I'm So Relevant!

All of this SEO work really paid off because now I'm in the #1 spot of every one of my targeted searches. My views have quadrupled and I sold something that had been sitting there for ages. I even make the first row or page of the more general searches. I'm so happy about this. I've tuned up my descriptions for google and all I have left is to figure out if my category and subcategories are considered to be the first 3 and most important tags to google or the first 3 of the 13 that I get to fill in. I asked a question on Market My Shop and I'll post it here when he has time to answer me.

I also want to show off my latest sweater of course.

Please come see my handmade designer plus size sweaters, sweater coats, capes and shrugs at MirabilisFashions.com

A great new blog for SEO and Etsy Relevancy

As anyone paying attention on Etsy knows, the default search is now relevancy. The big sellers who relied solely on renewing to get exposure are having a somewhat hilarious cow in the forums because they don't want to have to learn about SEO and implement it for their shops. This is really paying off in a big way for little sellers like me who are willing to do the SEO work to be seen. I can hardly believe it - I went from not being able to find myself to being on the first page of all of my targeted searches and even on the first page in one of the very general ones with just one day's work!

Anyway, it's always been hard to get detailed and specific SEO information on Etsy because you aren't generally allowed to talk to anyone technical. The only time I ever got decent technical information was in one man's thread and luckily for all of us he has started a blog that focuses on SEO in general but also has very specific information on Etsy relevancy. He writes in a very accessible style that you don't need to be technical to understand and he even answers questions. Anyway, go read his blog from beginning to end if you're feeling lost or just want to know a bit more. It's called Market My Shop and it's just great.

Please come see my handmade designer plus size sweaters, sweater coats, capes and shrugs at MirabilisFashions.com

An SEO Rant

(Warning - I'm really annoyed from all of the confusion and conflicting information over in the Etsy forums today so this will inevitably include some whining before I get to the end and decide to do something about it.)

I don't normally complain about Etsy much since it's the only home that I have at the moment but it's just crazy over there since they announced the changes to the relevancy search. The admins are contradicting the search engineers, everyone is wailing about not understanding the difference between tag stuffing and using good keyword phrases and people are running amok spreading hysteria and misinformation all over the forums. It's like one of those meetings from hell where no one knows what they're talking about so they just wave their arms around and freak out a lot. The worst part is that I've been wasting time there and doing it too.

I'm mostly annoyed at myself. I've worked in the software field as a programmer, business analyst and project manager and I would never have tolerated this behavior from myself or treated on of my customer's businesses in the way that I'm treating mine. I know how to research these kinds of things and organize myself with a solid plan so that's what I'm going to do. I'm going to stop wasting my time watching people freaking out on the Etsy forums and posting very authoritative sounding guesses about things, figure it out in terms of how major search engines work instead of aiming for Etsy's constantly moving target and then at the very end do my best to make sure that I'm relevant while still not tag stuffing. And I'm not changing another freaking tag until I figure it out!

(The whining part is that I was really hoping that the SEO fairy was going to visit my shop and listings one by one and make it all shiny and perfect and put me on page one of every search engine that there is and give me a pony too.)


I'm reading a series of Bing articles now that seem pretty helpful and go into a bit more detail. In the spirit of starting at the beginning and taking it one step at a time I'm just going to focus on the advice in the first one for now and start working on it tomorrow.

http://www.bing.com/community/site_blogs/b/webmaster/archive/2009/05/12/who-s-looking-for-you-sem-101.aspx
Please come see my handmade designer plus size sweaters, sweater coats, capes and shrugs at MirabilisFashions.com