Your Ultimate Guide: Etsy Inventory Management

The more scattered a company’s inventory is, the less likely they will have what they actually need when they need it.

‍With the advent of COVID-19, the already fierce eCommerce market has become even more cutthroat. But despite the fierce competition, Etsy has managed to remain a relevant and growing player over the years.

The multi-billion-dollar giant has successfully carved its niche in the industry with a knack for ‘artisanal,’ often ‘handcrafted’ items. This has garnered Etsy the ‘artsy commerce’ tag, making it a go-to choice for the ‘crafty’ demographic.

Launched in 2005, Etsy is now not only an online marketplace but also harbors a community for microenterprises looking to open up their business to the world. And people are willing to expend more money on these ‘authentic handcrafted’ goods, especially to support small businesses.

The downside is that sellers face significant Etsy inventory management challenges. So how does one maneuver around Etsy inventory management? Are the inbuilt Etsy inventory management features useful?

Read on to find out!

The art of handling your Etsy store

Etsy has been a relatively straightforward eCommerce store but has always lacked inventory management features. When you start your Etsy store, things may run smoothly, but once you start catering to a larger audience and plan to scale your business, you might face a couple of challenges in the transition. As you expand, you’ll want to:

• Instantly check your inventory levels
• Monitor seasonal and occasional trends
• Develop marketing and sales strategies to accelerate your growth
• Estimate the value of your inventory

Pen and paper methodologies will not be useful for such extensive tracking. But an intuitive inventory management system like Sumtracker can take these tasks off your hands.

The more efficient your Etsy inventory management, the faster you will witness growth in your business. Enable multi-channel inventory sync with Sumtracker and auto-sync all inventories across different channels within seconds.

Manage products with the same SKUs across different inventories with real-time sync and experiment with bundles and kits to find out what sells most. Generate reports, analyze trends and never run out of items that sell with auto-generated low stock alerts with Sumtracker.

Etsy inventory management: are there any inbuilt features?

When you lack a reliable Etsy inventory management system, the inability to track your inventory in real-time can lead to stock-outs or excess products being stored for too long.

Since smaller businesses rely heavily on word-of-mouth, even one bad customer experience could be detrimental to your business, which is why it is crucial to have a working inventory management solution.

As per recent developments, Etsy rolled out a centralised seller’s hub that facilitates the Etsy inventory management process for sellers all across.

With easier access to tools and services, sellers will have to spend less time managing their stores and have more time on their hands to innovate products. You can keep on top of your open orders, store reporting and analytics, and recent chats with customers.

In addition, Etsy will notify you if something requires your attention. The hub also enables you to manage your store on the go - easily login remotely with your mobile or laptop and check your store’s performance.

Additionally, the hub introduced SKUs to alleviate the stress of sellers struggling to track their inventory. SKUs, or stock-keeping units, allow sellers to differentiate between their products.

Let us consider an example to illustrate SKUs:

‍Imagine that you sold three distinct handmade jewellery boxes. How would you track which product would go where?

‍By assigning an SKU to each item, you can make it easier to differentiate between them and effectively track the sales for each.

Besides, if you’re handling e-stores on multiple platforms, SKUs help you track inventory levels for both stores to ensure that there is always enough in your inventory to satisfy consumer needs.

With Sumtracker, you can assign duplicate SKUs to multiple listings, and you will only have to manage the inventory of SKU1 since SKU2 will sync with SKU1 automatically, thus freeing up your time and effort.

Is the Etsy inventory management system sufficient?

Etsy’s centralized inventory hub certainly has potential when you first set up your store. However, these inbuilt solutions may not come in handy for sellers aiming for exponential growth.

Considering the ever-growing demand for eCommerce and a competitive market, sellers must tackle waves of change with more sophisticated tools. The quicker you cope with changes, the more your business thrives.

While store owners may be skeptical about investing too much in an inventory management system, trends show that this automated inventory software can exceptionally boost small, independent businesses.

If you’re apprehensive because inventory management tools may be difficult to use, let Sumtracker ease your fears. Sumtracker offers features that are relevant to you and truly make inventory management less cumbersome.

How to manage your Etsy inventory?

Here’s how you can master the art of managing your Etsy store:

• Get an inventory management system right from the start: Using an Etsy inventory management system from the beginning helps avoid stock issues as your sales grow. When demand increases, manual tracking becomes overwhelming and can lead to delayed order fulfillment. A system like Sumtracker ensures accurate stock updates, preventing overselling and improving customer satisfaction.

• Keep your workplace up and running: Set up an organized workspace (your dedicated studio, garage, or attic). Label your dressers or closets appropriately and set the proximity of items according to their popularity. Although you should always know the whereabouts of all your products, even those that don’t sell frequently.
• Assess sales trends and demands to maintain stock: Stock levels should align with demand. Fast-selling items need extra supply to prevent stockouts, while slow-moving items require careful purchasing. Etsy’s sales predictions are based on past trends, but a dedicated inventory system provides better forecasting for more accurate restocking decisions.

• Handle storage effectively: For small-scale sellers, simple methods like labeling, striking off packed items, or arranging products alphabetically help track inventory. However, as orders increase, relying on manual processes becomes inefficient. Upgrading to automated inventory management saves time and reduces errors.
• Assign SKUs to ease tracking: Using SKU codes simplifies inventory tracking. With Sumtracker, you can assign one SKU to a product and automatically sync it across multiple listings. This eliminates the need for manual updates and ensures inventory remains accurate across Etsy and other sales channels.

5 ways Etsy inventory management can up your sales game

Even the little tips and tricks can help you find your feet when you are starting out. We’ve curated these five tips to help you sell better on Etsy:

• Engage in the community through forums and attend local events, meet-ups, yard sales, and pop-up shops to network with other sellers and buyers.
• Give out your best on your Etsy store with immaculate product photos. Try different angles and depths to showcase the intricacies of your product.
• Ensure that your store is search engine optimised, use keywords in the title and description. This will be especially beneficial for users who come to your store through a quick Google search.
• Take your store to the social front. Engage with your followers and post regularly to build your brand on social media.
• Use inventory management software to manage your Etsy store.

By implementing an efficient system, owners can devote more time to other aspects of their business, such as search engine optimisation, customer service, and more.

A dependable solution like Sumtracker can help you manage your inventory at the back of your hand.

Automate your tasks, sync inventories on multiple channels in real-time, get low stock alerts, forecast trends with sales reports, check sales and purchase orders, and experiment with bundles to identify what sells from a single centralised Etsy inventory management hub with Sumtracker.