Pictures, Pictures, Pictures

The number one thing to tell yourself when you are creating imagery for your site, whether it's an etsy shop or your website is PICTURES, PICTURES, PICTURES. There's many reasons why an online shop has an advantage over a brick and mortar, but one of the major disadvantages is the inability for your future customers to touch, feel, hold, pet, taste, smell your products. The only thing they have to go on is your photos. Taking etsy as an example - have you ever seen items on etsy and thought to yourself "that is hideous and I would never buy or wear that", but it's still getting a lot of publicity and it's made it to the front page (FP)? Well... I guarantee it's because the shop owner has great pictures. No matter what the item, somebody out there will like it and the web cannot deny fantastic pictures.

When I first opened my shop I thought it was imperative to make sure that people could see what they were physically buying as well as what it looked like in its finished form. So I created a split view image. I quickly learned that I couldn't use that image as my first image that people saw. It was a no no, because it wasn't eye catching. It wasn't a wow and there was no way those pictures would make the front page.

Once I realized that the first page didn't have to show the entire item or the utilitarian features of it, I focused on creating wow moments. What made people say "that's gorgeous" or "that picture is great and the lighting and colors really work"? I was more likely to get included in treasuries and noticed by the etsy staff and that's exactly what happened. I have been featured in 2 etsy articles, 1 local newpaper article, countless treasuries and blogs and I have been on the front page several times.

Bear in mind these ideas do not apply just to Etsy. They apply to any website or online marketing initiative that is trying to sell a tangible product whether it's wearable, decorative, art, food etc. You could be selling the most delicious chocolate fudge ever made on Earth, but online shoppers can't taste and smell it, so if it doesn't look appealing they won't buy it!

How does your fudge look?

Are your pictures "front page" worthy?

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Stay tuned - One of my next entries will be about staging...



Do you need help with your shop or web marketing initiatives? Contact me.