Zazzle Traffic - 3351.8% lower than their leading Competitor - how might traffic be increased?

[CreativeLeahG]

Note sure how accurate these results are!

But according the site linked:

Zazzle stats

https://www.similarweb.com/website/zazzle.com/#overview

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Leading Competitor

https://www.similarweb.com/website/etsy.com/#overview

Etsy

Total Visits

479.5M

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Etsy's site traffic is approximately 3351.8% greater than Zazzle's site traffic.

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As an affiliate, I've been sending thousands of customers to Zazzle each week, but I've recently started deleting my Zazzle links because of the landing page redirect issue as such the traffic to Zazzle will decline - it is inevitable. Is driving away successful affiliates from Zazzle a wise decision?

If I can send thousands of customers to Zazzle weekly I am more than capable of sending them somewhere else. Which is sad but there appears to be no value with the current situation in me sending them here. 

If Zazzle can suggest a solution to the dilemma I and other affiliates face, that would be helpful, but it appears they almost want to encourage creators like me to leave the platform.

[PenguinPower]

Apples and oranges, if you ask me.. While there may be some perceived overlap, really Etsy and Zazzle do entirely different things. Etsy is the Amazon of handmade and vintage.. 

[CreativeLeahG]

Etsy offers an increasing number of customized goods ( as do Amazon) and a great number of digital offerings. It has changed a LOT in recent times. Competition is at an all-time high.

[Polenth]

Redbubble would be a better comparison, as that's another POD site. Compared to other PODs, the thing Zazzle isn't as good on is clothing choices. Which is a pity, as being able to upload vectors is great for getting clean finishes on the printing and should knock the socks off the competition (who mostly make people convert their vectors to png files). It's just most of the options were removed and we were left with a limited range of mainly t-shirts.

Not everything is about the affiliate scheme. I know this is the most important thing to you right now, but I doubt it has anything much to do with Zazzle's overall traffic and sales.

[Jadendreamer13]

Etsy has a large pool of POD offerings, and since the creators there partner with POD printers (like Print on Demand and others), they can offer products not available on Zazzle. Plus the POD creators there are now offering personalization on their products, videos, and cover photo mock-ups. So, Etsy is more of a competitor than folks might think. Plus, they have several browser-based analytics tools (like Everbee), that creators can use to identify trends, niches, best sellers, and SEO info to make creators’ jobs easier. That’s why I inquired about the Zazzle browser tool, Lynn Analytics last week. It’s either a new tool, or one that hasn’t been popular. I received no replies to that question. A tool like that for use with Zazzle would be a game changer for designers.

[Polenth]

That's not my point. It's like comparing Amazon to a site that only sells books. Amazon will always have more traffic, because they sell a lot of stuff that isn't books. You can't really judge how a book-only site is doing by comparing it to Amazon. You'd need to compare it to other book-only sites.

Etsy does have POD stuff, but it has a whole bunch of traffic for unique handmade and small batch items from independent crafters. Zazzle won't get that traffic because it's not that sort of business. So like I say, a better comparison is Redbubble. You could also get the stats for Society6, Spring, Teepublic and Threadless and see how they all compare.

Ultimately though, the overall traffic might not matter much to an individual artist. Whether you sell or not is more complicated than how many people visit the site as a whole.

[PenguinPower]

There may be some overlap - but as far as traffic goes, I still don't think you can compare the two... Etsy is a lot more than just a place to buy customized goods - it's a marketplace for a huge variety of handmade items - soaps, knitwear, pet products, carpentry, ceramics, jewelry and on and on.. it's also a known marketplace for vintage items - I myself have a couple of lovely vintage dresses acquired there. It should be no surprise at all that Etsy has more traffic than Z.. they have a much, much broader scope.

[zaralla]

I fully agree

[CreativeLeahG]

How much traffic we affiliates bring to Zazzle is a HUGE deal.  I drive several thousand customers to Zazzle each week. It's utterly ridiculous to say this 'doesn't affect traffic or sales' when it IS traffic.

Meanwhile Redbubble is not remotely comparable to Zazzle and yes Etsy has a ton of POD stuff. 

[Polenth]

I'm not saying that affiliates don't bring in traffic. It's that the landing page hasn't stopped the majority of people on Zazzle from linking to products. Which isn't to say that I like the landing page, but I don't see it as the primary issue.

Pretty much everyone I know in self-employed creative work has seen drops in sales this year, so it's not something specific to Zazzle or even to POD sites. It's happening for people with handmade soap and self-published books. It's much harder to persuade people to click a link when they know they don't have spending money. If you do persuade them, they can't buy it anyway.

