Week 17

This course was honestly just what I needed to push me to use social media more. I was rarely logging in before this semester, and when I did log in to Instagram or Facebook it was just to post and that's it. Now I log in a few times a week and I stay long enough to interact with people. I still don't really use twitter. I haven't gotten used to it yet. Even though it is user friendly, there are so many spam accounts it's hard to tell who's real.

I have not had a major impact on my business in terms of sales, but I do have a much larger following on my accounts. I know that it's a numbers game; the more people that see my stuff, the more likely I am to gain a customer. In terms of interaction, there has been a major change. I get messages and comments almost daily, even though I don't post that often. I'm brainstorming for some new content at the moment and I'm hoping to post 3-4 times per week to heighten my engagement.

My viewpoint of social media has changed a lot. I never knew how much work goes into being a blogger, or running a business that only sells online. There's a lot to consider like the proper tags to gain attention, the right time to post and the right content to post. I have seen very successful accounts with very little sales on Etsy (the shops show how many sales) and I think it's not because they aren't selling good stuff, they just aren't reaching their customers. I am in that boat. I am still working in my stock but by the time my season comes, I will have plenty to sell.

My understanding for how social media can be used to develop a business is that you have to put the work in. I noticed that a lot of people who have large amounts of followers and low amount of engagement are often that way because they bought followers. purchased followers are not worth it from what I see, because it's just fluff. They aren't engaged. A person with 100k followers should be getting more than 1k likes on their pictures or views on their videos. I know that low engagement can be the result of other things as well though. For my business, in order to fully develop it i have to post more about my process. From material selection, to work in progress posts and more. letting people see things being made will bring me more engagement.

I managed to find a local specialty yarn shop and they have some really unique selections. I also followed a lot of the big brand companies that I purchase supplies and tools from. When I make a post, I can tag them and possibly get featured. I'm looking forward to putting in the effort to make my business grow. By fall 2018 I should have a nice and established business.

Week 14

These are the promotions that I decided to create for my website. I included the "Shop Now" call to action buttons. My intent would be to drive traffic to my website and hopefully get some sales. These promotions are for Instagram and Facebook. I picked an up-close and bright image, to draw attention from people as they scroll along.

I manually selected my audience for the post boost. I chose United States, United Kingdom, and Canada for locations because they are where I get the most views in my Etsy shop. I picked ages 18 to 65+ because I often get a wide range of people visiting my page. My target audience is much more narrow, but I feel as though ads should cover a larger range of people in the case of reaching someone who may not have been previously considered to be a potential customer, and a chance to possibly expand the target audience.

I chose the interests shown in the screenshot below because people who are interested in those things are often the ones visiting my page. I see that my items have caught the attention of many "hipsters" and "millennials."

I plan to run some of these ads, but I want to make sure that I have plenty of stock when I start advertisement. I look forward to boosting my posts and hopefully getting some customers!