Planning

Finding your niche in Stampin’ Up! right out the gate of starting your business is key to all the success that will follow! Before Stampin’ Up!® I ran a very successful educational blog and it’s success was all down to knowing who my ideal reader was and making my content useful to them.

A niche is a place (your blog, Facebook page) that appeals to a particular person and their interests. The person we are looking for likes paper crafting. This is a very broad niche. There are thousands of businesses in this niche. We’re not going to stand out here. Let’s narrow it down for finding your niche in Stampin’ Up!

Finding Your Niche in Stampin’ Up!

We don’t just want people that like paper craft, we want people that USE paper craft. We want to narrow down into a paper craft hobby. A broad niche still but we’re starting to find our perfect person. Some people would suggest to narrow down into Stampin’ Up!® now. Personally I wouldn’t because I believe you’ll be missing a segment of the market that has never heard of Stampin’ Up!® and you risk singing to the choir.

Global or Local Niche?

Even though Stampin’ Up!® is a global company, demonstrators can only sell to their local market. You’ll want to attract people in your country. You could even scale right down to state and city if you want, but I caution on being too narrow on your audience and limiting your future growth.

With Stampin’ Up!® we are selling card making tools and accessories, so you can narrow down further into a card making niche. Stampin’ Up! also supplies scrap bookers with tools and accessories and maybe that’s your jam too, so you could narrow down and attract scrap bookers to you.

The next part for finding your niche in Stampin’ Up! is up to you. If you are a card maker who loves bright colours and funky cards then make card after card in your style. Keep working. Keep creating. Keep plugging away. Promote the heck out of your makes. Your perfect person will connect with your style and after being exposed to your creative goodness multiple times, they will want to connect with you!

Success in the creative industry is all about long term strategy.

Lisa Jacobs, 2014

I am in the baby stages of building my Stampin’ Up!® business and blogging about creative card making. I hope that sharing my journey will inspire other newbie Stampin’ Up!® bloggers as they build their businesses. Click here to read about my initial failure to start as a business.

A monthly report will keep me accountable and keeping it one place will help with the overwhelm I sometimes feel in these early days of building an online business. I am interested in seeing my growth and analysing what is working and what is not working.

Overview of October 2020:

1. ACES strategy over on Eager To Stamp Facebook page.
2. Facebook Ad running to win a Stampin’ Cut and Emboss Machine. Entrants are required to subscribe to my blog.
3. Facebook Page likes beginning October 53. Page likes end of October 65. Most are my perfect people from targeted ads.
4. Facebook Page follows is 71.
5. Best organic reach on Facebook 64.
6. Engagement on Facebook page in single digits.
7. Signed up for Kylie and Bruno Bertucci’s 2020 – 2021 Demonstrator Support Training.
8. Facebook focus: Working on my bumper sticker and making connections.
9. Set up Analytics so I can receive stats about my blog.
10. I have a Pinterest account, an Instagram account, a Twitter account and a YouTube account attached to my blog but to avoid overwhelm and doing too many things at once I am focusing on Facebook only at this time.

Goal Setting

October Review:

1. Financial: Over spent on November & December order.
2. Financial: Identified retired stamp sets to sell.
3. Marketing: Ran daily Facebook ads. Lost my stats about my target audience. Repeat in November and keep stats in planner.
4. Marketing: Set up spreadsheet for Facebook connection and set aside 15 per day for it.
5. Blog: Posted every week!
6. Making: 12 Days of Christmas prepared and stored ready to send out.
7. Making: Thank you cards made, photographed and posted.

November Focus:

1. Financial: Marketing plan – Facebook Ads. $1.50 per day directly to my Target Audience.
2. Marketing: Identify what I am REALLY selling and develop the Eager To Stamp bumper sticker.
3. Marketing: select five role models and use insights to study what’s working for them.
4. Blog: Continue posting once a week.
5. Plan pre-order purchases and projects to make.
6. Full-fill November birthday card orders.
7. Making: Prepare December thank you cards.
8. Making: Prepare Christmas packs.

