Craft Room Crushes - Thanks Pinterest!

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Materials everywhere, glue gun sticking to everyone and every thing, pieces of fabric found in every corner of the house and you haven't worn clean clothes in days. We've all been there, locked away in our lovely craft room for hours and days on end, completing orders only to realize that suddenly, it looks like a disaster zone with no hope of it ever recovering!

Never fear. With oodles of craft room and storage inspiration available in the form of Pinterest, you are bound to spot something that will make your life alot easier, and even if you're not in need of some craft room help, I never cease to get bored by looking at these images and wishing for a similar space to work in, if anything they're often a source of inspiration.

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I'm literally drooling over that ribbon holder and I need it in my life! Santa if you're listening! Or you could get your DIY head on and try some of these nifty techniques below.

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There are no words for the next clever idea, its beautiful, practical and what about that awesome turquoise colour. Whats not to love. If you're lucky enough to have the space to convert a walk in wardrobe, this could be a possibility for you.

For the button hoarder in you! Never lose a button again. This is a mighty use of space which you normally might not think of to use. I also wouldn't mind getting my hands on that handy contraption right underneath it!

And finally, some beautiful office spaces, for those of you who work from home full time. Lush, are they not?

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Now, go sort your crafty office space out! 

I know you're itching to!

Introduction to Anna - Pinterest Co-ordinator

Hi!
My name is Anna and in the new Etsy Ireland Admin Team I will be looking after the Crafty Ireland Pinterest Page, which you can already follow by going to www.pinterest.com/etsyireland.
The page will be run as a collection of boards, each of them inspired by a theme, very much like Etsy Treasuries really. Although you won't be able to pin directly into the page, you can certainly re-pin from it!

I'm hoping to make this page a promotional tool for the Etsy Ireland Team members not only to get to know each other, but also to make our products more visible to a wider public.
As the co-ordinator of this page, my intention is to be able to pin as many of you and your products as possible, according to the idea or theme I'm working on. The themes are very much inspired by the main upcoming events, and once I have chosen one, I search the group for items tagged with words related to that theme, and also with the tag 'craftyirelandteam'. After search, my choice is purely based on the images of your products that you have listed on your shop - I don't even look at the name of the shops until I finish the board, so please don't take it personally if your products do not happen to be pinned at a certain time of in a certain board.

If you are interested in this project I will need your co-operation, so please make sure of the following to increase your chances of being pinned in the boards:

• Upload beautiful, interesting pictures of your products - stunning images is what we're after if we want to seduce the eye and attract attention...!
• TAG ALL your products with the 'craftyirelandteam' tag - this is EXTREMELY important as it is the quickest and most successful way (if not the only way) for me to find you in the Etsy universe.
• Make sure your product title and tags are descriptive, appropriate and updated for the next upcoming event (for example: I've seen some images which would have been suitable for the theme I'm working on at the moment - Valentine's Day - but the items still have Christmas as a tag so I just can't use them!
• Encourage every Irish Etsy Seller to join the Etsy Ireland Team, if they haven't yet, as the more products available to pin the better the boards will look. 
• Invite everyone you know to visit www.pinterest.com/etsyireland and check our Pinterest Page on a regular basis.

I'm working on some other ideas, which I will put to you shortly, so make sure you visit the Etsy Ireland pages (discussion forum, blog and so on) regularly.

If you would like a bit more about me you're welcome to check me out in my Etsy shop profile!

Best wishes

Anna (annamonaldi.etsy.com)

Craft around the clock

Fancy getting stuck in??????????

Hi Everyone,


We are in need of some new Admin members for the team.  If you would like to volunteer your brains and your time to help the Etsy Ireland Team please drop me an email to sueatkilmeedy@eircom.net 


New members are welcome to apply too!


The positions required are to run the following sections:

• Getting to Know You
• A weekly Treasury involving another Etsy Team.
  
