Tips for Successful Shop and Design Promotion, Part I

Spreading the word is essential when it comes to letting people know about your Shop and designs. Here’s what you need to know to make your marketing and promoting efforts a success!

Next to getting keeping in constant touch with your audience, there are countless opportunities to improve the visibility of your designs and Shops. Let’s state the obvious first: the more you communicate (if done right), the better your chances of reaching people – and ultimately to sell your gear.

Choosing your social network channel

Once you have a fair enough idea of the direction you want to go in (design style, Shop theme, etc.), it’s important to find out which social networks are a good fit for you. Every channel – Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Pinterest or Twitter – caters to a different kind of audience. Apart from getting your ideas in tune with your audience, it’s important to choose the right social network to align with your strategy.

Facebook has the largest number of users, so it’s a wise choice for anyone to reach out to mass numbers of people. Joining groups and becoming an active member of groups will help you get noticed within your community.

Go easy on the things you share

Always remember that Facebook etc. are not direct sales platforms! Social media channels offer a great way of getting recognition for your designs and Shops, so don’t waste this opportunity. The things you publish should inspire your fans to follow you and look forward to your next post. You don’t achieve this with blatant, noisy advertising. Avoid publishing screenshots of your Shops or creating some form of razzmatazz in the vein of “Check out my brand new designs NOW!”

Alternative ways to advertise

Nicely-drafted sketches of new design ideas, your printed products in real-life situations (you can e.g. use PlaceIt images), and links to related articles or video clips serve to entertain your audience. Whenever possible, try affording a glimpse behind the scenes. For more information, we’ve already shed light on how to effectively use Facebook marketing and Instagram.

Interaction is key

On social networks, interaction with users has gold standard! See your posts as a door opener to exchange and share, and not as a direct means of promotion. Share thought-provoking posts and use references to trending topics, storytelling and sweepstakes to add value to ​​your products. With a bit of luck, these measures may even serve to become that little bit viral.

We’d like to wish you the best of success with your marketing endeavors! Check this space to learn more about paid advertising and individual promotions in the second part of the series coming soon. Stay tuned!

What’s your experience with promoting? And are there any other topics you want to learn more about? Please let us know in the comments!