Search results (tags) for: "site features etsy news"

Tech Update: Google Product Search Syndication

2009-11-25T15:05:00-05:00

UPDATE 12/1/09: The initial rollout of Google Product Search Syndication to Etsy sellers with active individual Google Merchant Center accounts has been completed. A gradual rollout of this feature to the remainder of the Etsy seller community will now begin. Questions and comments welcome in this discussion thread.

Sellers,

We're excited to announce that Etsy is partnering with Google as a participant in the Google Product Search Marketplace Partner Program.

Etsy's Google Product Search Syndication feature will allow Etsy sellers to have their items automatically submitted frequently and with all relevant attributes to Google Product Search. You can find Google Product Search via the "Shopping" link at the top of most Google search pages.

As a Google Product Search Marketplace Partner, participating Etsy sellers' items will appear in Google Product Search with the associated Etsy shop name and shop feedback visible and searchable.

This feature is being rolled out gradually to the Etsy seller community. Beta testing has been underway and we are now gradually activating this feature for Etsy sellers who currently use their shop feed to submit items to Google Product Search. No action is required from sellers. A gradual rollout to the remainder of the Etsy seller community will follow.

Participating sellers will see a link called Syndication under the Promote section inside Your Etsy when signed in. This Syndication page lists the partner websites Etsy is working with to help you maximize your shop's exposure. More partner websites will be added in the future.

Google Product Search Syndication will be enabled by default for participating sellers. Sellers can opt out of this service at any time.

We'd like to thank all the beta testers for their ongoing valuable feedback.

Please visit Etsy's Help site to learn more details about using Google Product Search Syndication.

Other Tips for Your Etsy Shop in the Seller Handbook

Customer Care: Improving Etsy Support

2009-11-12T12:30:00-05:00

Etsy's Support Team is committed to providing the best possible service to the Etsy community. We are delighted to announce that we are launching a brand new Help section and a new set of internal tools for Etsy's Support Team.

As we have with other recent features, we are going to roll out use of the new Help system over the next few days instead of all at once. We appreciate your patience and participation as we get the new Help system up and running.

Here are the highlights:

Searchable Help. Wave goodbye to those long, clunky, list-style Help pages. For the first time, Etsy's Frequently Asked Questions knowledge base (FAQs) is searchable! View FAQs by topic on Help Home, or quickly find answers by searching for a keyword or phase.

Contact Etsy Support. The new Help site allows you to contact Etsy's Support Team via a web form, instead of leaving Etsy to use email. Super convenient! (Note: You must be signed in to your Etsy account to use this feature, and we're gradually rolling this out to members. Until you your account comes up in the queue, this section will direct to the old FAQ.)

Help History. You can view and update your questions to Etsy's Support Team — and see our responses — right from the Help site using the My Help History page. In addition, a copy of the response from Etsy's Support Team will be sent to the email address on file in Your Etsy > Account Info. (Note: You must be signed in to your Etsy account to access My Help History, and we're gradually rolling this out to members. Until you your account comes up in the queue, this section will direct to the old FAQ.)

Submit a Suggestion. Have an idea to make Etsy even better? Want to offer us your point of view about Etsy? Use this handy form to let us know. (Note: You can alternatively discuss your ideas with other members in the community Ideas Forum.)

Teach Etsy How to Help. The new Help site allows members to rate the helpfulness of each FAQ. This provides us with valuable information so we can continually improve our resources for you. The Help site "learns" which FAQs are the most popular and automatically keeps these near the top for easier access.

Better Admin Tools. Etsy's Support Team has a new set of internal tools that integrate directly with the Help site to better serve our community. Every message sent to Etsy's Support Team is read and responded to by a real person. This human touch is vital to provide personalized assistance to every member who needs help. As we ramp up to full speed with these new tools, we have the ever-present goal in mind of improving the quality and timeliness of our customer support.

You may notice this week that emails you receive from Etsy's Support Team will look a little different. You can now easily see both your question to Support and our reply as a discussion thread. In addition, you will receive a reference number for your issue to improve correspondence tracking.

If you've recently sent an email to Etsy's Support Team, don't worry! You do not need to resubmit your question through the new Help site. We will respond as usual. Currently, you can still contact Etsy's Support Team by email to support@etsy.com, abuse@etsy.com, billng@etsy.com or content@etsy.com. We will forward emails to these addresses into our new Help system. (Be sure to send your message from the email address on file in Your Etsy > Account Info.) Over time, we will phase out the use of these email addresses and transition to using the Contact Etsy Support web form to contact the different areas of Etsy's Support Team.

P.S. If you would like to receive breaking, vital Etsy news as it happens — delivered straight to your email inbox — then sign up for Etsy News Alerts emails. Read more about it here. Expect this as an Etsy Alert email in your inbox if you already subscribe to the list.

You can also get an RSS feed of all TechUpdates here.

Talking Product: An Update on 2009 Site Feature Priorities

2009-11-02T15:00:00-05:00

Hi friends,

Welcome to the latest installment of Talking Product. For those of you who are unfamiliar with these posts, they are part of a regular series from my colleagues and me. Our CEO, Maria, started this series last year with her Talking Shop posts. In 2009, we’ve offered more posts by disciplines: Talking Product, Talking Marketing and Talking Tech. In June, all of us got together for a talkfest that we offered up as an audio podcast to more personally communicate with all of you about what’s happening at Etsy.

I am excited to offer you this latest update that covers the last few months. It also presents an overview of our priorities for the remainder of this year and into early next year, as well as a few general Product Team updates.

As a reminder from my previous updates, our first and foremost priority in recent months has been improving the shopping experience. We believe that among the most valuable things Etsy can do for sellers is attract buyers to the site, get them shopping and keep them coming back. While there is much work ahead and this will be a constant focus for us, we’re excited about some of the changes we’ve made so far and about the upcoming features we have in the queue.

So, what we have been up to lately?

Search

As I’ve indicated in past updates, improving the search and discovery experience on Etsy has been our top priority. We’ve made important strides in our efforts to improve Etsy's searching and shopping experience. Here are a few highlights:

Now when you perform a search on Etsy, you will often see links for recent popular related searches above your results. These related searches are actual searches recently performed by Etsy shoppers. They serve as suggestions for shoppers to refine their initial search or to stimulate ideas for successful similar searches. Related searches also offer sellers ideas to effectively tag items.
We made improvements to the way subcategories are suggested during the item listing process. Now, only those subcategories relevant to an item's top-level Category are suggested as item tags. This adjustment is helping to make the Category browsing experience more relevant.
We gave shoppers the ability to filter their search results by Category. This new feature provides shoppers a quick and easy way to narrow and refine their search results. Many Etsians tell us that this enhancement makes finding just the right item on Etsy easier and faster.

Checkout

We continued to work on making Checkout as smooth as possible, especially for new buyers. Our A/B testing framework allows us to test Checkout changes with a small percentage of shoppers, to make sure the changes will be understood and actually improve the user experience, before rolling the changes out to all shoppers.

We enabled new buyers to register on Etsy as a part of the regular Checkout flow. This was an important change since previously new buyers were required to leave Etsy.com in the middle of the Checkout flow in order to complete registration. The old process often resulted in buyer confusion.
We're currently A/B testing removing non-essential elements from the header of Checkout pages to focus shoppers on completing the Checkout process.

Seller Tools

Over the past few months, our new shipping tool with regional shipping options and the ability to rearrange items in your shop moved from the beta testing phase to full launch.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

In the last couple of months, we’ve devoted a fair amount of attention to SEO. With the help of our friends at SEOmoz, Etsy developed a stronger SEO strategy and implementation plan. The most significant changes of the last few months are:

Giving sellers more control over your shop page title, Item listing page titles, and Section page titles
Canonical tags for improved search engine ranking for these pages
Updating shop URLs to be more search-engine friendly as well as changing to 301 redirects

We focused on shop and item listing page SEO and launched improvements, including tools to help sellers preview how their shop home pages and item listings will appear in Google search results. We believe that these changes are, in part, responsible for the continued strong traffic to Etsy.com.   In partnership with SEOmoz, Etsy also created the Etsy Guide to SEO.

SEO is an ongoing effort, and we'll continue to make improvements. We are grateful to Etsy sellers who actively participated in our Virtual Labs sessions on this topic and to those who are diligently using the guide to improve traffic to their Etsy shops.

Community

We recently launched a redesign of the Community Hub. The goal with this redesign was to provide clear, more immediate access to information for the Etsy community about important news, events and activities occurring on Etsy.

Many of you have asked us to communicate frequently and with as much relevant information as we can. Prior to the launch of the new Community Hub, Etsy had only one blog, The Storque. To date, The Storque has served as a resource for Etsy buyers, sellers, staff, and the general public. It showcases a lot of terrific content and information, but the content that’s most relevant to Etsy sellers is not always easily accessible. The Community Hub is a step in the direction of focusing our communications on distinct audiences. We appreciate your patience and your feedback along the way and hope that you find the new Community Hub useful.

What is in store for the remainder of 2009 and early 2010?

As the year winds down our main focus is on keeping the site stable for holiday shoppers. Starting mid-November and going through December, we will go into a bit of a code lockdown so as not to disrupt the buying and selling experience on Etsy. During this period we will only release changes that will not risk the performance and user experience of the site. This is a common practice for most ecommerce sites and one that we believe is critical. With that in mind, some of the updates below will launch before this lockdown while others will launch early next year. Also, some of the changes might only launch to a small subset of users, and then over time we’ll expand to all users. We’ll provide updates on the specific timing and plans for each of these items via the Forums, Community Hub, and The Storque as we get closer to each launch.

Search and Discovery

Many shoppers, especially those new to Etsy, don’t know what they’re looking for when they arrive at the site. Maybe they are searching for a gift, or they know they’re going to find something they love at Etsy, but they’re not sure what. In addition, some Etsy shoppers describe their search experience on the site as “overwhelming” while others describe it as “addictive.” We’re looking to convert those who may feel overwhelmed into addicts. We believe a key to that lies in enabling shoppers to refine search results in various ways.

