Etsy Seller Interview with Emily of NerdyFit

How NerdyFit got started

Introduce your Etsy shop and tell us your story. How did you begin and decide on what to sell on Etsy, and how do you create your products?

I’m Emily, owner of the now-rebranded Etsy store, Nerdy Fit. My husband and I are huge Warhammer nerds and spend a lot of time gaming. Years ago, I was searching online for a cool t-shirt I could buy my husband for game nights, but I just couldn’t find anything cool. So, I looked into designing something myself using Photoshop and a local printing company. He loved it, and all our gaming friends did, too! So I started creating more designs for our friends. I figured there were other gamers out there who were looking for similar tees for their game nights, so I posted a few designs on Etsy, and it slowly began to take off. Then Christmas came, and we were swamped with orders! I did a lot of research on how to expand and ended up partnering with Printful to help fulfill orders, especially those coming from overseas. They have a great range of blank t-shirts, and the print quality was great. We’ve had nothing but great reviews from our customers, who have found us from all over the world.

Favorite items

What are your favorite items? What makes these so special? Why do you think these items might be selling well?

Our top-selling products right now are our gift tees for painting miniatures. I think these are fun gifts people like to get for loved ones who are miniature-painting obsessed. Over the holiday season, we also had mugs, but these sold out so fast that we haven’t managed to restock them yet.

Getting sales on Etsy

How long did it take for you to earn your first sale and how do you currently attract customers to your Etsy shop?

I got a sale within a few days on Etsy, but that was a total fluke. It took a few months for me to figure out Etsy SEO and list things in a way that would attract customers. The best thing we did was start out with a very specific niche. Back when we started, there really wasn’t anyone selling to the wargaming market, and because we were massive gaming nerds ourselves, we knew what designs would be helpful. Since then, eRank has been invaluable in helping with SEO research, and I’ve started keeping up with Etsy’s marketing tips. Adding videos to each listing has also been a huge boost in views and clicks, as well as making sure each listing has plenty of high-quality pictures. Since we sell t-shirts, I use placeit.net to create quality listing photos.

Managing NerdyFit

How do you manage your shop? Are you running solo or do you have any team members? What tools or services do you use to run your shop and how do you handle fulfillment?

I manage my shop solo, but my husband does help with coming up with design concepts. I have a full-time gig as a copywriter, so my shop is almost completely automated now and I have little input. When an order comes in, it automatically pushes to printful, which takes care of printing and shipping, and then the customer gets an automatic dispatch notification through Etsy. I use Etsy’s in-house marketing and ads, which are all done for me, and I use Facebook’s native marketing software to market on Instagram regularly (though I’ll admit, I’m not great at keeping up to date with this!). Around once a month, I’ll change up the designs in the store and work on my keywords and descriptions to help keep the store active and ranking on Etsy—eRank has been vital for this.

The future of NerdyFit

What goals do you have for your shop in the future?

We’re actually in the process of expanding the store to encompass different hobbies, not just wargaming. We want to create a destination for niche hobby gifts and apparel, so people can find unique gifts that show how much they know the person. It’s taking a lot of time and research to expand, but it means we can grow our nerdy tribe and include more hobby enthusiasts!

Advice for new sellers

What’s your advice for a new seller starting an Etsy shop?

Don’t be afraid to make mistakes. In the beginning, you’ll want everything to be absolutely perfect, but you’ll inevitably make a lot of mistakes and might even get some bad reviews. Don’t let it stop you! Your shop will only improve and grow by learning, tweaking, and changing. Keep a close eye on your SEO and figure out what keywords work best for your products. Etsy is forever changing its SEO policies, so this is always a work in progress.

Some sellers really get inspired by hearing numbers. Feel free to share these if you like.

Question: How much is your monthly revenue?
Answer: So, our stats for last year (total) were: Visits: 15K Orders: 733 Revenue: £15,003. 

Question: What is your shop’s conversion rate?
Answer: 4.9%