Christmas ornaments for introverts

I know, the title sounds a bit crazy, but it reflects some of my thoughts of this period. 

In my (rare) spare time I'm dedicating myself to get my shop ready for Christmas and so I've worked on new photos of my handmade ornaments (and also prepared a coupon code to have them with a 15% discount).

My ornaments
They are little and simple ornaments. Totally my style!

Some are made of cornastarch clay (stars and snowflakes) painted by me in white. Some others are made of recycled materials. My favourite are the felt embroidered stars.

They are different but all of them are rustic, nature inspired, traditional and small.

But, the most important thing, they are not too much eye-catching.

And so I said in my mind: "Hey, they are for people like me! These ornaments are for introverts!".

What about Christmas if you are introvert?

I'm not a very "Christmas person". Oh, no, I'm not the Grinch, I'm only and introvert girl! Proud of my introversion.

You can hear introverts saying that:

• They don't like the wastefulness and the confusion of Christmas time
• They don't feel great at crowded parties (even when only close family is involved)
• They don't like to go out and spend entire afternoons looking for the right gift
• They don't like bulky home decoration which steal part of their living space

I know that, probably, introvert people during Christmas time like better to:

• spend a full afternoon at home, on the sofa, watching a good Xmas movie
• cooking alone Xmas dishes for very "private" christmas lunches / dinners
• avoid too much noisy things (like those Santa's puppets mechanically saying "OhOhOh")
• enjoy some time of rest at home, dedicating themselves to hobbies and quiet activities
• buy gifts on-line and not in real shops after hours and hours of wandering in crowded shopping centers
• decorate their nest with gentle and not too much eye-catching ornaments

And it's probably because I'm introvert that I like to make all the little and "kind" Christmas ornaments you can find in my shop.

They don't occupy too much living space. 

They don't make noise or bling-blings of any kinds. 

You can buy them on-line if you want to offer a little gift to someone special (a very selected one, I presume).

They are perfect for a quiet, resting, loner and silent Christmas time in our precious cave, ehm, nest! :)

What do you think?
Does my post sound odd, annoyng, Grinch-style? 
Is there something familiar for you in the introvert Christmas I depicted in this post?
(wait, are you introvert or extrovert? a free test for you) 

Study the topic a bit more with this posts I found recently: 

Gift guide for introverts by Untidygrace
What introverts can give during the holidays by Holley Gerth
Ideas to survive the holidays if you are introvert by IntrovertSpring

Shop makeover: better photography

After defining the target of my shop and adjusting a bit my shop's banner and avatar, I decided to work on the photos.

You know, or you probably can imagine, how good photos are important for on-line shops! But we have to so some considerations about the factors that make a snapshot a good snapshot. 

Good light, no invasive elements, interesting composition, no mess, elements that "speak" about the dimensions of the photographed object ... these are of course things to work on when taking photos of items to sell on-line.

But we have also to consider what we want to communicate through our snapshots to our ideal customers. 

We haven't only to offer a clear image, but also a picture of the experiences or the sensations that are linked to our products and customers are probably looking for. We have to communicate a mood, a feeling, a style.

Let me tell something about my shop. 

My ideal customer is the eco-friendly and nature lover woman I described here.

What is she looking for when surfing etsy pages? What does she like best? 

My answer to these questions is ... something that offers a connection to nature, to outdoor free time, to a rustic and simple lifestyle.

And are my photos ready to communicate this to her? Not 100%.

An important part of my items were (and some still are, because I need other time to work) represented by impersonal snapshots with white plain blackground and nothing interesting. They didn't offer the sensation of being connected with nature my target is looking for.

But other snapshots were very good. I took them outdoor in our country home (after these tests) and have an old cement wall as background and other element like old wood boards or grey stones. 

They work very well! This is the style I need for my shop's photos.

So I took new photos of a lot of items which hadn't this style!

Here you can find a sort of "before&after gallery" that explains in images this change.

