How to Make More Sales in Your Handmade Business

In this episode I’m talking all about how to make more sales in your handmade business! 

The reason I’d like to bring it back to the basics is that it can be so easy to feel like we’ve consumed so much information as we try to get our businesses off the ground, that we can often find ourselves feeling like we’re not as grounded or goals driven as we wanna feel now with any business, there’s going to be trial and error. 

With any business there’s going to be trial and error. 

I attended a talk recently by Dave Nelson, who is really big into content marketing and has raised over $70 million dollars for his various tech business ventures. He’s actually the founder of TalkShoe, which is a huge podcasting platform, definitely check it out.

But in the room with me were other successful entrepreneurs who talked about failing multiple times in their businesses through trial and error, so it happens to even the most successful people in business. And honestly it was really relieving to hear that.

1. Work on Your Mindset 

The first way to make more sales in your business is to work on your mindset. 

And in terms of mindset, I mean shifting your mindset from running your business as a hobby, to running it like an actual business. 

And this one is so incredibly important, because I often hear makers and creative business owners calling their craft or their online shop, or their weekends at craft shows, as their side hustle while in the same breath bemoaning the fact that it is not their full time gig. 

Now, the majority of makers, I would say, are in the hobbyist category, so, they’re not making full time income from their business, and they’re not treating their hobby like a business. They might say things like “Oh I really need to get an email list together, but I just haven’t had time, I plan on getting to in next year.” This is a hobbyist mentality. Not a CEO mentality. 

With a CEO mentality, you would have the mindset of saying, “Look at all of the opportunities, resources, all of the information, and all of the technology there is out there to help me grow my business.”

Did you know that the global craft market size reached over $680 Billion in 2021? That is huge. That is a huge amount of opportunity, and there is no reason why you can’t tap into that. 

So change your mindset around your craft – and if you want to run a profitable business, change your mindset and treat like a business where you’re seeking real business opportunities and resources. 

2. Know Your Ideal Customer

The second way to make more sales in your handmade business is to know your ideal customer. 

Now this is sometimes easier said than done. It requires that you go through the process of branding your business, and this goes a lot deeper than just creating a logo, having brand colors, and setting up your website. 

It means doing market research. 

Look at other businesses in your niche that you might look up to or want to emulate in certain ways. What is their messaging like, what does their packaging look like, what do their photos look like, how are they engaging with potential customers on social media or over email? What kind of press are they getting? 

Don’t do this in order to copy, but to get some inspiration.

And then, what does your ideal customer like? Where do they hang out? What kind of publications do they read, what kind of media do they consume, where do they go to purchase products?

And then, what is your unique brand message and your brand values? And how can you craft a brand identity around this message that is consistent as you interact with your ideal customers online or in person? 

This is just the tip of the iceberg, but you really need to start with asking yourself these kinds of questions. As you start making sales, you’ll be able to identify even better who your ideal customer is and what kind of message they respond the best to.  

Once you know your ideal customer, you’ll know exactly what kind of press opportunities to look for. You’ll know where to market your products and your brand in order to make consistent sales. You’ll know exactly what to say to them over email. 

3. Be Present in Your Ideal Customer’s Life

The third way to make more sales in your handmade business is to be present in your ideal customer’s life so they can get to know, like, and trust you and your brand. 

This is marketing. And a business can’t thrive without marketing. That’s just the reality of doing business, and the way that we do it is going to change as the world and technology changes.

But the light at the end of the tunnel is that there is so much information out there to help you learn how to market your work and how to be present in your ideal customer’s life. 

Now, I have a bonus tip for you – and that is, to try and build a 3 month plan around what you need to do next in your business to bring it to the next level. 

Where are you with these three steps? 

Have you completed some of them, are you stuck on one of them? 

What do you feel you need to learn more about in order to understand your ideal customer, or market your work better, whatever it is, doing the research and getting yourself into that Handmade CEO mindset is really what is going to help you stay on track to reach your goals. 

And once those 3 months are up, you know, create your next 3 month plan – by that point some of your goals may have changed, especially if you were able to reach some of the goals that you’re going to set out for yourself right now.