Not very Good

[SStalter]

I have been on Zazzle for one and a half years. I have 3300 products listed. I average 1 view a day. 1 view out of 3300 products. Not 1 view for each product, just 1 view period. That's not very good is it? I have promoted on social media and those bring a view here and there. I must have either terrible designs or terrible key words. Maybe its because I dont do invitations?

[Baylee]

Hi. I just had a quick look at your store and wanted to tell you that you have some awesome designs .... so it's not that! Don't give up because they are definitely sale-worthy. 

I'll let someone else give you keyword advice but to me it looks like yours are not terrible, just could maybe be tweaked a bit.

So it all comes down to promotion, and there again maybe someone else can chime in here and give you better advice than I can...I actually suck at promotion..lol. 

[Barbara]

I looked at a number of your designs and think they're very good. With customer eyes on them, they should sell. You might consider branching out into the less expensive products such as postcards, particularly those that are more likely to sell in bulk. Various types of reunions might be an area to try. Posters can be good too if you target a specific audience. You have a number of ballerina designs that might work well. Keychains are another possibility.

Your keywords aren't bad at all, but you might consider beefing them up. I'm not all that good at keywords myself even though I know they have to pull in people searching for specific things. There are those here on Zazzle who can hopefully help you out on this.

One thing to remember is that Zazzle is slow right now--it always is in the summer--and the economic situation isn't helping much. Whatever you do, don't give up!

[DM]

When I started my POD journey in 2005, the very broad school of thought was that once you had 1,000 good-quality designs with good descriptions, you would start to see consistent sales. Now, 17 years later, it takes significantly more than 1,000 good-quality designs and descriptions. You have 3,300 products, so you're off to a good start. This is not a get-rich-quick business. It's not necessarily a get-rich business. It is a business, and it takes time and effort to see results.

Your designs are fine. My advice to you is to try to find your designs the same way a customer would. Go to your favorite search engine and search. Search here. When I type in your exact product title, I don't always find your products. I would suggest changing the way you format your titles as a test, and see if you can find them. What you deem a logical title may not be what the customer even thinks of at all.

[SStalter]

Thanks everyone.........I'll work on your suggestions!💻🙂

[ColsCreations]

You don't have terrible designs or terrible keywords. I think an issue you're facing is that many of your design themes fall under rather popular search terms so there's a lot of competition. [pink roses] for example, narrowed down to just the Decorative & Throw Pillow category, brings 10,397 results. [nautical anchor] gives 3,743. [cute mermaid] brings up 1,180. (And here I feel compelled to note that the first page of results for this one is littered with designs that have nothing to do with a cute mermaid design, including the top 5.)

You could beef up your tags but the problem remains that no matter how unique YOUR design is, if it falls into a popular main theme like pink roses or mermaids for example, you're dealing with a really saturated market so unless the customer knows exactly what they want and adds more keywords that you happened to use to their search, like say [cute blue mermaid with pink hair], it's going to be really hard to get found amid all the results.

It sounds counter-intuitive, but branching out into less popular design themes can be helpful as it narrows down the pool of competition in search results making it easier to be found by the people looking for that "niche" design type.

Also, try to make sure every product is in a Collection of at least 7 products (or maybe it's 5, I don't remember) so that customers see a "other products in this collection" scroll on the product page giving all your products more exposure.

[KeegansCreation]

I agree that it's the ubiquity of the design themes that is the problem. And I agree that adding more specificity is the solution. 

1) As advised by Col's Creation, branch out to less saturated niches. There are 10,398 pink rose throw pillows (up from 10,397 yesterday).  But there are only 566 pink tulip throw pillows. Branching out to something adjacent to what you're doing but less saturated is a good strategy. 

2)As advised by Cat, more name, monogram and photo template designs. I did see a lot of name designs (but they didn't all have name as a tag and they should) but rare photo designs and no monogram designs. 

3)My add on advice, another way to branch out and get found in more searches is to repurpose some designs for holidays and occasions. There are a lot of your winter designs that could get repurposed to Christmas. There are a lot of your floral designs that could get repurposed to Easter, Mother's Day and feminine birthdays.  They could also be made specific to grandmothers or stepmothers or brides, flower girls or bridesmaids. The more specificity in your design, the narrower the search customers do and the better your odds for coming up in the search results.

