Networking for Your Handmade Business
So how do you create a business from scratch and keep it going? We will tell you the hardest thing in life we ever had to do (besides parenting) is running our own business and be successful at it. I mean really considering this as our only income source and not looking back. That's tough. Running a business is easy. You have an idea for a product or service and you start selling it. It's getting customers to buy what you are offering and sustaining your business is tough. It's not that easy today to run your business. You need to consider social media marketing, have a strategy who you are targeting and be consistent. Oh, and sell your products too.
So here's some advice we can give you based on experience. It may not work for you, but it is our business strategy that creates sales each day and now we have a rhythm. So here it is:
- Have a website (not a free website) but a paid website like Shopify. It's a great website especially if you have actual products to sell. Shopify is really super helpful in getting you going. Don't be afraid to reach out.
- Create a social media platform. It can get overwhelming so we would recommend creating 2 social media - Facebook and Instagram are the best platforms we use.
- From your social media platforms, start networking but be intentional. For example, our audience is the BBQ and Real Estate community. It seems to give us the most bang for our buck.
- Create a following organically. Don't buy your followers. This will take time. We were able to create a following from 1 to 1000 within 4 months but that is posting daily. So post daily.
- Best part of Facebook and Instagram is that they are connected. So if you posted on Instagram you can share it on Facebook instantly so you don't need to do that twice.
That's basically it as a foundation. There's more to our business but the majority of our marketing is what you just read. Our advice is be patient, be consistent and be resourceful. It will get you far.