To that end, many of the features currently in development will be designed to give visitors a better view into the kinds of unique items available on Etsy and help them more easily refine the results displayed. We know that shoppers who perform a search on Etsy are significantly more likely to buy something than those who do not use the search function.

One feature in development is what we call Search Suggestions. This means that we'll suggest relevant search queries as site visitors begin to type a query into the search bar. These suggestions will be specific to Handmade, Vintage, Supplies, All Items or the Category page from which you search. The suggestions will be derived from Etsy’s search logs and will be displayed in a dropdown box as is the practice on many heavily trafficked ecommerce sites. We believe this functionality will help shoppers more quickly and easily discover items of interest on Etsy.   We're also dedicated to improving the overall search experience by focusing on improved handling of misspelled search terms, the page shoppers see when they perform a search with no results, and more.

Checkout

We remain focused on making Checkout as easy as possible for all Etsy buyers, especially new buyers. We're working on a project we call Guest Checkout, which will enable new buyers to check out on Etsy without first choosing a username and registering on the site. This type of functionality exists on many ecommerce sites and is generally an expected option for shoppers. By introducing it on Etsy, we intend to remove hurdles in the Etsy Checkout process.

International

Many buyers and sellers have asked for an easier way to communicate prices in currencies other than U.S. dollars. We plan to introduce a currency calculator on item pages so that shoppers can quickly (and without leaving the page) calculate prices in currencies other than U.S. dollars. The actual transactions will still occur in U.S. dollars.

Google Product Search

Many Etsy sellers use their Etsy shop RSS feed to schedule uploads of their items to Google Merchant Center, for placement in Google Product Search.

Later this year, Google is changing how sellers on marketplaces like Etsy upload items for placement in Google Product Search, and we're working with Google on a solution that will allow Etsy to automatically upload items from your shops into Google Base if you choose to opt in to the program. This functionality will be launched in beta form to a small group of sellers and will gradually roll out to the entire Etsy seller community. More details on this initiative will be announced soon.

Help

As mentioned in my last update, we have been working to launch a new Help site to make it easier for our members to find information more quickly along with a new set of internal tools for Etsy's Support Team. We’re pleased to report that this is about ready to launch. Please stay tuned to Etsy’s blog, The Storque, the new Community Hub, and to the Forums for further details.

Updates From the Etsy Product Team

We’re delighted to welcome Michael Craig to the team. Michael joins us as our design director focusing on user experience design. Among other things, he will focus on creating design standards for the site. Welcome, Michael, a.k.a. mcraig71!

We’re also thrilled to welcome two new babies to the team. Congrats to Beth, a.k.a. bethela, on the birth of her very cute son, Rowan! (MCR, who heads up Etsy's Sys Ops Team, and his wife also had a boy!)

We love to hear from you. You can find the Product Team on Etsy:

Sean is sean11
Tom is kutty
Eric is ericds
Beth is bethela
Amy is amydec
KC is okaysee
Jen is jendoo
Michael is mcraig71
And I’m saralouhicks

Lastly, but most importantly, we appreciate all of your input that you provide in the Forums, Storque blog comments, and in emails to Etsy’s Support Team regarding improvements and suggestions for the site. We take the suggestions from our community as one of the greatest considerations in determining our product roadmap, and we’re personally committed to make progress against them. We understand that it may seem that many long-requested features have not been prioritized, but we want to stress that we are listening, we appreciate your suggestions, and we are making progress.

There’s more ahead so please stay tuned. I’ll be back at the beginning of the year with another Talking Product post that provides an overview of our priorities for 2010. As always, your feedback is important, so I look forward to a continued dialogue around our priorities.   Thanks!

Tech Update: Upcoming SEO Improvements for Shop Home Pages

2009-10-30T19:40:00-05:00

UPDATE: We have completed the SEO improvements for shop pages, including the 302 to 301 redirect changes for username.etsy.com URLs.

[The following was originally posted on October 30, 2009.]

UPDATE: We're happy to announce that all the search engine optimization (SEO) changes described in the post below are now live on Etsy, except for the 302 to 301 redirect change for username.etsy.com URLs, which will roll out over the next 24 hours.

[The following was originally posted on October 28, 2009.]

As part of our ongoing initiative to increase SEO effectiveness on Etsy.com, we will be releasing an update within the next 24-48 hours that is designed to improve page rankings on search engines such as Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc.

Search engines look at the number of links into a web page, such as a seller’s shop or product listing page, and the quality of those links to determine the relevancy of that page in response to a search query. Our change will ensure that ALL incoming links to Etsy pages are counted by the search engines.

Prior to this change, all links to your shop URL (username.etsy.com) were 302 redirects to www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=123456, which many search engines viewed as temporary and therefore did not count in their algorithms. From a technical perspective, we changed 302 temporary redirects to permanent 301 redirects, which are counted.

In the process, we’ve also updated the current shop page URL (www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=123456) from a format that uses a numerical “user_id” to one that is SEO-enhancing as well as shopper-friendly: www.etsy.com/shop/username.

We anticipate that you’ll have questions and hope to address the majority of them below:

Do I need to make changes to all the current links to my site?
No, you do not need to make any changes to your current site references — whether you’re using username.etsy.com or www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=123456. Both will be automatically redirected to www.etsy.com/shop/username. In the future, if you’re embedding the link to your shop page on another site, please use http://www.etsy.com/shop/username. If you’re marketing your site and need a URL that’s easy to remember, continue to use username.etsy.com in your marketing materials.

When I create a new shop, what URL will be generated?
When a new shop is created on Etsy.com, two URLs will be generated: username.etsy.com and www.etsy.com/shop/username. Etsy will automatically assign www.etsy.com/shop/username to the page URL. Shop owners can continue to use username.etsy.com for marketing purposes — this will be automatically redirected to www.etsy.com/shop/username.

When can I expect to see the results of these changes?
Once changes are made on any site, it takes search engines a few weeks to recognize that change and reflect it in page rankings. Search engines crawl Etsy.com more frequently than most websites because of its size, number of inbound links and frequency of change.

Tell me more about 302 vs. 301 redirects.
On the Internet, there are different types of redirects used for different purposes by the search engines. The redirect from username.etsy.com to www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=123456 was a 302 redirect. Search engines assume 302 redirects are temporary and therefore do not count links to 302 redirects towards the number of links to a page. In contrast, 301 redirects are seen as permanent, and do count towards the number of links to a page. We're changing the 302 temporary redirect to a 301 permanent redirect to make sure all links to username.etsy.com are counted by search engines.

We’d like to recognize and thank our partners at SEOmoz – Rand, Lindsay, and Jen – for their involvement in our initiative. SEO is an ongoing process and as we continue to roll out enhancements, we will communicate them on The Storque. If you have questions or comments, please join us in this discussion thread in the Forums. We’d love to hear from you.

P.S. If you want to get the breaking, vital Etsy news as it happens — delivered straight to your email inbox, then sign up for Etsy News Alerts emails. Read more about it here. Expect this as an Etsy Alert email in your inbox if you already subscribe to the list.

You can also get an RSS feed of all TechUpdates here.

Not-So-Top-Secret: Policy Sneak Peek

2009-10-20T10:32:00-05:00

Psst ... Secret Squirrels! You may not know this, but for the past few months, a special task force at Etsy has been locked away in a tiny conference room, buckling down to polish up Etsy's site policies. I've just smuggled some highly classified documents out of the heavily-guarded, steel-doored Lawyer Hole over at Etsy HQ. I think you'll want to take a look at this file — it contains proposed revisions to the DOs & DON'Ts of Etsy.*

It’s been over a year since we last updated the DOs & DON'Ts of Etsy. During that time, the team has received feedback on our existing policies from the Etsy community — through the Forums, emails, Virtual Labs and in-person meet ups. Thank you for your input! Keeping our policies clear and up-to-date is one way we can help preserve the integrity of the site. We want to continue working with the community to better our services and our marketplace. This sneak peek preview provides another way for us to improve the site together. The revised DOs & DON’Ts will be posted on a special page for about a week to offer the opportunity to read through the document and respond with your thoughts about the proposed changes. If necessary, we may make final tweaks before we go live with the new DOs & DON'Ts. Our other policy documents, as well as Help content, will be updated to reflect the revisions to the DOs & DON’Ts at that time.

We understand that the changes may have a direct impact on some members and shops. Once we go live with the new policies, we will institute a grace period of several weeks to allow all members to edit existing account information, shops and listings as needed.

Visit this special page to see the preview of the revised DOs & DON'Ts of Etsy.

As you will see, most policies remain the same. In many areas, we've just clarified existing information or elaborated upon current practices to include these items formally in the DOs & DON'Ts document. Below I’ll highlight the changes, but be sure you preview the updated DOs & DON'Ts in their entirety.

Membership: A few notable policies that apply to all members have been moved up to the Membership section, like our policy for linking from a shop or profile to another selling venue. Collectives (seller accounts involving multiple people) have been further defined with the categories of Collaboration, Sharing a Shop and Shop Management Help. We clarified our rules for younger Etsians; collectives that include minors under the age of 18 may not utilize community features unless otherwise stated.

Conversations: You may not use Conversations to interfere with a transaction (with details on this in the Transactions section, too). We've also elaborated on the definition of "spam" as it relates to Etsy Convos.

Transactions: We’ve added information to the Transactions section, describing the roles of the seller, the buyer and Etsy in a transaction. Additionally, we’ve detailed various concerns or scenarios in which a transaction may be disputed, including: non-payment, non-delivery, refusal of service, dissatisfaction and interference. We’ve also clarified the circumstances in which a transaction may be canceled. In general, the additions to this section outline in greater detail the processes and policies already in place for transactions.

Feedback: To better accommodate custom orders and international transactions, we will be increasing the timeframe for submitting feedback from 90 days to 120 days. (This will go into effect when the policies are "live.") Additionally, we’ve clarified the circumstances in which Etsy will review feedback for removal, and we've lifted the 30-day limitation to requesting a feedback review for policy violation.

