How to do: PAPER FLOWERS

Origami paper flowers with a Callenders' finish

Hello to all!
My name is Phung Nhi I am here to show you how to do a origami flower with a Callenders' finishing. So what is a Callenders' finish? Read on and you will see ^_^

You need a few pieces of square paper, ideal would be 4x4. Follow the simple instructions as seen in the picture.

The picture #8 is a little difficult understand. You need to open up the triangle and fold in. Once both side is folded in the origami should look like picture #9

Upcycling & Packaging

Living frugally doesn't mean cutting budgets until it hurts or living without the cool things in life. It means using what you have to its fullest capacity. 

At our home we compost most of our food wastes, send our cans out to the recycle centers which pay money for aluminum and shred paper to help our compost reduce itself.

I feel upcycling is the most environmentally friendly way to keep our planet clean for the other items that don't lend themselves easily to recycling.  Besides, while recycling is nice, the amount of energy that goes into transporting and changing it from one product to another is fairly high. It is better than using new materials most certainly, but I love to put re-using before recycling whenever possible.

In my Etsy store I sell magnets. I like to package them up nicely, with a piece of chipboard in the small bag to help keep it's shape so the magnets don't puddle at the bottom of the bag, as well as protecting the items.

I am very conscious of quality in all my work. I spend a great deal of time researching my products and materials. So when I ship it out I would like the packaging to also reflect that. I also am mindful of the environment. I try to limit all my waste products.

Buying new chipboard inserts would definitely be one way to go. But when I think of all the chipboard I throw away every week in the form of cereal boxes I feel that there must be something I can do with it.

 

My solution is to cut the cereal box, which has never touched the inside of a trash can, and make them my chipboards.  

I hate the idea of advertising my brand of cereal. After cutting them I very slowly and quite carefully peel off the paper. It sounds easy, but I've found it is an art to get a clean pull. When done correctly it is as smooth and untouched as a new piece of chipboard. It does have some inconsistencies due to part of the cardboard being pulled. This side I use for the back. You can tell it isn't pristine, but I can't imagine anyone would be disgusted by it since most people just throw the packing out.

Back and front of my bumblebee magnets.

In this way I have given my cereal box two uses (cereal holder and packaging).

The Lemon Daisy 

New Blogger!

Hello!

My name is Kathy and my shop is Simply Beaded Treasure!

I have been invited to write some blogs for the Show and Tell Team. So here goes!
Here is a blog post from my own blog Simply Beaded
( http://beedtales.blogspot.com/)

Getting "found" on Etsy!

Wow!
I didn't know it would be so much work promoting my Etsy shop! But I did know that I had to do something to increase traffic and sales!
I opened my shop "Elemental Nature" in 2008. I was working full time as a medical technologist and I did very little other than post items to my shop. I didn't know anything about Etsy Teams,or BNR/BNS, or Treasuries. I really didn't know much about what it takes to be seen on Etsy! I thought you just listed your stuff and people bought it! Silly me!
 Well, in 2010 I stopped working due to health issues. Now I have time to spend on my jewelry and my shop. Earlier this year, I started looking for info on how to increase traffic to my shop and how to get "found" on Etsy search engines! SEO , teams,treasuries! Who knew?!

I started out reading all that I could find. First, I needed to change the name of my shop! No one knew what the name meant and it didn't tie into what my shop sold! So I changed the name to Simply Beaded Treasure.Okay, so now my shop name leads to thinking about jewelry! Great!  So, now what?

Next, I joined a few teams and started posting to discussion threads! WOW! The traffic started to jump! I was getting "faved" like never before! Okay, I know, the people were "faving" me because I was "faving them, but I found out some very interesting information! The more "faves" you have the more you are "seen" by Etsy search engines! My jewelry was coming up higher in the search pages! WOO HOO! Here we go! On the road to sales!!!
Well, not yet...
I signed up with a team that said it did shop critiques! Just what I needed! What was wrong with my shop? Why wasn't I getting sales? The girl who did my critique was wonderful and I learned so much! She told me how to change my titles, descriptions and tags to be seen! 
Here is how it goes:

1. You have 140 characters to use in your title, USE them!

  Example: Old title -Rhyolite Heart Earrings

 New listing: Natural Rustic Green Rhyolite Gemstone Heart Earrings   ~GemstoneEarrings ~Gemstone Heart Earrings~Rhyolite Earrings~Chunky Rustic Earrings 

This new title has "tags" that the search engines will pick up! Also, you don't want to use "artsy" titles that people won't be searching for! Ex: I was using names for my jewelry pieces like, "Woodland's Heart Earrings". Who would search for that? Add your names in the later part of he description!

