How to Use Email Marketing to Get More Sales on Etsy

Posted by Taylor Smith
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Social media has become a vital tool for online small businesses but, it's not the only tool and it doesn't always produce the results you hope for!

Etsy sellers looking to connect with customers and generate sales should also consider email marketing if they want to generate more sales and traffic in their Etsy shop in 2023.

In this blog post, we explore the benefits of email marketing and how it can help Etsy sellers reach out to their past customers, build an audience, and generate sales without paid ads or spending too much time on social media. We'll share some wild statistics on the effectiveness of email marketing and discuss how it can be a valuable tool for small businesses of any kind, particularly for Etsy sellers.

You can listen to the podcast episode here, or keep reading below!

As you start thinking about email marketing, you might have heard that you can't promote your sales, promos, or new products to past Etsy customers in your customer messages.

That's 100% true.

You can’t solicit sales in your Etsy messages. It’s against Etsy’s terms of service.

But there is a way to stay in touch with your customers AND bring them back to buy in a cinch…

…and ALSO attract more customers off of social media,

and build an easy, fun circle of communication with your customers (AKA people who love your brand) and stay in touch with them, over and over.

You need an Email List for your Etsy Shop!

So keep reading for full 101 on Email Marketing for Etsy Sellers!

Email Marketing is one of the most underrated marketing tools for online small businesses of any kind, but especially for Etsy sellers.

Building an Email List is one of the most effective ways you can generate sales for your Etsy shop because you can do it successfully without paid ads, without constantly being on social media and without a TON of extra time on your part (1 email a week!)

And it’s the BEST opportunity you have to market your business, even when you're just getting started.

We honestly wish we had started with email marketing from like Day 1, with our stickers, instead of waiting until we were several thousand sales in.

Also + new sellers if you’re thinking you’re not ready, the earlier you start, the more beneficial it is to you.

So what exactly IS email marketing?

Email marketing is actually a lot like social media. You have an audience of people who signed up to get your emails, these people are called email subscribers, and you send them content in the emails.

You can send out info about new products, sales and clearance, share helpful tips, and just let your audience get to know you better.

Also, if you’ve never done email marketing before, you might thinking, “I really don’t know about this.”

I think that email marketing gets that reputation of like “here’s our family’s 1995 newsletter” which is not only weird but also SO boring.

We’re all really focused on social media, which of course is a valuable tool, but it’s not the ONLY tool.

Here are some WILD stats you might not know about email marketing:

The average return-on-investment (ROI) for email marketing is 122%. That’s four times higher than any other digital marketing channel - including social media.

So, for every $1 you spend on email marketing, the average return is $36 in revenue!

Now, let’s talk about visibility. How many people are actually going to see those emails? How does it measure up to instagram and other social media platforms?

Visibility by platform

(the % of your audience who actually see your content):

Facebook:0-5%

Instagram: 2%

Tiktok: 4-15%

Email Marketing: 21%+

So the average email open rate is around 21%, but can go wayyyy higher than that (ours is 57% avg)!

So the first takeaway there is that WAY more people are seeing your email content than your social media content.

So then the next question is, does it actually work?

How many people click through to your shop in your emails vs. social media?

Instagram’s click-through-rate is 0.22% but with email marketing, the average is 3% for the art/artist niche.

And if that wasn’t enough to convince you, we have a couple more statistics that are gonna blow your mind. They’re just bananas.

At least once per month, 50.7% of people who are subscribed to marketing emails buy something from a marketing email.

77% of marketers have seen an increase in email engagement over the last 12 months.

That means that 77% of business owners using Email Marketing are seeing engagement go UP, while we all know that social media engagement has been struggling for the last 12+ months.

If you compare that to trying to stand out in the bajllion social media posts a day your Customers are seeing, it’s just crazy to think you wouldn’t start doing Email Marketing.

Things You might not KNOW about Email Marketing

#1 Email Marketing is an owned marketing channel.

You’ve probably heard us say this before if you’re an OG podcast listener but you don’t actually own your social media followers or even your accounts.

And your Etsy customers? They’re technically Etsy’s customers, not yours.

You’re using platforms owned by other people, whether they’re free or you’re paying to use them, you don’t own them. Obviously they’re super helpful and valuable tools for small businesses, but the risk is that if you lost access to your social media, or your Etsy account went down and you lost access for some crazy reason, you would have no way to make sales, right?

