Freebie Magnets With All My Orders

For years I've been giving away free little 1" badges with all my online sales; ones I ordered well before I bought my own badge maker. I was parceling up an order yesterday and I noticed that the website address on the badges was out of date, and had been for ages. Rather than put it on the long finger(as so many things seem to be residing at the moment!), I sat down and reworked one of my old designs. I picked 'join the craft revolution' for a few reasons; I could use it for my my craft and supplies shop-it being applicable to both, and also I thought it was a catchy phrase that might make people intrigued enough to go visit my website. I'm choosing to give away magnets this time as it's a handy thing to have, especially if people have a magnet board in their studio. Also someone is not too likely to wear a badge that has someones website address on it, whereas on a magnet it seems more innocuous.

Marketing Your Business

People always ask me for tips when they are starting out their craft business, and a few times I've met people for coffee to give them a detailed idea of what I do and to  how about going about it. A lot of the time people find the social networking  and branding side very difficult as it's not something they are used to. Many crafters that I know want to make pretty things all day long, but don't know where to start when it comes to marketing themselves.

About a year ago a met a lovely woman Eva Birdthistle through the market, as we got chatting at the stall she told me about her marketing and branding business. She mostly works with small companies and more often than not with artists and crafters. I asked her to send me on some info about her business so I could post it here. I figured that a lot of my readers are in the creative industry and might want some guidance when it comes to marketing/branding and creating a web presence:

MandPh is an outsourced marketing and photography service tailored to our customer’s needs. We look after a number of marketing services for clients such as:

·         Brand development & optimisation

·         Website production & management

·         Electronic direct mail production & reporting

·         Marketing literature design & production

·         Campaign management

On the photography side we provide high quality images suitable for brochures, websites, marketing literature and all your image requirements.

Our customers are mainly in the arts, theatre, crafts and leisure industries such as Áine Knitwear, Orchard Theatre Co, Limerick Youth Theatre, Funderland, Castles Limerick, Grow Roots.

Contact Information:

E: info@mandph.com

W: www.mandph.com

T: 086 3817677

Some of our work:

Images for Áine Knitwear

 Poster, Images and Website for Orchard Theatre Co www.orchardtc.com

 Business cards for ChefBillyBird

 Head shots for Grow Roots

 Poster and Images from Limerick Youth Theatre

Best 50 Quid I've Spent in Ages

There are always a million things to remember to bring when I'm doing markets but one of the most important is business cards. It's a a way of opening a dialogue with people and it's a window to future business with browsers. Lots of people come to markets with just a few quid in their pocket to buys some cake and nice cheese. These days people are taking a longer time to think about making a larger purchase, and at the moment that's anything over a tenner.

I recently switched from business cards to flyers as they can hold much more information. I can also fit on images of my work, the range of items that I sell, and all of my website addresses. One might be tempted to think that they are much more expensive than cards but I got an amazing deal last week. I got 500 flyers for only 50 euro, which is fantastic value. I got them locally in Limerick at Justin Herberts. They have a really friendly service and they are quick and helpful. I usually email on my digital file and collect my flyers a couple of hours later. I changed my design after getting them reprinted for this weeks markets and I also included the times of the market, which is an invaluable detail considering it's new opening times.

I got 500 printed thinking it would last me a month or so, but it was so busy over the weekend I'd say I've given out 250 of them already!! I include them in the bag with each of my sales, and I also hand them to interested browsers. It's such a simple and easy marketing tool, and I'm so glad I went to the extra effort.

Tips for Setting Up a Market Stall

I posted the following article yesterday on the Etsy Ireland blog, I thought some of you who didn't see it might be interested:

Hi this is Ruth from Nice Day Designs. There has been lots of talk recently within the team at meetings and on forums about markets and I realized that after 3 years at trading at a weekly market I may have a few bits of info to impart. There are two sides to doing a market, the nuts and bolts of display, tables, and getting your stall. And also what to do/say to your customers to make the best of your stand. Both aspects have their difficulties, and trust me I've learned the hard way by making every mistake in the book. Later in the week I'll be posting the second half, so stay tuned!

Firstly lets look at the basics, how to get a stall. Lots of people have been asking how can they get a market stall, and is there one basic source of info, and to be honest I'm not sure. In Ireland it mostly seems to be work of mouth, the best advice I can give is go to your nearest market and start talking to the traders. The likelihood is that they sell at a few different locations, and they will be able to tell you which are the best ones, and they'll be honest about footfall. Always try to check out a market before you do it, organisers will promise you the earth, but quite often they deliver very little. Find out things like do you need to supple cover, tables, what is parking like, do they require insurance? The company that I use is IOMST, they do a yearly rate that's very reasonable, most markets insist on it these days so it's just one of those things that you have to fork out for at the start. Also ask the market organiser do they advertise locally, they is no point paying them 50 euro for the day if there are no customers.

Next you need a great display, this can take a long time to figure out, it's taken me years to really figure it out properly. Maybe try to do some research online and at market, take photos of the displays that you like and try to learn from them. Here are some easy pitfalls.

-Don't put all your products flat on a table, people will be walking past and judge what you're selling in about 2 seconds, if it's not visible they will walk on.

-Don't have an empty stand, if there isn't lots to choose from people won't buy. If you don't have lots of work share your stand with a friend. It cuts on cost and it fills up the table better.

-Price your work, people will be afraid to ask if there is no price on it, especially with crafts people always assume that they can't afford it.

To help with creating a better display use risers, I made mine out of notice boards, Tesco are selling them at a really reasonable price at the moment. Buy two of them and put a hinge in the middle so they can be free standing. Also use things like boxes underneath your table cloth to raise the level of the table. Other things like pretty baskets and hat boxes are fantastic for displaying your work in. Shop around in the Euro discount shops, even in the garden or kitchen ware sections, think outside the box for what you can use. Also places like Aldi and Lidl sell mini easels and chalk boards, which can really add to the charm of a display. I got little brightly coloured picnic pots in a pound shop last year and I still get people commenting on how well they look on the stall. If it's possible try to contrast or conordinate the colours of your table cloth to your logo, it will really give your display that extra punch that it needs.

It's a good time of year to go shopping for market equipment, things like fold down tables, chairs and gazebos are all easily available in Argos, B&Q etc, look in the camping and garden sections. In the past I've used fold down tables that are used for wall paper pasting, they are very affordable and the heavy duty one is still working 3 years later. What ever you do if you need to provide your own stall do not buy the one in Argos that is a pole assembly, it is a nightmare to put together and it's useless in Irish weather, it may look like a bargain but trust me it will break your heart (and your back!). At the start try to find a market that is indoors or provides cover for you. For your first market it will be quite daunting to deal with this aspect as well as your display and selling to customers.

Signage is also very important, you want people to remember your brand and know what to call you when talking about how amazing you are later to friends and family! I made my own banner with my sewing machine, but in the past I've used a long laminated sign, that cost about 40 euro from my local printer. Just like with your etsy shop it's good to keep your look consistent, so my banner matches my tags, and my smaller price signs.I got this great stamp on etsy from Jlmould, and it's really helped with my packaging, while keeping my costs low. Also it's essential that you have business cards on hand, they sell little perspex holders for them in Easons. I'll talk more about business cards in the next post about interacting with your customers.

I hope this helps, and if any other readers have market tips I'd love to hear about them, just leave a comment below.