What to do while sales are slow.

As a lot of people have noticed, sales are EXTREMELY slow lately, even though May was Etsy's busiest and most profitable month to date. So what can we sellers do while sales are slow?

1. Work on improving your craft. There's always room to make what you do better.

2. Venture into other types of crafts. For example, I've been using the down time to create new and more interesting jewelry, start working with leather, learn basic metalsmithing, and creating ACEOs.

3. Work on getting your shop into tip-top shape. Work on improving your photography, rewriting your descriptions, getting the overall cohesiveness of your shop in order.

4. Work on your promotion. Join a networking site like Facebook or MySpace and promote yourself. Or work on starting up a blog or personal website.

Those are only a few of the ideas I've got floating around my head right now, but the fever is taking hold again...

Don't try this at home, kids.

I am excited! Today I got terribly bored and decided to try my hammering skills. So I dug up some old copper wire and got to work. It took a while to get the hammering technique down, and even longer for polishing. All in all, I think it worked out pretty good.

Here's a sample of what I've been working on:

When I get all the kinks worked out in the hammering and polishing process then I am going to oxidize them with Liver of Sulfur, and see how that goes. I can't wait to see the result.

I also decided to try my hand at making body jewelry as well, and successfully made a pair of CBRs that are just perfect for a tragus or cartilage piercing. They are 18g copper with a diameter of 10mm. The "ball" is a 4mm glass pearl that sits in there just perfectly. I'm going to see when I get more 4mm beads if the holes in regular beads are small enough where the bead won't thread itself onto the ring. If not, I'll just have to get 16g wire. I'm thinking of doing these in Sterling Silver as well, possibly Argentium because it's a more pure form of Silver, and marketing them on Etsy.

I'm proud of myself for my accomplishments today!

Don't forget the free gift with each purchase in my Etsy shop!

Excitement!

Today was exciting! The Boy and I were stuck in traffic most of the way, both times it was because of congestion around the Newburgh-Beacon bridge. So a 15 minute trip turned into a 45 minute trip. Luckily, I had the sound notion to bring my iPod with me today. I always knew it would come in handy. Anyway, today's adventures consisted of going to Fishkill to pick up The Boy's check, and then snailing our way over to Middletown, getting COMPLETELY LOST and spending $500 on a remote control car. For my part in being a supportive girlfriend, he took me to A C Moore, where I picked up a few things for myself. I got myself some leather, a stamp, some beads that were on clearance, and a picture frame for the gorgeous drawing I bought from fineartist on Etsy.

Today was also exciting, because I got my ring from markaplan from Etsy today! It is absolutely gorgeous! I lurves it. Now I have to lose 10 more lbs so I can get something else from my favourites.

I meant to go on about my new leather cuffs that I'm currently working on, but I got sidetracked by my shiny new ring. I've cut pieces of leather 1.5 inches wide and stamped them with an oil based paint. They're hanging up to dry right now, but here are some pictures of the progress:


I can't wait until they're dry so I can finish them! I've never worked with leather before, but it's something I've always wanted to do. I'm a big fan of cuffs, and I think this could be a pretty interesting project.

And remember my free gift with purchase in my Etsy shop from now until June 10th!

What's this? Free gift?

That's right. Now through June 10th I'll be giving away a free (surprise) gift with each purchase made from my Etsy store!

http://paysonwinters.etsy.com

I've been busy lately, promoting my shop and working on new items. I really want to take a metalsmithing class, but I don't know of anyone in the area who does them. My college doesn't offer one either, which makes me angry. I want to be able to make my own jewelry, instead of just assembling it like what I'm doing now. Anyone can do that. Not everyone can forge their own rings and pendants. That's what I want to be able to do. I want to add some unique items as well as some staple items such as hoops and rings and bangle bracelets. There's only so much you can do with beads, charms, and chains.

So as some of you may or may not know, I've started to diet again. I want to lose my weight slowly though, so my skin has time to shrink. There's nothing more disgusting than a person who's lost a tremendous amount of weight in a very short amount of time and has all that loose skin hanging off. No, that's just wrong. Anyways, I've been setting little goals for myself. I've just lost my first 10lbs so I bought myself this gorgeous ring from markaplan on Etsy. I'm going to do this for every 10lbs or so... Pick one item in my favourites on Etsy to reward myself for doing a good job. I think next I might get three of Gemma's Delicato stacking rings... I've been eyeing them for quite some time...

Aaaand I'm off. G'night.