Before/after for "embroidered pincushion with red deer"

Before/after for "embroidered Moleskine cahier cover":

Before/after for "pink cat pencil case":

Before/after for "granny square coin purse":

Little flowers, old wood, cement, stones, retrò accessories... this is what works well in offering a clear vision of a "close to nature" lifestyle to my ideal customer!

Do you agree with me?

Shop makeover: thinking about target

I can hear my readers saying: "Where have you gone?".

I know, I'm not blogging too much (for some reasons) in this period, although I have a long list of things I want to share with you.

I'm neglecting my blog, but I'm sitting long hours in front of my pc these days, because I'm working on a very big and important shop makeover (and so, after hours of hard work, I need to leave the pc far from me).

I'm (unlickily) out of work now and I have some free time to think about my little bussiness on Etsy.

Etsy is a hobby for me. I don't want to become rich with my creations, I only want to have fun and have a purpose for all the things I make.

But I can't conceal that the money I have on Paypal thanks to my Etsy shop has been important in the past, expecially to buy airplane tickets to come back to my family and friends in the north.

So now that I have a big amount of free time I decided to use it wisely and to improve some aspects of my shop which needed some help.

The shop makeover requires some steps. I've planned to write about them here on my blog, because I think they can inspire other Etsy sellers in some ways.

The first step is all about target!

If you are new to this subject you can read:

- this Etsy blog post ("How to find your target market")

- this Etsy worksheet ("Who's your ideal costumer?")

- this (italian) post on Etsy Italia Team blog ("Tre consigli per trovare e capire il tuo target")

I've paid attention to my products, their materials, their style, their uses, etc.

They were so heterogeneous!

It seemed like my shop hadn't a precise target.

And it was bad. Very bad!

I've read here and there an important thing: if you want to be for all, you will bo for nobody. It's true.

So I started to think to the thing my items have in common. I found it quickly: they are simple, inspired to nature, eco-friendly (because I mostly use recycled materials and/or organic fabric).

Something a well-defined kind of woman would like. She is in my mind, I know her very well, also because it's very similar to me.

Describing her in details in this blog page is not important, but I'm happy to write that I found my target market!

And after this important step I started to ask to myself "Is my shop ready to welcome this woman?".

The answer was (sadly): "No!".

The banner was too general. My avatar was too "elegant". 

The about page didn't tell about my passion for nature and eco-friendly life. 

My policies weren't promising something unique to my target. 

My items descriptions weren't focused on the eco-friendly process and materials I use to sew them. 

Only a group of my photos were communicating the rustic and nature-inspired style of my products.

A lot of work to do!

I started by changing the shop's title. 

No more the general "Bags and accessories" (thousands of people on Etsy make "bags and accessories"), now it's clear that MadameRenard makes "eco-friendly sewing".

And then I wrote it in a new banner I realized with picmonkey (a free tool online I use to edit all my photos).

This is my new banner:

Simple, with a modern rustic style, with something related to nature (leaves in the bag's bottom on the left), clean.

This is the one I've used before:

Same fonts and same cement wall as background (but darker), but very different for the style and the things it communicates to potentional customers.

I think I did a good work.

What do you think? Opinions are welcome, of course!

I've also changed my avatar. 

The previous one was an image of me well-dressed and well-"arranged" for a wedding.

A beautiful photo, yes, but... where was the real  me? The girl who wears informal clothes and spends her life between art and nature? Where was the girl who sew eco-friendly goodies trying to do her little part in saving the planet?

I needed a new avatar!

I picked up an old photo where I'm in the cloister of Certosa of Pavia, a beautiful place to visit if you are in northern Italy. There is art in it and a beautiful and bright green lawn. 

It's not perfect, but it's better.

It works.

This happened a week ago.

In the meantime I worked on other things:

- about page

- shop policies

- new photos for almost 50% of my items

- new descriptions and new tags

- items to remove because not oriented to my target (what to do with them?)

And I'm still working (now I'm focused on marketing).

I'm going to write other blog posts about the steps I'm making for this shop makeover.

Is this interesting for you? Please, let me know in the comments!