Thursday, July 23, 2009

The Etsy Goal Spreadsheet

I want to share with you one of the best things I've ever done for my Etsy shop. Of course, this works equally well for Artfire, 1000 Markets, and anywhere else you sell online.
A little background:
I'm not a terribly organized person. And my follow through isn't always that great, either. (Hey, I'm an artist! This means I get a free pass, right?) I wasn't very clear on my goals for my shop. I just knew that I wanted to be doing better. (i.e. selling more!)
Well, this is what I did. (with a little help from my husband, who is way better at the excel stuff than I am) I made a spreadsheet to track my Etsy sales. Sounds kind of like pointless organizing, right? Oh, but it isn't.
I've been using it for several months now. I have clarity on how much I've been selling now, week by week. I can see on what days people have been buying stuff. I have gratitude that I have been selling regularly. It's also made me conscious of how things are going for the shop.
All this from just a simple little spreadsheet.
But just tracking isn't enough. You have to know where you're going. So I set an audacious goal. Audacious, but hopefully achievable. What this did for me was enable me to really know how well I was doing from week to week, how close I was (or wasn't) to reaching my goals. And then I could adjust accordingly.

Here's a link to a downloadable version:
Spreadsheet me!
It's free, of course. (Heck, it's just a simple little spreadsheet!) But if you really want some good karma, share it with an Etsy/Artfire friend. (And if you'd like Chickenpants karma, tell them where you found it!)

Here's how you use it.
First, add your sales goal (where you'd like to be, sales wise at the end of the year) in the cell below the GOAL cell. (I've put 50 in randomly, but feel free to change it to whatever you want.)
The first column has weekly dates in it. Along the top are the days of the week. Enter how many sales you've had on any given day. They'll automatically subtract from the Left to Go cell. That's it!

Has this directly increased my sales? Probably not. But I'm now clear on what I'm doing and how well I'm doing it. I can't recommend enough starting up a spreadsheet of your own if you haven't already.
Best wishes for your Etsy success!
~Claire

Notes:
*To download, click on the link above. When the page loads, click on File, then select Export from the list. Select .xls to open in Excel. It'll ask you to save to your computer. Do that. Ta da!*

*I only dated this spreadsheet through the end of the year because I am lazy. But once you have it you can tweak it however you'd like!

16 comments:

woolies said...

Well, I'm going to print out the spreadsheet. But I'm not sure I'm organized enough to fill it out. I'll give it a whirl - thank you!

Miki said...

Thank you for sharing this! I like having goals to meet each month and this will help.

Unni Strand said...

Great tip and spreadsheet! I've already downloaded it and filled in the sales for the last two months. Thank you!

StarsandRobots said...

etsy, goals, spreadsheet? Yes Yes Yes! I'm a sucker for a spreadsheet. Excel is my most used program, you should see my three sheet monthly budget, I'm a little sick. Why I haven't married my Excel obsession with my etsy obsession before is beyond me, thanks for the big kick in the pants! Woo Hoo!

Jessica said...

Thanks so much! This is really helpful.=)

Anonymous said...

Thanks so much, I'm a stay at home mom just trying to figure out how to earn an extra buck. I feel, no I KNOW I have no business plan to speak of. Hopefully this will help. I'm definitely going to give it a whirl.

Gifted Designs said...

These are great and may just get me one step closer to being organized...:)

Thank you!

doeStudio said...

I am a huge fan of spreadsheets! Thanks for sharing!
Dawn

monsoonsandmangoes said...

thank you so much for this!! It couldn't come at a better time, as I'm going to focus fulltime on Monsoons & Mangoes this year (er..I just kinda haven't told my boss yet!! :).

I found your chicken pants yesterday on etsy & love them! so gorgeous & funny and as soon as I make my next sale I'm buying myself one :) (really.)

Love Daniella said...

This is really great! It's simple, but I never would have thought of it myself.

Thanks so much for sharing!

Anonymous said...

Thank you for clarifying things so well...I had a similar idea and was ecstatic to see this before I invested all the time to re-invent your wheel. Merci!

mai'mo said...

Thank you, I'm still trying to figure out best time to post, maybe this will help, thank you for sharing...Maggie (Mai'Mo)

Graciewear said...

This is the kind of thing I love to find. Maybe it will enthuse me for the long run. Thanks so much.

Absolutely Small said...

Thanks for the sweet comments, everyone! Be sure to download the 2010 copy of the spreadsheet...the link in this post is to the 2009 copy. ^-^
(Here's the post you need: http://absolutelysmall.blogspot.com/2009/12/3-ways-to-make-2010-best-year-ever-part.html)

tuskandweavevintage said...

this is absolutely the best thing to ever happen to me and my etsy shop. thanks so much for bloggin it!

Absolutely Small said...

You're welcome! ^_^

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