Selling on Etsy

I set up an Etsy shop late last week, just before packing up to go to Kalapana for the KAP trip that wasn't. It's... being an interesting experience.

On the one hand, it was encouraging to see more hits per photo on Etsy than I ever saw on Imagekind. I think Imagekind is a little full, and out here at any rate the response on the web site is a little slow. My pictures do show up on some searches, but the whole place is full of photographers. It helps that the number of photographers on Etsy is limited. Plus, I get the feeling no one else is doing aerials. At least not low-altitude aerials. Certainly not from a kite.

My shop has been open five days and a couple of people have marked my store. One person even marked a particular print. But no, no one has bought anything. I can't complain. No one has bought anything off of my Imagekind gallery, either. So fair's fair.

I'm still trying to figure out just how to market my photography. The only almost-sale I've had, a face-to-face, involved a buyer wanting a picture to be enlarged beyond what the image's resolution could support. Which just killed me, because I really wanted to make the sale, but I really didn't want to hand over a heavily pixelated picture, either. It was a no-sale with a promise to try to re-shoot a particular feature at a particular time of day with a particular tide level, which all requires a particular kind of wind and fifteen extra feet of tail on the kite. So no, not likely to get that sale any time soon.

But because of that experience my first two items were 4x5 ground photographs, printed on stretched canvas, at sizes large enough to please that first almost-customer. But that also meant my first items listed were $150 and $350. I hope I didn't scare people off before things even got going. On the other hand, I hope it also indicates I really can print that large from a 4x5 negative.

I went ahead and posted my shop for some critiques. I really am trying to get my t's crossed and my i's dotted. (Or is it the other way 'round?) Anyway, I'll give it a go. Time will tell if this is a good move.

Tom