Shops and Listings: Formerly called “Selling,” this section has been expanded to include detailed policies about shop set-up, listing items, tagging and specific rules for handmade items, vintage goods and supplies. The section on Tagging is entirely new to the DOs & DON’Ts, but most of this information was available in Etsy’s Help section or through guides posted on Etsy’s blog, The Storque. Expanded sections on rules for handmade, vintage and supplies items should help sellers understand what can be sold on Etsy and how to list items for sale.

Charitable Shops and Listings: Etsy appreciates the spirit of giving back. Due to some laws and the existence of unsavory individuals who may try to take advantage of this spirit, we have added a section for charitable shops and listings.

Prohibited Items: In response to a variety of community concerns, we have clarified our prohibited items list. These items — though they may be handmade, vintage or a crafting supply — are not allowed to be listed for sale on Etsy.

Showcase and Treasury: Making a first time appearance in the DOs & DON'Ts are specific sections for participation in the Showcase and the Treasury. We have gathered information from other areas of the site about these interactive features to formalize as policies in the DOs & DON'Ts.

The DOs & DON'Ts of Etsy, Terms of Use, Privacy Policy, Copyright and Intellectual Property Policy and the Help site all will be updated for consistency. Once we gather your feedback and make any changes, we will launch the final versions of everything together. At that time, we will send an email notice to all members. As stated above, we will also allow a grace period for all members to edit their existing content to comply with any changed policies.

*OK, so I admit it. I'm a lousy spy and a loyal Etsy employee. I totally made sure I had permission from the head honcho before I released this not-so-top-secret sneak peek of our new policies to you, the Etsy community. Truth is that we really want your feedback. Be sure to read the preview of the entire revised DOs & DON'Ts to provide us with the most accurate feedback, and then join us for discussion in this Forum thread.

All About Etsy FAQ: Welcome to the Community Hub

2009-10-09T16:00:00-05:00

Today we're excited to unveil your new Community Hub!

There's a lot going on in the Etsy community on any given day — at any given moment. This page is designed to gather together the main streams of activity so you can see the latest at a glance. You can participate in any way you want. We hope you'll join us!

The Community Hub is linked in the main Etsy top navigation bar found on every page on our site — just click on Community. If you want to bookmark it, use this url: http://community.etsy.com

From the Community Hub you can:

get quick updates about goings-on
access the Forums and Chat (there's also a "From the Forums" feed with some of the latest topics)
pop into the Virtual Labs for real-time, interactive events
reach the Teams pages on Etsy, where groups of members self-organize
jump to The Storque, Etsy's blog, where we post content ranging from shopping to seller how-to's
check out the Resources pages for helpful tools and graphics
join in community shopping polls with the Voter

Social networking has taken off in the Etsy community, so we're streaming in our Twitter feed. We're also providing you with the links to our other social networking pages, such as Facebook, and our media feeds, such as YouTube, Flickr, and iTunes (coming soon). There's much to explore, so dive in!

For upcoming events, check out the calendar embedded on the page.

Stay tuned for more improvements to some of these pages. We'd love to hear your feedback, so please share your thoughts in the comments below.

UPDATE: Due to some limitations we had to remove the top links from the new Community Hub (e.g. Cart, Sign In, Favorites, Conversations, etc.). If you are Signed In to Etsy when you visit the Community Hub you will still be Signed In even without the top links. We understand that this is a confusing experience and longer term we hope to find a solution to improve this. In the meantime, you can always go to www.etsy.com to view your top links.

Read more posts in the All about Etsy FAQ Series | Visit the Community Hub

Tech Update: Filter Search Results by Category

2009-09-28T18:00:00-05:00

Today we're excited to announce a useful new addition to the Etsy Search experience — you can now filter your search results by category.

When searching on Etsy, you often get a lot of results back. We think it's important to provide shoppers ways to narrow down their search results, while highlighting the wide variety of amazing items on Etsy, from Handmade, Vintage and Supplies.

Let's look at the search results in Handmade for "Halloween," for example. Under the Handmade heading on the left side of the page, you will now see links to the top seven categories ordered by the number of results for that search term in each. You can click the "see more categories" link to view all the categories with results. You can also jump to the results for your search term in Vintage, Supplies or All Items.

In this example, we see there are 1,919 results for "Halloween" within the Handmade: Art Category. Clicking the link for the Art Category will take you to those results with the option to drill down further into the applicable subcategories.

Now we see there are 238 results for "Halloween" within Handmade: Art: Photography. Let's drill down further to the 60 surreal Halloween photographs.

At any time, you can jump back up to any of your previously chosen filters. In this version, starting a new search will clear your filter choices. You can also clear your search term and simply browse all the items available on Etsy by category.

We hope you enjoy this new way to make discoveries on Etsy! Tell us what you think in this Forum thread. (We'll close comments on this blog post so that we can consolidate your feedback on the thread.)

Tech Update: New Checkout Updates

2009-09-24T19:20:00-05:00

As we mentioned in the previous Checkout Update, we're working to make Checkout a simpler, smoother process for shoppers, and we are rolling changes out gradually to make sure they improve buyer conversion. ("Conversion" is the percentage of shoppers who complete Checkout.) Improving buyer conversion helps more shoppers get a taste of Etsy and leads to more orders for Etsy sellers. In short, more happy Etsy members!

Today we're rolling out a change to a small percentage of Etsy traffic that removes non-essential elements from the header of Checkout pages, to make the process clearer and faster. Simplifying the page header in the Checkout process is an e-commerce practice used by many great shopping sites, such as Amazon and Apple.

Here's a preview of the shipping information page with a simplified header:

We're going to see if this change makes it easier for shoppers to complete Checkout, and we'll make adjustments as we learn more. If we're certain the changes improve the Checkout experience for shoppers, we'll roll the changes out to all of Etsy's traffic.

We'll update this post as we learn more.

Tech Update: Upcoming Changes for Shop and Item Page SEO

2009-09-23T18:00:00-05:00

UPDATE: We're happy to announce that the search engine optimization (SEO) changes described in the post below are now live on Etsy. It's important to note that the changes won't appear in Google search results immediately. Google checks web pages for updates periodically, so the changes won't appear in Google search results until Google visits your page again and updates the information it has about your page. If you want to see when Google last checked one of your pages, search for the page in Google and click the "Cached" link for your page.

At the top of the cached version of the page, Google states when they last viewed the page.

We're also excited to announce the launch of a tool that enables sellers to preview how their item pages and shop home page will appear in Google search results. When you list a new item or edit an existing listing, you can click a link to "View a preview of how your item will appear in Google search results."

This shows a preview that updates as you enter or edit your item title and description. You can simply enter your item title and description and instantly view how your item will appear in Google search results. This tool is also available on the Your Etsy > Appearance page where you can update your Shop Title and Shop Announcement and preview how your shop home page will appear in Google search results.

As we mentioned in the original post below, SEO is an ongoing process. We'll continue to make improvements and keep you updated on our progress here on The Storque.

[The following was originally posted on September 1, 2009.]

Etsy has been working with SEOmoz, a third-party consultancy, to improve the search engine optimization (SEO) for Etsy.com, including shop and item listing pages. Improved SEO means shoppers are more likely to find Etsy pages when they use search engines like Google and Bing.

We're excited to announce that we’re getting ready to move forward with some changes based on the guidance of the experts at SEOmoz. (Big thanks to Rand, Lindsay, Jen and everyone at SEOmoz!)

We're pre-announcing these changes to ensure sellers have time to prepare, but it's important to note that you don't need to make any changes to your shop or item listing pages. It's your choice whether you want to work on SEO. We know some sellers will want the opportunity to optimize their pages and take full advantage of these changes, and we also want to explain what Etsy is doing to improve SEO.

These changes will take effect within the next few weeks, and we’ll update this announcement to let you know when the changes are live on the site.

We'll start with an overview of changes we're making and then dig into some examples.

Titles

Google and other search engines limit the number of characters displayed in the page title of links on their search result pages. SEOmoz has found that the likelihood of Web searchers clicking through on a specific link in search results increases if the page title appears complete in Google or other search engines. To prevent page titles from getting cut off, we will remove non-essential characters, such as periods and commas, and then truncate page titles at the end of the last complete word up to 66 characters. (If this sounds complicated, check out the details and examples below.)

It's important to note that page titles are only visible to search engines, on search engine search result pages, and at the top of web browser windows.

SEOmoz has also found that brand names tend to increase the likelihood of Web searchers clicking on a page title in search results, which is why we're putting "on Etsy" at the end of page titles. Familiar brand names help searchers quickly identify links they trust, and to the extent the Etsy brand has gained significant awareness, SEOmoz recommends including "on Etsy" at the end of page titles. However, sellers' shop, section, and item titles are likely most relevant to searchers, and will be prioritized at the beginning of page titles. In certain situations "on Etsy" will be removed to create more room for the seller's shop, section, and item titles. We're also making sure that the seller’s username, which is often the seller’s brand, appears in page titles.

And now for some detailed examples.

Shop homepage title

The current format is: <username> on Etsy - <shop title>
The new format will be: <shop title> by <username> on Etsy

In order to keep the page title tag to 66 characters or fewer, we created rules for how the content will be truncated. The rules ensure that the full username is in the title tag, remove "on Etsy" if the <shop title> is too long, and truncate the <shop title> if it's still too long after "on Etsy" is removed.

If the <shop title> + <username> is greater than 54 characters, but less than 62 characters, "on Etsy" will be removed.

If the <shop title> + <username> is greater than 62 characters, "on Etsy" will be removed and the <shop title> will be truncated to the end of the last complete word, up to 42 characters + (20 - <username>). If your username is less than 20 characters, there's more room for a longer <shop title>.

Here are a few examples:

<username>: littleblackrabbit (17 characters) <shop title>: vintage and recycled inspiration (32 characters) <shop title> + <username> = 49 characters, so "on Etsy" will be included and nothing will be truncated Page title: vintage and recycled inspiration by littleblackrabbit on Etsy

<username>: BettyTurbo (10 characters)
<shop title>: mostly involving cake ice cream and moustaches (45 characters)
<shop title> + <username> = 55 characters, so "on Etsy" will be removed
Page title: mostly involving cake ice cream and moustaches by BettyTurbo

<username>: iheartnorwegianwood (19 characters)
<shop title>: Harnesses cage skirts fringe leggings specialness (49 characters)
<shop title> + <username> = 68 characters, so "on Etsy" will be removed and the <shop title> will be truncated
Page title: Harnesses cage skirts fringe leggings by iheartnorwegianwood

Here's a tool you can use to calculate the number of characters in your <username> and <shop title>.

