Etsy doesn’t provide many areas in your Etsy shop to build your brand. So if you are only on Etsy, branding your business shouldn’t take you long to complete and set up.
That said, branding is one of those areas that you can get stuck procrastinating on for ages.
Having a great brand helps you to look professional and more experienced than you are.
It is also a great tool to help you stand out from the competition.
What is branding?
Branding is a means to conveying what your shop stands for to your perfect customer.
It consists of everything that you put in front of your customer, starting with your shop name, logo, images and even the way you write your product descriptions. If you have your own website or are on social media, then the colours, fonts and text used all have to portray the same look and feel to the customer.
The aim is that whatever means your perfect customer touches your business, they get the same feeling about it.
If this is a bit of a weird concept to you, then think about how you feel when you think of some of the big brands.
Companies such as Apple, Nike and McDonalds, how do you expect to feel if you go into one of their shops, visit their website or buy one of their products? The feelings could be different for each company. But the feeling is consistent across everything you touch within that company.
This is what you have to try and emulate with your brand, although on a much smaller scale.
When deciding on your branding style, remember to always keep your Perfect Customer in mind. Your business is for your customer. All your decisions have to be based on what your customer likes. All your choices, including how it looks and feels, has to be for your perfect customer and not merely what you want.
Define your brand in 3 words
Your brand is how you want your Perfect Customer to FEEL about your company. This could be when they think about your business or visit your Etsy shop or website.
Think about how you want your customer to feel when they interact with you. Do you want them to feel motivated, inspired, healthy, challenged or anything else?
Use these 3 words as your guide for building your brand.
Everything you create, all images, words, colours should give the feeling of these 3 words.
For example, if you make fun kids rompers, then maybe your words would be fun, cheerful and happy. This means colours, pictures and your words should all be light, bright and sunny. Nothing dark or downbeat.
What’s in a name?
Your shop name is essential but not something to get too hung about. Again, this is something that can lead you to procrastinate for far too long rather than just make a decision and move on.
You’d be surprised at how little attention you customer pays to the name of your shop!
That said, ideally, the name of your shop should represent your chosen 3 words and gives an idea of what the shop is about.
Once you have decided on your shop name, try to set up all the social media accounts for that name and get a website domain. You may not use them straight away, but it would be a real pain if someone else gets them while you wait until you are ready.
Create a brand style guide to build your brand
Create a mood board that evokes the feeling of what you want your brand to represent. Use it to define your brand colours, logo, photo style and any other graphic elements that you will be using across your brand, shop, website and documents.
Use your mood board for reference and make sure it reflects the 3 words that you have chosen to define your brand. This is the starting point to build your brand.
Here are some excellent examples of mood boards for other businesses.
Once you have your mood board that shows the mood you are trying to recreate, it’s time to define the finer details. Think about the colours, fonts, etc. you want to communicate with your customer.
Now you are ready to create your brand style guide. You can download a free brand style guide template here.
Once you have decided on all the different elements, compile them all together in your brand style guide. Reference this brand style guide for everything that your customer will see to build your brand on Etsy.
Create a logo
Your logo needs to be high quality, professional-looking and fit the feel of your brand.
Often it is better to keep it simple. Think about what it would look like if you had to print it on a black and white printer, would it still be clear and represent your brand.
Take a look at Creative Market or Canva. They have many templates for logos to get you started.
How to use to build your brand on Etsy
Shop Title
Your shop title is displayed on your shop’s home page and let’s both your customers and Etsy know what your shop is about.
You only have 46 characters to describe your shop, so keep it on-brand but as keyword-rich, as you can.
Shop Icon
Your shop icon is a logo for your business on Etsy. This small but powerful graphic will represent your shop across the site. You could use your logo as your shop icon.
If you’re new to graphic design, free online tools like Canva make the process simple.
Depending on how you setup your shop banner then this might be the only visual for your shop, so make sure you create something at a size of 500 x 500 pixels. This will be scaled down by Etsy as needed.
Order Receipt Banner
Your logo can also be used on your Order Receipt Banner. Or you can create something that tells your customer a bit more about your shop.
Shop Announcement
Your shop announcement is displayed on your shop’s home page. This area gives you 3 visible rows of text to promote your shop. You can write more, but the customer has to scroll to read it.
Messages to Buyers
Etsy automates emails sent to buyers when they buy from you. You define what goes into these messages, so again make sure it reflects your shop’s personality and brand.
Your Shop Story
Shoppers come to Etsy to buy from real people. So inject your shop story with its own personality and make sure your customers know why you do what you do and what value you can provide them.
Shop Members
Your personal profile photo appears as the shop owner image on your shop’s home page and in conversation threads.
Again, make sure it reflects the personality you are trying to create.
This is an opportunity to show yourself rather than another graphic. This will help build trust and credibility.
The dimensions for this is 400×400 pixels.
Create a banner
The banner on your Etsy shop spans the top of your shop’s homepage. Your banner is the most prominent graphic displayed on your shop, so make sure it reflects your business and products well.
You have a choice of either a big banner, mini banner or no banner at all.
The correct dimensions for big banners are 3360 x 840 pixels and mini banners are 1200 x 160 pixels.
The smaller the banner, the higher up the page your products start to display on a desktop. Mini banners don’t display at all on mobile devices.
You can change your banner to reflect different seasons, new products, or major holidays. You can even use your banner to include some or all of the following:
- Your Shop Name
- Your Logo
- A Call-to-Action
- Your Social Media @ Names
- If you’re running a sale, you could indicate that here
Product Photos
Your product photos are THE primary way to sell your products. These are likely to be the first place a customer interacts with your shop so you need the experience to be the best it can be.
Always make sure your photos are amazing, high quality and consistent, to make sure they maintain a cohesive with your brand look and feel.
Packaging
Don’t forget to keep the brand experience going when the customer buys a product from you.
Make sure your packaging has some details that reflect your brand.
Whether it is branded stickers on your products, printed boxes or wrapping paper or even just a business card or flyer placed in with their purchase, they will all help to remind your customer who they have bought from rather than it being ‘Etsy’.
Create branded templates
At some point, you will need to market your shop.
To make this easier create some branded templates that you can re-use for each communication with your customer.
Branded templates can include styling for social media, blog post header images, documents, emails, etc.. basically, anything that the customer will see.
Remember to build your brand on Etsy, you must be your brand!
Every communication with your customer must be on-brand.
Etsy has created a great section in the handbook to help you figure out your branding with examples of shops find out more here.
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