From Hobby to Business: Hannah Weston’s Jewellery Journey

Welcome to the Bring Your Product Idea to Life podcast. This is the podcast for you if you're getting started selling products or if you'd like to create your own product to sell.

I'm Vicki Weinberg, a product creation coach and Amazon expert. Every week I share friendly practical advice as well as inspirational stories from small businesses. Let's get started.

Hello. So today on the podcast, I am speaking to Hannah Weston from Hannah Weston Jewellery. Hannah designs and makes contemporary everyday jewellery.

Each collection has a meaning behind it, intended to celebrate stories and connect with our loved ones. Hannah also works to commission and runs beginner jewellery workshops. I really love this conversation with Hannah.

In it, she talks about how she started her business. Well, actually she started as a hobby. It then became a business alongside her teaching career.

Before she started Hannah Weston Jewellery full time, I found the story that Hannah shared really interesting and inspiring. We spoke a lot about running a business alongside your career.

At what point is or is there, is there a good point to, you know, transition to working on your business full time? If so, when? Yeah, it was a really great conversation, as all of our interviews are, and I would really love now to introduce you to Hannah.

Hi, Hannah, thank you so much for being here.

Hello. Thank you. So sorry, your screen cut out a little bit there.

That was really bad. Well, Hannah, I would love if you could please give an introduction to yourself, your business and what you sell.

Hello. Yes. So I am Hannah. I founded and I run Hannah Weston Jewellery and I design and make meaningful everyday jewelry.

I also run workshops and I work to commission.

Amazing. Thank you. So can we start right at the beginning with when and how you started making jewellery? Because that is quite a skill.

So I actually started making jewellery when I was little, like a lot of children do. I started stringing beads together with my mum, but we started doing it because I have no fingers on one hand.

And I went through quite a determined phase of many times in my life of trying to hide my right hand and trying to do everything just with one hand. So my mum saw stringing beads together as a way to make me use both hands because you can't do that very easily one handed.

So that was how I originally got started making jewelry.

And then career wise, I moved into teaching and I went through quite a stressful period of time with teaching and my local library held a craft fair and they put a leaflet through our door and basically my husband suggested that I did the craft fair and I picked up jewellery making again. So, yeah, so I did the craft fair and absolutely loved it. And it sort of exploded from. Exploded. It sort of grew from there.

Oh, amazing. How long ago was the craft fair?

Oh, well, it's quite a while.

And had you been making jewelry in the time, like, since being a child, and then between the craft fair, was it something you ever did from time to time, or was it just one of those things that you sort of left behind as you got older?

So it was. It was basically, I sort of picked it up and put it down continually throughout my life. I'm quite. I'm very crafty.

So, like, I sew and I can knit and I like embroidering things and making cards. But jewellery making was the thing that I always came back to.

And there was an amazing little bead shop called Craft Basics in York that I had to pass on my way home if I walked home from town. And so I used to pop in there and top up with beads. And. Yeah, so it's sort of.

100%, yeah, definitely it was a hobby. I mean, with the craft fair, like, I think I spent like £100 on supplies and I doubled that money, but it was still very light.

That was my first selling event and I mainly sold to people I knew because I told those people I was going to be there and they came to see me. So I was. Yeah, I was selling bits and pieces to family and friends, but it was still very much just a hobby.

Well, I guess you were still teaching at that point as well, weren't you? So there's always going to be something.

Yeah, yeah.

So how did it change from being a hobby to a business? And I know that when it happens overnight, but can you talk us through sort of the story of how that happened?

Yeah.

So basically I did the craft fair and then I got to thinking one day, and I kind of judge me for not thinking this sooner in my life, but I got to thinking about, like, how jewelry was made, like where it came from. Could you buy silver before it was made into jewelry?

So I bought a book, I started doing a bit of research, I found a supplier, I bought a couple of tools and I set up at my kitchen worktop. I actually chipped my kitchen worktop because I didn't know how to attach a piece of kit to it properly.