Because you have limited space in titles it's best to include the most important keywords at the beginning of your <shop title> and to focus on the unique value of your shop.

It's important to note that your <shop title> will only be truncated in the page title, which is visible to search engines, on search engine search results pages, and at the top of web browser windows. Your full <shop title> will still appear on your shop homepage on Etsy.

Item page title

The current format is: <item title> by <username> on Etsy

While we're not changing the format, we are adding rules for how content is truncated. The rules ensure that the full username is in the title tag, remove "on Etsy" if the <item title> is too long, and truncate the <item title> if it's still too long after "on Etsy" is removed.

If the <item title> + <username> is greater than 54 characters but less than 62 characters, "on Etsy" will be removed. If the <item title> + <username> is greater than 62 characters, "on Etsy" will be removed and the <item title> will be truncated to the end of the last complete word up to 42 characters + (20 - <username>).

Section page title

The current format is: <username> on Etsy - <section name>
The new format will be: View <section name> by <username> on Etsy

If the <section name> + <username> is greater than 49 characters but less than 56 characters, "on Etsy" will be removed. If the <section name> + <username> is greater than 56 characters, "on Etsy" will be removed and the <section title> will be truncated to the end of the last complete word up to 37 characters + (20 - <username>).

Canonical tags

We're going to use canonical tags on shop homepages, section pages and item pages.

What's a canonical tag? This is part of the code for your Etsy pages that lets search engines know when different URLs (web addresses) are actually the same page. For example, check out these two URLs: http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?ref=sc_main_21&listing_id=29577528
and http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=29577528

The URLs are different, but they point to the exact same page. Generally, search engines assume that a different URL means it’s a different page, unless the code of the page uses a canonical tag to tell the search engine otherwise.

This change will only be visible to search engines, but is important because it will help improve the search engine rankings of sellers' pages. The number and quality of links to a page is an important factor in search engine rankings. If Google thinks those two pages are different, it will count the number of links to each page separately. If Google knows pages with different URLs are the same page, it will add up the links to the different versions of the page and give credit for all of those links to one version of the page, likely increasing the ranking of the page.

If you're interested, SEOmoz has more info on canonical tags.

What's next?

It's important to note that SEO is an ongoing process, and we'll continue to make improvements. We're working with SEOmoz to identify how to improve site-wide SEO, and we'll keep you updated on our progress here on The Storque.

Over the past several weeks, many Etsians have participated in Forum discussions and a Virtual Lab with Rand Fishkin, CEO of SEOmoz. If you didn't get a chance to participate in the recent Virtual Lab with Rand, we'll be announcing additional Virtual Labs in the coming weeks.

We're closing comments here and starting a Forum thread so that Etsy Admin can better answer your questions and the discussion will be searchable. Join us there

Tech Update: Introducing Rearrange Your Shop

2009-09-03T15:15:00-05:00

Today we released a new feature for all sellers that allows you to rearrange the order of the listings in your shop. When the preview video got a record-breaking response, we knew this was a feature many sellers wanted as soon as possible! We want to thank all of our beta testers over the last few months who provided feedback and greatly improved the feature during development.

Below, we have detailed instructions on how to use the Rearrange Your Shop site feature. Please note the following:

We will throttle the feature to all sellers over the next two days, so for a short period only a subset of sellers will have access. The selection process is random. You will know if the feature is turned on by going to Your Etsy > Shop Appearance and viewing the bottom of the page.
You need to enable the feature before you can start using it. See instructions below on how to enable this feature.
We recommend that you have a high speed internet connection when using Rearrange Your Shop. The feature pulls a lot of data to your browser and requires a cable, DSL or other high speed connection for best performance.
The feature was tested on and is confirmed to work with the following browsers: Internet Explorer versions 6 to 8, Firefox version 3 and higher, and Safari version 3 and higher. We do not recommend using this feature on browsers that are not listed above.
This feature was built with a systemwide "on/off switch." What does this mean? Under extreme circumstances when Etsy needs to manage the load on our servers, we could temporarily disable this feature for all sellers. Sellers would be notified with a message under Your Etsy > Shop Appearance. In short, our Engineering Team could turn off this one feature without taking down the rest of the site — be it for maintenance or for site speed and performance reasons to maintain the shopping experience on Etsy.

Here is how to get started:

Sign in and go to Your Etsy.
Click on Shop Appearance.
At the bottom of the page you will see a section for Rearrange Your Shop:
Enable the feature and save.
Go to your shop's homepage (yourshopname.etsy.com).
Under Featured Items (if you have that enabled), you will see a link to "Rearrange Your Shop."
When clicked, you will be placed in an new mode where you can drag and drop listings. Here is a screenshot of when you mouse over a listing:
Finally here is screenshot of moving a listing:

For additional questions, you can reference the brief FAQ below.

What is the Rearrange Your Shop feature?
The Rearrange Your Shop feature allows sellers to rearrange the item listings in their shops to any order they wish.

How does the feature work?
To rearrange your listings, you click and drag your item listings to change the order on any page of your shop. Remember, each shop page has a total of 21 listings. If you want to move a listing between pages, you can click on a listing and select the page it should be moved to. Note, if you hold down shift when you move a listing between pages, it will keep you on the current page. Normally when you move a listing to a new page, you will be taken the new page.

What happens when I add a listing or relist after I change my shop layout?
When you add a new listing to your shop, that listing will appear first, even if you rearranged your listings previously in your shop. Once a listing is added, you can rearrange it in your shop as well.

What will shoppers see when they view my shop after I rearranged my listings?
The default view for shoppers will be the new custom layout you created. Shoppers can still choose to sort listings based on time listed and price.

Does rearranging listings change the way I feature items in my shop?
No, the Featured Items section will remain the same and is managed separately.

How do I turn the feature off?
You can turn the feature off by going to Your Etsy > Shop Appearance. From there you can disable the feature. When you turn the feature off, shoppers will see your listings sorted by the time they were listed.

Can I rearrange listings for each of my sections?
At this time, you can only rearrange listings for the main portion of your shop, not each section.

What are some features Etsy might add to Rearrange Your Shop in the future?
In the future, we would like to add the following enhancements to Rearrange Your Shop:

Adding more keyboard shortcuts for faster rearranging.
Including the custom order in more areas of Etsy, including the shop view under Your Etsy and the Etsy Mini.
Changing behavior such that when you edit a listing or relist, it stays in the same location in your shop.

We are so happy to be launching this new feature for all sellers! Please let us know if you have comments or questions in this Forum discussion thread. (We'll close commenting here in order to better follow the conversation.)

Tech Update: Beta Test of New Rearrange Your Shop Feature

2009-09-01T14:30:00-05:00

UPDATE: We have completed the final phase of beta testing for the Rearrange Your Shop feature. During this final phase, the shops included in beta testing will be available for everyone to view. If you come across one of these shops, you will see that the sort order for the shop's items will say "Custom" instead of the default, "Most Recently Listed."

The final step after this phase is to provide the feature to all Etsy sellers. Thanks so much for your patience while we test the new feature — we know sellers are eager to use it!

[The following was originally published on June 9, 2009.]

Today we began a closed beta test of our new Rearrange Your Shop feature with a handful of selected Etsy sellers. This feature allows sellers to arrange items in their shops by dragging and dropping items. To give you a sense of how this works, we recorded a quick product demo. (Watch the video above.)

Over the course of the next few weeks we will gather feedback on the user experience, expand the beta to include more sellers, and we will post an announcement on the blog when the feature is available to all Etsy sellers.

For additional questions, you can reference the brief FAQ below.

What is the new Rearrange Your Shop feature?
The new Rearrange Your Shop feature allows sellers to rearrange the item listings in their shops to any order they wish.

How will I know if I am part of the beta?
We will send an email to beta participants. Sorry, we cannot accept additional beta testers beyond the original group at this time.

How does the feature work?
To rearrange your items, you click and drag your items to change the order on any page of your shop. Remember, each shop page has a total of 21 items. If you want to move an item between pages, you can click on an item and select the page the item should be moved to. When moving an item to a new page, the item will always appear as the first item on the new page. Finally, when you've completed your new layout, you can save or cancel.

What happens when I add or relist items after I change my shop layout?
When you add a new item to your shop, that item will appear first, even if you rearranged your items previously in your shop. Once an item is added, you can rearrange that item in your shop as well.

What will buyers see when they view my shop after I rearranged my items?
The default view for buyers will be the new custom layout you created. Buyers can still sort items based on time listed and price.

Does rearranging items change the way I feature items in my shop?
No, the Featured Items section will remain the same and is managed separately.

Can I rearrange items for each of my sections?
At this time, you can only rearrange items for the main portion of your shop, not each section.

We are looking forward to sharing this new feature with everyone — we just want to make sure it's the best it can be!

P.S. We closed commenting on the Storque post because the record-breaking number of comments was slowing down the load time on the post! Please continue to give us your feedback in this forum thread.

P.P.S. If you would like to receive breaking, vital Etsy news as it happens — delivered straight to your email inbox — then sign up for Etsy News Alerts emails. Read more about it here. Expect this as an Etsy Alert email in your inbox if you already subscribe to the list.

You can also get an RSS feed of all TechUpdates here.

Tech Update: New Shipping Tool Available

2009-08-28T10:46:00-05:00

Sellers,

We are happy to announce that we completed our beta test of the new shipping regions tool. Sellers will now have the option to use the existing Shipping Profile page or you can use the new Shipping Profile page, which includes the option to ship to a geographic region as well as to an individual country. Sellers can also find the link to the new Shipping Profile on the existing Shipping Profile pages.

For now, we have included just two new regions, but we may add more in the future:

Europe non-EU countries
European Union countries

Here are some answers to frequently asked questions about this feature:

Using regions in your shipping profile is completely optional. You need not change your current shipping profiles, and you can still create "custom shipping profiles" just as you have done in the past. The regions are predefined and cannot be altered.

