Arts and Crafts and Things

[kriadydragon]

My mom is of the very arts and crafts and creative persuasion and I'm talking her into selling some of her stuff over the Internet. Not so much as a means of income, but because she likes creating all these cool things, so why not sell some of these cool things to make a bit of money to make more cool things?

It's just a thought right now, but if it's something she does pursue, how would one go about doing it? I don't mean setting up a webpage, I mean placing orders and payment and all that? For those of you with online businesses, how do you go about it and what advice do you have?

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And while I'm at it...

I would really like to have some sort of a promotion, a give-away or contest, to promote my book. My mom and I got the idea of making some of the creatures in my book into little figurines. My mom is also into this interesting drawing style, and we thought we might also do portraits of the creatures or book marks. So the question is, what should I do as a means of promotion using these items? A free book mark with purchase of the book and a figurine for whoever buys... lets say (just throwing out numbers, here) the tenth book or twentieth or whatever? Or maybe have some kind of a contest of some sort?

One thing I would like to do is have this be a joint effort with anyone who has a book (or comic, or art) they'd like to promote, in part because I would love others to brainstorm with, but also because I've heard of other authors doing joint promotions and it sounded like fun. So if anyone would like to take part, let me know, but I'm more than happy to just take any suggestions anyone has to offer and how I should go about this.

Comments

[karri-kln1671.livejournal.com]

Etsy

[imbecamiel.livejournal.com]

If she is interested in it more as a way of making a bit of money from a hobby than in building a business, I would really recommend going with someplace like Etsy or Ebay. Those places can have rather complex rules, and will take a cut of your money. (The main reason I haven't gone with Etsy for selling jewelry is that their rules about listings being exclusive to their site, not being allowed to post them on your own website as well, are frustrating for anyone looking to build a more formal business website.) However, for someone who wants to do it casually, the fact that those sites help so much with the promotion is a really big deal. Unless you absolutely love social media networking, promoting an independent website for a business is a huge pain. Independent sites require some form of checkout system as well, which very often means paying for a site that will support that. (It's possible to get free/inexpensive options - but again, requires more work and know-how.)

As for your book-related giveaway... Sounds like a fun idea! And it can certainly work. I recently purchased a hardcover version of an interesting-looking self-published book (rather than the much cheaper Kindle version, which I would have otherwise gone with when sampling an unknown author) simply because the author said that she'd include a sketch of one of the main characters for anyone who purchased within X time. In fact, it was her example sketch that drew my attention to her book on to begin with - I saw it on DA, and liked it.

As far as the mechanics of such a promotion, I would recommend either going with "any purchases within this timeframe" (up to a certain number, if you're concerned about more purchases than you're willing to give out prizes to), or else some form of contest, or all purchasers within X timeframe being entered into a drawing. I think that those give people a greater feeling that they've got a chance of winning (even if the proportional numbers of winners:purchasers are the same) than the chances of being an arbitrary number in line to purchase the book.

[kriadydragon.livejournal.com]

Thank you for the input :D

I like the idea of a raffle of some sort since it would be a much easier way of handling things.

I'd really like to get my book up onto Kindle and may have to pay to have someone do it for me, because the do-it-yourself formatting makes no flippin's sense. Even my brother, who's a computer guru, couldn't figure out what they were talking about.

[sholio]

I think that sounds like a great promotion! :) I like the idea of randomizing it somewhat, so it's truly random and everyone has an equal shot at getting a prize. The free bookmarks are also a good idea; I make bookmarks as giveaways when I do conventions, and they're pretty easy to do with just an inkjet printer and an Xacto knife and ruler to cut them apart. They're not very expensive for materials unless you're doing hundreds and hundreds of them.

As far as selling stuff, back when I had a store on my website, I used Paypal. It gives you the code for putting buttons on your site, calculates the total automatically, and adds shipping if you want it to. However, you DO need some html knowledge to set it up, and I think the other people who've suggested Etsy are probably right; it's almost certainly easier to set up and offers you more promotion opportunities than doing it on your own. (I have never used Etsy myself, but I know lots of people do, and the site has great search features, so people can find your stuff even without specifically looking for your store if they're searching for similar items -- I often go on Etsy when I'm looking for a handmade gift item!)

I would totally be interested in participating in some kind of joint promotion, too! :)

ETA: Something you might want to look into, if you feel comfortable doing this, is having a table at local craft shows to sell both your book and your mom's stuff. I have been occasionally doing this to sell my book(s) and my art. Most towns have some arts festivals and things like that. The bigger/better known craft fairs in town might be kind of expensive for a table, but if you keep your eyes open you might find some little ones around wherever you live that are cheap or free -- like with churches or community clubs (our community Lions club has a small craft fair around the holidays, for example) or other groups that have fundraisers. Anyway, it's a thought! Since I've done a few of these, I could give you some tips if you decide that you want to. :)

[kriadydragon.livejournal.com]

Thanks :D I'll have to look into Etsy and see what it's like. My mom isn't a big fan of computers (they tend to make her angry) so the less hassle involved the better.

I would really love to do bookmarks, especially since we have the means and the accessories to make some really cool ones. I'm kind of thinking of maybe doing some kind of raffle with various prizes (from different kinds of bookmarks to the figurines) since that would probably be the easiest way to go. Now I just need to figure out how to go about doing something like that.

I'm not sure if my mom would want to do a craft show, even a small one, only because she had done something like that before and... she didn't particularly enjoy it (neither did she sell much). But as a means of promotion more than actually making sales it might be okay. I'll have to talk to her about it.