So I took a chunk out of the kitchen worktop and started sort of making. Just playing around, basically, and making shapes. They weren't even bits of jewelry, they were just. I was just cutting shapes out of silver.

I had no idea what I was doing. And then I went to a Kings of Leon gig with a friend and she brought a mute.

She bought one of her friends and we got chatting about jewellery making and she put me in touch with a lady who I could do lessons with. So I started having lessons and I would go at the end of every term and do a whole day and, like, learn loads of skills.

It was like a whole day intensive. And then I had my first child and one of my colleagues. I was on maternity leave.

One of my colleagues tagged me and I'm a bit embarrassed to say this, but one of my colleagues tagged me in a Facebook challenge. That was a poster piece of artwork that you've made every day for seven days. And on the seventh day, I posted a picture of a rose quartz necklace.

And one of her friends got in touch with me and asked if it was for sale. And I was sort of like, I haven't really. I hadn't really thought about it.

And she messaged me and said, well, think about it, because I'd really like to buy it. And she did end up buying it as a gift for somebody. And that was the first time I'd sold something to someone I didn't know.

And I was suddenly like, oh, I wonder. I wonder whether other people that I don't know might like to buy things that I've made.

So while I was on maternity leave, I basically, during the times. Because my. My first child was really good at sleeping, but didn't sleep in the house, she would only ever sleep in the car or prom.

So I spent hours and hours sitting in the car and I basically started, like, reading blogs and watching YouTube videos about how to start a business and how to open an Etsy sh. Get started on socials. And that was when it became more of a side hustle.

So, yeah, like, I opened the Etsy shop, started selling to people that I didn't know, and it grew from there.

Oh, that's amazing. Thank you for sharing all of that. And I think it's really.

I don't think you should be embarrassed about the, you know, the challenge and the fact that somebody brought something. I think that's amazing. And that's obviously a sign, isn't it? I think that's such a sign, though, that you were on the. You know, because you were.

You made something that Somebody wanted. So that must have been really nice, like, validation for you that, oh, actually I could. Because before then you said you would just make people.

You just making things for friends and family.

Yeah.

Were you just. Were you sort of. Were you buying. Making things for people as. Or were you. If you see what I mean, were you making people in mind?

That's a really good question. So I did. I made bits and pieces. But then, because I.

At the time that I started, I also, like, started a Facebook page just to kind of document what I was doing. And so, like, friends would send me messages and say, like, I need a Secret Santa gift. I've got this. Like, this is my budget.

Can you make me something? So I'd make them something. And I made stuff for, like, friends and family for gifts. So everyone got bracelets and necklaces.

Um, so, yeah, so I think that, like, that was the first time that somebody outside just my friends and family circle had kind of seen what I was doing, I guess.

Yeah. Because it sounds like before you were making things with someone or a purpose in mind, so you sort of knew.

That someone was habit. Yeah, they were sort of commissions. The early days of my commission work.

Because it's a lot scarier, isn't it, to sell something and not know if somebody would want to buy it? That's real. That's a real shift, isn't it?

Yeah, definitely. Yeah.

That must have been really scary. But I think it's amazing that you took the leap to do it.

Yeah.

So you started off, you said, on Etsy. So how did you find having an Etsy store? Was that quite a big learning curve or.

It was a huge learning curve. I feel like. I feel like at the time.

I haven't been on Etsy for a really long time, so I can't speak for now, but I feel like at the time there was a real dark art to it, to getting seen on Etsy. But, I mean, I did make sales from it, but I couldn't tell you that they were strategic sales.

I felt like people happened upon me somewhat accidentally. But. Yeah, so. So I'd started the Etsy shop and. And I just read uploads on how to write good listings.

I think I bought a couple of courses on, like, you know, Etsy SEO and. Yeah. How to. How to lay out your product descriptions and good photography and stuff like that.

And did you still have. Did you have your own website at that point or was it mostly Facebook? Because you mentioned documenting what you were doing on Facebook.

Yeah, so I basically, I'd Post a picture on Facebook and say, but more articulately, here's something. I made it cost this much DM if you'd like to buy it. And people did. And then just Etsy. I didn't have my own website at that point.

