A lot of handmade sellers are on Instagram, and know that Instagram is a great way to reach new people who don’t know about their products. . .
but they’re also hoping to generate some sales of course!
And I am guessing… you might be in the same boat!
So today we are going to talk about how to make handmade product sales from your Instagram account.
Because the truth is…it’s not as easy as saying “Hey look! I’m selling this cool product, just click the link in my bio so you can buy it!”
If you want to make sales on Instagram, it comes down to a few small details that don’t necessarily have anything to do with inviting your followers to buy your products.
Let’s dive in.
One common mistake I see handmade sellers make on Instagram is having a feed and pictures like you would see in a Black Friday newspaper ad insert.
For example, their feed might have a close up picture of their new bar of soap with text that says “Check out our lavender calming soap, click the link in my bio to learn more!”
I like to tell the handmade sellers that I work with to think MAGAZINE, not catalog!
Granted… print magazines aren’t as big as they used to be BECAUSE social media has taken over… but whether you still buy them or not, I am sure you’ve sat in an airport, at the beach, in a doctor’s waiting room and flipped through the pages of a magazine before…
Now…we all flip through our Instagram feed instead. But the concept is the same:
People buy and read magazines to learn something, have a bit of fun, and be inspired.
Those three things are what makes you want to get and open up the magazine; not the ads that are inside. THEN, because they have our attention for entertaining us with their content, magazines sell ad space to brands that fit within the content you are already enjoying.
And most of the time the ads don’t just show the product, they fit the product into a scene, or a “feeling.”
That’s exactly what you need to do with your Instagram strategy. Your feed should feel like a magazine.
Let me explain.
Imagine you are curling up on the couch with your favorite magazine, and when you start to page through it, each page has a product picture with a white background, and text underneath saying what it is and who makes it.
Page after page.
After a while, I’m betting you might get up and get a different magazine, because you’re getting a bit bored.
The next magazine you pick up has interesting articles on how to decorate your home, with beautiful pictures of cozy rooms and lovely gardens. One page has a garden scene: a woman is sitting in her backyard, curled up in a chair, and next to her is a flower garden with colorful flowers and beautiful lavender plants in full bloom. The woman looks relaxed and happy. Below the scene is a picture of lavender soap, set in a basket filled with other self-care items, and the caption says “let our new lavender soap transport you to your happy place.”
The picture looks so serene and inviting, that you are motivated to order that soap and give it a try!
What sold you on the soap wasn’t the soap itself, it was the feeling you got looking at the picture, and imagining yourself feeling like the woman in the picture – relaxed and happy.
When you “think magazine,” you are creating posts for your Instagram account that sell a feeling, not a product!
And that will set you apart from other handmade sellers . . . and create an image and feeling that followers will associate with your brand and your products.
So, the first way to make handmade sales on Instagram is to sell a feeling, to sell lifestyle, not a product—by thinking magazine, not catalog!
One thing you may have heard me say before – but it’s worth repeating – is to remember the 80/20 rule.
THIS FREE PLANNER WILL HELP YOU CREATE A SOCIAL MEDIA PLAN FOR YOUR HANDMADE SHOP. KNOW WHAT TO POST, WHEN TO POST IT, AND WHAT TOOLS TO USE!
You want to remember that most of the people on your Instagram feed want to scroll through entertaining, inspiring, and valuable content.
And before you sell, you first need their attention.
The more people read/engage/comment/like your posts, the higher up you rank in THEIR feed (algorithm) – so they start seeing more and more of your posts….
And if 80% of your posts entertain, inspire, and inform, it helps to make sure your followers
Once you develop that trust, then you can post those 20% remaining posts that are more of a pure-sell post.
Don’t forget—you’re still selling in the 80% … just not quite directly.
You don’t need to say BUY NOW in your caption for it to turn into a sale. Think back to our magazine picture of the woman in her peaceful garden. Your 80% posts are creating a feeling, a trust in your brand, and will indirectly generate product sales.
Next I want to talk to you about your one and only “link in bio,” and another common mistake I see shop owners make on Instagram.
Many makers have their Instagram bio link go to their home page, or a certain product page. But . . . if your Call-to-Action (what you’re encouraging people to DO) in each caption is a little different for each post (like one post says” check out this necklace via link in bio”, while the next post says “check out this ring”), then one link won’t take everyone to the exact right place.
