. And give me some hope that some day soon I might actually be able to earn enough to pay my bills and some occasional wants. And at least be able to hold up my head knowing that after years of struggling, I had finally reaped the reward of some time of measurable success.
If you are thinking about starting your own Etsy journey, click this link to get 40 free etsy listings. https://etsy.me/3MhfyfA
Click here, if you would like to check out my Etsy shop. Where you will find a variety of fun items such as this fall inspired puzzle of Turkey’s demanding Thanksgiving be switched to Happy Sudoku day.
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Setting up Sales Tax or Figuring out the Right Price: Which was Harder on Etsy
I have spent the past few weeks trying to prepare for quarter 4. Last year, because I only had digital items like coloring packs and logic puzzles, which except for being travel friendly, are not that big a draw. Therefore, there was nothing major for me to do.
But this year I have added some POD or print on demand items like mugs, puzzles, and T-shirts. Because of their potential for being given as gifts, getting things right this year is going to be much harder. This year little details like price, photos, and keywords will require much more effort than it did last year.
After watching multiple videos on Etsy and the POD items I am working on this season, it was time to set down with a pricing calculator to try and set a price that was high enough to give me a few dollars of profit yet low enough to be attractive to buyers.
It would seem like after watching multiple videos and aided by the handy Etsy profit calculator on Erank figuring out a fair price should be easy. But for me anyways, it was anything but easy as within minutes my head was swimming with a bunch of unanswered questions. Was it better to go as low as I can and have no sales, or was it better to go higher so I could have a 50% or higher sale during Black Friday/cyber-Monday week? Free shipping, reduced shipping, or regular shipping which was better? Should i experiment with multiple price points or have everything set to the same price?
Talk about analysis paralysis, my head was so overcome with choices that within a few minutes my head was spinning and pounding so hard that I had take long breaks to rest and try and figure out what to do. The stress was so bad it made me wonder, which was worse, trying to navigate the new world of sales tax or setting up prices?
Because Etsy is a market place and thus is required to collect sales tax on our behalf, it would seem like it should be an easy answer. Etsy collects the taxes for us and Etsy turns it in for us, so what is the problem? The problem is that even though we only sell digital and POD items and only sell on market place platforms like Etsy and Amazon Market Place so we do not have the hassle to collect sales tax in many states we still have for a license to collect sales tax and turn in a $0 sales tax.
Talk about making your head spin. I had no clue where to begin. I spent an entire hour on hold, being switched from one department to another, just trying to figure out what form I needed to fill out and where it was. Thankfully the people at the state tax form were nice and helpful. They went out of their way to find the answer to my questions and even offered some helpful info to get me started on the right foot.
Thanks to their help I was able to set up an account and muddle my way through filling out the paper work. But it only took a few days, when I went back to try and figure out where and how to turn in my zero-dollar sales tax form, to realize that I had quite a few more questions. For a few hours it would have been hard to answer which of the two issues was harder to understand.
That was until I found a helpful video on You Tube about setting up for collecting sales tax and turning in a zero-sales tax form. I found there step by step tutorial quite helpful. Before watching their video I had no idea what form I was supposed to fill out. Thanks to their video, I found out that one I had found the correct place to sign in, and I was even using the right info to try and sign in. The problem was that I did not know that I had to remove the hyphens if I wanted the sign in info to work. Thanks to one video, the frustration of multiple unsuccessful log in attempts was solved and in 1/3 the time it normally takes me to figure out keywords for an easy listing, I was in and filling out the paperwork.
If you live in Florida or have nexus in Florida, you might find this series on Florida Department of Revenue by James Baker CPA to be helpful.
While I still have a lot more to learn about how sales tax and filing forms work, thanks to this helpful video, right now I can confidently say, that thanks to Etsy being a market place platform, filling out the required sales tax form is so much easier than trying to figure out how to price a t-shirt or a mug.
Click here, if you would like to check out my Etsy shop.
And if you are thinking about starting your own Etsy journey, click this link to get 40 free etsy listings. https://etsy.me/3MhfyfA
Preparing for Quarter 4
The past few days I have been dedicating every ounce of spare energy that I had to preparing for my first real shot at the potential excitement of quarter 4. While my shop was opened last year, I only had about 40 digital coloring and activity packs in my shop. It was not until the end of December before I added my first POD product which was way too late to have a real shot at getting a slice of the quarter 4 sales.
Under normal circumstances, quarter 4 brings in the biggest number of sales. From what some people have said in their Etsy videos about this time of the year, they make as much and sometimes more in this quarter than they do all year long.
But as we know this is not a normal year. Finances are tight, and rising food and gas prices have taken a huge chunk out of people’s budget. So how big and exciting this quarter four will be is uncertain. And considering my past history with poor timing, such as starting a You Tube channel just before ad apocalypse and its financial impact on small channels, I do not hold much hope of seeing a dramatic rise in sales.
Continue reading “Preparing for Quarter 4”
Sabbath Afternoon Fun:Bible Scramble Psalms 2:1 level 2Sabbath Afternoon Fun:
Happy Sabbath. I hope that you enjoy this Bible quiz.
Sabbath Afternoon Fun: Bible Word Search Psalms 2:1
Happy Sabbath. I hope that you are enjoying this wonderful day of communing with God and reflection upon His many blessings such as the joy of watching a family of black birds crossing the street at a rest stop,
or enjoying a fun Bible quiz.
Enduring the Hidden Drop of the Etsy Roller Coaster
I have been trying all morning to create a post about the struggle of trying to build an Etsy shop while dealing with poor health and a slumping economy. There is so much I could say now that I have passed the 1st year mark with my shop about the importance of listening to old adage of if it is not broke don’t fix it, the importance of listening your body and knowing when to give your body the rest it needs, accepting that not everyone will be an overnight success, and more.
But today my brain is just to tired to focus. As much as I would love to write an article saying that if you just think positive there is delay or disaster that will stress you. But that is not true.
Like it or not there are days that you will wake up and say to yourself, what am I doing? Why am I even trying when nothing I do work? And you will be tempted to give up. And strangely enough, some of those days might come the day after you make a sale.
Sure there are going to be many great days when your mind will be full of hopes and dreams. Dreams that are bolstered by the remission of your symptoms and encouraged by a few sales. Like a well designed roller-coaster, there will be a period of steady climb with only a few mild dips that are perfect for lulling you into a false sense of confidence before a blind turn reveals a stomach shattering dip.
With a new high of 8 sales, July was one of those months. Finally after months of getting only with 1 sale and only 3 months where I got 2 or 3 sales, my slow but steady work was starting to paying off. With a few sales now behind me, and more than a hundred and fifty listings, my business was on the cusp of taking off as each new listing, sale, and the occasional review only adding to the growing momentum. With each sale I was calculating the conversion ratio to estimate what my sales would look like if I got x amount of visits and how may visits it would take to pass the next mile marker of 10 sales per month.
After such an exciting month I was eager to see the progress that August would bring. Now that I had close to 160 listings, 30 sales, and 2 reviews, surely I was set to see my biggest month ever with 9, 10, or even 11 plus sales. And from the amount of traffic, which was 4 times the amount of my normal traffic, it seemed like that hope was going to become a reality. Day by day I eagerly looked at my inbox hoping to receive a message from Etsy letting me know that this massive (at least for me), influx of traffic had converted into sales. Morning after morning I woke up filled with hope, eager to see how much money I had made overnight, only to be met with disappointment.
Continue reading “Enduring the Hidden Drop of the Etsy Roller Coaster”
reflectionsaboutlifedotcom 