So when did you make the shift? Because I know, sorry to give everyone a spoiler alert that you're not teaching anymore.

So when did you make the shift from having your hobby as first going from a hobby to a side hustle and then going from a side hustle to, you know, doing this full time? When did that happen?

So the way it kind of grew was that during term time I would focus solely on teaching, and then during the holidays I would focus on jewelry stuff and I'd sell more and it grow and I'd get more Facebook followers. And then I'd go back to teaching and focus back on the teaching. And it went through that cycle.

And then when I had my first child, I went back part time. And because I was secondary, it's not so easy to give consistent hours across each year when you're part time secondary.

So first year I was three days. Then I was like two and a half days. And in the third year of being part time, I was only two days, but I had three and a half days childcare.

So me and my husband had chatted and I was like, do I give up the childcare? And one of those days was my mum. And then it meant dropping my youngest just to one day at nursery and thinking about how that would impact her.

And this whole time, like, my husband's like, nodding along and then he went, or you could keep the child care and spend a day and a half every week on the business. And I was like, oh, okay, I could do that. Is that allowed? So that was what we went with. And I started to spend more regular time on the business.

And then there were probably about a dozen reasons why I left teaching. Some not bad at all. I don't hate teaching. I loved teaching. I still love teaching. It's why I do workshops.

But it wasn't so compatible with having young children. And I think I just found it, I found it really difficult to be both.

I couldn't be the teacher that I had been before children, because having a child had changed me and I had different priorities now and also a heck of a lot less free time. And so basically an opportunity arose where I was able to leave without skating around the issue.

I had a miscarriage and I was signed off work for like three months. And that was the longest period of time I'd ever been away from teaching. And on the day that I went back, that day didn't go so well.

And at the end of the day I was chatting to the head of HR and she sort of said, do you want to stay a teacher? And I was like, no.

So we started to have that conversation about me leaving and in the time that I'd been off I'd really like jewellery making had been, I guess like mentally a real safe space and just pouring my ideas into designs and into commissions. And I did a couple of workshops and really loved them. I did a big in person event and really loved that.

And it just got to the point where in my mind I was no longer a teacher, I was a jewellery designer. This is what I did now. So yeah, that's how it kind of played out.

Thank you and I'm so sorry for what happened and thank you so much for being really open and sharing that. And I hope you didn't mind me asking, asking the question. Oh good. Because I get, I think I mentioned this briefly before we started recording.

I just think it's really interesting because lots of people start their businesses on the side of something else, often a job.

And it's really hard, isn't it, to know what point to make the transition to saying I'm not a teacher or whatever your career is, I'm a jewelry maker or I'm a business owner. I think it's really hard and I think the answer is always going to be different for everyone.

Yeah, yeah. And I think I know lots of people who've made that transition and their answers would always be different.

But people have said like, how do I know when I'm ready, when is a good time to jump?

And I think definitely from my point of view a good time to leave a stable, solid, regularly paid job is a bit like when is it a good time to have a child? There is no good time. You just like, I didn't wait until my salary from Hannah Weston Jewellery matched my teaching salary.

I couldn't have physically done that because I would have needed to, there'd have needed to be two of me to earn the same money from both incomes. So yeah, so I like, I was really fortunate in that my husband's salary could support us both.

So we sort of made the necessary changes to our lifestyle and we worked it around that way. But I know other people that have like saved up like six months wages and then they quit and they give themselves six months to make it work.

So yeah, there's loads of different ways of doing it, but I don't think there's ever a really good time to go, I'm gonna step into the world of unpredictability.

Yeah, I agree with you. And I.

So I had a product business before I do this and I, as I've talked about on this podcast before that, after my first son was born, I had postnatal depression.

I went, I was meant to go back to work, but the discussions around going back to my full time role at that time, just, even, just even thinking about it completely overwhelmed me and I just thought, I actually didn't think I could cope with going back to what I was doing. And that was the point. I decided, okay, I'm going to step away and concentrate on my business.

