Last Day of Earring Promotion!

Today I have been on the computer watching the activity in my etsy shop due to the Mother's Day Showcase. It's going about the same as last Sunday, with lots of views on the featured item, but still views in other areas. I learned how to change the featured item without having it be sold, so I've featured 4 items. The cream pearl and crystal ab bracelet did not show up well, so I changed that almost right away. My work is also in a treasury which had one new view last I checked. It is a ruby red bracelet that I listed in February before I joined the etsy beadweavers.

In two weeks, I will be in an art show in Burr Ridge, Illinois, for the whole weekend. I am looking forward to it. It's nice to get feed back in person. I'm hoping for some sales because it costs money to participate besides spending your entire weekend (and your spouse's) outdoors no matter what the weather. I also spend a lot of time preparing for the show. I can't just display everything! So if you will be in the vicinity of Burr Ridge, Illinois on May 15 and 16, please comment, and I will post the directions and details. There are 75 artists in a variety of media, so it should be a good show.

Pictures tomorrow, I promise!

Mother's Day Showcase & Earrings Promotion

The photos are of additions to my shop today. The left side is my final pair of earrings in the April promotion. Since I have a Mother's Day Showcase slot, I decided to keep the prices promotional for one more day.

The right side is a cream pearl and crystal ab bicone bead bracelet in right angle weave. I use gold with cream. It is a classic bracelet style I enjoy making that's under $200 and have sold through the Illinois Artisan shop in Chicago. It can be made with any beads; these are Swarovski.

I worked on my challenge item for the Etsy Beadweavers Team today. The theme is colors imbeded in insects. I chose the damselfly. Materials include different finishes on the delicas and two turquoise, orange and lime green colors. Like I'm ready for the islands. So far it is a combination of a couple of stitches and free form. It will be listed on Wednesday.

The Big Reveal for the Use the Muse contest is Thursday, May 6 according to Artbeads.

Earrings Promotion

This is the pair of earrings I listed in my shop today for my earring promotion.

I made a lot of these earrings in anticipation of sales at Art Fairs. My first Art Fair, I had only a few earrings and they matched the pieces of jewelry I was trying to sell. I have found that people generally look at the more expensive items and skip the earrings, unless that is what they truly want to buy.

I have a fair number of earrings that have beaded beads on them which I haven't listed because I can't offer them at low prices. I enjoy making the beaded beads and am thinking about only making earrings with beadweaving on them in the future. They would be unique and original which is something my earring promotion ones are less likely to be. I don't make more than one pair of each style. I like variety. But because they are created with beads that are readily available, it is possible someone else would like the same combination I did, which I hope happens because then I have a customer.

Earrings Promotion, Peach Bracelet, Flowers

I finished the peach bracelet I wrote about yesterday. You can see how similar yet different the two bracelets are. If you want to see the detail, click on the photo.











These are today's earrings for my shop promotion. I may leave the lower prices until Sunday, since I have another Mother's Day Showcase slot on May 1, Saturday and don't want the items inactive then.











I picked the first of many lily of the valley flowers today. They bring up sweet childhood memories and have a short bloom period. They grow on the northeast side of my house where I can't see them, so I put them in a special little Waterford crystal vase that is perfect for violets and lily of the valley. I also have blue and pink columbine blooming on that side of the house that remind me of Colorado, Rocky Mountain National Park.

Earring Promotion and Peaches and Cream Bracelet

Today's earring has three shades of purple with crystal ab. I love the large faceted Swarovski round beads, guess that's because I like crystal things.

I spent time creating a new bracelet in peaches and creams with an accent of dark copper. I have a bracelet in these colors at the Illinois Artisan Shop in Chicago. I found the photos I took in February and added one above. It has taken me almost two months to make something else in the series. Sometimes I like to order a lot of beads and make several items from them; usually I end up ordering more beads to finish because I try not to over order. This version has light peach crystals where the photo has cream pearls and vice versa. I used tiny size 13 cream charlottes instead of shiny copper beads and the other connecting beads are different. The stitch is the same. The in process bracelet's coloring is very soft. The photo bracelet is predominantly cream and the in process is peach. The next bracelet will be in a different stitch. I'll take a photo when the in process bracelet is complete.

Earrings Promotion & Showcase Results

Another day, another pair of earrings listed and blogged about. These are simple and sweet; they are only 3/4 inch long which is petite for dangle earrings. Some day I'll learn how to make the glued on to a post kind, but until then there are dangles.

My Mother's Day Showcase slot yesterday yielded some interesting results to me. For those of you who need to know the results to the bottom line, there were no sales, so you can consider it a failure. However, I had lots of views, especially on the one item featured--175 views. The other items in tiny pictures after you click on the featured item received only 2 or 3 views each. Overall I had almost twice as many views as my previous all time highest number of views which was on the first day of voting on my first EBW Challenge entry, April 9. I still had my normal number of daily views besides the showcase items. I'm still learning about hearts, but I received only 1, so either people didn't like what they saw or they don't understand how to use them either. I think they are like bookmarks--heart a shop and you can find it back again.

My feelings on the showcase experiment depend on what the goal was. If it was to make money now, I failed. If it was to have my work seen by people, I did quite well for me. I don't know how many could find me back again if they wanted to do so, so it might be just like a massage...feels good now, but I'll need to repeat it again soon. The cost per view was 8 cents, ($15 total) which is far less than other sites I've priced. I could have gone to a movie and had lots of popcorn. So I hope the viewers enjoyed what they saw, which is why I create things. Compared to other ways I have tried to promote my work, such as setting up a table in the lobby of the Thompson Center in downtown Chicago and talking to anyone who was passing by and stopped to look, this was easy but not very personal. My first day doing that also resulted in no sales. I guess I know why I was an accountant--you can quantify things when you analyze results.

I have another showcase slot on Saturday. I want to list the number of views on each item, not just the showcase featured ones, so that I can see what people looked at that day. I know I picked a good color (rose pink like today's earrings) item to feature because it stood out; some of the white and clear items were hard to see. The featured item in my shop had good views, but not on the earrings; next time I won't feature in my shop what I feature in the showcase.