Craft Websites for Today's Hobbyist

Craft websites are extremely important today for the craft hobbyist turn business person. And having that online presence will give a more professional presence today and let people know that the craft is more than just a hobby.



A lot of people nowadays are turning their hobbies of making crafts into real and veryrewarding businesses, either out of necessity due to a job loss and today's economic downturn, or they happened into business inadvertently as family and friends began making referrals to their friends and coworkers and the hobby grew into a business naturally.



A lot of crafters are also taking their businessesonline and establishing storefronts on websites like Etsy.com or eBay.com so they can reach a wider geographic location with their crafts.



But the most exciting approach to getting your crafts noticedonline is to build a web presence and get recognizedas the authority for whatever craft it is you make and sell, whether it's recycled jeans into doll clothes and pillows or making lighted wine bottles and lighted mason jars by recycling used glass.



There are a lot of crafters who place business cards on their tables at craft fairs and it's always a really good idea, almost a necessity anymore, that you have your website address, or URL, listed on your business cards along with an email address. It's pretty much expected, even for home-based craft businesses.



If you follow these basicsteps to give your crafts an online presence, potential buyers who see your items at craft shows but may want to purchase later, will have a place to go online. This increases your opportunities of building your craft business and you'll be on your way to very successful side business that mightultimately support you full time in the event you may lose your day job.



Below are the principal pages that craft websites should have to start out with, especially if you're selling crafts.



A Craft Site's Home Page

Photographs: Crafts are visual items and since most crafts are very exclusive, terrific photos of them are critical for trying to sell them online.



Photos of your craft items should be presented on the home page as well as throughout the site. But the Home page is where many website visitors will land on so it's vital that they know what you do and what you're selling.



Brief Introduction: Draft a few introductory sentences describing what your items are, what they can be used for, and why people should buy them.



Testimonials: If you've already made some sales, you should sprinkle some short testimonials throughout your website so visitors know you're establishing yourself and your craft.



About Me Page

Who are you? The About Me page should briefly explain a little bit about you, your background and how you started out in your craft. If you have a background story about how and why you started making your items, this is the page to do it on.



Contact Page

It's crucial that you have a way for your visitors to contact you to ask about special orders or how to buy one of your crafts, especially if you haven't set up a method for them to order online.



Maybe you're just getting started and you want to showcase your crafts first and take orders over the phone. And that's just fine! A lot of crafters do this at first to get their feet wet in taking and filling orders.



You can always integrate a shopping cart or Buy Now buttons later on if you start to sell a lot of your items by phone or email.



Article Page or Directory

An excellent way to establish yourself as an expert or experienced crafter is to write articles about what you do. Some subjects could also be about where to find liquidated materials for making crafts or really, just about any topics about crafts at all.



As crafters get more experienced with the Internet, there are a lot of ways to learn how to build out craft websites, for instance including a directory with links to other tools. But essentially, for those just getting started, having craft websites will add a nice professional feel to the venture and make it more than just a hobby, than if you have a business card with no craft website listed on it.





AUTHOR RESOURCE BOX:

About the Author: Karen Musselman owns Wedding Favor Bookmarks, a craft website for custom laminated bookmarks. She also designed her husbands craft website for lighted wine bottles at www.JimsCustomCrafts.com. Karen is also the author of "Make Money at Craft Fairs: How to Turn Your Crafts into Your Gold Mine of Cash."