And I think that's the case for lots of people, that there's never a good time, but often there's something that makes you go, okay, it's sort of now or never.

Yes. And I, I very much feel like, did I jump or was I pushed?

And I don't mean like school pushed me out, but did I jump into this business or was I pushed into this business? And I honestly don't know. It's like, I can't tell.

I feel similar actually, but on the other side of it, I feel like I'm pleased that I made the decision. Yeah, I think it was inevitable that I was.

Yeah, yeah, I'm the same as you. It was, it was inevitable it was gonna happen. Like my mum had been saying it for years before I actually did it.

And every time she said, why don't you just do this? And I was like, because that's a ridiculous thing to do. I hadn't yet put myself in that category, I think, in my mind.

And yeah, in having that three months off teaching, I had unconsciously moved myself from one box into the other.

I think that's exactly what happened for me. As. I think as you mentioned before, becoming a parent really changes you and it really changes your outlook.

And I think even if I hadn't had postnatal depression, I still think I looked at things differently then. Like I didn't want to be in the office for however many hours a day it was. And I didn't want to be getting up in the dark and getting on a train.

And I know I'm very fortunate that I was able to not have to do that because, yeah, I think it's, I think life events can really change how you, your outlook on life and what you want.

Yeah, Definitely. I mean, I. So I had quite a traumatic birth with my first as well.

So when I said there were lots of reasons why I gave up teaching, like, that was a contributing factor as well. But, like, it had changed me to the point where just. It wasn't that my heart wasn't in. It just it had really changed my perspective on things.

And I found that really hard to marry with teaching.

Yeah, that makes sense. And I think. Yeah, I think that's. It's really interesting.

Thank you for sharing your story, because I think, as you say, I get asked that sometimes as well, or when's a good time to step away and focus on my business. And I think all I can say is that, as you said, there's no good time. But I think you. You sort of know when it's the right time.

Yeah, I think it's. And I've. I've thought this with some of the decisions that I've made in the business since I started doing this full.

It's not that I could do it, it's that I couldn't not do it. So, like, I'm now in. I used to work at the end of our dining room and I'm now in a studio that's at the end of our garage.

And people have said, like, how did you know that it was the right time to build a studio? And I'm like, I couldn't not do it.

I just got to an impasse where there was kind of a metaphorical wall in front of me, and to get through the wall, this needed to happen.

That makes sense. It's very nice studio, by the way. Obviously I can see it and anyone on YouTube can see it, but yeah, it looks lovely. So what else?

Apart from you have your studio now and obviously you've got more time to dedicate to your business. But other than those two things, what else has changed now that you're working on your business full time?

I've got control on my working hours. And it. With teaching, you need to give quite a lot of notice before you do something.

And there's red tape, and that doesn't necessarily come from the school, that can come from higher up. But I like the fact that I've got autonomy over my business.

Like, I can make a decision yesterday about something and order something I need for it, and it'll be in the house today and I can be getting on with that thing so I can make changes really quickly and be adaptable. And I've got autonomy over my working life, so I do the School run every day.

And I can be at events during the day that are happening at my daughter's school, whereas I couldn't have done that in my previous job. And so I read something somewhere that another independent business talked about.

Where they were talking about being self employed is just choosing which 14 hours of the day you work. And I quite like that.

I like the fact that I can break off in the afternoon, go pick the kids up, spend an hour with them, and then when my husband gets home from work, I can pop back in here and do a bit more.

So it gives us a level of flexibility that we didn't have before, which has been really key to our family sort of moving through the day sort of thing.

Yeah, thank you. You know, I resonate with that so much because I feel exactly the same. My day is very similar.

I take my daughter to school and I walk the dog and I work and then I do the school run later and then I'll make dinner and then work some more. But it's nice doing that when you're choosing to do it rather than having to do it.

Yeah.

There's a real difference, isn't there, between working in the evenings? So when I had a corporate role, sometimes I'd work in the evenings just to get things done. And you. I resented that.