And if the reader doesn’t see what they clicked to see, they will click back out, and you will lose a potential sale. People are lazy. They won’t look very hard for what they came for if you don’t make it super easy for them.
The goal of your one and only link in bio is to make the shopping experience easy for the potential buyer—and the easiest way to do this is to create a landing page.
A landing page is a page that will have several links based on what Call-To-Action or CTAs you have talked about on your Instagram posts.
For example, your landing page may have your business logo at the top, and 5 choices for the visitor to click:
You can create a page like this on your website OR if you don’t have one, you can also get apps that will let you do this without the need for your own website at all, great for those of you who sell on Etsy. Here are a few:
All of these eliminate confusion and increase the likelihood that whoever clicks will purchase your products – it’s a shortcut to exactly what they’re looking for!
Most of you are probably aware that you need to engage on Instagram, because that is what Instagram is all about.
But to make sales and get followers, genuine engagement is key.
What this means is, you can’t just scroll through your Instagram feed liking things or posting one word comments like “cute!” or “awesome!”
You need to be genuine and really connect.
Encourage conversations.
Take the time to genuinely reply to what people are saying or asking.
Don’t just engage with people who are on your feed, go and comment on profiles and accounts that are in your industry!
For example, if you sell products for new moms, comment on mom accounts or on mom community accounts on the app.
Many sales also happen in the DMs, so encourage people to DM you for more information in your comments and give them genuine advice on how your products may help them.
Genuine engagement builds connections with your followers and creates trust in your brand—which in turn results in sales of your products.
When you sit down to plan your IG calendar every quarter (which is how often I think you should do this) and decide what you will be promoting and when over the next 3 months –
look at these two questions to create/plan/organize promos that really engage your readers:
What’s going on in your world would is anything that’s going on in *your* business worth sharing and leveraging – things like new product launches, special product collections, and limited release products.
What’s going on in their world means designing promos that fit in with what they’re going through in their life at that time -here are a few examples:
Ideal Customer: New moms
Life Stage/life event: New baby is born, mom feeling overwhelmed
Promo: New mom pamper yourself gift basket
Ideal Customer: University students
Time of year: 1 month before classes start
Promo: Academic planner giveaway and 10% off
Next, when it comes to implementing your promotions – go all in. It’s important to plan “organized” promotions vs. random promotions that consist of a single post on a random Wednesday and then call it a day.
An organized promotion will be on your content calendar so that you can build up to it and tease it, have a set promotion period (could be a few days for short promos or even up to a couple of weeks for longer more important ones), and then a wrap up when it’s done (where you announce “last days before the sale ends”, or “only a few products left before the next batch” etc..)
I guess my point is that it takes more than posting just ONE post or graphic and announcing in the caption what the promo is to get results. You need multiple posts, over multiple days to give yourself a chance to maximize your reach AND to get it in front of your engaged followers more than once.
Doing it in this manner will generate more interest and give more people a chance to enter it, which will generate more sales and PR.
If you can afford it, advertising can also generate sales.
I recommend starting with a small budget; experiment to see what works and what doesn’t.
Regardless of how much or little you spend, I always recommend a retargeting ad strategy, which means that your ads are displayed only to people who have previously engaged with your posts.
This way your ads will be going to people who are interested in your product and already know your brand- and these are people who are much more likely to click and purchase.
Instagram can be a great way to increase your sales and connect with new customers.
But it also can get a bit overwhelming at times, and trying to figure out how to do everything right can take forever.
If you’d like to dive deeper and learn how to make the most out of it for your shop – check out the Instagram For Makers course inside the Tizzit HQ course library.
GET THE Instagram for makers CoURSE
GROW YOUR AUDIENCE AND START MAKING SALES for your shop USING INSTAGRAM
Each video in the course contains step by step instructions geared towards handmade shop owners. . . tips to help you gain followers, connect with them and create trust in your brand, and – of course – generate product sales!
So be sure to check out the Tizzit HQ Instagram for Makers course – our step-by-step course to turn strangers to followers to customers using Instagram.
Until next time, au revoir!
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I was in search of ways to advertise my website on my Instagram. I got to know some of the fantastic ways to do so through your blog. Liked your suggestion of posting engaging content rather than only-sell post and posting about what is going in viewers world.
Hello Bony, we are more than happy to hear our tips helped you!