Storque articles by TechUpdates

Tech Update: Stay Signed In

2010-01-14T00:40:00-05:00

Hey, Etsy addicts! We're excited to announce the launch of the ability to stay signed into Etsy for one day at a time. Simply mark the helpful new checkbox on Etsy's sign in page and we won't ask for your username or password more than once in a 24-hour period.

Give it a try when you see it and let us know what you think! Questions and comments welcome in this Forum thread.

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Tech Update: Search Suggestions

2010-01-12T13:33:00-05:00

We're excited to announce the launch of a fun new Search feature called Search Suggestions. Now when you perform a search for an item, you will often see links for suggested searches below the search bar as you type.

The suggested searches you'll see are recent related searches performed by other Etsy visitors, and the suggestions are available for searches within Handmade, Vintage, Supplies, All Items and top-level Categories.

This feature is now live for a small percentage of Etsy traffic (so you may not see it yet), and we will be gradually rolling it out to everyone over time.

Search Suggestions are designed to help shoppers — especially new visitors — when they search, providing ideas and inspiration for effective searches that might interest them. We've found that many shoppers are unsure of which search terms to use when they arrive on Etsy and welcome a little help.

Tip: Sellers can get ideas for item tags from relevant Search Suggestions, as they represent actual recent searches from Etsy shoppers.

There's a truly amazing variety of unique items available here on Etsy, and Search Suggestions make it easy and fun to try some searches you might never have thought of before.

Give it a try when you see it and let us know what you think! Questions and comments welcome in this Forum thread.

Customer Care: Improving Etsy Support

2009-11-12T12:30:00-05:00

Etsy's Support Team is committed to providing the best possible service to the Etsy community. We are delighted to announce that we are launching a brand new Help section and a new set of internal tools for Etsy's Support Team.

As we have with other recent features, we are going to roll out use of the new Help system over the next few days instead of all at once. We appreciate your patience and participation as we get the new Help system up and running.

Here are the highlights:

Searchable Help. Wave goodbye to those long, clunky, list-style Help pages. For the first time, Etsy's Frequently Asked Questions knowledge base (FAQs) is searchable! View FAQs by topic on Help Home, or quickly find answers by searching for a keyword or phase.

Contact Etsy Support. The new Help site allows you to contact Etsy's Support Team via a web form, instead of leaving Etsy to use email. Super convenient! (Note: You must be signed in to your Etsy account to use this feature, and we're gradually rolling this out to members. Until you your account comes up in the queue, this section will direct to the old FAQ.)

Help History. You can view and update your questions to Etsy's Support Team — and see our responses — right from the Help site using the My Help History page. In addition, a copy of the response from Etsy's Support Team will be sent to the email address on file in Your Etsy > Account Info. (Note: You must be signed in to your Etsy account to access My Help History, and we're gradually rolling this out to members. Until you your account comes up in the queue, this section will direct to the old FAQ.)

Submit a Suggestion. Have an idea to make Etsy even better? Want to offer us your point of view about Etsy? Use this handy form to let us know. (Note: You can alternatively discuss your ideas with other members in the community Ideas Forum.)

Teach Etsy How to Help. The new Help site allows members to rate the helpfulness of each FAQ. This provides us with valuable information so we can continually improve our resources for you. The Help site "learns" which FAQs are the most popular and automatically keeps these near the top for easier access.

Better Admin Tools. Etsy's Support Team has a new set of internal tools that integrate directly with the Help site to better serve our community. Every message sent to Etsy's Support Team is read and responded to by a real person. This human touch is vital to provide personalized assistance to every member who needs help. As we ramp up to full speed with these new tools, we have the ever-present goal in mind of improving the quality and timeliness of our customer support.

You may notice this week that emails you receive from Etsy's Support Team will look a little different. You can now easily see both your question to Support and our reply as a discussion thread. In addition, you will receive a reference number for your issue to improve correspondence tracking.

If you've recently sent an email to Etsy's Support Team, don't worry! You do not need to resubmit your question through the new Help site. We will respond as usual. Currently, you can still contact Etsy's Support Team by email to support@etsy.com, abuse@etsy.com, billng@etsy.com or content@etsy.com. We will forward emails to these addresses into our new Help system. (Be sure to send your message from the email address on file in Your Etsy > Account Info.) Over time, we will phase out the use of these email addresses and transition to using the Contact Etsy Support web form to contact the different areas of Etsy's Support Team.

P.S. If you would like to receive breaking, vital Etsy news as it happens — delivered straight to your email inbox — then sign up for Etsy News Alerts emails. Read more about it here. Expect this as an Etsy Alert email in your inbox if you already subscribe to the list.

