I am going to be doing an occasional series of posts with ideas for craft sellers on how to keep inspired and motivated.
Many craft sellers have times when they may be struggling to get sales, and other times when they feel Smashing Targets – Motivational Ideas for Craft Sellers
In each episode of this series I will give some ideas and thoughts to help you stay motivated, fid inspiration and, hopefully, find a little peace of mind.
This episode is “Smashing Targets”.
This idea can really help you feel motivated to continue growing your craft business. It is very easy, costs next to nothing and those who have tried it find it very motivational (and it can be fun too).
All you need to do is create a list of targets for your craft business. Here are some examples:
- Reach 10 sales, 25 sales, 50 sales and so on…
- Get an average of 1 sale per day for a calendar month
- Reach a run of 2 sales every day for 10 consecutive days
- Get my Etsy shop up to 50 listings
- Reach 100 shop views in a week
- Reach 10 reviews in my Amazon Handmade shop
- Have attended 20 craft shows
- Acquire 100 followers for my Facebook business page
- Get my first positive feedback, 10th feedback, 20th etc
- Get featured on a blog
- Have 20 Pinterest boards with at least 10 pins on each
- Get a sale from Australia or New Zealand
- Reach $100 of revenue in my Etsy shop
- Reach £100 of profit from my eBay shop
- Create 10 new patterns for my knitting shop
Be sure to adjust all the figures to suit your business model. A shop selling high priced, time consuming items will probably have a lot fewer sales than someone selling low priced, quick to make items. Whether 1 sale a week, 10 sales or 100 sales is a major milestone will therefore vary.
Increment the targets in whatever steps you like. You can choose whether you have small steps between targets or more challenging larger ones, or a mixture.
Start with targets that you are pretty confident you will soon reach. Then expand to add more challenging ones. If you start with targets that you will not hit for ages you could become demotivated.
After using targets for a while you will become better at setting ones that are both achievable in a reasonable time, but also challenging.
Write your list of targets in your planner, a notebook, a document on your computer or anywhere else – just be sure it is somewhere you can find it again easily! Some people like to have some of their current targets visible, near to where they work, to motivate them onwards.
When you achieve a target you add the date to your list, tick it off, cross it out, delete it or whatever way you would like to record you have achieved it.
You can then add more targets to keep you going.
If you like you could think of rewards for hitting various targets.
For example:
- Have a take-out when I hit 250 sales!
- Put £1 in my “Saving for a Treat” box when I hit a new sales goal
- Buy the fancy knitting needles I want when I reach £100 profit in a calendar month
- Eat a square of chocolate when I hit each target
Some people like to create little charts to track some targets, and tick, colour in or stick a gold star in the box under each achievement reached.
I create target charts in my yearly planners. I colour in squares as I hit the various targets. Seeing the charts fill up reminds me of how far I have come and spurs me onwards!
Setting targets to reach encourages you to keep creating, marketing and generally pushing forward. And when a nice target is very near it can be a great way to encourage you to spend a little while longer on working rather than lazing in front of the tv!
Reaching each new target can be very satisfying, especially if it has taken a while to get there. You know that every target reached shows your hard work is paying off.
When you reach a particularly exciting target you can share the good news with your followers on social media too.
Good luck hitting your targets!