What Do You Wish You Had Known Your First Holiday Season on Zazzle?

[dotellabelle]

The holiday season is always exciting, and a little overwhelming, for Zazzle designers. For newer creators, it can feel like there’s so much to learn at once: design trends, upload strategies, marketing, pricing, and just keeping up with demand.

For those of you who’ve been through a few Q4s already:
What’s something you wish you had known during your very first holiday season?

It could be anything, a workflow trick, a reminder about deadlines, how to handle promotions, or even just words of encouragement. I think this could be a great thread to share wisdom with newer designers and maybe even remind ourselves of how far we’ve all come.

For me, I wish I had taken more time to focus on creating solid, quality designs instead of chasing quantity. In the long run, the “more is more” approach just created extra work. Now I put my energy into strategically planning themes for my collections, and it’s made such a difference.

Victoria | Do Tell A Belle

[Bailamor]

Good question! I would have liked to know and still would, because last year I had very few Christmas-specific designs. That’s why I’m still wondering what kind of Christmas-specific products people shop for on Zazzle. I did actually notice a general increase in sales because some non-Christmas-specific items were bought as gifts. I also noticed that during the Christmas season, more ornaments are sold (makes sense).

[dotellabelle]

Ornaments are definitely a big one! I’ve noticed the same. It’s funny how some non-holiday designs get picked up as gifts too. That’s actually a good reminder for newer designers — you don’t have to have thousands of Christmas-specific items. Sometimes simply updating your keywords and descriptions to align with holiday gift searches can help your existing designs show up in front of seasonal shoppers.

Victoria | Do Tell A Belle

[Bailamor]

Definitely. To me, it seemed like items related to hobbies of kids, or friends were suddenly being bought, even though they hadn’t been sold or even noticed throughout the whole year.

[CLC]

Hi...this is my third year on Zazzle, the first year I designed several Christmas Cards and did not sell any, then I noticed there were over 800,000 Christmas Cards, so very difficult to get products noticed, over 700,000 items for ornaments, same result. The next year I designed event specific theme cards and ornaments which narrowed down the search results and generated sales. What I have done best with for Christmas are personalized gifts which are not holiday theme.

[dotellabelle]

Yes, @CLC  exactly! I think that’s what makes Zazzle special compared to other platforms. The depth of personalization and the ability to niche down into specific themes is where customers really connect—and where designers can shine.

Victoria | Do Tell A Belle

[DancingPelican]

I like to look at what sold last year for me during Q4 and make more variations of those items that sold. I learned that having a good mix of holiday-themed AND evergreen (things that sell all year) is best, with heavier emphasis on the evergreen. Birthdays and anniversaries happen every day of the year, including Q4. Also, think of good gift ideas that appeal to your target customer or your niche - photo gifts and monogram gifts or gifts personalized in some way tend to do well on Zazzle. Another thing to consider for Q4 are colors. What colors are popular at that time of year? Make more of those.

[dotellabelle]

That’s such great advice @DancingPelican . Especially the balance between evergreen and holiday designs. It’s easy to get caught up in the Christmas rush and forget that people are still celebrating birthdays, weddings, and anniversaries in December too. 

Victoria | Do Tell A Belle