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Me too! I’ve been starting a business with Stampin’ Up!® on and off since 2017.

Although I have had this blog since 2017, I have been inconsistent with it until 2020. It wasn’t COVID-19 that prompted me to start consistently blogging again, it was a need to make a decision about my relationship with Stampin’ Up!®

Starting a business with Stampin’ Up!® 2017

In 2017 I signed up as a hobby demonstrator. I wanted to make cards, scrapbook and get the discount. I held successful card making classes in my home. No one bought anything and I didn’t care.

How is that successful you ask? Because people showed up, we used product and we had fun. My goal was not business minded. It was filling my bucket with feel good, social mojo. I wasn’t starting a business with Stampin’ Up!® at this time.

Three quarters into the year my husband and I had THE chat. You know the one where the kids are now at fulltime school, are you going to go back to work, kind-a chat. I decided to turn my Stampin’ Up!® affiliation into a business.

I thought starting a business with Stampin’ Up!® meant I should hire out a space to meet with like-minded crafters once a week and hopefully gain customers. Several time slots were available to cater for work and school schedules. My business was advertised in the local paper and on Facebook. I signed up for business courses and sought advice from the small business centre to get a business plan together. NO ONE TURNED UP. I persisted for 3 months. Nothing. Nudda. Nil. I was still my best customer.

I gave up. Applied for a teaching job and went back to work. I was back to being a Stampin’ Up!® hobby demonstrator.

Starting a business with Stampin’ Up!® again 2020

A new teaching position in 2020 gave me the opportunity of a little bit of time on my hands. I was in a new town with no friends and no social circle. I decided to put myself out there as a card maker, make a few friends and sell a few products on the side.

But…COVID-19 shut everything down, making it difficult to meet new people. I decided to go all in and set my Stampin’ Up!® affliation as an online side business.

Since I am still in the baby stages of building my business and blogging about creative card making I hope that sharing my journey will inspire other newbie Stampin’ Up!® bloggers in the way that I have been inspired.

A monthly report will also keep me accountable. I am interested in seeing my growth and analysing what is working and what is not working. I will share my goals to help me stay on track and maintain focus.

My main goal is to show my journey from baby blog making absolutely nothing to a successful income-producing one.

And gaining a few online card making friends would be the cherry on top!

March and April 2020:

1. I started working on my niche and identifying who my audience is. My initial idea was to combine my teaching and card making. I started sifting through my potential audience looking for people that were interested in paper crafting with children. This is a great niche but it’s not a great fit as a focus for a Stampin’ Up!® business.
2. Facebook page likes: 20.
3. I signed up for Stampin’ Up!’®s Demonstrator Business Web Site (DBWS) and I decided to start posting on the blog once a month.

June and July 2020:

1. Enrolled with Wealthy Teachers: On Course Social and learnt the ACES method for content creation. I implemented the ACES formula and scheduled a post a day to Facebook.
2. June and July saw very little growth in page likes, reach was on-par with my audience numbers but engagement was between 0 and 2. I kid you not. This page was DEAD.

August 2020:

1. ACES one post a day on Facebook.
2. Facebook ad $1.50 a day. Every week I would change my target audience for the ad, looking for my perfect person.
3. I did 3 Facebook Lives.
4. Page likes beginning of August 40. Page likes end of August 42.
5. 48 Page Follows.
6. Best organic reach got to 85.
7. Engagement single digits.

September 2020:

1. ACES on post a day on Facebook.
2. Facebook Ads. Still changing the target audience on a weekly basis, sifting for those perfect people.
3. Page likes beginning September 42. Page likes end of September 53.
4. 59 Page Follows.
5. Best organic reach got to 29.
6. Engagement single digits.
7. Retook Rachel Millar’s 100 Perfect People course.

Success in the creative industry is all about long term strategy.

Lisa Jacobs, 2014

I’m looking forward to full disclosure in this 2020 – 2021 Stampin’ Up! year.

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October 2020: Finding a Stampin’ Up! niche and stats