But yeah, when I'm working on like the podcast or something else I'm doing now in the evening, it's almost. I don't know if fun's the right word, but it's a choice and I think that makes such a difference.

Yeah. And you're doing it because you're building something. Like the girls love coming in here and just sitting in here and coming to markets.

And I went through a real phase of. So I do pop up workshops. So rather than people coming here and making jewelry, I go to venues and create a workshop in their event spaces.

And then people come and make jewelry and I went through a real phase of forgetting crucial bits of kit that I needed. So my husband and the girls would jump in the van and come to my rescue, like the A team and.

But they love coming and seeing what mummy does and they, they wouldn't have got that necessarily if I was still in my teaching job.

Yeah, that's so lovely.

Yeah. So I think just like being a good role model as well, like.

Yeah, yeah. It's great that they can see what your, what you're doing. And has it changed how you view your business? I don't.

It's okay if the answer is no by the way.

But do you think about your business differently now that it's, it's your full time business as opposed to something you were doing around a teaching job?

It's definitely, it's scarier now. And I. So like I've often said this to people as well.

When I was training to teach they would tell me what I needed to know before I needed to know it. Whereas in this business often I find out I needed to know something 10 or 15 minutes after I could have done with knowing it.

And so, and also sort of in a teaching environment you've got very obvious like training providers or like career progression paths that are provided for you. Whereas in business you have to sort of go out and find out what you need to know and find out who.

The people who can teach you that and avoid the people who are pretending that they could teach you that. And it's, it is a bit of a minefield.

But when you found the people who know their stuff and who like I look for grownups who are more experienced in business who I can say help me with this. So yeah, you sort of, you need to find your more experienced people and your people who can help you do different bits.

But I love sort of, I guess it's given me like a new lease. Like my website I built myself. So I had help from, I guess you'd call her a mentor but in fact Ellie who you know.

So, so I had help from Ellie but like I built it, I built that website myself and I love being able to learn to do stuff in my business and yeah. Know how that stuff works.

Yeah, I know what you mean. It is really if you, if you, if you're interested in business and I think you have to be interested in business to have a business.

I think it is really exciting if you want to view it like that. All of the things that you learn, all of the skills that you acquire. Because I know exactly what you mean.

Probably, I don't know, 10 years ago maybe, or maybe I've got the time scales wrong. You might have thought, oh, I couldn't build a website. Or like I know what I mean.

Ridiculous.

But yeah, honest, like if you'd said to me 10 years ago, like in 10 years you'll be running Hannah Weston Jewelry as your sole income, I would have laughed hysterically and spat out whatever was in my mouth at the time. Yeah, it is all just bonkers.

Like when I look back, I mean I never had a business plan and truth be told, I never woke up one day and thought I Want to run a jewelry business. That's what I want to do is my life. I kind of feel like I tripped and fell into this. It's just kind of happened. But it's all been organic.

It's all been me wittering on endlessly at people about what I do and finding people to work with and collaborate with so that you spread your message further. And yeah, it's, it's insane really, to think about.

I think it is, I think it, I think it is. And I think it does sound like that your whole story's been really organic, you know, from start until now.

It's kind of, it's not been something where you just woke up one morning and said, right, I'm going to start Hannah Western Jewelry and I'm going to stop. Like, that didn't happen in a day.

Somebody, somebody said to me about, they were like, oh, I really need to write a business plan. What's your business plan? And I was like, oh, I don't think I have one.

And my husband since corrected me and got actually, we did make a business plan over a bottle of wine one night and, and a lot of that business plan has actually come to fruition. I need to kind of update it and yeah, just bring it into the present day.

But I, I think because I've made it up as I've gone along, because you have to. Everyone's winging it.

Like, even the CEOs of massive companies, like they're, they're winging the next stages of their journey to a certain degree, I think. Yeah, you just kind of, you just have to keep going. Yeah.

Well, so much changes. It's out of our control.

Yeah.

Like whether it's like, I don't know, social media algorithms or, I don't know, different policies or like marketplaces change their rule. There's so much, so much happening that we have to react to.

