Etsy Boosts Marketing Initiatives for Holiday Season

Etsy announced today they are boosting their brand marketing initiatives for the holiday season to bring more new shoppers to the platform.

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The company is launching new marketing campaigns to remind shoppers they are the best destination for unique and thoughtful holiday gifts.

“This holiday season we want people to know that Etsy is the best destination for finding truly unique and thoughtful gifts. Our goal is to make the magic of the holidays memorable, and our marketing campaigns are geared towards sending exactly that message.”

Patrick Reiter, Head of Buyer Marketing

National TV Campaign

On Nov 8, Etsy will roll out a national US TV ad featuring customer testimonials with individuals discussing their shopping journey through Etsy’s differentiated experience.

This national ad buy follows local tests that Etsy recently ran using several creative concepts.

The marketplace believes the testimonials tested the best due to the emotional, human element and the fact they featured a wider range of products.

The testimonials ran in Seattle, Minneapolis, and Baltimore. Brand awareness, visits, and purchase intent performed better in these three cities compared to their respective control markets.

The commercials will run nationally for four weeks across networks and cable. It will be mostly 30-second ad buys and Etsy will also test some 15 slots.

New York City Subways

Starting this week, Etsy will feature beautiful illustrations on New York City subways to remind riders why Etsy is the best destination for “Gifts as thoughtful as you are.”

This campaign leans into the human emotion associated with finding the perfect gift.

The thoughtful gift-giver takes pride in just how well they know their friends and loved ones and thrives on the satisfaction of gifting the perfect present.

The campaign’s illustrations showcase the breadth of Etsy’s products and categories, but also allow for subway riders to dream up what that perfect gift is and buy it on Etsy.

The creative direction was to create a pattern of delightful gifts that would feel like an endless wrapping paper. The ads will run in 575 subway cars for four weeks.

Here are examples of the NYC Subway illustrations that are now being used:

American Express and Brit + Co

Etsy will also take part in American Express’ Small Business Saturday on November 24. This is the second year the marketplace is participating in the event.

READ MORE: Etsy Joins American Express for Second Year to Celebrate Small Business Saturday on November 24

And Etsy is teaming up with Brit + Co to launch a first-of-its-kind shopping experience. The shop is curated, hosted on Brit.co, and features over 1,000 handpicked items from Etsy.

Using an innovative shopping tool created by Brit.co, shoppers will discover the best one-of-a kind items created by Etsy’s community of 2 million entrepreneurs.

Better Shopping Experience

In addition to Etsy’s marketing efforts, Etsy is bringing joy and inspiration to holiday shopping with focused on removing friction from the shopping process.

Etsy has enhanced search & discovery, improved transparency around shipping, and made it more seamless for buyers to work with sellers on personalized and customized items.

They believe all of this will enable new and existing buyers to have a joyful and inspirational experience on Etsy during the holidays.

• This holiday season Etys is making gift giving easy with a new discovery feed and curated gift guides. Besides their gift guides for him, her, kids, personalized, and pets they have a gender inclusive category “for all.”
• Etsy has added a new feature on listing pages so that buyers can more effectively communicate item personalization requests to sellers. The company believes this feature will be a valued addition for many Etsy buyers, and make it easier for sellers to deliver exactly what their buyers want.
• Millions of items now ship for free on Etsy. The marketplace is continuing to educate sellers on the importance of fair and competitive shipping. Etsy is also making shipping times and estimated delivery dates clearer on the site, so that buyers can be confident that items will arrive in time for the holidays.

There is a lot going on with Etsy this holiday season and these marketing and promotion efforts appear to be the largest branding push by the marketplace.

Hopefully, it will turn into Holiday Season gold for sellers.

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