I knew it !!

I have finally discovered a way to prove that etsy is lying it's lying A$$ off about the number of shops on the site.  I had been daily tracking the number of shops out of curiosity for a while when I noticed one day it nearly doubled over night back in July. 
1,448,089 shops found for 7/09/2019

2,845,072 shops found for 7/10/2019
Now, I knew immediately that something was very fishy with this but I wasn't sure what exactly they were trying to pull.  

One has(had) always been able to type a blank space in the etsy search bar and then select find shops containing " " and that is/was supposed to pull up all "Active" shops which previously had been defined as shops with at least 1 listing for sale, you know actively selling.  

I knew that it was not actually possible for over a Million shops to magically open overnight.  😐 I suspect that etsy has done this to appear more popular/occupied/active/valuable than it truly is, I highly suspect that they are pumping the numbers to dazzle the board and shareholders.  However, I have for months now thought that it was incredibly suspect but I had no way to prove it so speculate as I might all I had was a theory.

I have been busy moving house, remodeling a house, vending at events, you know living my life, but in the back of my mind I have continued to think about and be bothered by what I consider to be fraudulent representation by etsy of the number of shops active on site.

This morning after doing my regular number check I used the "sort by" option and after changing from relevancy to recent to alphabetical I had the Ah-HA moment and proof.  Right there on my screen when I switched to alphabetical it shows empty shops, as in shops with nothing for sale, a lot of them.  On the first page alone of the 10 shops shown 6 of them are empty and after clicking in and looking at them they are looonnnggg empty like last review 7 years ago, or only ever 3 sales years ago.  😕

I still have no exact reason for etsy's pumping up the numbers but I do at least now have proof that they are falsifying the number shops on site and I know I'm not crazy they are lying.  On the second page out of 10 shops listed only 3 actually have items for sale. 😐

Your desperation is showing. . .

Sometimes I really want to shout at other etsy sellers, "your desperation is showing".  I know it sounds rude or mean but it's actually quite true and a big factor in what is wrong with etsy's search results.  😐

I have dug in and did some research in the form of several searches and checking things within the search results and what I have found is really disappointing.  😕

There are many many sellers who are mis-tagging and mis-using attributes which contributes to the bad search results because it is purposeful mis-information.  

For example in my "chainmaille barrette" search recall the bracelets, well click into the listing and check the tags and that seller has tagged the bracelet with the terms barrette, necklace, and key chain.  So the listings appears in many more searches than it should because the seller has purposely mis-tagged the item as things it is not. 

The same is true for the mis-use/abuse of the attributes, etsy has stated that the holiday attributes should be used for when an item would be used or themed.  So christmas trees and christmas themed items should be attributed to the holiday christmas but things that simply could be christmas gifts should not be because virtually anything could be a christmas gift but not be at all christmas related.  For example when "valentine's day" option was removed from certain jewelry sub-catagories and styles many sellers had a forum freak out the admins tried over and over to explain the distinction and many refused to accept it or follow the edict.

These things have led me to the conclusion the bad search results are only partially etsy's fault and largely due to poor seller behavior, specifically seller desperation to be seen even in searches that do not fit their items, basically shoving things down people's throats even though they know perfectly that they are misrepresenting their things, clogging the system with bad results, driving shoppers away from the site and it's "broken search". 😒

It is the very definition of "cutting of your nose to spite your face" or "shooting yourself in the foot" if you prefer. 

The real problem lies in there is no real solution either etsy has to hire teams of people to comb through a gazillion listings and delete/remove the inappropriate tags and attributes or sellers have to grow up stop trying to game the system and take responsibility and fix their sh*t.  I do not see either of those things happening. 😞

RainbowMaille on Sale. . .

RainbowMaille on ACMoore Marketplace

My A.C.Moore marketplace shop is having a 20% off sale on everything, no minimum purchase, no qualifiers or requirements, just 20% off everything. 

Oh etsy. . .

Ok, so I have complained about etsy's search being not so intelligent for AI and I have complained about etsy's "help" not being very helpful so here's what happens when those to issues collided recently.  😕

I opened a "help ticket" with etsy to report the following :

Etsy search regularly returns really bad results. The forums are full of threads about search being broken but I'm not talking about the "Clumping".

I am talking about search returning results that are not what was searched for.

I searched for "chainmaille barrette" and the top of the first page only actually has 1 correct result, the rest are not chainmaille or not barrettes. Seriously, the houston astros bracelets is infringement, the loop deloop hair clip is wire wrap not chainmaille, the toni chain maile tutorial is a tutorial for a necklace (it's not a finished good, it's not a barrette) the rest are scale flowers not chainmaille.

I even provided a screen shot to prove/illustrate the randomness of their bad search results.  Not surprisingly I was disappointed with the response I received in return, also not surprisingly it took 3 damned days to get a response.  

Hello,

I'm sorry to hear that the search is not returning results consistent to your search. I know you have been with us for 6 years so you know how to search for the items you are looking for.

I'm noting your feedback and will be sharing it with the team to consider for a future update. Please know we take comments from the community to heart, and we make many changes to the site based on what we hear.

For legal reasons, I have to point out that any ideas members share with us are non-proprietary to them. You can read more in our Terms of Use. 

Don't hesitate to reach back out to me if I can help with anything else. 

Best wishes,
xxxxxx(name removed)
Etsy Support

So ya' know the typical awe thanks for pointing that out but we don't plan to do anything about it, non-answer reply. Although, this is the first one that has come with this particular "legal" notation.  I, of course, responded and pointed out this is not just an issue from the buyer perspective but from a seller perspective as well. 