• Treasury Coordinator
• Responsbile for adding your own Etsy Ireland Team Treasury and others done by team members to the blog on a weekly basis.
  
• Pinterest Coordinator
• We have set up an Etsy Ireland page and we need someone to oversee it.
  
• Flickr Coordinator
  
• Facebook Coordinator

So if you feel up to the challenge and are interested please drop me a line.


Sue

15 Tips for Using Pinterest

I mentioned last week that I would write up a guide to Pinterest, it seems like my Timeline and Blogging articles were popular so I might as well continue imparting my nerdy skills. If you are at all involved with crafts/design you will probably have heard of Pinterest, that is if you are not already a member. It's a website  where people share their taste via virtual pin boards, basically it's like bookmarking with pictures in a shared community. For designers its an amazing resource for two reasons, one it's fantastic for research and information; I've learned tons of new techniques for both crafts and computers since joining. Secondly it's as a way of sharing your own creations, I pin most of my blog posts and some of my etsy listings so my followers (and virally millions of others) can see them.  Even though it has one twentieth the users as Twitter it generates nearly the same referrals, which just shows you the power it has to generate traffic for yourr brand/website. I've been addicted since before Christmas (go here if you would like to follow me) so I've learned a few things along the way:

1. Set up an account;

For some weird reason the site is still invite only, but you can either request one when you go to Pinterest, or if you leave your email in the comments section I can send you an invitation.

2. Don't just repin; 

There are two ways to pin; either by repinning an item that someone else has pinned or by pinning something new to the site. After you've been on the site a while you will see lots of the same tutorials floating around, the community depends on people adding fresh items or it's gets stale very fast. Some of the hardcore Pinners say that you should contribute 1 new pin for every 5 that you repin. But I'm gonna be realistic and say that I do 1 for every 10, I see way too many cool things not to. You can install the pin button on your tool bar that makes pinning cool stuff from the internet really easy.  

3. Pin with the correct link; 

After a while you will notice that not everyone knows how to use Pinterest properly and that some images don't link to the proper site, as a user this is insanely headwrecking!! Please don't be one of those users. for instance if you are on a blog and you see a great post, don't just pin the whole site and click the picture you like, you have to click into the link of that individual blog post and then click your 'pin it' button. Otherwise other people will be brought to the main site rather than that specific post. I hate it when I see a pin for a fantastic tutorial and then I can't find the page. Another thing that people do is pin images directly from Googe images, giving that as a referral link rather than the website, leading people to a dead end, which is also really annoying and breaks the rules of Pinterest.

4. Find a lost pin;

If you get stuck in the above situation but you really want to find the source there is a way. Right click on the pin, then 'open the image in new tab', right click on that and 'save as'. Open up Google Images an drop the file into the search bar, it will then give you a list of sites that this image has appeared on (this is also a good way to see is anyone stealing your images online without permission).

5. Organise your brain and your browsing;

I used to use bookmarks but I really hated them as I always lost sites or forgot what I named them. Pinterest is fantastic for sorting out this kind of information. I have a borad for loads of helpful articles for selling online that includes loads of marketing tips that I can refer back to when I need them. The same goes for card making, sewing tips and cookery. Now when I sit down to make cards I take a look at my board first and scan for inspiration (just like I do with my scrap booking magazines). I also keep a cookery board, so if I can't think of anything to make for dinner I can take a peek at my board and see if anything takes my fancy. I use Pinterest as a place to store ideas until I need them. 

6. Add text to your image;

This is something I haven't quite gotten in the habit of doing yet, but I see it used a lot to great effect. If you are doing a blog post that you intend to pin, or something useful that you would expect others to pin then add text to one of the images. For instance for my blogging article I made images to go with the piece and included the phrase '20 blogging tips' in the picture. There is a pin description, but sometimes people leave this blank, for these instances your pin will still have an explanation embedded into the image. Another tip I read was also to include your website address in the image. This has two benefits; 1. If the link gets lost along the way or someone pins it incorrectly then people can still find your site. 2. It creates brand awareness on Pinterest, if your posts get popular people will start to recognise that brand. 

