Help Yourself By Helping Others: Promotional Ideas that Don’t Cost a Dime

Offering others my help has been my most successful networking tool. When conceptualizing ideas to market myself, I try to think of ways I can offer support. Don’t get me wrong. My underlying objective is to market myself. Mother Theresa I am not. However, when I take others’ interests to heart, I seem to benefit more than when I put my interests first. Included here are a few things I’ve started to do on a regular basis, all of which have increased interest in my handmade wares.

- donate a portion of all my proceeds to a local charity
- post how-to craft tutorials on my blog and other networking sites like Craftster
- post networking tips on my blog and other networking sites like byhand.me
- provide feedback and tips in forums on Etsy, among others, on a regular basis
- offer my wares or time for charitable donation
- promote fellow crafters via networking sites like Facebook & Twitter

To note, my most recent blog post, “50 Free Promotional Sites for Crafters,” has been my biggest networking success to date. In return for the list, readers of my blog were urged to follow me on Twitter. And sure enough, within 48 hours of posting, I noted some 200 plus new followers (and the number continues to increase). In turn, this exposure has lead to more than triple the daily views I was receiving in my Etsy shop. No Etsy showcase, banner ad, or even press clip about my shop has awarded me near the same amount of exposure. And it didn’t cost a dime.

http://anisemouette.etsy.com
http://anisemouette.blogspot.com