2019 Etsy Review — Can You Make Real Money On Etsy?

This is a comprehensive Etsy Review. I first came into contact with the Etsy website more than a year ago when I was searching for ways to make money online. The idea of making my own Etsy shop, creating products, and selling them sounded really good. You might’ve been in the same position.

We know they sell some excellent and unique products that have satisfied customers all over the world but you might be wondering if you’ll get that same level of satisfaction when you sell on Etsy. If that’s the case keep reading because I’m going to tell you the ins and outs about selling on Etsy in this review.

So wondering if…

  • Etsy is worth the money?
  • it’s valuable for people who just want to make money with Etsy?
  • Etsy is Legit?

Good News!

I’ll be sharing:

  • what Etsy is
  • what the pros and cons of Etsy are
  • who can benefit from using Etsy
  • what kind of tools and features Etsy provides you with
  • what support Etsy provides
  • how much Etsy costs
  • what my personal take on Etsy is
  • The Verdict
  • Alternatives

RealDigitalSuccess.com presents the…

2019 Etsy review


Name: ETSY
Website: www.etsy.com
Founders/Owners: Rob Kalin, Haim Schopik, Jared Tarbell, Chris Maguire
Price: Free — $10/month, A new plan is coming this year.
Overall ranking: 6/10


Etsy, product overview

Esty is an online marketplace on which you buy and sell handmade and vintage products. You can find almost everything on there from coffee mugs to handmade jewelry. It’s what you could call a marketplace for people into arts and crafts.

How can you make money on Etsy?
Etsy also makes it possible to start an Etsy shop and sell your own products.

Is it a reliable way to make money online? …Let’s find out!


The Good & The Bad

The good

Pro #1 You can work from home
Everything on Etsy happens online so you can work from anywhere. No fixed hours, no fixed location.
Pro #2  It’s a creative outlet
Etsy’s target audience is people looking for unique handmade items. Etsy can be an enormous creative outlet and you are getting paid to do it.
Pro #3  Promoted listings
Get your listings in front of viewers with promoted listings. If your products are good and you can show them to the right audience promoted listings can get you a lot of sales.

The bad

Con #1 Etsy stores generally don’t perform well in search engines
Most Etsy stores are always at the bottom of search engine results which means they don’t get any organic traffic. This means you’re at the mercy of the traffic on Etsy.

Con #2 Forced to compete with competition lowering prices

The traffic that’s on Etsy is insane but there’s also a lot of competition which isn’t always good for sales. A lot of people try to compete by lowering their prices which results in you being forced to do that too because Etsy doesn’t provide you with the tools to create a solid brand.

Con #3 Very limited scaling capabilities
Since all the products are handmade it will take a long time to acquire a decent sum of money unless you sell really expensive products. This makes it very hard to scale your business.


Who is the Etsy for?

You should try Etsy out if:

  • You like creating your own products
  • You want to have a side income
  • You will take at serious and put in the time and energy

You shouldn’t try Etsy out if:

  • You need money immediately
  • You want to make a 5 figure monthly income
  • If you aren’t into crafting your own products

Etsy tools & training

Etsy App

Managing your show from your phone
Communicate with customers
Manage your orders and edit your listings
Analytics to optimize your store and

Shop builder

Create a custom store (No coding needed)
Upload pictures and create a description
Banner templates
features listing offers

Etsy Marketing

Get some eyes on your store
Promoted listings
Send coupons to Etsy users and draw their attention.


Etsy Support

Seller Handbook
Articles containing everything you need to know to sell products on Etsy.

Community
Connect with others on the Etsy forum or create a team and help each other with selling products.

Help center
Get answers to your questions at the help center.

Online Labs
Live webinars hosted by the Etsy admin


Etsy price

There are two plans and a third one will be introduced later this year.

Etsy Standard, Free
Etsy Plus,   $10/ month
Etsy Premium (Will be available later this year)

Etsy also charges $0,20 per listing and a 5% commission per sale.


My personal take on Etsy

I’ve seen a lot of Etsy reviews based on if it’s possible to make money on it. Most of the reviews say that it’s possible to make money on Etsy but they bash them at the same time because of the limited capabilities.

Most of these reviews are really old because Etsy has come a long way over the years. They have the Etsy plus plan that comes with a lot of benefits including having your own domain name and more styling options.

Honestly…  If you aim to make money online even though it has improved a lot I wouldn’t recommend it. You have to market your shop which takes a lot of time and also has to create the products. When I look at the handmade products that do well on Etsy I can’t imagine how you can scale your business without having to work like a madman 24/7.

Most of the marketing tools are also geared towards Etsy users and they cost money. You’ll get coupons for promoted listings when you purchase the Etsy Plus plan but I don’t know how rewarding that is in the long term.

Seeing how much Etsy has changed over the years I’m curious to see what the new premium will have in store for us. I’ll update this review the moment it comes out.


Etsy overall overview

Name: ETSY
Website: www.etsy.com
Founders/Owners: Rob Kalin, Haim Schopik, Jared Tarbell, Chris Maguire
Price: Free — $10/month, a new plan is coming this year.
Overall ranking: 6/10


Verdict

What does the jury of Real Digital Succes think:

Can You Make Money With Etsy..?   Yes!
Is It The Ideal Way To Make Money Online?   No!

It’s not an ideal way to make money because:

  • It’s hard to scale because you make hand made products
  • It’s hard to do SEO for an Etsy shop
  • Not alot of branding options to differentiate yourself

Alternatives for Etsy

I’ve looked at Etsy in the past as a way to make money online with one of my hobbies but I ended up not picking it because it’s not scalable and the marketing options are limited.

You might be at that same point while reading this so I’m going to show you the platform I found right after that which completely changed my life.

This training platform I found helped me with:

  • Finding a way to combine my hobby with earning money online
  • Creating a scalable business
  • Creating passive income with the help of recurring commissions and high website rankings.

It’s called Wealthy Affiliate. It’s an online marketing training platform with +1.4million users on it either making money online or on their way to making money online with creating content about what they love.

Not only me but others have also benefitted from this platform. Check this out.


Click Here To Check Out My Wealthy Affiliate Review


That’s all for now. If you have any questions or you just want to show some love leave a comment in the comment section and I’ll get back to you as soon as possible.

See you at the next post!

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About Rogier

I’m an Affiliate Marketing and SEO veteran, Blogger, and Pinterest Marketer based in The Netherlands. On this website, I share my learnings about online entrepreneurship, and digital resources while enjoying life to the fullest.

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