Look at the Google preview as you are typing your listing. It will show you how your listing will look in a Google search.

2. The first 160 characters of your description are added to your Google search listing too, so make these characters something that will grab a buyers attention! 
For the Rhyolite earrings:
Beautiful natural colors mix together in these chunky,rustic gemstone heart earrings! The main component of these great earrings is the awesome multi-colored  

A short summary of your item that tells the buyer what you are selling and why they want it! Some gets cut off, but the important part is there!

3. Tags! I was using one word tags like "green", rhyolite,earrings etc. NO NO NO! These won't work!
Too general!

Tags for the Rhyolite Earrings:

• gemstone earrings
• heart earrings
• rustic earrings
• chunky earrings
• buyfromwomen
• natural earrings
• green earrings
• Rhyolite earrings
• dangle earrings
• woodland earrings
• gifts for women
• SimplyBeadedTreasure

Two word tags are better when possible. Add your shop name in case someone looks for your shop by name. Add team tags so team members can find your items. Tags like "gifts for women" will bring up your items on that search page. Be as specific as possible!

All of these things have made a huge difference in the traffic to my shop and my placement on search pages. 

The another and one of the most important things I did was start making Treasuries!  Since you can't add your own shop to a Treasury, you may wonder how this works. Well, when you make treasuries, the people you put on your treasury will often (not always) put you on their treasuries! Everyone on a treasury helps to promote the treasury, and in so doing are helping to promote you!  I joined a few Treasury teams that have treasury making games. Lots and lots of promotion!
Most of the teams that I am on also have a thread for posting treasuries. More promotion!

Another form of Treasury is the BNR and BNS. (I won't go into these in this post, but look for a upcoming post for these!) Basically for a BNR (Buy and Replace) you purchase an item from one of the shops on the Treasury and you take their place in the treasury. You stay until you have a sale and someone replaces you! For a BNS (Buy and Stay) You buy into the treasury and you stay for an alotted time until the next round. Both of these are highly promoted and you are seen by many! 
Promotion is the key to getting seen on Etsy! Networking with other sellers is the key to promotion!

I am now a member of 21 teams and I am active on all of them! I have the time for that, but you only need a few to get started! With a little time and effort on your par you can inprove your traffic and sales! I had been getting a sale here and there, but went months without any! I have gotten 4 sales in the past two weeks, and I know that it is due to all my efforts in promoting my shop!
Look for upcoming posts here on BNR and BNS, and I will also be doing one on Social Media. Check back for these!

Here is a list of links to the Etsy teams that I am on. Check them out! Join a few! It really helps!

Treasury Teams

https://www.etsy.com/teams/10548/top-treasury
https://www.etsy.com/teams/14114/treasury
https://www.etsy.com/teams/21266/perpetual-bnr-bns-hub
https://www.etsy.com/teams/21084/buy-from-women

Social Media Teams

https://www.etsy.com/teams/10355/etsians-of-facebook
https://www.etsy.com/teams/8220/facebookers-on-etsy

Promotion Teams

https://www.etsy.com/teams/19190/colorful-items-promotional-team 
https://www.etsy.com/teams/15483/get-noticed
https://www.etsy.com/teams/20663/giving-tree-promotions
https://www.etsy.com/teams/20686/love-and-promotion
https://www.etsy.com/teams/11916/no-sales
https://www.etsy.com/teams/19725/promotion-and-sales
https://www.etsy.com/teams/20787/see-and-be-seen
https://www.etsy.com/teams/7508/self-taught-artists-team
https://www.etsy.com/teams/10412/share-the-love-team
https://www.etsy.com/teams/20904/show-tell-your-etsy-business-team-satet
https://www.etsy.com/teams/11668/the-crazy-advertisers-team

Other teams 

https://www.etsy.com/teams/10860/seller-opportunity-tools
https://www.etsy.com/teams/19755/everything-jewelry
https://www.etsy.com/teams/8572/handmade-jewelry
https://www.etsy.com/teams/21172/necklaces

Try it out and good luck!

