Drop In Sales

[Galaxy_For_Desi]

I have a problem, I used to sell in an acceptable manner, but since March, I have only sold ten sales
I don't know why this sudden drop in sales
Is this a general depression, or do I have a problem?
What do I do to increase my sales again?
Even Pinterest has been going down since March as well
Please advice, I trust your opinion

[Mariholly]

The same thing is happening here too. Suddenly the visits and sales of my stores have fallen to 2021 numbers, especially my store dedicated to weddings. Last year I sold a lot of graduation cards, this year just a handful. I think a possible algorithm change, coupled with cover photos and digital download products (I don't have many of these) are affecting my sales. The new designs do not receive visits. I have a lot of EP designs that were selling daily, now they are down as well... Fortunately there are some affiliates who are very welcoming to my designs and keep saving them in their collections to be promoted and keep me afloat. The networks are not working now either. Pretty depressed with all this.

[SapphireDesigns]

I'm experiencing the very same issue... my revenue was steadily increasing on a yearly basis (with the exception of 2020... because... well... 2020 lol)  last year was my best year and I also had my best months during the graduation season.  This year - I'm at less than HALF of last years revenue AND I've increased my products significantly.  I agree that is has to do with the cover photos taking front stage - and the addition of the digital downloads.  Now, to add to it - 7 days ago Zazzles back-end went down (again) and the last viewed date hasn't updated - strangely enough - my sales have almost come to a full stop since then... I usually average around 8-15 sales per day this time of year - since the store management tool stopped updating... I'm lucky if I get TWO.  I don't think it's a coincidence or problem with our designs.  It's all very strange.

[CrazyMermaid]

It sounds like your graduation inventory has not stood the test of time. Did your products fall in the MP? Did new products take their place or did existing products move up? Did you add cover photos? Did you enable digital downloads? You seem to know where there are potential problems. Did you add new graduation inventory, with cover photos? That is a very competitive niche these days. So it might take a while for new inventory to place in the MP 

I think the Memorial Day weekend had more impact on sales than the backend update issue. The backend wouldn't affect existing MP products. You should design at least 3 months ahead to insulate yourself from any MP indexing issues. 

[Mariholly]

OMG! It seems that I am reading my own story... I have had half the sales in May than in 2022, I am really frustrated now.... Maybe I expected a last minute miracle with the graduations... But nothing, there was no miracle and June has not started in the best way either. I make my covers, update my descriptions and labels with AI, especially on old products. Regarding digital downloads, it's not that easy for me, many of my products have fonts or images that are not licensed to be sold digitally. Let's not forget that until a few months ago the modern fonts that could be used here were very limited and that the download option was not an option either, so when creating something with foreign content you only had to think about the license for POD .... I think I'm back at the exit sign...

[JeanFitzgerald]

I've been on Zazzle since 2009 with over 3K pet designs (concentrating on 100 dog breeds) uploaded with excellent key words, etc. (I have been selling on Cafe Press since 2004 where in the second year I made $39K just in Nov and Dec.  I was totally blown away and Cafe Press is still selling a very good number of products without any new uploads in years and without promotion.

On Zazzle, where I started making great sales in 2010 - starting this month of April 2024, instead of approaching a good number of sales that paid for my fine art supplies,  I've made less than $2 this month through the 23rd.

I've called and talked to two customer service people.  In both cases (over a period of days), they could not help me.  In the first case, a report was filed and Zazzle got back to me by e-mail basically saying "here's a link" to help you 'cause we're just too busy to answer these kinds of concerns.

  Now I'm retired living on social security and Zazzle will not even look into any tech issue there might be.  I sympathize with others who have had decreased sales and I know we are all disappointed that Zazzle cannot respond to people having worked so hard and now experiencing dramatically decreased sales.  This is not the case with Cafe Press as far as number of sales.  I am so grateful for their ability to generate sales for me, as I said previously, without any promotion or adding new products in years.  I have dozens of designs for each breed, and in checking 11 pages of Cavalier King Charles designs, not one of my 31 designs showed up where as before, several would show up on the first page.  I have 58 Golden Retriever designs and in 11 pages (I didn't check the pages after that), nothing of mine showed up.    In my mind, there's no way there isn't some kind of gliche or they changed the algorithm.  So wrong to ignore shop keepers who have spent so much time helping Zazzle make money.

[CrazyMermaid]

Every single Youtube POD guru has recommended that designers niche down into dog breeds. One even uses dog breeds as her test store for her YouTube Channel. You might be experiencing a lot of competition on and off Zazzle in that category.