[Noob Friendly Method] Easy Money On Etsy.com

I've been here long enough so I thought it was about time I gave something back. This is a simple method I've used in the past to make a few hundred every now and then, but it can easily be scaled up to make more more.

1- Go to your local flea market, a public auction or even a garage sale. Find a few handmade items in good condition or even new ones if you can. Get around 20 or so to start with, that way you won't loose much in the worst case scenario if you don't sell anything at all.

TIP: If you don't have much money just go for small items like bases, flower pots, salad bowls, etc. Anything that you can get for $20-30 a piece.

TIP 2: Do not go for brand name items. If you go to a flea market, finding items the sellers made themselves shouldn't be a problem.

2- Now go to Etsy.com and make your account. Make it something related to what you're selling and/or easy to remember. They will give you your own online shop with your own subdomain (for example http://yourusername.etsy.com).

3- Start listing what you bought. They only charge you $0.20 per item you list, so if you list 20 that's $4 in total.

4- Give the items a reasonable price but make it at least 3x what you paid. If you buy 20 bases at $25/piece and sell them at $75/piece on etsy, that's $1000 in profit from $1500 in net earnings. Keep in mind that it could take a while to sell all your items and you may not sell every item you buy.

5- Now for the BH part: make sure you don't mention that you didn't make the items yourself. Etsy's not ebay, so sell the items as your own.

6- Etsy does have high traffic and a lot of buyers but promoting your store never hurts. Find forums for people interested in what you're selling. If you're selling handcrafted bases, look for forums dedicated to handcrafted goods and start posting in discussions with a link to your shop in your signature. Scale this up to groups, yahoo answers, twitter, facebook, etc.

And that's it. If you find this works for you, scale it up and keep selling. Go to flea markets/garage sales/public auctions every once in a while and load yourself up with cheap items you can sell. Keep promoting your etsy store and profit.

If you can think outside the box you can twist this up and make much more than a few hundred.

Bonus Tip: if you have friends/family with a lot of junk in good condition that they don't use/don't have room for, ask them to give it to you. This way you can start up with no investment (good for newbies) and do your family/friends a favor by taking the things off their hands.

-Enjoy

That sounds like a good idea, but how do you find hand made items and also if they are secound hand won't people on the site mind if they think they are buying new handmade stuff? Also how much do you make with this idea personally.

better off spending the time for a real business model that you can repeat and scale. this one does not sound sustainable since you are at the mercy of the flea markets.

Grey Area Hat said:

That sounds like a good idea, but how do you find hand made items and also if they are secound hand won't people on the site mind if they think they are buying new handmade stuff? Also how much do you make with this idea personally.

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I don't personally do this anymore, but the last time I did I made about $500 off free stuff I got from some friends. There's nothing on the site that says the items must be new before selling so no, as long as you give them a reasonable price they won't complain.

Like I said, get stuff that are in good condition and/or could pass for new if you want. That will help your sales.

Stuff like what? I can't imagine the handmade stuff sales all that well.

rockamore1 said:

Stuff like what? I can't imagine the handmade stuff sales all that well.

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Take a look at the site and see for yourself. It's like cafepress but for household items and other things, so yes, since they're all about selling handmade stuff it does sell well.

If you're too lazy to type the URL, here: www.etsy.com

Edit: In case anyone takes the word "lazy" as an insult, you should know it was not meant at anyone in particular

Edding200 said:

Take a look at the site and see for yourself. It's like cafepress but for household items and other things, so yes, since they're all about selling handmade stuff it does sell well.

If you're too lazy to type the URL, here: www.etsy.com

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Im not lazy asshole, it was a rhetorical question, my point was the stuff on the site is not in high demand, it does not sell well enough to be supplemental income. In my opinion a noob will not make $1500 from selling clay pots. Learn some respect, it seems you have none. Sarcasm was uncalled for jackass.

If you're too dumb to know the meaning of rhetorical, here: the undue use of exaggeration or display; bombast.

rockamore1 said:

Im not lazy asshole, it was a rhetorical question, my point was the stuff on the site is not in high demand, it does not sell well enough to be supplemental income. In my opinion a noob will not make $1500 from selling clay pots. Learn some respect, it seems you have none. Sarcasm was uncalled for jackass.

If you're too dumb to know the meaning of rhetorical, here: the undue use of exaggeration or display; bombast.

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I'm not going to get into a flame war, so stop replying to my thread if that's what you want. Also, you were the one insulting me on that last post.