Treasuries How To

Treasuries- is a place to be creative and collect one item from sixteen of your favorite shops, as a show and tell member we strongly encourage curating treasuries weekly.

Benefits for curating; 

Helps show other shop owners your on going interest in there shop 

Members featuring your shop and helping you build and increase your views

Do you know how to create a treasury?

Here's Etsy's detailed instructions:
www.etsy.com/help/article/82

Shortened Version;

Pick 16 items (from different shops duplicating shops or adding your own shop is frowned upon by Etsy).

At the very bottom of every  item page, it will say "Add item to treasury" click on that. Give your treasury a title 
(you can use a title that matches a theme) and click 'Save'. You can create more the one treasury at a time this way also by adding different items with a different title, by clicking add new.

When your shop is being featured in a treasury you should always do your best to promote it, by sharing to social media and including a few hash tags to increase views on this treasury so others are seeing how awesome your shop is. Also remember to;

FAVOR - This is when you click on the little heart for the treasury itself. This means that the *treasury* has been favored and will pass through the activity feed of your followers.

COMMENT - This is pretty self-explanatory. This is when you leave a comment regarding the treasury try to use a comment with three words or more. 

CLICK - This is when you "click" on the individual listings within the treasury. It is either a click on the heart to favor the listing or a ctrl+click (holding the control button down at the same time you click on the individual listing to open it in another browser. Did you know that you can add up points in the treasury by clicking up to 30 times? We can click on individual listings in each treasury (either by heart or ctrl+click) up to 30 TIMES!
But...there is a cool-off period for clicks. There is a 4-5 hour period before our clicks will count again.

Views: We can "view" a treasury every 45 minutes for it to count points as a view.

Selling On Etsy

When you were a child what did you say when someone would ask you, "What do you want to be when you grow up?" Did you give a blank stare while envisioning a sharp eyed adult version of you bustling along in a busy city with a nice briefcase swinging along your side? If you didn't then you probably like me and gave a different answer every time that question came.

No one ever says,   "I want to be the owner of a  unique business when I grow up!"

That is me, an owner of a business which sells unique items along side many others. We are  bustling along on a busy internet highway, but our briefcase is more of a combination of craft tables, file cabinets, and social media outlets.

What do you need to do? What do You want to sell? Most importantly, why? Sometimes, starting business is a combination of each of these questions and their subsequent answers. You need to make money, you want to sell your paintings, and because, well let's be serious here- no one else paints what you paint!

For most people starting an online business is an extension of their already operating physical business. Others, just want to create one of a kind pieces that sell and currently have no idea where to begin. Online selling is one awesome way to do so, especially with Etsy~!

Let's get to it, shall we?

Selling on Etsy is a lot of fun!  I want to point that out first! You Will meet awesome people! You will learn how much better you can become, and you will get your share of  "AH ha!" moments~!

You want to first have a look at these enriching resources-

The Sellers Handbook A lot of very useful information can be found here, don't skip out!

Rules of Selling on Etsy---Yes, even an awesome online presence like Etsy has rules.



Once you know the basics, you need to take great- I MEAN GREAT photos of your items. Sadly, I myself struggle with this! Photography is the bane of my existence. Fortunately, I can point you in the right direction!

Very Useful Video

More Photography Tips for Your Etsy Shop


There is a wealth of information on the Etsy blog to cover, and re-cover anything you will ever need  to know in regards to Etsy Selling!

OK, So you have your photos, you have your store open. Now what? Well, this is where many new seller s get stumped. You need to draw attention to your shop! What better way than social media? Facebook, Twitter, StumbleUpon, Instagram, and Pinterest- to name a few! If you haven't already, get on over to each one and get an account set up so you can promote your store like crazy!

Once youhave inmind what you are selling and  understand the rules, then youare making an excellent start~!

Every day, look at your store and critique your items, see if you can take another photo, see if your  keywords and tags could use adjusting, see if you need a more attractive banner, and most of all, relax and keep creating~! 

More Helpful And Amazing Links

Search Engine Optimization for Your Etsy Store

Creating Your Shop Banner

Linking With Social Media

Till next time,

   Crystalyn