One of the easiest ways to sell more shirts is to make it easy for people to find your shop. You can create your own Spreadshirt URL. For example, my Spreadshirt shop is available at http://IheartPGH.spreadshirt.com. Your url with the numbers in it will still continue to work so you don’t have to go back and change old links.

Setting up the URL is easy:

• log-in to your shop
• click Shops
• click Linking
• type in your custom name
• click Save

You can click on this image to see a larger screen shot of the Linking page

More information and a detailed tutorial is available here.

I was going over the shop settings with someone today and they asked me “what is RSS?”  This is one of my favorite questions and I LOVE rss, but it is also one of the hardest things to explain in one sentence.  I have made many attempts at trying to explain RSS and blogging - it took me 3 months to “get” RSS thanks to my friend Dave who never gave up on explaining it to me.

Well thankfully the guys from Creative Commons have put together this nifty 5 minute video that does an amazing job of explaining RSS in a quick convenient format.  If you are new to RSS, I think you will find this helpful.

I know this has been one feature we have received a ton of requests for - edit and existing product. The wait is over, let the editing begin. Temple announced the arrival of product editing in the forums today, here are the details:

Today we released a new feature in the Shop Admin for your products. You can now edit an existing product or clone a product! Products can be altered for your shop or the Marketplace independently or both at the same time.

Editing a product to for replacement:

If you edit your product in the ?Product Overview? screen, it will be altered in both your shop and within the Marketplace (assuming that your product has been opened in both areas).

Here?s how it works:: Your original product is deleted and replaced by the new product (e.g. with a new color or alternate design). The editable attributes given to the old product (i.e. the commission rate, product name, etc) are automatically transferred to the new product. The product will get moved to the top of the ?Product Overview? list the same as every new product.

Editing a product to create a new version:

Please remember this will change your product in all areas. If you would prefer to change the product in just one of the selling areas (i.e. in your shop OR the marketplace) then simply use the small blue ?My Products? drop-down menu to the top left of the product overview screen and select either your shop or the marketplace.

If you want create new version of a pre-existing product WITHOUT deleting the original, then click on the ‘Clone Product’ option. A copy of the product will be provided which you can then change according to your desires. Great for creating the same design layout on different products, colors, etc!

Let me know if you have any questions!

Each month our amazing customer service specialist, Temple, shares her top tips for improving your shop. Click here to see past tips from Temple.

First, let’s discuss Colors! Choosing a color scheme can be a difficult task, but there are tools to make it a bit easier! Under Shops > Shop Layout > Colors and Fonts, you can choose from our predesigned color scheme or create your own with hex codes. One cool tool, the Color Combo Library , provides different palettes of colors that are complimentary. If you have a favorite hex code, then enter it and find a palette to fit your style! Another site, Color Match, allows you to choose from complimentary colors, analogic, and other choices to find your shop color scheme!
FireFox offers ColorZilla which is a browser add-on and provides the hex code to any color you select on your screen.

Yes, you can now follow Spreadshirt on Twitter. Many of us here at Spreadshirt have been playing around with Twitter so we thought it was time for a Spreadshirt Twitter. We won’t twitter you about every t-shirt but we will be using Twitter to announce some special things and possibly a promotion or two so follow along!

We hope that you love your order from Spreadshirt.  If for some reason, something is not right with your order we are here to help and you can send your item back to us.  But we don’t want your return to end up on this shelf…

If we don’t know who the package is from we can’t help!

So here are a few tips from the Spreadshirt customer service department for faster returns.

With your return please include the following information:

• Order #
• Name
• Contact info - phone number, email, address
• Reason for return - the more specific the better.  Was it the wrong size or is there a problem with the design?  The more information we have the better.
• The Quality Control Card, if you have it

With the upcoming Holiday season many are getting their shop and new products ready. The next shopping craze will be Halloween, then of course the biggest shopping sensation of the year…Christmas. Besides getting your designs and new products ready, check out what the world is searching for.

Two search results I found interesting were:

Yahoo! Buzz can give you the top searches in several different categories, such as TV, movies, sports, etc. Each list provides the top leaders and movers. The leader list offers the top searches and the number of days they have been on the list.

Google Trends will provide the top 100 searches of the day. Change the date to go back a few days or compare specific search phrases to each other. Comparison between Funny T-shirts and T-shirts returns a line chart to compare and region selection to see what your state or country is searching for.

Top searches can help get customers to your site, but simply adding T-shirts to your Key Words does not mean you will be selling 20 shirts tomorrow. Search Engine Optimization is still a major part of getting your shop noticed. Search Engine Guide provides some great tips and information about optimizing your site and keywords. Start optimizing now, so your shop can have better findings when the Internet Shopping season is in full swing!

Happy Optimizing!

Temple

Check out Spreadshirt in this article from the Baltimore Sun.

Fitting you to a ‘T’ - Event he most casual of fashionistas can make a statement through custom-made T-shirts
Baltimore Sun, June 30

The article has a nice list of tips from Jana, Spreadshirt CEO and other t-shirt experts on creating your own custom shirts. I think these apply to anyone who is creating custom apparel.

• DO block out some time to pick the right style, color and design features you want. Rushing through the process could result in an ugly T-shirt. And who wants that? “Go in and think through things,” says Jana Eggers, U.S. CEO of Spreadshirt Inc. “We have a whole bunch of different fonts. Try a bunch of them. See which one you like best. Don’t just pick the first one.”

• DO use spell-check. If you’re using text, please check and double check your spelling. Nothing says “I’m-a-dork” better than a T-shirt that reads, “I’m Too Sexy for This SIHRT.”

• DO try selecting an interesting color, especially if the shirt is a gift. “There’s nothing wrong with the plain white shirt,” Eggers says. “But you want to think, ‘Hey, do I want this to be one of their mow-the lawn shirts?’ or do I want it to be something that they look in the closet and say, ‘I want to wear this.’”

• DON’T overload the shirt with too much text. It may be tempting to try to print on a baby tee the chapter in Jane Eyre you were supposed to read for your summer school English class, but that’s just wrong.

• DON’T put the date on your family reunion shirts. Everyone knows what year it is; try to make the shirt stylish enough that people will want to wear it again. “Everybody gets these shirts, and they throw them away,” says Michael de Zayas, founder of Neighborhoodies.com. “And nobody’s proud wearing a shirt three years from now that says, ‘July 2006 Johnson Family Reunion.’”

• DON’T throw out any ideas — no matter how boring they may seem. “Are you a sports fan? Where do you live?” de Zayas says to ask yourself. “Do you want a silly shirt. Do you want a serious shirt? What are you passionate about? Think about things that interest you. Really make a message that is different from everyone else’s.”

If you have created custom t-shirts before, what is your best piece of advice for someone who is just getting started?

We missed you! Here is the presentation from today’s webinar…

[slideshare id=67884&doc=branding-beyond-your-logo-creating-quality-content-for-your-shop4602&w=425]

One of the coolest additions to your Shop Admin is the new User Profile section. Under the new Profile section you can:

• Upload new designs and create products.
• View incoming messages from Spreadshirt.
• Save products and designs from your shop (or others) as “Favorites” for quick reference.
• Check the status of your purchases.
• Upload personal photos of your products so your customers can see close-up images of your designs or just see how it looks on an actual person!

You can preview these new features on the beta site, but keep in mind that the beta is strictly for testing, so anything you change in your test account will not be found in your Spreadshop once the site goes live.