Last week, I talked about Amazon ads, and this week, I wanted to look at ads on Etsy and address the question, “Are Etsy ads worth it?” (Cutting to the chase — yes, they totally can be.)
Advertising on Etsy is even easier than advertising on Amazon. The process is super easy and takes just a couple of minutes to set up.
And while you don’t want to rely solely on Etsy ads to send traffic to your store at first, these ads can help boost your listings throughout the year, which can eventually lead to more sales.
Below, you’ll more about how Etsy ads work, including offsite ads, along with tips for optimizing your ads and setting your ads’ budget.
Let’s take a look…
Here’s how ads on Etsy work
Ads on Etsy work through a bidding system, not a buying system. So there are ad auctions where your listings compete against other sellers’ for paid advertising space in Etsy’s search results. Factors that influence Etsy search results are how likely shoppers are to click on listings and your bid amount.
Etsy evaluates your listings’ quality score to determine how likely shoppers are to click on them. This means you want to pay attention to your listings’ SEO, which includes your listings’ titles, tags, and descriptions.
The better your listing’s SEO is and the higher your bid is, the more likely you are to receive a competitive placement with Etsy’s search results.
To get set up with Etsy ads…
- Go inside your Etsy Shop Manager
- Click Marketing on the left-hand side
- Select Etsy Ads
- Follow the prompts…
That’s it!
Tips for advertising on Etsy
You can find the tips listed below (and more) in the Etsy Seller Handbook:
Promote your listings like this…
Start by promoting all of your active listings. Then, after a month, reassess and promote only those listings that have been performing well along with any new listings you’ve added to your shop. You can also adjust which listings you promote according to the seasons. You can learn more about how to decide which listings to promote here.
(And for tips on how to optimize your listings in terms of their titles and tags, click here.)
Pay attention to this metric first…
Pay attention to your listings’ return on advertising spend (ROAS). Look at the number of dollars in revenue that are generated from every $1 you spend on advertising. You can learn more about your ads’ performance here. Calculate your current ROAS average to make a benchmark by looking at your shop’s total revenue for the last 30 days and dividing that number by your total advertising cost.
But also look at this metric…
The second most important metric to pay attention to is your click-through rate (CTR). If your CTRs are low, you might want to change some things in your listings, such as your primary images, titles, tags, et cetera. Click here to learn more about optimizing your listings. (If your CTRs don’t improve soon, you may want to turn off your ads for those listings.)
Budgeting your Etsy ads
When you set a budget for your ads on Etsy, that figure is the most money you’ll spend on advertising in a day. There may be days when you spend less than what you’ve budgeted for, but you’ll never spend more. Etsy charges you only when a shopper clicks on your ad and goes to your listing or shop. If a customer sees your ad but doesn’t click, you aren’t charged.
Your ads’ cost per click (CPC) is determined based on your listings’ price and the amount of sales Etsy expects from each ad click — in other words, how likely shoppers are to purchase your products after clicking your ads. So, for example, if Etsy thinks shoppers are highly likely to buy an expensive product, the CPC will be higher to make sure the ad shows.
The budget you set depends on what you want to spend and how big your inventory is. But the minimum Etsy ad spend is $.02. And the best way to determine if your ads are worth it is to look at your ROAS, which I talked about previously.
Etsy recommends a daily budget of at least $3-$5. But you should come up with a budget that you can maintain for at least 30 days. And if your budget is limited, you should prioritize investing in ads for your bestselling items or categories. Newer shops may want to hold off on doing ads until their listings are optimized and they’ve gotten some good reviews.
What about Etsy’s offsite ads?
Etsy offsite ads promote your listings on Google and social media platforms. Etsy is in charge of these ads. All sellers are automatically included in the Offsite ads program, but you can opt-out of it if you want.
The way the offsite ads work is Etsy teams up with Google and major social media platforms and sends them data about your store and listings. The platforms hang onto this data and match the most relevant Etsy listings to shoppers’ search queries.
To make it more likely for your listings to show up on Etsy’s offsite ads, you need to optimize your listings as much as possible. In general, to get the biggest bang for your buck with Etsy ads, you need to have great SEO to make the ads worthwhile.
Don’t forget… Just For 72 Hours… TrademarkInspector.com is $47!
This tool will scan your Etsy listings for you and helps make sure you’re not accidentally using any trademarks in your listings.
As you know, people get trademark-hungry and can come after you for the silliest things.The goal of the software is to make sure you’re safe, your store isn’t at risk, and you can keep bringing in sales for a long time.
TrademarkInspector will eventually cost at least $27/month (prevention now is way cheaper than if you have to hire a lawyer later)… but you can get it for $47 for 72 hours only by heading here:
https://rachelrofe.com/72hourstrademarksale