By building up an email list of customers, you’re strengthening your business and making it healthier. Yes, it’s definitely work to add it, but if you care about the health of your business for more than the next year, adding an owned marketing channel like email marketing is a very smarty move.

#2 On Etsy, it's very hard to build customer loyalty but email marketing can change that.

One downside to Etsy is that it’s very hard to create repeat customers. You only have that one automation option to send a one-time coupon to past customers, but that’s literally it.

By adding email marketing, you have a much more powerful way to stay in contact with your customers and potentially create superfans who buy from you every time you drop something new in your shop.

Another BEAUTIFUL thing about Email Marketing?

#3 There’s no competition inside of those emails.

No other sellers, no competitors’ videos to scroll through. Just your own shop.

There just is no comparison.

Alright, we’ve talked a lot about all the really valuable reasons you should do email marketing, so here’s the quick recap:

With Email Marketing for your Etsy shop, you can:

Diversify your sales
Hustle less on social media
Build a back up list of contacts
Create repeat, raving & loyal customers

Now, what you need to know to get started with email marketing?

Do I need a website to do email marketing?

No, you don’t need a website. You can create a landing page through your email service provider and direct your audience and customers to join your list through your landing page.

Do I have to use paid softwares to do email marketing?

No. You do need an email service provider. There are a lot of options out there, some of the most common ones are Mailchimp, flodesk, and Convertkit. We LOVE and use Convertkit, and you can actually have up to 1,000 email subscribers for free before you need to move into a paid plan.

How do I get people to sign up for my email list?

People only sign up for email lists when there’s something in it for them. So, if you want people to sign up, you have to give them something of VALUE for free in exchange for their email. We call this a “lead magnet.”

One mistake we see people making is sharing their email newsletter and asking people to join by saying something like, “Sign up for my newsletter for updates!”

Very few people will sign up for “updates” or a “newsletter” because that’s 1) boring and 2) there’s nothing in it for them. Instead, you want to offer them something of VALUE. It’s got to be something your customers actually want.

Here are a few ideas:

Coupons
Free quiz
Free consultation
Digital downloads
Free digital products

Once people sign up for your email list, you give them that thing for free, and then they’re on your list to get all your future emails.

It’s also important to say here that you will have people unsubscribe from time to time, that’s normal. People unfollow you on instagram sometimes too, it’s just not a big deal.

How often do I send people emails? I don't want to bother them?

You can make extra sales on Etsy with just 1 email per week! (Take that, daily social media hustle! 😂)

We only email our list about 2-3 times a month except during a time when we have a sale going, like black friday for example.

What do I put in my emails to get people to buy?

Your email content should be really similar to your social media content. A lot of people don’t realize this.

Keep your emails short, sweet, and make them sound like YOU!

No one wants to read a really long, boring email.

Tell short stories, have clear call-to-actions, and use graphics, photos, emojis, we love a good gif, and keep them interesting.

Every email should also have a single goal. Some emails are meant to promote a single product, while others are meant to share a whole collection of products, and some emails might be just to share tips and build a relationship with your customers.

Now, let’s dive into some Etsy-specific topics:

You can’t message your Etsy customers about new products. You can’t send updates in Etsy like “hey, I just launched new products, you might like them.”

You aren't actually able to send your Etsy customers any messages about sales, new products, or shop updates.

That’s why you need email marketing. What you can do though is send one-time message about their past order and, in that message, include the invite to sign up for the email list.

There are also a LOT of other locations on Etsy where you can promote your email sign up link.

One other super important thing to note: you cannot automatically add my Etsy customers to my email list just because you have their emails at purchase.

It's very important that when you create an Email List for your Etsy Customers that you don't email them (or add them to your list) without their consent. This is illegal in most countries & against Etsy's TOS. But you can INVITE your Etsy customers to OPT IN & voluntarily join your email list.

So if you have been looking for a way to diversify your business, make it stronger, and create more sales in the process (without hustling more on social media), email marketing might be JUST the right next step for you.

And, if you’re on board, but you honestly just want a step-by-step of how to create, launch, and grow an email list to make more sales on Etsy…

You're going to want to enroll in our mini course, Email Marketing for Etsy Sellers!