It's not just the buyer perspective of not finding what I'm looking for, it is also a problem as a shop owner as I have "search terms" in my stats and clicks for phrases that I do not have a single word of in my listings. :-/

I noticed in the last few weeks I have seen "search terms" in my shop stats such as :
"in a world full of grandmas be a nana"
"beating on a dime"
"mail order hat pattern 3454"
"metal wall art made in israel"

Honestly, the only one of those that makes any kind of sense is the "metal wall art made in israel" as I do sell metal wall art, HOWEVER I am located in the USA not Israel and I do not ship internationally. I turned off etsy ads because of it.

The following day I received the following response :

Hi there, 

Thanks for your response, with more detailed search terms from your shop stats. My name is XXXXX and I'm a Support Specialist here at Etsy. 

First, I'll certainly be passing your email along as feedback for our team that works on Search. This is something we're always working to improve, so it's helpful to see examples like the ones you've provided. 

I do want to note that it's possible that your items were appearing in a buyers "Recently viewed" or "Similar to recently viewed" which appears at the bottom of a search page. If they clicked on your listing in either of these sections, the original term they entered into search would still appear in your shop stats, even if your listing did not appear in the results for these search terms. For example, I've just done a search for "in a world full of grandmas be a nana", and I only saw one page of search results and none of your items were in those results. However, I do still see all of my recently viewed items at the bottom of the page, which have nothing to do with this search term. 

I do realize this isn't ideal, so I'll be noting this in my feedback as well. 

Please do let me know if you have any other questions. I'm glad to help. 

Best,

xxxxxx(name removed)

So apparently, it is possible to not even be in the search results and yet end up with clicks tied to the search term, it makes no sense to me but there you have it, an "etsy explanation" as usual it explains nothing. 

Etsy transparent as Mud.

October Pink Sale

It's breast cancer awareness month so I'm having a "Pink Sale" as in things that are pink or have pink in them are on sale, 15% off thru the end of the month.  

I give up. . .

I have never had the best search placement on etsy, no matter how I re-work my SEO, regardless of keywords, location, shop policies, about section, 5 star rating be damned.  😐  Nothing I have ever done or tried has had any real impact on my placement except promoted listings which etsy has now ruined.  They billed me $1.28 for a single click the last day even though I had a $1 daily budget, I had to turn them off.  😠

I have seen a lot of threads in the etsy forums about search being broken.  Honestly, etsy's search is broken in many ways, they killed the "fairness" guideline, they turned loose AI which was not ready, and now they are shoving ads everywhere. First, the fairness guidelines were there to limit the number of times a shop could be on the same page, now there is no limit on the number of times the same shop can be on a single page so you get "clumping" whole pages of the same shop over and over and over and over. . . Second, the AI sounds like a good idea except it doesn't work it still needs to "learn" to be "intelligent" it's totally artificial but not smart as it provides really bad results some times.  Finally, since the new "advertising" crap-ness they are shoving ads everywhere they can, more rows of ads than there used to be and ads for things unrelated in searches with less results. 😕

So I searched for "chainmaille barrette" and this is what came up 

I feel the need to point out that there is only 1 actual "chainmaille barrette" at the top of this search result, see that row of "ads" at the top not a single one, scale flowers on clips are not chain and not barrettes.  See that houston astros bracelet that is infringement and hello a bracelet is not a barrette.  Also as pretty as the loop de loop thing is, it's wire wrap not chainmaille of any kind.  😕  Plus what the ? is with the tutorial for a necklace, it's not a finished good, it's not a barrette, it is not really related to the search "chainmaille barrette" at all except by 1 word.  

You may be wondering why I care, well this is the type of thing that keeps my listings buried.   In the small search "chainmaille barrette" there are only 78 results, I have 11 listings for chainmaille barrettes so you'd think I could get more than 1 on the first page, but nope.  Plus to add insult to injury the one single listing of mine on the first page of that search is in the very bottom row, it is quite literally the very last thing on the page.  However the infringing shop has 3 f*cking bracelets on the first page of the barrette search.

The truly crappy part is it's purely an etsy thing, I know my keywords/SEO are on target because if you do a Google search for chainmaille barrette and select images I am right there in the first row and the third row and the fourth row and even my instagram post is in the top half of the page.  So etsy hates me and buries my listings on purpose.  If you try a larger search like chainmaille earrings which has 6,500 results my first appearance is 1 listing on page 4 and 1 on page 5 and 1 on page 8, in spite of the fact that I have 20 earring listings and set them for free shipping which was supposed to get priority placement.  😕

In light of all that it is probably no surprise that I have become rather disillusioned with etsy in the past couple of years, unfortunately the new A.C.Moore marketplace seems to be really slow taking off so I'm stuck with etsy but I have cut promotions and the etsy plus subscription.

P.S.  I have no changed the barrette listings over to free shipping and miraculously 10 out of 11 are now on the first page.  😏

what's up with that?!?!

Since the start of the new etsy "advertising" crap-ness I have been getting some really weird search terms. . .like really weird.

"in a world full of grandmas be a nana"
"beating on a dime"
"metal wall art made in israel"
"mail order hat pattern 3454"

The only one that makes any kind of sense is the 'metal wall art' but when you add the made in Israel and I'm located in the USA. . .well you can see how it doesn't apply, as for the rest of them they are nonsensical the only words that are even in my listings are articles like in/on, a, be.  

It's total BS that my items would even be shown in such searches that obviously do not apply, the AI (artificial intelligence) is not living up to what the I stands for as this is the opposite of intelligence.  😠  It makes no sense to serve shoppers such obviously wrong search result because it will not lead to purchases, furthermore, the more an item is shown without being clicked, favorite'd or purchased it degrades the listing quality score. 😕  

I think etsy is purposely degrading our listing's quality scores so that they can increase the per click charges across the board, yes I am accusing them of manipulating things to maximize their profits as a platform at the cost of individual shops, site functionality, and buyer service.