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Where and how do Folksy advertise?

Where and how do Folksy advertise?

Folksy may not be a household name yet but our user figures reflect our established position in the market. In September 2022 over 210k people visited Folksy and during the Christmas season that number can reach over ½ million a month.

Why don’t we run TV adverts?

The simplest response to this question is that we don’t have the budget. Although at first glance, the price of running a TV advert may appear to be affordable, the lower prices sometimes quoted are for one-off adverts placed at quieter times to a limited audience, and do not include the cost of creating the advert. To be successful, a TV advert must form part of a campaign and a typical ad campaign costs in the region of £30,000 a month. We simply do not have the budget for that.

Why do we not have the budget?

The fees we charge to sell on Folksy are some of the lowest among the similar platforms - see our fee comparison here https://blog.folksy.com/2022/10/25/folksy-vs-etsy-fee-comparison.

We believe in being affordable, transparent and fair. We intentionally keep our fees as low as possible in order to open up Folksy to as many artists and makers as possible, and give them access to the market for craft. Unlike other marketplaces, we also don’t hold on to your money. The consequence of this is that we don’t have a lot of money left to put into advertising and need to be more creative in how we promote both Folksy and our sellers. In order to advertise on the same level as some other brands, we would need to significantly increase our fees and raise our commission to at least 25%.

So how do you advertise?

Although we don’t run TV adverts, this doesn’t mean we don’t advertise Folksy. We do. However, we generally focus on our advertising on digital platforms, as we have found these to be most successful and cost effective.

In addition to the high-quality content we create for our own social media channels and blog – designed to showcase our makers, foster connections within our community and reach new audiences – we also regularly run social media adverts focused on increasing brand awareness. We have a combined audience of well over 430k people across social media*, Folksy products are seen by over 10 million people on Pinterest a month, and our blog is ranked in the top 10 UK craft blogs by Vuelio.

We also run paid Google Shopping Ads (also known as PLAs) for every product on Folksy that is eligible according to Google’s terms at no additional charge to sellers. The amount we can spend on these however is limited by our intentionally low commission.

We have worked with PR agencies in the past and paid for print advertising in magazines but, in our experience, print advertising has not been as effective as digital. We now focus on getting press coverage for our sellers through Press Loft, which is an online PR platform and resource for journalists. We update our Press Loft account daily and have achieved some great coverage for our sellers - check this page https://folksypress.tumblr.com/ to see some of the features Folksy makers have had in recent months.

We also have an engaged subscriber list of over 50k craft buyers and enthusiasts that we have built up since Folksy launched in 2008. We also work hard to find innovative ways to shout about Folksy, and strengthen our position in the sector through partnerships and collaborations. We are active members of the Craft UK network (facilitated through the UK Crafts Council - see the full list of members here) and work with other members to support makers and promote craft at a nationwide level. We currently have two very exciting national campaigns in the pipeline, both with companies who share the same principles as we do.

We often run campaigns that our sellers can take part in to promote Folksy and the UK craft sector in general. Find out how you could be featured in one of our campaigns here - https://blog.folksy.com/2021/07/06/how-to-be-featured-on-folksy

Despite not paying for print or TV advertising, Folksy has been interviewed by both the BBC and Sky News, and our makers have also been featured in The Financial Times, Metro, The Sunday Telegraph, The Independent, Country Living, Stylist Magazine and many other high-profile publications.

*438,970 followers on social media at 25 October 2022:
244,100 on Pinterest 85,477 Facebook 55,800 Instagram 52,800 Twitter 793 TikTok




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