As long as Zazzle can make it through this period, they might end up winning by standing still. Their nearest POD competitors are going over to subscription fees and limiting who can be seen in the marketplace. I don't count Etsy and Amazon in that, as they're in a different league with their larger focus, but they're pants to work with and I don't want their policies over here.

[CreativeLeahG]

You don't see it as an issue because you weren't getting 5 x 35% referrals a day, I was. That is several hundred £'s a week I am now not getting.

just because you don't see it as a problem doesn't mean it isn't a problem. Every affiliate in the P2 program like me does.

We are bringing the same amount of customers , generating sales but not seeing referrals. That is a problem and I believe redirecting our links amounts to breach of contract. YES it is a problem.

[Connie]

I think was Polenth meant was not that it wasn't a problem for the affiliates that are losing money, but it's not a problem as far as influencing the traffic. Because the customers are still coming to the site, they just aren't buying your products. If you were to delete all your external links, and not drive any traffic to Zazzle, then maybe that would have an influence in that total traffic number.

[CreativeLeahG]

It's a problem (as you note) if Affiliates like me who bring a decent amount of traffic and sales STOP doing that because it has no value for us. Which is what I've been saying this entire time. I fully intend to do exactly that and have been removing my links. Yes, given I send a couple of thousand customers to Zazzle each week, it will dent their income.

The average customer allegedly spends $24, with a  50% ish bounce rate, that's approx $24,000 in sales  a week ($1,248,000 per annum) just from me alone. If all of us affiliates leave the platform, then what?

[mylittleeden]

I am worried if anything we need more promoters right now not less... Not good news for any of us nor you Leah 😪  I know how tireless you have worked for Zazzle over the many years!

I have been upping my own efforts to promote my own products as I have certainly seen massive decline in sales and lower position (and often no longer seen at all) in the marketplace.

That said I also got my first referral bonus in years! So I think something must be happening to us? Interestingly I never went on the affiliate P2 program mainly because I only promote my own artwork and don't have the time nor desire to promote others as this takes away my creative time which is the reason I started on this path in the first place! 

I have and will always appreciate those affiliates, it is support from you and others who believe in my art and designs enough to promote them, that has kept me going all these years.

I do hope 🙏 solutions and a fair resolution can be found. It is proving to be a tough year all round... I hope you can hang in there 💞

[HeatherM]

I think Etsy is a beast of it's own and with sellers all over the world can compete with one another on product and price. Another advantage of Etsy's POD sellers have is they are not selling identical products with a different design on it.

If you take a macro glance at the categories on the Etsy home page, it is easy to see how Etsy can bring in 34.5 times the traffic.

As far as backlinking goes Etsy dominates Pinterest - - - and that is just one platform.

Zazzle is doing fantastic in the self-fulfilling POD marketplace. I learned about Zazzle from some major POD YouTube influencers promoting the Zazzle site. I think that all the buzz about the ease of the POD business model is making POD more competitive then ever.

[Anne]

Thanks for sharing this, @CreativeLeahG .
It looks like CafePress, which I think is a direct competitor, is going up while Zazzle goes down:
https://www.similarweb.com/website/cafepress.com/#overview
I was looking at the Holidays home page on Zazzle and found retro imagery targeted at (in my view) children, or at best women (certainly not men!). This puzzles me, as I don't see much of attractive gifts for children on the site.
Also it is very dynamic (restless), compared to the CafePress homepage: https://www.cafepress.com/
It is clear from their homepage what is being sold. (contrary to the Zazzle homepage).
It's all the individual things that make or break a site. Sorry for the distraction. Driving away affiliates is probably the worst.

[CreativeLeahG]

Wow! It has had a facelift, actually looks how Zazzle used to look! Thank you for sharing this info. I have an old account with them, I might revamp it.

[HeatherM]

Wow! Zazzle has made some huge improvements! I had never looked at CafePress before, nor do I have more than a year experience with Zazzle, but I am blown away with the change. CafePress has a Redbubble kinda vibe.

[CreativeLeahG]

Personally I prefer Cafepress page view, much clearer for customers and creators what it's all about.

[HeatherM]

Have you looked at Zazzle in an incognito window?

[CreativeLeahG]

Yes 

[idraw]

@CreativeLeahG 

You should read this first:

Also anyone having a CP account---
<https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2022/03/ftc-takes-action-against-cafepress-data-...>

[CreativeLeahG]

I'm not a fan of CP, but just looking at options while seeing if Zazzle is going to address the issues here.

[LMGildersleeve]

😮Cafepress has templates now?!?

[HeatherM]

I don't see any templates. Just the typical TeePublic, Redbubble kinda stuff.

[idraw]

@LMGildersleeve   @HeatherM  @CreativeLeahG   @Connie   @Anne 

I just checked, tested by adding text to a baby bib, you can now personalize products on CP.

