I’ve now been writing for Tindie for a few months, mostly talking about various items that people sell here. Admittedly, I haven’t listed anything on Tindie, so take my ideas with a grain of salt, but I have browsed around quite a bit at this point. Some listings are better than others, and here are a few things I’ve noticed that will hopefully help you sell your awesome and wacky items!
Listing a product on Tindie is free and each listing goes through approval before appearing in your store. In addition to making potential customers feel great about their purchase, ensuring you have great images and that you have done a thorough job of proofreading will get your listing approved post-haste. If you’re just starting out it is worth your time to check out this roundup of all the basics in this Tindie listing guide.
Text Description
Descriptions, in my opinion, should be longer than a paragraph or two, but not too long. From my perspective of writing up a summary on a project, even if the item looks cool, I need details on how it was made, what it could be used for, and what sets it apart from the crowd. This can, or course, take the form of a video, but if there’s just a paragraph and a picture, it’s tough to get a feel for what the product is all about. In many cases actual customers will be better convinced to buy something if they know a little more about it with a minimum of effort.
That being said, if it’s too long for someone to easily read, perhaps it’d be best to cut it down, or host an expanded description on another site like Hackaday.io or GitHub. Strive to do an excellent job of explaining your product, but instead of leaving out a wealth of details you can point the more motivated engineers to your “making-of” or “taking this further” page. When in doubt, sometimes it helps to put yourself in the place of many different types of readers. Are you appealing to the beginner, the ‘this just needs to work’ crowd, and the experts who want to know every component and why it was chosen?
Video
For some items, what it does is pretty self-explanatory with just a few pictures and some text. “Oh, it’s an adapter for a USB cable to plug into X-Y-Z?” On the other hand, if you’re showing off a new MIDI device or something that flashes LEDs, it’s really good to see and/or hear how it works! For that matter, even if you don’t need a video, it’s a great format to personally describe your item and what it’s good for.
The holo clock video seen above is a great example. It’s entertaining, fairly short, shows how it works, and how the device is assembled!
Store Theme
Though many of us build eclectic items, it might be helpful to keep your store focused on one theme, such as breakout boards, camera accessories, or 3D printing. Though I don’t have hard data to tell me this, if I were looking for a certain product, I might look for a store that sells “X” over one that sells “X, Y, Z, and sometimes Q.” For that matter, there is no reason one couldn’t open two or even more stores to keep things separate!
If you want to go even deeper into what can make your store a success, check out this analysis published last year by a data scientist.
What are Your Listing Tips?
Do you have your own formula for listing items? Share what works for you by sending us a Tweet @Tindie.
