Sometimes an Etsy seller comes across the issue of their products not being found in Etsy search results. Like their listings have just magically disappeared and are nowhere to be found.
Many times, there’s a reason for the disappearance, we just need to do a little sleuthing to figure it out.
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Here are 11 reasons why your listings are not being found on Etsy.
- You need better Etsy SEO
- You don’t have any videos in your listing photos
- Other shops’ ads are pushing you down in search
- Bad product photography
- Overpriced or underpriced products
- Not driving your own traffic
- De-indexed listings
- Account suspended
- An Etsy glitch
- Too many open orders
- Too many open cases against your shop
I’m going to get to it and dive right into reason number 1.
You need better Etsy SEO
Your products could be lost in the sea of literally millions of other products. Without a good keyword strategy, your product listings could possibly never be seen by potential buyers.
I spend a lot of time on keyword research and implementing a good keyword strategy. It takes time and practice to get just the right combination of keyword phrases for each product. Discoverability through keywords is our number one tool for SEO.
What keywords are buyers using to search for your products?
When you list an item on Etsy, Etsy’s algorithm tries to decide which items to surface in its search results. You have a very small window of opportunity to prove to Etsy that your products are worth showing to potential customers.
When your products don’t get any engagement, Etsy will rank your products lower than other similar products. This results in you ending up at the bottom of the pack, if not corrected.
Etsy considers clicks, favorites, sales, etc. as buyer engagement. The more positive engagement, the higher the product ranking. Etsy has other factors for product ranking, but here we’re just focused on the SEO aspect.
You can check out this article to learn more about how to get your products ranking higher in Etsy search.
Choose keywords that accurately describe your items. Keywords, tags and titles aren’t a set-it-and-forget-it thing. Keywords may have to be revisited over time as trends change. Also consider that our language and how we search for things changes as well when choosing keywords.
Here are a few Etsy seller tools that could help you find the right keywords for your products.
- Marmalead
- eRank
- EverBee
- Alura
- Roketfy
- Sale Samurai
- Etsy Hunt
Now, on to reason number 2.
You don’t have any videos in your listings
A few years ago, Etsy started allowing sellers to add video content in addition to the listing photos. You can now add a video between 5 seconds and 15 seconds long to your listings.
Videos displayed in Etsy search results
Videos, at this time, are being shown in the second image spot within your listing. It is also available on Etsy search results pages, indicated by a video arrow icon and will auto play when hovered over.
This is an eye-catching feature as so many people are addicted to video now with YouTube and TikTok. It makes a potential buyer stop because of the movement created on the screen.
Videos displayed in Etsy Buyer App
Etsy also has said they were giving preference to listings in the Etsy app search results if it contained a video. How much this affects search ranking, we don’t know for sure. But it would be worth adding videos to get that boost in search results.
Also, when you open up the Etsy buyer app, you will see a section right now called Most-loved videos. Etsy is incorporating video just like all other platforms as much as possible to gain buyer’s attention.
Etsy recently introduced the newest Etsy Seller App (the blue one) which has a new feature called Explore. Explore allows you to add longer video content posted right to the Etsy Buyer App for buyers to browse. You can add text overlays, etc. right in the app and link those videos to your Etsy shop products.
This all helps keep customers on Etsy longer, reducing the bounce rate and hopefully gaining some more sales.
Here’s a quick walkthrough tutorial of how to upload videos to Etsy Explore.
Get yourself in those featured spots by adding video to your listings and taking advantage of the Explore feature today.
Note* Not all sellers have this feature right now as they had been rolling it out to sellers over time.
Don’t forget to download the Etsy Seller app. This app will give you access to new features only available in the Etsy Seller App. And, it’s free to download!
After adding listing videos, we can take a look at reason number 3.
Other shops’ ads are pushing you down in search
Etsy is now showing ads on search results everywhere. They often are on the very top of the search results page and a row of ads is added in about every 2-4 rows of search results.
This makes it even harder for your products to actually show on the first page of Etsy search at all when up to half of the page is filled with ads.
If you’d like to find out more about how you too can use Etsy ads to boost your listings in search results, check out this article.
Also, keep in mind that with the amount of listings that might match any one search query, Etsy will only show the first 250 pages of relevant results. And we all know that buyers will not look past the first few pages of listings before bouncing or changing their search terms. The more ads that are shoving your listing down, the more buried you can become.
Next, is reason number 4.
Bad product photography
With today’s technology, there isn’t much of an excuse for bad product photography. Most people are walking around with a camera strapped to them at least half the day already as all smartphones now come with amazing built in cameras.
Whether using a traditional camera like a DSLR, SLR or even just your iPhone, like me, you can take amazing photos in just minutes. A few quick edits to lighten and brighten and you can have click-worthy product photography that makes your customers say, “Yes, please!”
To see my down and dirty, quick and easy setup for some of our sign photos, check out this video.
Next up, we’re talking about tricky number 5.
Overpriced products or underpriced products
Buyers are finicky creatures when it comes to pricing. Some buyers could care less about the price of an item if they really want it, and other buyers are super budget-conscious and always looking for a good deal.
Knowing what your buyer’s spending habits and preferences are and their relationship to money is can help you decide what the best pricing strategy and price point is for your products.
With your buyer in mind, pricing too low can cause your buyers to feel like you are selling an inferior product that may not hold up over time and is junk.
