Do YOU Want To Make More Etsy Sales?

Some of you might know what a BSP is and some may not so lets start with the basics....

BSP = Barter Sales Project

A BSP is a great project especially for new and/or undiscovered shops. In my experience I feel that one of the biggest problems opening an Etsy Shop is making that very first sale! That first sale seems to be the very hardest and the reason its so hard is because people are afraid to buy from a shop that has little to no sales and no feedback. I think they figure why take the risk when they can get something similar from a well established shop. It's unfortunate but it really seems to be the way it is. The BSP will help you establish your shop with sales under your belt along with positive feedback. The 2 key ingredients to getting on your feet. If you are already on your feet and have plenty of sales coming in, this is still a very fun project to take part in. You will get to go shopping among your team mates giving you the opportunity to check out some cool stuff, maybe stock up on Christmas gifts, stocking stuffers, even Birthday gifts or any other holiday you might need a gift for or just getting cool keepsakes for yourself. 

Everyone who is interested in taking part in our BSP can start by signing up below, scroll all the way down to the very bottom of this post and you will see a link up, just simply click the little blue button that says add your link and follow the instructions by adding your shop name and your shop link. 

BSP will run for a full week in June, the exact dates are TBA. This gives everyone the rest of April and all of May to get their shops ready for it. 

Getting ready for BSP you will need to create items in your shop that you feel are worth around $5. In order to ensure fair trade it is very important that everyone is creating stuff of the same value as this is a bartering project. 

When you list your BSP items in your shop you will need to create a new section in your shop and call it BSP or what I have done is called it BSP/Sale and that way it doesn't scare off any potential sales from people who are not part of the BSP. 

You will also need to make sure you tag the items with EAWT BSP. Tagging the items properly is very important. If you want to add BSP in the title you may but it is not necessary as long as you have tagged them properly and added them to the new BSP section in your shop. 

No cash ever changes hands during BSP so you will have to have your shop set to take either 'check/money order' or 'other' for method of payment. 

As far as the shipping costs go you can go ahead and list the shipping cost on each item so that if anyone else who is not part of the BSP wants to purchase the item from you they can and they will pay the shipping on it too but for the BSP we will not be charging each other shipping as we will each be taking care of our own shipping costs. To get around this we will use a generic free shipping coupon code so everyone who signs up for BSP will need to add a free shipping coupon code to their shop and make the code BSPFREE this is important that everyone makes it the same so that we all know the code when we go to make the purchases.

To ensure fair trade when BSP week arrives the way it will work is when someone buys from you, you MUST in turn buy from them. This is the only way to ensure fair trade and that no one gets their feelings hurt. We all work very hard on our items and our shops and though we are not all going to have the same tastes and likes this can still be fun for everyone. If someone buys from you and you turn around to buy from them but don't see anything in their shop that is to your particular taste or style then just try and decide who you know that would like it and this is where the stocking up on gifts comes in. If we start asking for permission to barter with each other or telling someone you can't barter with them because you don't like what they are selling, well then this no longer becomes fun because someones feelings ARE going to be hurt, or even crushed so by setting it up this way we eliminate that from happening.

Also with setting it up this way each of you really controls your own destiny of how many sales you would like to make in your shop. If you wish you were at 20 sales then all you have to do is make 20 items for BSP and go out and buy 20 BSP items from your team mates who will in turn have to turn around and buy from you, and there, you just made 20 sales, or maybe you have 25 already but want to be at 50, well just make 25 items and do the above and you will be at 50 sales! Its that easy!!! 

When BSP week arrives everyone who is signed up to participate needs to go over the following check list and ensure everything on it is checked off in your shop. Once it is all done you are ready to go shopping. Simply do a search under handmade by typing in EAWT BSP and everything that is available will come up as long as everyone has followed this check list properly...

BSP CHECK LIST

• All BSP items are listed in your shop
• All listed BSP items are tagged with EAWT & BSP
• All BSP items are priced at $5
• Your Free Shipping Coupon Code is BSPFREE and is Activated
• Your shop is set to accept "other" or "check or money order" as method of payment

When you see an item that you are interested in just add it to your cart, enter in the code BSPFREE and choose either 'other' or 'check/moneyorder' as the form of payment and check out. That person will see the sale in their inbox and will then have to go to your shop and find something that they want to purchase in your BSP section, this is why creating the section is so important, its much easier when we are the ones retaliating the sale that we can just click on that section rather then having to search through the whole shop looking for BSP items.

Once the BSP sales are made each person will treat it just like any regular sale meaning get it all ready to ship out and shipped out in a timely fashion. Make sure that everyone is leaving positive feedback only for each other, both buyer and seller need to leave feedback. The sellers can actually go and leave their positive feedback right away for the buyer, its better the buyers wait until they get the item to leave theirs that way if they want to write anything unique about the item they can. 

Please please please do not leave negative or neutral feedback for anyone!!! That will totally defeat the purpose of this project. If anyone has a problem for any reason then they can be dealt with and sorted out by way of convo. Negative feedback can be very damaging to a shop and affects will be ever lasting so please take this rule very seriously. If you absolutely are so unhappy for whatever reason that you can not bring yourself to leave positive feedback then just don't leave any at all. It's kind of like something my mother always told me as a child, "if you can't say anything nice, then don't say anything at all' that is how this will work.

I think that pretty much covers everything. If anyone has any questions about anything then go ahead and post them here and I will get to them.

Looking forward to BSP, you all have 8 weeks minimum to get your items and your shops ready, remember items must be worth around $5. Now don't forget to sign up for BSP week below. 

Happy bartering!

☺