photo credit: Got Sarah

One reason people don’t stick around on a website is because the website loads so slowly.  Often you can increase your page load speed dramatically just by making your images load faster.

Jewelry websites and blogs are especially image heavy so if you don’t compress and resize your images you could be turning visitors away without even realizing it.  There’s no point increating a beautiful website with gorgeous images on it if no one has the pateince to let them load.

Photoshop and Irfanview are two programs that can easily be the solution to your bandwidth sucking image problem.

Learn how to reduce your image size with both Photoshop and Irfanview (a free program) in this new Handmade Results Article.

Do you have a Blogger blog and want a new look?  Well check out this site I discovered for some great artsy free blogger backgrounds.

Beautiful Blogger Blogs?

I was just checking out a member’s website and I was struck by how beautiful her blog was.  It was a simple free blospot blog and i thought, has Google come out with new backgrounds? Google blogger backgrounds have generally struck me as not terribly exciting, but definitely serviceable.  And of the course the (free) price is right.   But I never really considered the backgrounds to be especially beautiful…

Here’s a screenshot of the site, Gabriela Bijoux, the site whose background intrigued me so.

Isn’t that background gorgeous?  I love how it’s offset with the daisy.

Not a Google Background…

Back to my question.  Did Google come out with new backgrounds for it’s free blog platform?  No, they didn’t.

It was simply a background supplied by Shabby Blogs.

Shabby blogs has lots of interesting stuff to check out for the free blogspot blogger.

Seeing this site got me thinking… Read the rest of this entry

Wouldn’t you love to sell more handmade jewelry from your website or webshop?

Your jewelry sales numbers can make or break your business. But how do you improve those numbers?

Here’s how you improve your jewelry business step by step.

1. Get traffic to your product page
2. Figure out your conversion rate
3. Improve your jewelry product description.  If you are starting from zero, use the jewelry description tips to start fresh, or if you think your numbers aren’t bad, change one element on your original.
4. Wait a month (or 2,000 page views, whichever comes first) then calculate your conversion rate again.

What You Do Next:

Evaluate: Did your sales go up or down?

Then… take the best of the two versions and modify one aspect (headlines are a good place to start), then do it again.

Little by little, by testing different elements and tracking your results, you sell more handmade jewelry over time.  Guaranteed.

Other Ways to Test

You can get faster results by split testing.  Split testing is where you have two versions of the same page running at one time, and you send a portion of your page traffic to each using something like Google Website Optimizer.

If you have lots of traffic, you can test more than one element at a time.

Google Website Optimizer will only help you if you have your own blog or website and can access your HTML code. If you have a webshop like Etsy, where you can’t modify the code, use the steps I outline in this this post.

Good luck and go get more handmade jewelry sales

Best,

P.S. Here’s a one-click option I’m trying because Website Optimizer just confuses the heck out of me.  It’s called “Conversion Chicken” and it installed with a single click.  There’s a free version so no credit card needed.

Have a comment about Sell More Handmade Jewelry?  Share your thoughts and questions below:

Free Content is everywhere on the web.  This embedded video example post is so I can show Handmade Results Weekly Members how to embed a video.  The video showing how to embed the video is available here (Handmade Results Weekly premium subscribers only)

Looks pretty doesn’t it?

Now go embed something onto your jewelry website!

P.S. Are you wondering how to make your own video for promoting jewelry websites? How to Make Videos to Promote Your Jewelry is one of the lessons you’ll get access to when you join Handmade Results Weekly.

Return from Embedded Video Example for Jewelry Websites to How to Use Other People’s Videos

Return from Embedded Video Example to Handmade Results Home

Why is No One Buying From My Handmade Jewelry Website? Help!

How to design a jewelry website so that people find it, people like what they see, and stay long enough to even figure out if they want to maybe buy something.

Your Jewelry Website. Is it Selling? Why or Why Not? Could it be you haven’t designed it right?

I received a wonderful email from a reader the other day that set me off on a complete tangent. Before I knew it my whole schedule went out the window because I got all wrapped up in giving her some website tips.

Here’s the story. Audrey from Texas has a website that she started, oh, about 6 months ago, and she hasn’t seen any results.

She wrote,

Now if someone would start buying on the website I’d be a really happy woman. It’s been up since March and people haven’t found it yet, even with marketing, etc. They keep saying it takes time, but I’m really getting frustrated.

She didn’t come out and ask for a review, but she did say suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Before I knew it 2 of my precious free hours had passed as I gave a whole slew of tips and information. Then I started writing more! Whew! Today, we’ll tackle some tips for designing your website. Read the rest of this entry