When I was where you are now- lots of designs but not lots of views or sales- I gave myself a challenge. I challenged myself to come up with a design for every single person on the Recipients list that Zazzle has. I made new designs or repurposed existing ones for them all. Many went nowhere but some were hits that surprised me.  I took my rather generic (but well done, I think) cap and mortarboard graduation design and made it specific to a nephew. There are 7,827 graduation cards (any of which could be given to a nephew) but only 1,879 specific to a nephew so my card started showing up in searches for graduation cards for nephews and now it makes steady sales every May and June. My point is, repurposing designs for increased specificity makes the search results smaller and your odds of being found higher. I used the Recipients list as a way to find design specifics I might have otherwise not thought of.

[Cat]

Well, your work is absolutely beautiful, but I think the issue may be that the types of products you're creating look very similar to the types of products people can buy anywhere. So unless someone just happens to need EXACTLY what you've offered in terms of style or color, they're probably not going to be willing to pay $65 for a pretty throw pillow, or $20 for a coffee mug when they can get something very similar for a fraction of the price elsewhere.

I guess my advice is to try to offer things that people can't find elsewhere, like stuff they can personalize with monograms, names, or photo templates, or items designed for a very specific occasion, or things that fall into a niche market. You can't compete with the big box stores, so you need to offer the sorts of things that customers can't find at places like that.

[KeegansCreation]

To piggyback on this, when making a product that has a template text or photo, it is essential to have name or monogram or photo as a tag (whichever fits). I did a random sample of OP's products with template names and only about half of them had name (or add name) as a tag.

[PotaninaTania]

I think you have very good tags

[mylittleeden]

Agree lovely designs it isn't that! It is important to promote, and find niches, which as time has gone on gets harder and harder each year. I have been working almost every day on here for over 10 long years now. It is frustrating when even now I still struggle to get sales. But often you see poor designs do better than good ones because those operating those stores are much better at doing the marketing. If there is anything I have learnt from Zazzle is that your best artwork often doesn't give you the best return... it is those quick 10 minute graphic ideas, that still are my savior. I paint more for myself than for profit that is for sure sadly creating unique art takes time and time is money but I will never give up my soul and my art for cash so having a mix of good sellers and good ideas along with slow return items is always the way to go at least for me... I love what I create and that for me has to be first even if it doesn't sell well. It is a bonus when someone likes something enough to purchase though and love each and everyone who does 😍. Zazzle is a learning curve and no doubt will always be, tagging and finding the gaps in the marketplace are certainly the best way to get sales. But keep designing and most importantly keep happy and don't be discouraged Rome as they say wasn't built in a day! 💖

[Westerngirl2]

I agree with everything everyone has already said. Your designs are very appealing. I know it can be discouraging, when you have all this pretty stuff, and no one seems to be looking.

It just takes time. I started here in 2010, and just in the last few years feel that I'm finally getting traction. Not getting rich, by any means, but it's gotten to an income level that, with other sources, I'm realizing that I'm dependent on it. That, in itself, is plenty scary!!

Part of the equation is attracting third party promoters. A huge percentage of my sales are through third party. I wish I could tell you how that came about, but I really don't know. Eventually, I guess, my store(s) just got noticed, probably through nothing I did, because I too, am a lousy promoter. Many of us do not excel at that. The best luck I've had in promoting is through Pinterest, and frankly, they've made that more difficult to be noticed, too, in the last 2 years.

Having said that I'm a lousy promoter (!) I did promote several of your products. And I'll come back and do more, from time to time. I really believe that it's just a matter of time for you, as you seem to have everything in place to be successful. Now....the patience!

Wishing you lots of success in the future!

[SStalter]

Thank you all for taking the time to comment:

@Westerngirl2-thank you so much for the promotion of my products and practical comments about patience...I find my patience is growing shorter rather than longer...lol

@mylittleden-thank you. I've grown to dislike the word niches, even though I understand how important it is. I think perhaps I design in a too general way, as do probably many other people.

@Cat-thank you very much...yes, perhaps my style of design is too generic for Zazzle. I did think I was offering things that people can't find anywhere else, because most of my designs are designed by me and are unique. I often think that Zazzle is not where I should be putting my designs.

@ColCreations-thank you...as usual your comments are "right on" and are astute observations. They are appreciated.

I'm pretty sure my style of design is not going to be successful on Zazzle but perhaps somewhere else. I don't think another POD site is the answer either. I've tried others in the past. Same problem for me. I don't really want to design for niches I am not interested in just for the sake of searching for other niches.
Fortunately I am of an age that I don't need the money but I do enjoy the designing part. I like to design things and that is the challenge, fun and satisfaction for me.

I just think it is sad (for me) that with 3300 designs offered, I get only 1 view a day. pathetic! lol

[Cat]

I'm sorry, I didn't at all mean to imply that your art was "generic." I just meant that the products you've chosen, and the subject matter (florals, mermaids, patterns, etc.) are all part of very saturated markets.