Even if you're the most organized person, you've got processes and you know what you're doing.

Yeah.

There's so much that we can't control, like the economy or whatever it is. There's so much, isn't there that we just cannot do anything about and we have to adapt to.

Yeah, definitely. And at the end of the day, you are like, particularly when you're a product business, although I guess this applies to any business.

You're asking people to part with their hard earned cash for something that you've made and that's a big deal. That's like, that's not to be taken for granted.

So yeah, every sale is like, it never gets old, that sale pinging through because people are trusting you with their money.

Yeah. And I think you're right. And that's always really exciting.

Definitely.

And if you don't mind me asking, something else, it's slightly different, although we've sort of skated around this a little bit is.

And feel free to sort of say if you don't want to talk about this, but I would love to know about why you decided to stop selling on Etsy and focus on your website. And this isn't because I think there's anything wrong with Etsy.

I just think it's, it's interesting because, you know, lots of people go the other way, don't they? Start on a website and then look to go on a marketplace and there's no right or wrong here at all.

I just thought it'd be really interesting to talk about why you decided to move from Etsy and what the impact of that's been either way, if you don't mind.

Yeah, no, I'm totally happy to. So I think, I think marketplaces like Etsy are, they are amazing for small businesses.

They have big marketing budgets, they, I mean Etsy advertises on TV and that gets your product to a massive audience. They've got kind of the know like and trust already there.

So I think if people are shopping on Etsy, there's a level of trust in your business because they are shopping with small businesses but they're shopping via a big corporation. So I do think there is a lot of value in Etsy.

The actual reason that I stopped selling Etsy was because every time you, every time you sell something, if you've got that product on auto renew, then you have like six transactions come in and out of your account for that, like that purchase.

So if somebody bought something from me, I'd pay a transaction fee and then I'd pay like VAT on that transaction fee and then I'd pay a renewal fee for the new listing and then I'd pay VAT on the renewal fee and then there was something else and I can't remember what the third one was, but basically on my statement there'd be six tiny amounts of money for one sale and then I'd get the money that they gave me after they'd taken their fees and it just started to fry my head a little bit. It was so hard when it came to bookkeeping.

And I do my bookkeeping ye olde fashioned way on a spreadsheet, but at the Time I was dabbling in a, like a third party program for it, like QuickBooks or something. And I just really struggled to get my head around it. So I just sort of parked it.

I took everything off and I parked it and thought I'm just gonna leave it for now. I think I also noticed that a few sellers or a few people in my industry had also left. So that kind of reaffirmed my decision to leave.

But I think also it is quite a flooded market now and when you search for stuff, I wonder whether everything on there is handmade. Like, yeah, like Etsy's USP used to be handmade or vintage and there's definitely some stuff on there that is not handmade or vintage.

So I kind of felt like it just got diluted a bit. So yeah, there's, I guess like I can literally argue it anyway either way.

But for me the thing that made me come off was the six fees per transaction.

Thank you for sharing that. And I'm with you in the fact that there's definitely pros and cons to Etsy or any marketplace.

Which is why I was just curious because I think it's just good for people to have a awareness of. Yeah, you know, there are reasons to sell on different marketplaces and maybe there are other things to consider.

I think it's just really good, isn't it, just to be open about all of it.

I think it's a really positive thing to do if, if like, if you've got a really unique product, like jewelry is a very saturated market. So there's an awful lot of jewelry on there. And I think maybe since like lockdown, like lots of markets have become very saturated.

But I think if you really invest time in it and you can work out how it works and how to get a scene, then it's really beneficial.

And it can be really beneficial because you've got sort of the, the power of a big corporation behind you in terms of their marketing and reach of new customers and stuff. But yeah, it comes with its negatives as well.

Yeah, I think you're. And I always say, I think same for all marketplaces.

And it's interesting though, as a consumer talking about it being flooded, one thing I've, I've noticed is it's definitely harder to find what you're looking for now.

So you'll type in whatever it is you're looking for and you'll get lots of things come up that are relevant and then you'll also get something come up and you think, why are they Showing me that.