These regions are not necessarily tied to specific shipping profiles used by postal services or shipping companies such as UPS or DHL. This level of customization is something we'd like to offer in the future, but it is not possible at this time.

We cannot create regions at the province or state level at this time. This means, for example, that we can't offer regions within the U.S. or Canadian provinces or other such groupings.

A country shipping cost will override a regional shipping cost if that county also appears in the region. For example, if there is a country cost listed for France and a regional cost for the European Union (which includes France) the country cost will be the one used. The country cost can be set either higher or lower than the shipping cost for the rest of the region.

The order in which countries are displayed on the View Listing page has been updated. The item the country ships from will be listed first (except in rare cases where the seller does not ship to her own country), and all other countries and regions will be listed alphabetically thereafter. Finally, "Everywhere Else" (if offered) will be displayed last.

The shipping cost will be applied based on the mailing address the buyer enters at Checkout. (This part of the tool remains the same.)

Here's an example of how a hypothetical seller from France could set up her shipping costs:

Ship to France: $5 USD
Ship to Canada: $8 USD
Ship to Europe non-EU countries: $7 USD
Ship to European Union (EU) countries: $6 USD
Ship to United States $8 USD
Ship to Everywhere Else $10 USD

Note: It is OK to have the same price to more than one country or region as in this example.

In this example, buyers who check out and enter France in their shipping address would be charged $5, since the country shipping cost would override the regional European Union (EU) cost, even though France is in the EU. Similarly, buyers from Germany (in EU) would pay $6, buyers from Switzerland (non-EU) would pay $7; buyers from the United States and Canada would pay $8. Buyers from Australia would pay $10, as they would be from "Everywhere Else" in this example.

Using shipping regions is completely optional; as a seller you don't have to do anything differently if you prefer to continue to set shipping costs individually for each country. These changes to shipping are compatible with the shipping profiles you currently use on Etsy.

To start using this new shipping regions tool, you can find a link on both the create a shipping profile page and the edit a shipping profile page under Your Etsy. Remember: If you change your shipping profiles, you need to apply the revised profiles to your listings by going to Your Etsy > Batch Shipping.

We are closing comments on this post so that we can follow your discussion in this Forum thread.

Shipping How-To's | Tech Updates

Tech Update: Checkout Updates and Buyer Conversion

2009-08-27T16:20:00-05:00

UPDATE: In the post below, we described testing improvements to the registration process for first-time Etsy buyers. For the last few weeks, we've been testing in-line registration, which enables first-time buyers to register as a part of Checkout instead of having to leave Checkout to complete registration. We're happy to announce that our tests showed that in-line registration resulted in more first-time Etsy buyers completing Checkout, and we have now rolled in-line registration out to 100% of Etsy's traffic.

Here's to making it painless for shoppers to check out on Etsy! We still have many more changes in mind, so stay tuned as we continue to improve this aspect of the site.

[The following was originally published July 22, 2009.]

As we move into the latter half of 2009, one of Etsy's main projects is to update Checkout in order to make it a smoother, simpler experience for shoppers. Here among Etsy's Product Team, this is part of what we call "improving buyer conversion." Buyer conversion is simply the percentage of buyers who both start and complete Checkout. The higher the conversion rate, the more shoppers are buying from you!

For example, one of the improvements we are working on has to do with first-time buyers on Etsy. Often, first-time buyers have not yet registered for Etsy, and so it's during Checkout that they first encounter the membership requirement. In other words, they are required to both register and check out to complete their first purchase. We know we can make sign-up during Checkout more convenient for shoppers (and therefore good for Etsy sellers).

We will roll out these changes gradually, using an A/B testing framework, which Sara, Etsy's VP of Product, described in her recent post. This A/B testing framework will give us the ability to launch this new functionality to only a small percentage of our users, while a majority of members will still experience the existing functionality. Therefore we can compare the two and quantify the effectiveness of the new process. Once we optimize the best way of flowing through the process, we will roll out these improvements to all of Etsy's traffic.

Looking to the future, we have additional improvements for conversion that we will test and implement between now and October 2009. If you have suggestions on how we can improve conversion for buyers on Etsy, please visit this associated Forum thread.

All About Etsy FAQ Series: Get Involved in the Voter

2009-07-11T17:15:00-05:00

Have you heard about the Etsy Voter? It's a fun part of Etsy where people can vote on their favorite Etsy items. In this installment of the All About Etsy FAQ Series, I'll answer some frequently asked questions about how this site feature works and how you can get involved, whether you're a shopper or a seller. The more people who get involved, the more fun it is!

FAQs

What is the Voter?
The Voter is an interactive tool built by our Flash guru Jared Tarbell. It allows people to vote on Etsy items, and at the end of the voting period, we can all see which items come out on top. Because it's such a neat tool, we're using it every week for informal, fun polls. The Voter can be used as a way to see which items resonate with the Etsy community. Ultimately, it's a way for shoppers to find some wonderful, fresh items.

The Voter is located at www.etsy.com/voter.php. When you go there, you'll see themed groupings of polls — the voting has closed for some, but you can still click in to see how the results turned out and how many people voted.

Who gets to vote?
Anyone! You just have to be registered and signed into Etsy in order to cast a vote. We encourage everyone to get involved in voting! After you place your vote, you can see the running tally of which items are in the lead.

How do I find out about rounds of voting and the winners?
Click on the "Voting" Featured Column on the left hand navigation of Etsy's blog, The Storque. Every Monday, we announce the winner and ask for nominations for the following week's vote. Every Tuesday we put up the call for votes for the current round.

Can I purchase an item from the Voter? Will that remove the item from the Voter and mess things up?
It won't mess things up! Absolutely, you can buy items from the Voter. (That's our not-so-secret mission, in fact!) Purchasing an item you see in the Voter will not remove the item from the application.

How do items get included in a round of voting?
When the top favorite is announced on Monday in a Storque post, we include a call for nominations for the next round. You may nominate one of your own items or any item that you think fits the described theme. Simply paste a link to the item page in the comments of the post.

We cannot include all the nominated items! The Voter performs best with about 45 or less items (60 at max). If your item did not get into a vote and you're feeling discouraged, it could just be that we didn't have the space. You may also want to take another look at your item photography and double check to make sure your item is not breaking any rules and is tagged properly. Here are some tips in the Seller Handbook.

How do Admin decide the weekly themes?
We plan our themes according to the Editorial calendar for our blog, which in turn is integrated with the Merchandising themes. Feel free to suggest ideas in the comments of the posts.

How do I know if one of my items has been included in a vote?
Etsy Admin try to convo each seller individually, but sometimes we're just too swamped with work! We're aware that we need a better way to notify sellers when their items are featured.

My item is included. Now what do I do?
Congratulations! You've been nominated for this week's round of Voting. Please spread the word about your nominations (Twitter, blog, paste the link in your Shop announcement, etc.) and get folks to vote. You should be proud!

What happens after the top favorite is announced?
For our informal weekly votes, the goal is to help shoppers find some great items and to help sellers make some sales or get their products noticed. We use the Voter to share the love (and some fame and glory)!

When the voting closes on Mondays, we will shortly thereafter feature the top favorite on Etsy's blog, The Storque. Etsy Admin use this Voter tool as a way to find a top favorite to feature on our blog, in the Members' Choice Gift Guide (or other Gift Guide if there's a specific one that fits the theme), and perhaps on the Etsy home page. We may include some of the runners up in the curated areas of our site.

If you are a runner up, we cannot promise that your item will be featured in these places — as some items sell or expire, some sellers may already be featured in the Gift Guides, some items may be inappropriate for the curated areas of the site, or we may discover a slight rule infringement preventing us from putting it in the spotlight. Sometimes our tools can be wonky and we have to do things manually (especially when items sell), so let us know if you think there's been a human error. We will do our best to include as many of the runners up as possible.

As a general rule of thumb, if you're a runner up and you've made a sale from the Voter or being in the Related Items in the Storque post, we consider that accomplishing the goal of this exercise!

My item featured in the Voter sold and the sold listing is still in the Voter. Can you replace it with another listing so I can have a fresh item in the running?
Because sold items remain in the running, we cannot replace them in the Voter with new listings once voting has started. Even if it's an identical listing, our tool does not have the capacity to swap out the item id number and retain the votes.

If your item hasn't sold, you can replace the main image of your item and ask us to "refresh," if you want to re-photograph your listing to make it more visually compelling. (Just convo Vanessa).

Wait a second, I thought my item was in the Voter, but it's just in the related items of the Storque post. What gives?
If your item is featured in the Related Items or main image of the Storque announcement, but not in the Voter, don't despair! We apologize if you got excited when you saw your item and thought it would be in the vote. Being in the Storque Related Items is actually really good exposure too. We need to illustrate our posts with eye-catching product, but we cannot repeat items in both the post where we call for votes and the Voter. (This was pointed out as potentially "swaying the votes.")

How come I've never heard of this site feature? Where is the Voter linked on Etsy?
Funny you should ask...We added the link to the Voter to the Community Hub in October 2009. Click on "Voting" under the Featured Columns on the left navigation of The Storque to find the latest post.

The items below are some of our previous top picks!

All about Etsy FAQ Series | Seller Handbook | Help on Etsy

We closed comments on this post and have started this discussion thread.

Tech Updates: Related Searches

2009-07-10T15:00:00-05:00

Now when you perform a search on Etsy, you will often see links for recent popular related searches above your results. You can try it out now with a search for "handbag":

These related searches are actual searches recently performed by Etsy shoppers. They are specific to Handmade, Vintage and Supplies — you will receive different related searches in a search for "handbag" under Handmade than in a search for "handbag" under Vintage, for example. Related searches are also available for popular searches on category-specific search results.

The related search links for a given search query are selected at random from a pool of recent popular related searches, and they change upon refresh or as you page through search results. They are designed to help shoppers narrow their search results with more specific searches, and they also serve as a suggestion tool providing ideas for searches.

