This week we got our first Etsy sale! Yay! It was really exciting. We worked all last weekend on the site, moving things around, archiving products that don’t fit our new feel anymore and are kind of duds, adding lifestyle photos of the products, renaming the file images to maximize SEO potential, and reorganizing the homepage again. The photo above is where we did a lot of the work, not a bad office setup lol. We decided this week to focus our advertising more on Etsy since people who come there are already in a buying mindset, so we migrated our most loved collection over there and followed all of their guidelines for best practices to make the products easily found by people who want funny Mom mugs. That sounds like it wouldn’t be that hard but it requires a lot of manual work and uploading and yeah. Took a long ass time. It’s still in progress, but so far we’ve seen phenomenal results with a total of 1-2 people visiting our Etsy store a day. Eeeeeek. So there’s obviously more work to be done there.
What we really want to do is a build a community of Moms, who like me, love being a mother but also can find humor and idiocy in the often mundane and frustrating tasks and interactions that go along with it. And also laugh at themselves. And at how hard it is to do your best and get through the day and also not go crazy lol. We want to be a company where people feel like they’re part of the gang and come to treat themselves to a little something that will make them smile and feel a little seen and heard when they use the product. And a place they think of to buy gifts for their friends who feel the same way. We’re trying to get a handle on what the best way to do that is, via instagram or TikTok or this blog or likely a combination of all three or who knows what.
The process of starting this business has been extremely interesting and not at all how I thought it would be. It’s a constant lift and shift of seeing what works (or more often what doesn’t) and trying to make changes that will get the results we want and bring the people funny mugs lol. It almost feels like a series of problem solving challenges and I enjoy that immensely and am willing to put in the work because I do think we have some really funny stuff that can make Moms smile and add a little levity and humor to the routine. That all being said, this is HARD! I can see why some 90% of new online business owners kind of loose steam and give up after a few months when things don’t take off right away. I’m not going to do that until we’ve literally done everything we possibly can and given it our very best shot. Luckily Wob is in the same boat as me and we’re doing this together. This weekend my sister was here too and she gave us some good suggestion and insights about how to figure out our direction going forward.
Ironically, or I guess quite fittingly, I’m having a hard time fitting time in that I want to devote to Fields of Happy with all the other daily demands of motherhood life, and trying to find ways to support myself and my kids. It’s difficult. It’s tiring. It’s often frustrating and feels like I can’t get or keep my head above water. But I need to just shut up and do my best. I’ve got this. Let me take a sip from my “Tough as a Mother” mug, hold my head high, remind myself theres’s nothing I can’t do, and continue onward.
1 comment
Hi there – new subscriber here small business owner and Etsy shop owner. First off – I totally love your cups and eyeing the “not slim, kinda’ shady” cup. Anyhoo, I totally feel you on starting a business and realizing it’s hard. I have an Etsy shop that I started last year and I’m getting ready to launch a website at the end of the month. I stumbled on your site through Pinterest – and I wasn’t even searching for cups. Anyhoo, something you are doing is definitely working – because you just earned a new subscriber and a future / soon to be customer. Don’t give up! Let’s rock this world - small business owners and mom’s unite!!