So I don't know why that is, but it's definitely not as straightforward to find things on there, which obviously must be also frustrating if you're a seller and you're selling a product that's very relevant, but you're being on a page of search results with some products that are just not what the customer's looking for. Because, yeah, a lot I've been looking.

I like my Christmas presents on Etsy and I found that a lot lately, that searching for something and going, well, that does. That's not what I'm looking for. Talking about being found that. If you don't mind me asking. So did you find.

Was it quite scary to go from being on Etsy where obviously people are there to shop, it's a marketplace people trust, to having to rely on getting people to your website? Because that's quite a shame.

Yeah.

I think because I never quite mastered the dark art of Etsy, it wasn't a big part of my revenue stream and so moving to my own website didn't make an awful lot of difference at the time. It is harder. But I think also you can create more of an experience, a brand experience, with your own website.

So I put off having my own website for years just through stuff like, I didn't want to have to pick, like, which host do you pick? Like, who do you go with, how do you build it, how do you get.

There's so much stuff with websites that you need to know and like little bits of coding and stuff depending on who you is. So in the end, my first website was actually built by my husband's cousin.

She built me a Squarespace website and yeah, so I used that for a couple of years. But I think I liked. I like my Squarespace website over my Etsy shop because I had more autonomy over it.

I guess for the same reason that I prefer running my own business over teaching. Like, I've got control of how it looks, I've got control of the order of my products. Yeah, there's just a lot more autonomy over it.

Yeah, that makes sense. Well, thank you. I hope you don't mind me again. It's just. I think it's. Yeah, I think it is interesting because obviously a website is.

So it's a different thing, isn't it? As you say, you've got so much control. But equally, I think for lots of us, getting people to our websites is always the.

Yeah, it is hard and it's a relentless thing as well.

You have to continually be directing people to your Website, you can't just go, right, I've done some marketing that's ticked off for that year, I don't need to look at that again. It needs to be a daily weekly thing that you're continuing to push and remind people that you're there and getting people to your website.

So yeah, it is hard.

That's true. I think everything's hard.

I guess on the other side of that, the good thing with that is that I think that if you're on third party marketplaces, there can also be a bit of a reliance on them bringing in the sales and the traffic.

And then if something goes wrong, say you get closed down or, I don't know, anything happens or that website goes down, for example, that could be quite tricky.

So I think depending on where that marketplace's home is can like you're at the mercy of all their policy changes.

So anything like with shipping, I know there was a big thing with Etsy with they wanted sellers to give free shipping in America when people spent over $35, I think it was. But that applied to everybody whether you were in the US or not.

So if you were a UK seller and somebody put $35 worth of stuff in their basket, Etsy would like push your listings to the top of a search if your postage was free. But postage to the states is like 11 quid. So that was quite a big chunk out of your profit margin if you were going to do that.

And just things like that, like and their returns policies, that you're at the mercy of that third party's business decisions. Whereas if you're on your own website you make the decisions and communicate those with the customer.

Yeah.

And I think there's so many, yeah, there's just so many benefits, as you say, to just having your that autonomy and been able to make those decisions.

Yeah.

Well, thank you so much for all that you shared, Hannah. I have one final question before we finish, if that's okay. So what would your number one piece of advice be for other product creators?

So I say this and I find it very much easier to say than do but just go full throttle at it. You have to like head down and just push and keep pushing and keep believing in yourself relentlessly. I think that's the key to your success.

Yeah, just go full throttle form the thank you.

And you know what you say that it's easier to say than to do. I think that goes for almost every piece of advice. It's true, isn't it?

Yeah, definitely.

Well, thank you so much, Hannah. Thank you for everything you shared.

Oh, thank you for having me. It's been fun.

Oh, you're so welcome.

Thank you so much for listening. Right to the end of this episode. Do remember that you can get the full back catalogue and lots of free resources bosses on my website, vickiweinberg.

Com. Please do remember to rate and review this episode if you've enjoyed it, and also share it with a friend who you think might find it useful.

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