Small Shop Lab
Blog
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How to Build an Email List When the Marketplace Owns Your Customer
I paid about $824 for 76,294 Facebook followers and Facebook still decides who sees my posts. Etsy is the same arrangement. Where to ask for an email address, what to offer, and…
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The Handmade Pricing Formula (With a Free Calculator)
My material is 84% of my selling price and my customer can look up what it costs. The one-line formula I actually use, the four layers it left out, and a calculator…
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How to Cost Your Own Labour, When Someone Else Makes It and Sends You the Bill
I do not make what I sell — a karigor does, and he invoices me 300 to 1,000 taka a piece. What happens to your pricing when the labour in every item…
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How to Pack Jewelry So It Survives the Post — and the Return Packing Cannot Stop
Zero to one parcel in a hundred arrives broken. Twenty in a hundred come back, and none of them for damage. The five-layer method that produced those numbers, and the returns problem…
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I Ran the Numbers on My Own Shop. My Margin Was 6% — and Shipping Ate Two-Thirds of It
My silver costs 84% of what I charge and my customer knows the rate. Gross margin 6.3%, net per delivered order 2.2%, break-even 20 to 53 orders a month — every figure…
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Why Your Etsy Shop Gets No Views: a 13-Point Diagnostic
No views is three different problems with three different fixes. A diagnostic built on the nine ranking factors Etsy is legally required to publish — and how to tell which one is…
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How to Write Etsy Titles in 2026 (Etsy Just Changed Its Own Advice)
In April 2026 Etsy started asking for listing titles under 15 words, with the item named first and no repeated words. Most Etsy SEO advice still says fill all 140 characters. Here…
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Free Shipping on Etsy: What It Actually Costs You in 2026
Etsy charges its 6.5% transaction fee on shipping whether you show it or hide it, so free shipping does not cost more in fees. A $38 order, worked through three ways, shows…
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I Bought 76,294 Real Followers for My Jewelry Shop. They Were the Right People — and It Still Wasn’t Enough.
Three years and $1,064 of my own money in Meta ads, published in full: 77.5% of it bought page follows at 1.1 cents each. Real people in my real market, and it…
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Two Photos of the Same Anklet: One Sells, One Doesn’t
Both photographs are mine, both from real listings, both of silver anklets. One works. The difference costs nothing to fix and has nothing to do with the camera — three rules, and…
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Every Etsy Fee in 2026, Worked Through on a $38 Order
Etsy takes more than the 6.5% everyone quotes — and two of its fees are charged on money you never keep. Every published fee for 2026, worked through on one $38 order,…
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Etsy vs Your Own Store in 2026: Where the Fees Actually Cross
Etsy takes 10.7% of a $38 order; Shopify takes 3.7% plus $39 a month. They cross at about 15 orders — and that crossover is the least important number in the decision.…