Tip: Sellers can get ideas for item tags from relevant related searches, as they represent actual recent searches from Etsy shoppers. It's amazing to see the things people search for on Etsy!

More improvements are in the works for Etsy's Search, with much of our focus now on improving Etsy's category structure and introducing category-specific search refinements for shoppers. Please keep the detailed feedback coming and stay tuned. We'll close comments here so we can follow discussion in this Forum thread.

Talking Product: Etsy Site Feature Priorities for 2009

2009-07-01T19:00:00-05:00

Hi friends,

Following up on our recent Talking Shop podcast, I want to provide a few operational updates from the Etsy Product Team. We are excited to summarize what we’ve accomplished since my last Talking Product update and to provide a glimpse into the priorities for the second half of the year.

So, what have we accomplished in the last few months?

Search
As I noted in my last update, Search is our top priority for 2009. We made enhancements to Search designed to improve the Etsy shopping experience:

We simplified the Search drop down menu and launched an Advanced Search option.
We gave shoppers new options to sort search results by Most Relevant and filter by "ship to country."

Checkout
We’ve been working to make clarifications and improvements to the Etsy checkout process, and we launched several updates in the past few months to make it easier for shoppers to purchase on Etsy:

We made improvements to the Etsy checkout process.
We added the suffix “USD” across the site to notify users that our prices are listed in US dollars.

Seller Tools
We launched beta versions of two new features frequently requested by sellers: a new shipping tool which includes regional shipping options for Europe and the ability to rearrange items in your shop. We’re making a few updates to these features based on feedback we received during testing, and we will be rolling these new features out to everyone in July.

Payments
We provided sellers with the ability to pay their Etsy bill with PayPal. This was a highly requested feature for many sellers, and we hope many of you have opted in to use this new service.

Showcase
We gave Etsy Category pages a fresh new look, making Category Showcases more prominent. We also launched Subcategory Showcases for Jewelry and Art.

Sharing
We made it easier to share your Favorites and share Etsy with your friends on Facebook.

Developer Community
Lastly, we also launched the Etsy Developer Community and API and have seen some exciting applications enabled by it. Our Handmade Code series on Etsy’s blog, The Storque, has featured a number of them, including Craft Cult, Etsy Hacks, ColorMatch by 26OliveStreet and the “Etsy Addict” iPhone application.

What’s in store for the remainder of 2009?

Our top focus continues to be on helping shoppers find and discover unique items and making it easier for them to check out. Here are some further details on our top priorities going into the second half of the year:

Search and Browsing
Search remains our top priority. One important area of focus will be improving the category structure and introducing category-specific search refinements for shoppers.

As part of the improvements to our category structure, you will see in the coming months updates to certain categories. We’ve been working closely with sellers in specific categories to understand the best taxonomy for these areas, and we look forward to launching these updates.

Adding category-specific search refinements means, for example, if a buyer is searching or browsing for a sweater, we want to make it easier for them to refine their choices by options like size and color. In order to do this we will need to enhance the item listing process and update our category taxonomy. We think these enhancements will provide much needed improvements to finding, discovering and buying on Etsy.

These are very large undertakings as listing, tagging, searching and browsing are at the core of our site experience. Improvements will occur over time, and we will do our best to communicate major changes.

Checkout
As mentioned in my last update, we are working on “inline registration” (in other words, letting first-time buyers check out on Etsy without forcing them to confirm their registration first). The goal is to make it easier for first-time buyers to check out on Etsy. This will be launching before the end of the summer using a new A/B testing framework. This A/B test will give us the ability to launch this new functionality to only a small percentage of our users, while a majority of members will still experience the existing functionality. This allows us to monitor performance and feedback before launching to everyone. We’ll provide further details as we get closer to launch.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
We are committed to implementing and sharing SEO best practices with our community. To that end, in addition to our own ongoing efforts, we are hiring SEO specialists to work with us on a comprehensive strategy as well as implementation plan. We're working to formalize an agreement with these specialists and will be sharing additional details in the coming weeks.

Community
We will be launching in the next couple months a redesign of the Community main page. The goal of this redesign is to provide better access to information to the community about important news, events and activities occurring on Etsy.

Help
Improving customer support is top of mind for us at Etsy. We will be updating our internal systems and processes in the coming months to provide better support to our members. This includes updating our Help pages to make it easier for members to find information more quickly.

There’s more ahead so please stay tuned. I’ll continue to provide regular quarterly updates on our progress as well as upcoming projects. As always, your feedback is important, so I look forward to a continued dialogue around our priorities. Please post your comments below.

Thanks,

Sara, a.k.a saralouhicks

Talking Shop Posts | Tech Updates

Tech Updates: Share Your Favorites

2009-07-01T18:30:00-05:00

Today we rolled out a number of improvements to Etsy's popular Favorites feature. These enhancements are designed to make Etsy Favorites more usable, visible and sharable.

Use 'em

Sold items can now be added to your Favorites. Sometimes you just aren’t quick enough, and an item you want is sold out by the time you see it. You can still add it to your Favorites. Views and hearts now continue to accumulate on items even after they’ve been sold.
Tip: Convo the seller to see if they can make another item for you or if they're planning to list another.

No more grey boxes to delete. Many Etsy community members have complained in the past about the clutter of anonymous grey items in their Favorites with the text “Listing expired or removed.” This would occur when an item expired, was being edited, or belonged to a shop in Vacation Mode. These grey boxes are no more. Here’s what happens now:

When an item you’ve hearted expires, it will be removed from your Favorites.
When an item you’ve hearted is being edited by the seller, it will not appear in your Favorites while the editing is in progress. When the editing is complete, the item will return to the spot you had it in your Favorites.
When an item you’ve hearted goes into Vacation Mode, it will remain in your Favorites — you will just be unable to purchase the item until the seller returns from vacation.

See 'em

A “heart counter” has been added to item pages. You can now see the number of hearts for any item, active or sold, along with views in the new “stats” section on the lower right of item pages.
Tip: If an item gets blogged about and then sells, it can still show off its street cred with more and more hearts and views.

Show off your Favorites on your Etsy Profile. You now have the option to display the last six items you added to your Favorites on your Etsy Profile page! These items will be displayed below the "Favorite Materials" section of your Profile. To turn this feature on, sign in to Etsy and proceed to Your Etsy > Public Profile. Check the checkbox at the bottom of the page next to “Favorite Items” and click "Save Changes" to start showing the world the cool stuff you find!

Share 'em

Don’t keep your Favorites to yourself! (Unless you want to.) Now when you sign in to Etsy and proceed to Your Etsy > Favorites, you will see a link for a new Share widget on the upper right. Pop this open for options to share your list of Favorites with your friends or with the world. With this widget you can easily share your collection of Favorites on Twitter or Facebook, embed them on your blog, or copy and paste the web address for your public Favorites page.
Happy hearting!

Tech Updates: Facebook Connect

2009-07-01T17:42:00-05:00

Today we made it easier to share your Etsy activity with your friends on Facebook, a social networking site many Etsians use.

When you sign in to Etsy, you will see a link at the top of the page (next to "Conversations") for "Facebook Connect." Click that link to activate an overlay that you can use to establish a connection with Facebook.

Once you're connected with Facebook, you will see your Facebook Profile Picture at the top of every page on Etsy.

What can I do while I'm connected with Facebook on Etsy?

You can share your Etsy activity with your friends! When you list an item or heart an item (add an item to your Etsy Favorites) while connected with Facebook, you will see an option to share that action on Facebook in the form of a story published to your Facebook News Feed. Click the "Post this item to Facebook" link to activate a pop-up from Facebook with a preview of your story before you publish:

These links to share your activity on Facebook will only be visible while you're connected with Facebook, and all posts from Etsy to Facebook are made explicitly by you. You can disconnect with Facebook at any time via the "Facebook" link at the top of the page. If you're not interested in connecting with Facebook from Etsy, you can remove the Facebook option by clicking the "don't show again" link on the Facebook Connect overlay.

We hope you enjoy this additional option to share the Etsy experience with your friends!

FAQs

What is Facebook Connect?
Facebook Connect allows you to bring your Facebook account into Etsy, so you can share what you're doing on Etsy with your friends on Facebook. You have complete control over what is shared.

How do I connect with Facebook on Etsy?
After signing in to Etsy, you will see a link for Facebook Connect at the top of the page, next to "Conversations." Click this link and then click "Connect with Facebook" to establish a connection to Facebook.

What can I do while I'm connected to Facebook on Etsy?
You can share select actions you take on Etsy with your friends on Facebook. These actions currently include adding an item to your Etsy Favorites ("hearting" an item) and listing an item on Etsy.

After hearting an item or listing an item, you will see an option to post the item to Facebook. Clicking that link activates a pop-up from Facebook where you can preview and annotate your post before publishing the item to your Facebook profile and Facebook friends' home pages.

Can I post items I've renewed or relisted on Facebook?
At this time Facebook Connect on Etsy allows you to post newly listed items on Facebook but not renewed or relisted items.

Does Etsy automatically post to my Facebook profile?
No. All posts to your Facebook Profile and News Feed from Etsy are made explicitly by you.

How do I disconnect from Facebook?
You will know when you are connected to Facebook on Etsy because your Facebook Profile Picture will appear at the top of all Etsy pages next to a "Facebook" link. Click this link and then click "Log out of Facebook" to terminate your connection with Facebook. This will log you out of Facebook completely.

I have no interest in connecting with Facebook. Can I remove the Facebook Connect link so I don't have to see it when I sign in to Etsy?
Yes. To remove the Facebook Connect link, click it to activate the overlay and then click "don't show again." The Facebook Connect option will no longer appear when you sign in to Etsy.

If you change your mind, you can re-enable the Facebook Connect option by going to Your Etsy > Account Info. On the Account Info page, you will find a "Settings" section where you can enable or disable Facebook Connect.

I signed in to Etsy and I was already connected with Facebook. Why?
This occurs when you sign in to Etsy while being logged into Facebook, if you've connected with Facebook through Etsy before.

