Etsy's Handmade Blog
Team Tip: Team Tags!
Story by EtsyTeams, sarawearsskirts
Published on March 10, 2008 in How-To 		Photo by

Anda Lewis Corrie

Does your Team use a Team tag in item listings to identify your items as being created by an Etsy Team member?  Perhaps you should!  Team Tags can be useful for a variety of reasons. By agreeing upon and using a consistent tag among your Team members, it becomes easy to tell buyers how to search on Etsy for items in your Team members' shops.  Then on your blog or website, you can provide the link to the search results. You can also publish the Team tag on promotional materials you make for your Team.  

But how does a Team decide upon a tag to use? Your Team Tag should include the word "team" in it, whether at the beginning, middle or end of the tag.  The tag, ideally, is a word that isn't commonly used for other means of tagging — for example, the New England Street Team, or NEST, realized that "nest" isn't a useful tag for their Team because many items on Etsy are tagged "nest," and rightfully so, because they're object that are bird nests!  Currently, the Team is using the term "nesty." Using the tag "NewEnglandTeam" might be a better tag, because it's highly unlikely that anyone who isn't on their Team would be interested in using that tag for items.

Please refrain from tagging your items with tags of Teams that you are not a member of. Mistagging is confusing to Team members and to buyers.  Perhaps inquire about joining the Team if you find you'd like to tag your items with a Team's tag. If a tag includes the word "team," it's a Team tag.  Teams work very hard! Be respectful of the work Etsy Teams do, and don't tag your items with Team tags unless you're a member of that Team.  

For more Team Tips, please check the Teams Resource page.  Also, we discuss the Team Tips, news and ideas in the Etsy Teams email list! Keep up the great work, Etsy Teams!

Tags Etsy Teams, HOW-TO, Ideas, marketing, promoting, promotion, Seller Handbook, sellers, selling, tagging, team tags, Team Tips
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12 comments     Login to add your own!

March 10, 2008 at 1:46 p.m. claudiasburningink

The Oklahoma team tags there items, OKEtsy.

March 10, 2008 at 1:51 p.m. claudiasburningink

I will bring it up to the team to see about adding 'team" to the tag. Thanks Sara

March 10, 2008 at 1:58 p.m. Born2BeeWild

Cool, good to know. I say we just use OKEtsy. Shorter and to the point. ;)

March 10, 2008 at 9:15 p.m. SteppingStones

Thanks Sara! We use artsinri for ours!
Plus I sometimes use arts in ri, cover those bases!!

March 11, 2008 at 10:49 a.m. shoozles

Thanks Sara :)

March 12, 2008 at 2:18 p.m. BLSoaps

If it's not something that's likely to be confused with another tag (ie: EGCG) is it really all that necessary to change the tag? I'll do it if I need to. But I'd rather not! LOL! I definitely agree that adding Team is a good idea for some team tags, to lessen confusion. But it doesn't seem to really be necessary for all of them.

March 27, 2008 at 12:49 a.m. DantesSpirit

No. Just no.
Not only is adding 'team' to our tags downright stupid, it's redundant as well.
Many of us already put that we are members of such and such Street Team in our listings and to search such and such tag for more items by our Street Team. To add 'Team' to our tags? Redundant.

Most street teams have unique enough tags already, that they stand out enough without having to add Team to them.

When YOU decide to support US Street Teams as far as tag abuse, then we'll consider this. Right now, you telling us we need to do this, is shoving YOUR problems with tag abuse off on us and telling us it's not enough of a concern to you.

So no. I will not add 'team' to my EBW tag.

March 28, 2008 at noon myminimocs

just chimming in as a co-Team Leader of EtsyBABY. if etsy admin would add ONE LINE to the dont's of
the etsy rules...
"DON'T use a team name or etsy shop name as an item tag if you do not
blong to that street team." it would make it an easier task for teams to deal with on their own. why is this so hard. for me it has nothing to do with the time it takes to change the tags but it's is the whole point of some lazy shop owner riding the coat tails
of a hard working teams. we all know the time and energy it takes to
start, manage and maintain a successful team. we are very proud of how
well organized our EtsyBABY team is and of our very active members. we
will happily police our own team tag and watch for the abuses
ourselves but can't etsy admin throw us a bone by adding just one item
to the don't list so that when we do approach someone we can point
them to the rules of etsy. i would think admin would be all over this
idea because it would save them tons of hours of answering emails and
trying to play modeator so much. i feel upset that this "band-aid" is what is being talked about as the solution to this issue. this will only delay an actual resolve to this very real problem. i am not going to change the tags in my shop nor will we ask our members to give up something that
rightfully belongs to us as a team.
sincerely,
annie/myminimocs

March 28, 2008 at 12:28 p.m. GoldtoneDesigns

Co Leader of EtsyBABY here:

I am deeply concerned that Etsy Admin chose to go ahead and not take
into consideration that the majority of the teams,when asked about this issue back in February, responded with a
firm NO.

All we ask is that Etsy add one simple line: DO
NOT USE ETSY TEAM TAGS OR SHOP NAMES (etsyBABY falls under BOTH
categories). EtsyBABY will not be adding the "team" to any of our
listings due to the fact that
1. It will take Etsy MONTHS to come up with a way to police the
teams
2. Other's will start to mis tag using Team
3. Too much time and effort (which etsy benefits from) has gone into
establishing our tag and street team..
Are we asking too much from Etsy?????? I don't think so.

Best Regards,
Jen
goldtonedesigns

March 28, 2008 at 10:42 p.m. bijoutery

Does it matter how the word 'team' is added to the team name? As in all one word, or can it be two seperate words?

For instance, our new team MSOE, is 'team msoe' or 'msoe team' ok? Or does it need to be 'teammsoe' or 'msoeteam'? I'd prefer to have the two seperate if possible so its more clear that it's a team tag...

April 13, 2008 at 10:21 p.m. sarawearsskirts

Thanks for your opinions, however this is something we've given a lot of thought, and we really feel strengthens the Team Tag program overall, so I do encourage Teams to make this small change. Your Team doesn't *have* to adopt this change, but I strongly recommend it.

Nov. 30, 2008 at 6:41 p.m. PaulaArt

Hi, just now in the process of tagging my etsy pieces with Vermont Made Team. Is that all I need to do?

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