Resources

If you love the idea of starting an online store or blog, then I’d love to help you get started. This resource guide is a list of my favorite tools and products that I have personally used throughout the last 5 years in business. 

I have received many questions about how to get started, what online shopping platform I use, where I find my designers, my are my favorite templates, what are my favorite marketing apps... the list goes on! I love helping people, so here’s my way of helping you clear through the clutter in this online world. I hope you find these products and services helpful! 

I'll be adding more resources as I test out and use new products and services, so do check back from time to time.

If you have any questions, feel free to contact me!

Disclosure: There are some affiliate links below and I may receive commission for purchases made through links in this post. However, these are products I have personally used, found so helpful, and I love.

Shopify

Shopify is the online shopping platform I use for my site. I have been using Shopify for the last 4 years and have no regrets. When I wanted to make the leap from selling solely on Etsy to selling on my own site, I knew I needed to start with a selling platform. I did a lot of research comparing all the various shopping platforms and I kept landing back on Shopify. With Shopify’s 14 day free trial I was able to set up my store, test out some of the best apps, and fall in love with having a site to call my own! You can sign up here for Shopify’s free 14 day trial with no credit card required. If you love it, then you'll realize you have to have it too. 

When getting started with your free 14 day trial you'll be able to try out a free theme, upload your store logo, customize the colors to match your brand, create some products listings, create your own blog, sync your shop up with Pinterest, sync your shop up with Facebook and Instagram, and add apps like SMSBump!

When creating your own online store, you only want to do the heavy lifting once. With Shopify you will not have to think twice about switching to a better platform in the future because Shopify is the best platform out there. 

Out of the Sandbox

Once you have your shopping platform selected, you next need to pick a store theme. Your theme is important because it does more than make your site look pretty, it helps it function on the backend. If you’ve heard about things like having a responsive site or coding, then this is where those details come into play. Every page your customer / visitor lands on should have a great user experience. If it doesn’t, then they’ll leave, and once someone leaves your site there’s a chance they are gone forever. Don’t take your chances, upgrade your site with a super cool and very reliable theme from Out of the Sandbox.

My current theme is Mobilia and I love the ease of using this theme. I have thought about changing it to Turbo to get even more features and a new look and feel. That’s on the bucket list of things to get done! 

PRIVY

Your site is all set up and you're ready to get some sales! Your best way to capitalize on your traffic is to capture your visitors and turn them into paying customers. Our favorite way to do that is with Privy pop-ups. Privy pop-ups enable you to offer your visitors a discount for signing up to be a newsletters subscriber. You can also show them free shipping offers for specific collections. Your first goal as a business owner is to convert as much of your traffic into leads. Once you have potential buyers on your email list, you can then email them to announce your new collections, giveaways, sales, and more! This si and to do this you need to get 

Click here to sign-up for a FREE TRIAL WITH PRIVY!

Fiverr

Once your site is up and running you may need some help with designing your logo or business cards, building out landing pages, copywriting for your product pages, and product photography. By the way, that list goes on and on. There are so many moving parts that make up a unique, user friendly, and trustworthy site. When in doubt, I have turned to the freelancers at Fiverr to help me tackle some of those jobs. I have freelancers help me with my copywriting, artwork, and other site maintenance tasks.

Don't let your long list of to dos stop you from launching your new online store. Get some help from the awesome freelancers at Fiverr, so you can free up your time to do the higher level tasks. 

Creative Market

Creative Market is my go-to place to find social media and website templates. Have you ever seen those super engaging and fun Instagram stories? Well a lot of those are created from templates! It can be so time consuming for me to create all of my own custom templates, so I find templates on Creative Market, and edit the colors, fonts and images to make them my own. This allows me to be creative, but not fully responsible for the whole process. I also find most of my fonts on Creative Market as well. The designers are truly the best of the best! 

Tailwind

If Pinterest is part of your marketing strategy, like it is for me, then you have to have Tailwind. Tailwind helps you schedule your pins like a pro! What I love about Tailwind is that it reduces the amount of time I need to spend on Pinterest by helping me schedule out my pins for the entire week, even months in advance. I have also been able to increase my pins' reach with Tailwind Tribes and SmartLoop. Take the guesswork out of pinning and use their analytics tool to see which pins get the most engagement and what are the best times to pin based on your account's engagement. 

Tailwind also offers Instagram scheduling. I will say I do not currently use this service, but it definitely makes sense to use one platform to manage scheduling for both your social media accounts. 

Smart.bio

If you have an Instagram account for your business, then Smart.bio is a MUST! What is Smart.bio you ask? It's a custom link in your Instagram profile that takes visitors to your branded landing page. This page allows you to list your top links to pages within your site or anywhere else on the web. You can also provide links to all your previous Instagram posts. This allows you to drive traffic to specific product pages or blog posts from each Instagram post. THIS. IS. GENIUS!

No one loves seeing past posts they want to explore and learn more from, only to have to click over to your site and end up down the rabbit hole to find that relevant piece of content. Make your followers happy and let them click a link in your bio that actually makes them want to click again and again and again! Sign up for Smart.bio today because it's FREE and must-have Instagram marketing tool for your business.