On the flipside, if you are priced significantly higher than your competition and you aren’t proving the value of the item above the quality, etc. of competing products, buyers will simply choose the cheaper option as they don’t see the added value compared to your competitors that’s reflected in your higher prices.
Getting your pricing right can be a stumbling block for many Etsy sellers. If you need some help getting a baseline for pricing, check out this article to learn more about how to do product pricing the right way.
Then, we need to talk a look at reason number 6.
Not driving your own traffic
Long gone are the days of just relying on Etsy to put your products in front of buyers and then selling them like hotcakes. There is so much competition on Etsy that if you aren’t driving your own traffic, it’s likely you aren’t seeing much traffic at all.
2 ways to drive your own traffic is by externally linking your products to social media and running Etsy ads.
Driving traffic through external links to Etsy products
With external links like when you save pins on Pinterest and post to Instagram and Facebook, you are connecting with buyers outside of Etsy itself. Many times these posts are shown to people who already know, like and trust your brand. You’re just redirecting them back to your products on Etsy to make purchases.
You can easily do this by adding a photo or video to your social media post and the link to the product over on Etsy; then, your follower or subscriber clicks through to the item.
For help with driving traffic through social media, check this out.
Etsy loves seeing that you are driving more traffic to the platform and will reward you for it by sending you more organic Etsy search traffic.
When you use your own product links, with the Share and Save Etsy feature, you can also get back 4% of your Etsy transaction fees for any resulting sale through those links.
Win-win when you drive your own traffic.
Driving traffic through Etsy Ads to Etsy products
The other way to drive more traffic to your products is through Etsy ads. Giving your products a bit of a boost and showing them in featured ads spots at the top of search and sprinkled throughout Etsy search results.
Etsy ads need to be monitored, though, if you are going to give it a go and will need adjustments if things get out of whack.
Read more about if Etsy ads may be worth it for your shop here.
Don’t forget to join my FREE Etsy Seller Success Facebook Group!
Let’s move on to reason number 8.
De-indexed listings
What does de-indexed mean?
If your listings are de-indexed on Etsy, it means that Etsy is no longer showing your listing in search results.
Your listing simply is one they are ignoring completely. It is not discoverable for buyers when searching Etsy.
Why Etsy would de-index your listings.
Check to see if you are still indexed on Etsy by taking your listing title and pasting it into the Etsy search bar. If your product shows up, then it’s still there, and it’s most likely something else causing it to show lower in Etsy search results.
You could also find your Etsy shop has been placed on vacation mode or de-indexed because you haven’t paid your fees balance or your shop is suspended.
For unpaid Etsy fee balances, you have until the 15th of each month to get your balance paid before it becomes an issue that could get your products removed from search.
If your shop has been suspended, we’re discussing this next.
If you think that your products could have been de-indexed by accident, contact Etsy support about the issue.
The next reason, number 9, never makes sellers happy.
Account suspensions
There are several reasons that your account could be suspended on Etsy.
Reasons why your Etsy account has been suspended.
Here are a few of the most common reasons for Etsy account suspensions.
- Too many copyright infringements
- Opened a new shop
- Too many cases filed against your shop
Click here to learn more about these and other reasons why your Etsy shop could get suspended.
If you want to learn more about whether you can sell copyrighted products on Etsy, check out this article.
If you’d like to see some of my free trainings, yep, FREE, you can check them out on my YouTube channel. I cover topics about online business, selling on Etsy and Shopify, digital design, marketing and loads more.
Next, the number 10 reason why your products aren’t being shown isn’t one we have control over.
An Etsy glitch
This one gets Etsy sellers all kinds of bent out of shape.
And it’s a really frustrating one when you are trying to do something with your shop and the site has on oops. As sellers, we are subject to all kinds of glitches from time to time, from stale search results pages, to accidental shop closures and more.
If you suspect a glitch, you can also check in the Etsy help section and see if other sellers are also experiencing issues in community forums section of the website. And contact support if needed.
You can also check Etsystatus.com which has keeps track of any current site-wide issues.
Finally, on to number 11.
Too many open orders
Etsy has stated that if it feels like your shop is not able to keep up with its current number of open orders, your shop could be suppressed in search. This doesn’t mean that you won’t get any more orders, but you will see much less activity in your shop.
Etsy also reserves the right to put your shop on vacation mode until you are caught up with open orders.
Many Etsy sellers see this kind of problem during the holidays when shops will see sudden jumps in traffic and orders. Usually, it will work itself out as you hack away at your open order count, but I have also heard that this type of traffic throttling can sometimes get stuck, resulting in weeks of lower than normal sales coming in, and this isn’t good during high buying seasons and can ruin your holiday sales.
Again, it may require a shout out to Etsy to see if this is dampening search ranking and keeping you from showing up on Etsy.
Too many open cases against your shop
As I mentioned before, this can get your shop permanently shut down on Etsy resulting in you never being able to sell your products on Etsy’s platform ever again.
Here are a few reasons why cases could be opened against your shop.
- Late deliveries
- Packages not being delivered
- Wrong items being delivered
- Buyer/Seller Disputes
If you suspect something hinky is happening with your products and you aren’t seeing them in relevant search queries, go through your Etsy shop listings and see if one of these 11 reasons could be the culprit for your products aren’t being found on Etsy.
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