[LMGildersleeve]

People have added images too.
CafePress has invitations as products. If you search them they are complete s**t designs. I'm sure their design tool is nothing like Zs. But if you were inclined you could certainly find if you could make a decent invitation design and earn some $ over there.

[CreativeLeahG]

I'm doing design bundles with readymade invitation backgrounds so no design skills are required other than adding the text templates, so that could be a bonus for some. I shall be checking out CP changes this week.

[HeatherM]

Good luck with CP! I bet it will be a fun activity for your Zazzle retirement!

[Connie]

There's some overlap between Zazzle and Etsy, but the sites really aren't comparable. Etsy sells in a lot more categories than Zazzle does, so they are more like Amazon than Zazzle. Etsy used to be a handmade marketplace- now they mostly sell drop-shipped cheap overseas stuff and AI generated images. They have less unique, customizable designs now, and are flooded with the dime-a-dozen, mostly AI generated images on the usual mugs and tumblers. The only thing they directly compete with Zazzle is the printable downloads for wedding invitations. And even with that, Zazzle is a lot easier, because customers can add all their information directly into the invitation here. Zazzle's also not a publicly traded company like Etsy, so they can focus more on customers and designers, rather than the dry stats of driving traffic to the bottom of the barrel cheap stuff, losing sight of their original mission statement.

I do agree that the new product landing pages are directing traffic away from that product, and it is unfair for promoters.

[Barbara]

Something to take into consideration if the statistics for traffic are current is that Etsy has been doing some bang-up excellent advertising on YouTube for at least the past month. They're attention-getting, fairly short, and highly professional. Ads rarely to never suck me in, but theirs do, so how are they affecting the general populace?

Colorwash's Home

[zaralla]

5 billion views, isn't it ?

[Lais]

Approximately 0.5 Billion views.

[Jadendreamer13]

I’ve seen several ads for Etsy on TV this holiday season. I haven’t seen any yet for Zazzle. And I’ve never seen any type of ad for Cafe Press on any social media platform or any other type of media.

[Lais]

I don't think it's a good comparison. Zazzle and Etsy's structure is different. On Zazzle, we're just responsible for the designs/artwork, and Z does everything else: production, printing, sending to customer, dealing with customer complaints, etc. Etsy is the other way around. This may allow Etsy to have a lot more customers then Zazzle does. If suddenly Zazzle starts getting 20x more visits than it's usual, it may actually be a problem, they may not be able to deal with a huge amount of new orders, products will go out of stock, orders will get late, and in the end customers will say Zazzle is a bad company. 

[CreativeLeahG]

Leading sellers are reporting losses of 75%, I don't think Zazzle having too many customers is an issue presently.

[Lais]

I agree with you. Last year when I checked Zazzle on similarweb, during this time of the year, if I'm not wrong, Zazzle had about 40M visits. It's really low this year. 

What I'm saying, though, is that Zazzle may not be able to have as many visits as Etsy does. Maybe Z can have up to 100M? I don't know. But certainly not 400M. That's how I see it.

But I agree with you on the problem with the Promoter Program 2. I really hope you guys can get in touch and resolve it. Maybe establish a Promoter Program 3.0? Even though I'm not in the promoter program 2, I have to say I feel disappointed that Zazzle did not give you a response until the moment.

[CreativeLeahG]

The thing is, if Zazzle decided the 35% was costing too much, ie we were too good at referring our own products, then it'd be better to put their hands up and end it or reduce it to something more manageable like 25% or 20% but THIS redirect, which appears to be a breach of contract (no notice given our links were being redirected etc etc) is unacceptable. 

Despite my efforts I am still sending several hundred customers to Zazzle DAILY, but if this situation doesn't change I will literally have to delete all my content and Pin boards because my efforts to reduce traffic in light of this don't appear to be working. But I refuse to keep generating Zazzle many thousands of $'s when this situation persists.

I have already formally requested I come out of the P2 program.

@Heather   Zazzle has now (via the trust pilot complaint) acknowledged receipt of this complaint and knowledge it exists..as such a response is now pending.

[HeatherM]

@CreativeLeahG  If you delete your Pins to prevent Zazzle from making a sale, won't that reduce your Royalty payments too or are you thinking that your are making sales and not receiving your Royalty payments either?

[CreativeLeahG]

If I was making sales, I'd be making the 35% royalty too. The redirected links give me 1 in 66 chance of doing both. So, no .... the blogs, the twitter posts, the facebook groups, facebook pages, websites all need to go so I can begin again either affiliating with the 15% code or simply sending all that traffic elsewhere to a site that appreciates my efforts.