7. The ins and outs of linking to FB and Twitter;

I have to raise my hand and say I learned this info the hard way. In my settings I linked my account to my Facebook timeline, thinking it would show on my page; not knowing that it would update all my friends about each pin (can I add that I'm addicted so that's a lot of pins). When pinning something it gives you the optiont o share on Facebook and Twitter, you can do this sporadically so you don't spam all your friends. At the start I was frustrated that I couldn't share my business page, but I figured out how to do it. After you pin something a box appears asking if you want to share your pin, click the Facebook one, then go to your page in the drop down menu. 

8. Write good descriptions;
Writing a good description makes it easier for people to search for this item. Even though it's tempting to write 'amazeballs' as the descriptions, ''chocolate sponge with caramel glaze,they are totally amazeballs cookery# baking# cake# chocolate#' will mean that more people will find it. I must admit that when I'm repinning I don't always edit them to make them better for searching, but it's worth the effort. You can also use the @ and # symbols like you do on Twitter.

9. New profiles;
Pinterest just changed their profile layout recently, and you can now choose what image represents your board. Just click the main image and choose your cover image from your pins. Pinterest users are very visual so try to curate your profile like you would an Etsy treasury, I thought about what images and colours matched each other. Also make sure to add all of your relevant links to your profile, I've stated following lots of new blogs and Facebook pages because I've been interested in their taste of Pinterest. I also added my business name in brackets after my own name just in case people don't know me as Ruth.

10. Find out who is pinning you:
I pin quite a few of my blog posts, but other people pin them too, and it's nice too see what is popular. Just type in www.pinterest.com/source/yourwebsitehere/ and you will see all the pins that link to your site.

11. Be Seasonal;
Every time a new holiday/season rolls around Pinterest is flooded with pins for that event, so at Christmas and Valentines there are endless recipes, present ideas, craft tutorials and shopping guides. If you are trying to promote your own seasonal wares or articles make sure to post them early so that they have time to circulate. Or if you like writing craft how-to's then think about the seasons ahead of time and write up some tutorials geared towards these holidays.

12. Share your profile;
Add links to your Pinterest on your blog and business page. Promote it just as much as the other sites that you are part of, if someone finds you on one platform they will want to know where else you are. Make it easy for people to follow you. I even mention that I'm addicted to Pinterest in my twitter profile. You can also add a link to your account to your email signature. Recently I started using social networking icons on my business cards and labels, and on my latest batch I added the P to represent Pinterest.

13. Add the Pin It button to your posts
Sometimes you will see a little red Pin It button on blog posts, this is just like a facebook or twitter sharing button. You can go here to get your button and just paste the html into you post template so that it appears in each of your blog posts like a signature. You can find this in Settings, and then go to blog posts, and paste in the html.

14. Pinterest is a community
You are able to like and comment on pins just like on Facebook. To take part in the community more comment on other peoples pins to interact with them. You can also use the ' symbol to tag another user if you see something that you think they might like, or to let them know you are talking about them. I must admit that I'm guilty of not doing this, but I'm very excited when i do get a comment because it happens so rarely!

15. Set a timer/limit;
Be warned Pinterest is incredibly addictive, and time can easily fritter away. Because of the nature of the site it always leads you to more sites, with more cool stuff, with other links, and so on. They estimate that the average regular user spends 1 hr 17 minutes on it per day. To stop yourself whiling away the hours looking a pretty things set a deadline for yourself, trust me I've learned the hard way.

Helpful Links:
Pinterest deconstructed infographic
Guide to Pinterest infographic
Marketing tips for Pinterest
How to find the original source on Pinterest
7 Ways to use Pinterest
and saving the best til last...
The ultimate guide to Pinterest