I use the Etsy Shop application on Facebook. Is Facebook Connect the same thing?
Facebook Connect is separate from the Etsy Shop application. You can still use the Etsy Shop Facebook application and other Etsy Facebook applications. Facebook Connect allows you to share actions you take on Etsy, such as the items you list or add to your Favorites, with your friends on Facebook.

I have a Business/Fan Page for my Etsy shop on Facebook. Can I use Facebook Connect to publish my Etsy activity on my Page?
Not at this time. Facebook Connect on Etsy allows you to publish Etsy activity on your Facebook Profile, but not your Pages (sometimes called Fan Pages or Business Pages). We plan to enable this functionality in the future.

We're closing comments here since we want to follow your discussion in this Forum thread.

Tech Update: New Shipping Tool Now Beta Testing

2009-06-03T15:15:00-05:00

Sellers,

As many of you have expressed through the Forums, in surveys and at meet-ups, there’s a big demand for regional shipping options. We are happy to announce that we are currently conducting a closed beta test of new shipping regions. This tool will give sellers the ability to set shipping costs for a predefined region, thus alleviating the problem of setting the same shipping costs across many countries.

Below is a list of the regions we are testing. (We may add additional regions at a later date.)

Africa
Central America
European Union (EU) countries
Europe non-EU countries
South America

When using the tool, beta testers can see which countries are included within these regions.

Below is a preview screenshot of the new Your Etsy > Shipping Options page with Shipping Regions:

As you browse items on Etsy, you might notice that our beta testers' listings may display shipping costs using the new regions. Below is an example of shipping information on a listing that uses Shipping Regions:

If you see listings that look like this: don't be alarmed! This is a sign of good things to come. We do not anticipate problems with transactions involving Shipping Regions, but please communicate with the seller (who is likely a beta tester) and contact Etsy's Support Team if you experience any transaction issues related to Shipping Regions. Thanks for being patient while we work out the kinks during this testing period.

Shipping How-To's | Tech Updates

Tech Updates: Sort Search Results by Most Relevant

2009-05-20T12:35:00-05:00

Today, after lots of user testing, public previews in the Virtual Labs and detailed feedback from the Etsy community, we’ve rolled out an exciting enhancement to the Etsy Search experience.

You can now sort your Etsy search results by Most Relevant, in addition to Most Recently Listed and by Price. While the default sort option for search results is still Most Recently Listed, users can now choose to view results for Handmade, Vintage, Supplies, All Items and category-specific searches sorted by Most Relevant.

How does the Most Relevant option work?

Etsy looks at a combination of item tags, titles, descriptions and materials to determine which items are most relevant for a given search query. Item listing date is also an important factor in determining Most Relevant, as we’ve found users value fresh results for their favorite searches. (The ability to save your favorite searches is something we’re actively exploring based on this feedback.)

Relevancy also works for Advanced Search queries — you can choose to limit your search to item descriptions via our Advanced Search page, for example, and sort your results by Most Relevant.

As on other sites, establishing relevancy on Etsy will be an evolving process and is in active development. We expect that Etsy’s ability to sort results by Most Relevant will progress as we roll out improvements to the item listing process. We will always communicate changes to the item listing process in advance — there are no changes to the item listing process at this time and sellers do not need to do anything differently to ensure their items appear in search results sorted by Most Relevant. Describing and tagging your items accurately is the best way to ensure your items are found for the appropriate searches. Our current guidelines and tips for tagging items still apply, and items tagged well according to these guidelines should perform well under Most Relevant.

What’s next?

We have a number of enhancements in the works, including links to related searches on search results, location-related search improvements and improvements to the item listing process. Stay tuned, and keep the detailed feedback coming. We will continue to communicate our progress in this area here on the Etsy Blog, in the Etsy Forums and to the Etsy News email list.

We've closed commenting on this article; please join in this Forum thread to discuss your questions or comments about these improvements to Etsy Search.

Please join Etsy Admin Daniellexo and Sean11 for a workshop about creating thorough listings with tags, titles, materials and descriptions in the Virtual Labs on Thursday, May 28, 2009 at 3 p.m. ET.

Tech Updates: Filter Search Results by Ship to Country

2009-05-20T12:30:00-05:00

Based on your feedback, we're happy to announce that buyers can now filter search results to only show items from sellers who ship to their country. This feature helps buyers quickly narrow search results to items they can buy and should be especially handy for our members who are not based in the United States.

What's changed?

The Search Tools box on search results pages now includes a dropdown to filter results by "ship to country." Buyers select their country from the dropdown and the search results update to only show items from sellers who ship to the selected country or everywhere else. The "ship to" filter persists until the buyer clicks a link to clear it, selects a different country, or leaves Etsy.

What's next?

We are actively working on another location-related search feature: the ability for buyers to filter search results by the seller's location. This will help shoppers find local sellers or sellers in specific areas of interest.

We've closed commenting on this article; please join in this Forum thread to discuss your questions or comments about these improvements.

P.S. If you would like to receive breaking, vital Etsy news as it happens—delivered straight to your email inbox—then sign up for Etsy News Alerts emails. Read more about it here. Expect this as an Etsy Alert email in your inbox if you already subscribe to the list.

You can also get an RSS feed of all TechUpdates here.

Etsy Seller Survey: Shipping Address and Order Management

2009-05-19T15:50:00-05:00

Attention Etsy Sellers!

We want to make the selling experience better on Etsy and we need your help. We value your input and would love to gain some more insight into your process regarding shipping procedures and notifications about sales.

If you are an Etsy seller, please take our brief Shipping Address / Order Management Survey. It'll take three minutes!

Click here to take the survey.

The survey closes in one week, so don't delay! And we thank you for your participation!

See related posts about other surveys.

P.S. If you want to get the breaking, vital Etsy news as it happens — delivered straight to your email inbox, then sign up for Etsy News Alerts emails. Read more about it here. Expect this as an Etsy Alert email in your inbox if you already subscribe to the list.

You can also get an RSS feed of all TechUpdates here.

Tech Update: Announcing New Art Subcategory Showcases

2009-05-12T15:45:00-05:00

Attention Artists,

Following up on the launch of Jewelry Subcategory Showcases, today we begin selling a new set of Subcategory Showcases in the Art Category. Art Subcategory Showcase spots are on sale now and available for purchase on the Showcase Gateway. These spots will begin appearing on the site starting tomorrow, Wednesday, May 13, 2009 at 12am EDT.

The new Art Subcategory Showcases increase the availability of spots for this popular category, and will also allow you to reach an even more targeted group of shoppers interested in your specific medium, be it printmaking, painting, sculpture, etc. These spots will be priced at $7 per 24-hour cycle. There will be 25 spots in each Subcategory Showcase. The subcategories in Art include:

Aceo
Collage
Drawing
Fiber art
Illustration
Mixed media
Painting
Photography
Print
Printmaking
Reproduction
Sculpture

The Art Subcategory Showcase spots will display the same way as the Jewelry Subcategory Showcase modules (as shown below), and they will be shown on all pages within the subcategory.

These new Subcategory Showcases can be purchased in the same manner as the other Showcases — through the Showcase Gateway.

Remember, in order to be placed in a Subcategory Showcase, your item must be tagged accurately. For instance, an item going into the Collage Subcategory must be tagged with "art" (as the first tag) and also with "collage" as the second tag. (The second tag determines which subcategory your item will fall under.)

Artists and art-lovers, we hope you like this new promotion!

What is this Showcase thing? For a general introduction to Showcase, read Matt's Storque article 13.5 Questions about the Showcase, and for deeper thoughts on figuring out if Showcase is right for you, see Beth's Showcase Deconstructed article.

P.S. If you want to get the breaking, vital Etsy news as it happens — delivered straight to your email inbox, then sign up for Etsy News Alerts emails. Read more about it here. Expect this as an Etsy Alert email in your inbox if you already subscribe to the list.

You can also get an RSS feed of all TechUpdates here.

Tech Update: Adding USD to Prices on Etsy.com

2009-05-12T15:20:00-05:00

As you're shopping on Etsy today, you will notice that we are starting to add the suffix "USD" across the site to notify users that our prices are listed in US dollars.

In this first phase, you will see this change in several places, including Checkout, Search results, view detail pages, Gift Guides and on Your Etsy. There are some places, such as the Treasury and Showcase, that will be changed at a later date.

In the future, we plan to offer the ability to see prices in different currencies. Showing the three letter USD suffix is an important first step in this process.

We've closed commenting on this article; please join in this Forum thread to discuss your questions or comments about these improvements.

P.S. If you would like to receive breaking, vital Etsy news as it happens—delivered straight to your email inbox—then sign up for Etsy News Alerts emails. Read more about it here. Expect this as an Etsy Alert email in your inbox if you already subscribe to the list.

You can also get an RSS feed of all TechUpdates here.

Tech Updates: Advanced Search

2009-04-30T12:08:00-05:00

UPDATE: There is a now a link to Advanced Search in the header at the top of every page on Etsy. Look for it next to the Search button.

After a busy period of testing and refining, we’re excited to announce some significant enhancements to Etsy's Search—and the shopping experience on our site. These changes were outlined in our March 9 article on Search, and a number of you have had the opportunity to preview them in recent sessions in the Virtual Labs about Etsy's Search.

What’s changed?

Simplified search dropdown menu. The main search dropdown menu now offers the following options for searches: Handmade, Vintage, Supplies, All Items, Sellers. Previous options included “Handmade Items: tags, titles,” “Vintage Items: tags, titles,” “Supplies: tags, titles," “Handmade Items: tags, titles, descriptions” and "Materials." Modifiers like tags, titles and descriptions have been removed from the search dropdown menu, and the Materials option has been moved to our new Advanced Search page (more on that in a minute). Etsy searches item tags and titles by default.

Redesigned search results pages. Search results pages for Handmade, Vintage, Supplies and category-specific searches have been redesigned. The Search Tools, Search Tips and Matching Sellers boxes have been moved from the right side of search results to the left side of the page, following a standard in use on many ecommerce websites and search engines. There is now a price filter on all item search results pages, including the pages you get when you click on links for Tags and Materials on item listing pages. Additional filters will eventually be incorporated into this area on the left.

When no results are found for a search, users will now be presented with suggestions for searching and see recently listed items on the site.

