Smart Links – Keep Up with Dynamic Guilds

An “ArtFire Guild” is similar to an “Etsy Team”.  Connecting sellers with other sellers is very important to ensuring the entire community succeeds.  Selling handmade becomes easier when working with a team who understand your challenges as an artist selling online.  ArtFire currently has nearly 100 ArtFire Guilds, making this a growing part of the site.

Jenn, a seller on both Etsy and ArtFire, shared a great tip in the ArtFire forums.  She has an easy and useful idea for linking to an ArtFire Guild to your off-platform shop or network’s blog.

“We have a badge on our blog that links to our group members items,” Jenn explains in the thread.  “How did we do it? Very simple.”

Below are Jenn’s easy steps:

1. Create a guild tag and have members tag their items with this tag.
2. Do a keyword search for that specific guild tag.
3. Copy and paste the URL that comes up with that search.
4. Now, post the link where you wish to have this search displayed!

Jenn uses this link for many outside ArtFire promotion opportunities, including ads and blogs. It’s a quick way to promote your ArtFire Guild without all the work to include new shop items.

“You can also use the link in a guild badge, so that it opens up the ArtFire search page,” Jenn suggests.  “This link will search any all items with that tag.  So today there may be 5 pages of items. Next week as more users tag with that item, there will be 20 pages.  No need to change the URL at all.  As long as your tags remain the same, this URL will remain the same,” she says.

To see Jenn’s idea in action, check out her Guild’s blog.  You can also see Jenn’s Artfire shop as well as both of her Etsy.com shops, MyBraggBag and TheTangledSkein.

Great tip Jenn!

Wonder what’s happening at ArtFire?  Check out our ArtFire review!

How do you promote your selling platform seller network?  Whether it’s an Etsy Team or an ArtFire Guild, what works for you?  How can you increase sales for everyone while keeping up with the ever-changing network?

Tell us how you connect with artists online.  What works for your Etsy Team or ArtFire Guild?  Share you thoughts with HandmadeMarketing.org – if we feature your tip, we’ll link to your team’s blog or site!