I was surfing the Teams Blog Ring one day when I came across the Bookbinding Etsy Street Team (BEST)'s blog.  I just love it when I see a Team sharing like this — not only with each other, but with the world via their blog. As I dug deeper, I found they were not only highly skilled in the art of bookmaking, they were a tight knit group supporting and promoting each other and Etsy. Read on to see how they do it...

Can you tell us a bit about your Etsy Team (what's the glue that holds your team together: location, craft, etc.)?

Our craft! The Bookbinding Etsy Street Team (BEST) is comprised of members from all over the world, united together because of our mutual love for bookbinding. For the most part our members are bookbinders and sell their creations on Etsy, but we also have members who simply appreciate bookbinding. Our goal for the Team is to have a caring and supportive community where we can discuss ideas and learn from each other. And then after we have everyone on Etsy drooling over the rich variety of handmade books our Team is offering, we shall conquer the rest of the world!

What does your Team do to help each other?

We always try to be supporting and encouraging to our members. We know it's difficult to start and maintain a small business, and since we are scattered across the globe and aren't able to be physically there for each other, we definitely try to figure out ways to connect online. We try to make the Team fun; for example, we have events like our Team Book Swap, where members create books and then receive a random swap back! This past swap was based around the theme of "Travel"... some fantastic books were sent in!

How does your Team promote Etsy and each others' shops?

Phew, let's see! We have a Team Blog which we use to post about Etsy Team Events or our many Member Features. We list all of our members' blogs on the page, and anyone who submits an article gets their Etsy Shop Mini displayed at the top of the blog! We make Team Treasuries using our Team tag, bookbindingteam, to search for items to include. We try to organize Team Sales, which we promote in the Etsy Forums. We have a Team Shop; the sales go towards advertising our Team online. And right now we are currently working on our second Business Card Swap, where we create little packets full of our members' business cards, which we include along with packages to help promote each others' shops!

How does your Team connect with each other?

We have a Yahoo Groups forum which is our main form of communication with the Team. Members can discuss any problems they have with binding, questions about their Etsy shop, upcoming BEST events, etc. We also have a
Flickr, Myspace, and Facebook group, and we hold Team meetings in the Etsy Chat Rooms.

Tell us a bit about a current or past Team event or promotion.

We recently hosted our first ever Online Trunk Show! Because we are a Global Team and it's not really possible to gather everyone together for a physical trunk show, we decided to have one online at the Virtual Labs on Etsy so that anyone could participate. It was a very enjoyable experience and a definite success. We can't wait to do another one!

What's your favorite part of the Team program?

The spirit of the Team, the compassion of our members... it definitely makes the Team program wonderful. Earlier this year we hosted our first Charity Fundraising Event, and it was very touching how many of our members were willing to donate their items to help those in need. There are so many fantastic people to meet here!

Do you have any suggestions for new Teams or sellers who might be interested in creating their own Team?

If there are people interested in being a part of your Team, just go for it! Find members who are willing to work hard for the Team and try to delegate so that nobody gets burnt out and it remains a fun and enjoyable process for everyone. Come up with rules that work for your Team and your goals, but always be willing to adapt as new situations arise!

Does your Team have an exciting promotion, event or announcement to share?

Summer is coming to a close and we're now looking forward to hosting a Halloween contest! Members will be creating items based off of the theme of "Halloween" and uploading them to Etsy by October 20th. We will then post a poll on our Team Blog and ask everyone to vote for their favorite item. On Halloween, the book with the most votes would be virtually awarded the 2008 Zombie Award for the BEST Halloween book! We hope you will all vote, stay tuned to the Team Blog for more details!

[Maiko at the EtsyLabs]

Much thanks to Maiko, aka flurrsprite, the leader of this Team for sharing these answers with us and leading a great Team!  Want to see more BEST books?  Search "bookbindingteam"!  Want to learn more about Teams?  Check us out! See you next week for another fun Feature on another great Etsy Team!