Advanced item search. We now have an Advanced Search page, accessible via the Search Tools box on every item search results page.

The Advanced Search page offers a variety of ways to search for items on Etsy. You can search within Handmade, Vintage, Supplies or All Items. You can also search within the categories specific to Handmade, Vintage and Supplies. By default, searches within these areas will include sellers' item tags and titles, but you now also have the option to include item descriptions and item materials in your search as well. You can also limit your search by including only item tags, titles, descriptions or materials in your search, or any combination of these attributes. You may find that including item descriptions is useful for some searches but not for others, or you may find that limiting your search to item titles returns the best results for your needs.

Expect this Advanced Search page to grow as we roll out additional enhancements including improved options for searching by seller and by location, as well as more intuitive ways to refine your search.

What’s next?

We’re refining a forthcoming option to sort search results by Most Relevant. In its initial rollout, we anticipate that users will have to actively choose to reorder the default search results (search results will continue to be sorted by Most Recently Listed by default). This new Most Relevant option will allow users to sort search results by Most Relevant in addition to Most Recently Listed and by price.

A number of you had the opportunity to preview the Most Relevant option in recent search-focused sessions in the Virtual Labs. We have another search Virtual Lab coming up next Tuesday, April 21. Anyone who is interested in testing different searches will be given access to a special area on Etsy to try out new search features and discuss the future of Etsy Search with us. Join us Tuesday, April 21 at 3:00pm EDT (check when this is in your time zone) in the Virtual Labs to talk search.

As we noted in March, improving the item listing process is central to improving the quality of Etsy's Search, and we’re hard at work on improvements in this area. We will share more details about listing process improvements as they near completion.

There’s much more to come, so keep the detailed feedback coming and stay tuned. We will continue to communicate our progress in this area here on the Etsy Blog, in the Etsy Forums and to the Etsy News email list.

We've closed commenting on this article; please join in this Forum thread to discuss your questions or comments about these improvements to Etsy Search. Also, be sure to mark your calendar for our next special Virtual Lab session on Tuesday, April 21 at 3:00pm EDT.

P.S. If you would like to receive breaking, vital Etsy news as it happens—delivered straight to your email inbox—then sign up for Etsy News Alerts emails. Read more about it here. Expect this as an Etsy Alert email in your inbox if you already subscribe to the list.

You can also get an RSS feed of all TechUpdates here.

Tech Update: Site Maintenance on Community Flash Applications 4/23/09

2009-04-22T13:43:00-05:00

We will be performing site maintenance on Treasury, Chat, Virtual Labs, and the Voter on Thursday, April 23rd, 2009 from 3pm to 4pm EDT. (Click here to translate this time on a world clock.) We want to give you a heads up, since many of you use these site features every day. (For those of you who haven't tried them yet, you're missing out!)

Thank you for your patience while we keep these features performing at their best (in other words, with flying raccoons, gold stars, and satisfying "ping" sounds). We are not anticipating any problems with restoring Treasury lists, but we apologize in advance if your lists are lost.

Check out these Community site features and let us know which one is your favorite in the comments below.

How-tos about Treasury | FAQ about Virtual Labs | Voting Posts on Etsy's Blog

Etsy’s Treasury: Finding Focus

2009-04-15T15:15:00-05:00

Recently, we've decided it's time to revisit the way we utilize and maintain the integrity of our Treasury feature. Below we will walk you through a brief history of the feature, where we find ourselves today and our plans for the Treasury moving forward.

Where we've come from
Upon launching the Treasury on Etsy in August of 2006, our original goals for the feature were to create an interactive place where members could create and share their own featured lists of Etsy items. Over time, it evolved into a community feature, and Etsy staff (“Admins”) would occasionally promote outstanding lists from the Treasury pool to the front page of Etsy. As the Etsy community and Admins have worked together using the Treasury, gathered feedback and discussed the rules for creating lists, a few guidelines for the feature organically evolved. Collectively, with the community's input, a general understanding has developed that the Treasury feature is:

A community space for members to create and share handpicked lists of items on Etsy.
Treasury lists are not intended for self-promotion, but members may add one of their own items to to their handpicked list.
If a list containing an item from the curator’s Etsy shop is promoted to the front page of Etsy, then that one item will automatically be excluded from the front page collection.
Similarly, if a list contains more than one item from a shop, only one item per shop will be included on the front page.
Etsy generally has not changed a curated Treasury list from its original state when promoting it to the front page.

Again, the above guidelines have evolved over time and represent the way Etsy’s Treasury is understood and loved today.

Where we are now
As we've grown, this more relaxed evolution and set of guidelines isn't working as well as it had previously. While the original purpose of the Treasury was a community feature not intended for self-promotion, we realize that by promoting lists to the front page, this creates a sense of competition and leaves room for abuse of the feature. The integrity of the Treasury is something we know is important to each of you – and it’s important to us, too, and so with your help we are taking steps to keep the feature one that can benefit both the community and Etsy as a whole.

Where we are headed
We realize the current set of Treasury guidelines has been shaped as we have grown together and that we have not been as clear as we could have been in laying out concrete, visible guidelines for the feature as it has grown and changed. Moving forward, we are laying out clear guidelines for the Treasury which you will find below. We will actively be upholding these clearly-posted guidelines. Violating Treasury guidelines may result in suspension of privileges and/or account termination.

With this transition, we will also begin using our more focused merchandising themes as a criterion in choosing Treasury lists that are promoted to the front page. Whole lists or partial selections from a list may be promoted. When a partial list is promoted to the front page, we will still be giving credit to the original Treasury list as inspiration. The original list within the Treasury will remain just as the curator created it, even if only a partial selection is promoted to the front page.

Revised Treasury guidelines

Only one Treasury list per person. Do not create lists with multiple accounts at the same time.
Treasury is not intended for personal promotion. Please do not include more than one of your own items.
Etsy may, at times, promote whole or partial selections from a Treasury list to the front page.
This list will expire two days after creation. Bonus time (up to 24 hours) may be randomly added to the lifetime of your list.
Etsy reserves the right to remove Treasury lists at any time.

We've come this far together, and we welcome your comments and feedback in the Forums.

Tech Update: Checkout Updates

2009-04-14T16:20:00-05:00

Checkout is a core experience on Etsy, one which we are working to improve. Our goals for Checkout are to make it easy for buyers to purchase items on Etsy and to reduce the occurrence of buyers who complete Checkout on Etsy but do not complete payment on PayPal.

Today, we completed the first phase of updating the Etsy Checkout process. This first phase consists of improving messaging. Our changes include:

Updating the language on each page of Checkout to better inform buyers on the steps required to checkout.
Changing the wording on the third page of Checkout. This page is now messaged to the buyer as the "Final Review" page. Also, the button to continue is now called "Commit To Buy" — driving home the point that they still need to pay, whether with PayPal or any other method.
Updating the design of the last page of Checkout. See below for a screenshot. When using PayPal, we now tell the buyer how many payments are remaining and clearly provide a payment status on each item.

Looking into the future, we are planning a number of improvements to the Checkout process. For now, we hope you check out the new Checkout as you're checking out with some great handmade and vintage items!

TechUpdates | Shopping Posts | Explore all the fun ways to shop on Etsy

Tech Update: Announcing New Jewelry Sub-Category Showcases

2009-04-08T12:34:00-05:00

Hello Sellers,

On Thursday, April 9, 2009 at 12am EDT we will begin selling Jewelry Subcategory Showcase spots. (Translate this time on a world clock.) They will be available for purchase at the Showcase Gateway. These spots will begin appearing on the site starting Friday April 10, 2009 at 12am EDT.

If you have tried to buy a Showcase spot in the past, particularly in some of our more popular categories such as Jewelry, you might be interested in this upcoming trial offer. Not only will the new Subcategory Showcases increase availability of spots, but they will also allow you to reach an even more targeted group of shoppers interested in your specific type of item.

These spots will be priced at $7 per 24-hour cycle. There will be 25 spots in each Subcategory Showcase. The sub-categories in Jewelry include:

Subcategory Showcase spots will display just as the Showcase modules on the recently updated category pages, and they will be shown on all pages within the subcategory. These new Subcategory Showcases can be purchased in the same manner as the other Showcases — through the Showcase Gateway.

Remember, in order to be placed in a Subcategory Showcase, your item must be tagged accurately. For instance, an item going into the Necklace Subcategory must be tagged with "jewelry" (as the first tag) and "necklace" (as the second tag). (The second tag determines which subcategory your item will fall under.)

This is the first trial offer for Subcategory Showcases and we welcome your feedback in this forum thread. (We will close commenting on this post in order to consolidate feedback.) After we evaluate feedback on these Jewelry Subcategory Showcases, we will consider launching Subcategory Showcases in other Categories.

What is this Showcase thing? For a general introduction to Showcase, read Matt's Storque article 13.5 Questions about the Showcase, and for deeper thoughts on figuring out if Showcase is right for you, see Beth's Showcase Deconstructed article.

P.S.
If you want to get the breaking, vital Etsy news as it happens — delivered straight to your email inbox, then sign up for Etsy News Alerts emails. Read more about it here. Expect this as an Etsy Alert email in your inbox if you already subscribe to the list.

You can also get an RSS feed of all TechUpdates here.

Tech Update: Seller Directory and Stocked Shops

2009-04-01T12:30:00-05:00

Hello friends,

Recently, we updated one of the ways to shop on Etsy — the Seller Directory on the Buy page of the site. We are now limiting this page to stocked shops (a stocked shop has at least one active item listing). Our goal is to improve the shopping experience on Etsy.

All Etsy shops will remain findable on the site. This change only affects which shops appear of the Seller Directory on the Buy page of the site. Unstocked shops will still be accessible via username search as well as direct URL (the username.etsy.com web address).

Shops with only inactive listings and shops in "vacation mode" will not be viewable in the Seller Directly for the duration of inactivity.

We continue to strive to improve both the selling and buying experience on Etsy, and we hope that this update to the Seller Directory is another step in that direction.

Get to know some sellers through our Shop Local series or check out the new Recently Listed site feature!