I wanted to make some examples for you of products I would create with your amazing art, but you've turned off customization on pretty much everything I could find, so I couldn't. I think that's the number one thing I would change if I were you. Zazzle's whole shtick is customization, so right there you've lost a huge chunk of the customers. 

I'm not even remotely as talented as you are in the art department, but I make dozens of sales every day, and mostly it's because I go whichever direction the customers lead me. And mostly they've led me down the path of highly customizable products where the art serves as a backdrop for something they need to buy anyway.

I hope that helps, and once again, I'm really sorry if my previous comment made you feel in any way bad about your art, because it's amazingly beautiful.

[SStalter]

@KeegansCreation--thank you..your comments and suggestions are appreciated. The devil is in the details, right? lol

[SStalter]

@Cat--no worries--no offense taken,😊

[Connie]

How do you see how many views you have gotten for your whole store?

Please don't get discouraged and close up your shop- I've found some things I want to promote, when I get a chance. Like others have said, you have beautiful designs, they just aren't getting found. Check out Elke and Jen Clarke's free blog and podcast and YouTube channel- they share a lot of great tips for being successful on Zazzle. And if you can afford it (or even if you can't, LOL!) their paid PDA Coaching Program is SUPERB for learning how to get found on Zazzle, and how to take your store to the next level. I earned more in my first year of taking their courses, than I had in my whole Zazzle lifetime before!

[Krysanthe]

I  agree with all that has been said here, but here's a little something I didn't see anyone mention.  When you sell something...do more of THAT.  Each sale you make is free market research because you KNOW it's something someone wants to buy.  There are lots of ways you can "do more of THAT."  In the example of your Pink Kitty pillow here's a few ideas:

• You can make a blue, gray or purple kitty pillow
• You can create a seamless pattern with multiple of the pink kitty and put it on items where it fits...I mean if someone wants ONE kitty on a pillow they might love 20 kitties on one pillow. 
• You can put the pink kitty design on more items
• You can design birthday invitations with the pink kitty graphic
• You can make other cute pink animal pillows like a panda or fox with the same design athesitic. 

Now, I'm not saying if you did all those things they would all sell, but you have a higher chance of selling them rather than something new and completely random because you KNOW someone in the market liked something about that design.   

[Cat]

YES!!!!  ↑↑↑↑↑

[CreativeLeahG]

The problem is not your products, because without views no one has seen them. So how do you get them seen?

Have you pinned, shared to FB, tweeted every single one of those products? 

I have over 60,000 and I guarantee every single one near enough has been shared. 

Sharing takes your 'product' out of 'your dream store land' into the real world. This part is hard to explain so I just kinda hope it makes sense! Once you share your product it becomes a 'thing'. So begin sharing your products, each and every one, with relevant hashtags and so forth on relevant sites.

BUT as others have said if your products ( I can't see them, they seem to have been  hidden) are fairly generic, without templates and compete with a massive audience your view rate might be low but it will at least be 1 view for every product. If you have 40 of the same design but on various products that will hinder your overall views. Why? I don't know it just does. QC used in this way is not good for views. And again all those QCs need to be shared as individual products not as collections.

Good luck!

[idraw]

Hi Leah, I went to her shop earlier and I found that she does have images in her media section, but nowhere else. So you can see some  nice images there. And she still has a message link. Her original post was early June, so I am not sure she will respond to our posts.

. 

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[idraw]

@SStalter
Using your profile link, I tried to view your shop, products (says whoops 404),and collections, nothing….
Is this a glitch, or did you hide everything, (is it a Texas thing, lol)? I just realized this is an old post I am replying to…but anyhow…

So I went to your media sidebar which is the only thing available, and looked at your images. Very nice watercolor look, also the design pattern around the animals, well done. Keep going in those two directions.
The zazzle stats may be off, are you also using google analytics, probably more accurate input. Don’t depend on stats for your decisions. Look at your sales, likes, etc. Go in that direction when creating new products.

[idraw]

@SStalter 
if you are reading theses posts, I may have accidentally figured out why your store, collections etc are not showing, hence, you said ,very low views. Unless you want them hidden, that is.
Go to settings>advanced. settings>customize store, then in the left column click add ,to the right of  stores, and also collections. That should move them to the right column (makes them visible to the public) once you have done that, be sure to click submit/save at the bottom of the page. Then you will see a message on the page saying success. Refresh the page just to make sure. Then reload your home page (click on view public link top right, under. your banner) You should then see your shop and your collections in public view.