The ecommerce industry is rapidly growing, and many businesses and individuals are looking for reliable platforms through which they enjoy the benefits of exponential growth of the ecommerce sector.
Amazon Handmade and Etsy are two of the most popular ecommerce platforms, especially when it comes to selling handmade and unique products. Therefore, this article will thoroughly discuss Handmade Amazon vs. Etsy so that you are able to choose the best platform according to your requirements.
Table of Contents
Overview of Etsy
Etsy is an online marketplace that is meant for businesses and individuals selling vintage and handmade products. It was founded in 2005 and has exponentially grown to have 96.3 million active buyers in 2021.
A lot of people establish Etsy stores due to the fact that the organization is driven by actual goals meant to bring improvement to society. It aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 50% by 2030. Moreover, Etsy has many other initiatives to support sellers from marginalized communities.
Benefits of Selling on Etsy
Following are the major benefits of selling on Etsy:
Minimum Startup Charges
There are no significant charges involved in establishing an online Etsy store. In fact, the company promotes the fact that you only need 20¢ to start an Etsy store. Moreover, you don’t have to worry about any additional charges and fees. The other charges involved in shipping and payment processing are also made clear to the sellers, so you don’t have to deal with any hidden charges.
Analytics
The standard plan of Etsy has comprehensive analytics and custom options through which you can measure the different metrics and statistics of your store. Keeping up with such important metrics is important to ensure you are implementing the best practices to make your Etsy store successful.
Overview of Amazon Handmade
Let’s go through the basics of Amazon Handmade so that the comparison between Handmade Amazon vs. Etsy becomes easier.
Amazon is the most popular ecommerce platform. In the USA alone, it has annual net sales of over $300 billion. Amazon Handmade is a smaller part of the overall Amazon Marketplace. As the name suggests, Amazon Handmade was established to specialize in selling handcrafted products.
A lot of small businesses use it to sell unique products. Official stats from Amazon suggests that artists from over 80 countries are using Amazon Handmade to sell handcraft products, and it has surpassed $2 million in total sales.
Benefits of Amazon Handmade
The most obvious benefit of using Amazon Handmade is that there is a lot of credibility and brand recognition associated with Amazon. Following are some of the other benefits of using it:
Massive Reach
Amazon Handmade products are added to the overall Amazon ecommerce website that the most popular ecommerce site in the world. As a result, small businesses and individual sellers can rely on Amazon Handmade to get their products in front of a global audience.
No Listing Fees
Amazon Handmade does not charge any product listing fee. Hence, you can list multiple products and only have to pay when you make a sale.
Handmade Amazon vs. Etsy
There are some significant differences between Handmade Amazon vs. Etsy. These are:
- Amazon does not offer off-site ads, while off-site advertising is a popular feature of Etsy stores.
- Etsy charges product listing fees that recur every four months, while there are no such charges involved in Amazon Handmade.
- Becoming a seller on Amazon Handmade is much more challenging than registering on Etsy. Amazon requires a lot of information like tax details, international credit cards, and government-issued ID. It takes about 12 weeks to get approval from Amazon. On the other hand, you can open an Etsy store with a few clicks and enter the relevant information.
- Etsy pays sellers through the Etsy accounts via PayPal or mail on a daily, weekly, monthly, or bimonthly basis as per the seller’s choice. Amazon Handmade only pays via the seller’s bank account every two weeks.
- Sellers can use the Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) services to let Amazon handle procedures like storing and shipping the products after the purchase is made. Etsy does not have the option of warehousing your products or handling shipping procedures on your behalf.
- Both Amazon Handmade and Etsy have multiple impressive product categories. However, Amazon Handmade has some unique product categories such as “Handmade Electronics Accessories” and sports and outdoors. A seller should check these categories on both platforms in detail to ensure the platform of their choice can fulfill their requirements.
Conclusion
Ultimately, both Amazon Handmade and Etsy are useful, reliable, and trustable platforms for selling your handmade products. You should carefully analyze your requirements and compare them with the features of Handmade Amazon vs. Etsy to ensure the platform of your choice is capable of fulfilling your requirements. It will help you in selecting the best platform and take your online business to the next level.