You can also get an RSS feed of all TechUpdates here.

Talking Product: An Update on 2009 Site Feature Priorities

2009-11-02T15:00:00-05:00

Hi friends,

Welcome to the latest installment of Talking Product. For those of you who are unfamiliar with these posts, they are part of a regular series from my colleagues and me. Our CEO, Maria, started this series last year with her Talking Shop posts. In 2009, we’ve offered more posts by disciplines: Talking Product, Talking Marketing and Talking Tech. In June, all of us got together for a talkfest that we offered up as an audio podcast to more personally communicate with all of you about what’s happening at Etsy.

I am excited to offer you this latest update that covers the last few months. It also presents an overview of our priorities for the remainder of this year and into early next year, as well as a few general Product Team updates.

As a reminder from my previous updates, our first and foremost priority in recent months has been improving the shopping experience. We believe that among the most valuable things Etsy can do for sellers is attract buyers to the site, get them shopping and keep them coming back. While there is much work ahead and this will be a constant focus for us, we’re excited about some of the changes we’ve made so far and about the upcoming features we have in the queue.

So, what we have been up to lately?

Search

As I’ve indicated in past updates, improving the search and discovery experience on Etsy has been our top priority. We’ve made important strides in our efforts to improve Etsy's searching and shopping experience. Here are a few highlights:

Now when you perform a search on Etsy, you will often see links for recent popular related searches above your results. These related searches are actual searches recently performed by Etsy shoppers. They serve as suggestions for shoppers to refine their initial search or to stimulate ideas for successful similar searches. Related searches also offer sellers ideas to effectively tag items.
We made improvements to the way subcategories are suggested during the item listing process. Now, only those subcategories relevant to an item's top-level Category are suggested as item tags. This adjustment is helping to make the Category browsing experience more relevant.
We gave shoppers the ability to filter their search results by Category. This new feature provides shoppers a quick and easy way to narrow and refine their search results. Many Etsians tell us that this enhancement makes finding just the right item on Etsy easier and faster.

Checkout

We continued to work on making Checkout as smooth as possible, especially for new buyers. Our A/B testing framework allows us to test Checkout changes with a small percentage of shoppers, to make sure the changes will be understood and actually improve the user experience, before rolling the changes out to all shoppers.

We enabled new buyers to register on Etsy as a part of the regular Checkout flow. This was an important change since previously new buyers were required to leave Etsy.com in the middle of the Checkout flow in order to complete registration. The old process often resulted in buyer confusion.
We're currently A/B testing removing non-essential elements from the header of Checkout pages to focus shoppers on completing the Checkout process.

Seller Tools

Over the past few months, our new shipping tool with regional shipping options and the ability to rearrange items in your shop moved from the beta testing phase to full launch.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

In the last couple of months, we’ve devoted a fair amount of attention to SEO. With the help of our friends at SEOmoz, Etsy developed a stronger SEO strategy and implementation plan. The most significant changes of the last few months are:

Giving sellers more control over your shop page title, Item listing page titles, and Section page titles
Canonical tags for improved search engine ranking for these pages
Updating shop URLs to be more search-engine friendly as well as changing to 301 redirects

We focused on shop and item listing page SEO and launched improvements, including tools to help sellers preview how their shop home pages and item listings will appear in Google search results. We believe that these changes are, in part, responsible for the continued strong traffic to Etsy.com.   In partnership with SEOmoz, Etsy also created the Etsy Guide to SEO.

SEO is an ongoing effort, and we'll continue to make improvements. We are grateful to Etsy sellers who actively participated in our Virtual Labs sessions on this topic and to those who are diligently using the guide to improve traffic to their Etsy shops.

Community

We recently launched a redesign of the Community Hub. The goal with this redesign was to provide clear, more immediate access to information for the Etsy community about important news, events and activities occurring on Etsy.

Many of you have asked us to communicate frequently and with as much relevant information as we can. Prior to the launch of the new Community Hub, Etsy had only one blog, The Storque. To date, The Storque has served as a resource for Etsy buyers, sellers, staff, and the general public. It showcases a lot of terrific content and information, but the content that’s most relevant to Etsy sellers is not always easily accessible. The Community Hub is a step in the direction of focusing our communications on distinct audiences. We appreciate your patience and your feedback along the way and hope that you find the new Community Hub useful.

What is in store for the remainder of 2009 and early 2010?

As the year winds down our main focus is on keeping the site stable for holiday shoppers. Starting mid-November and going through December, we will go into a bit of a code lockdown so as not to disrupt the buying and selling experience on Etsy. During this period we will only release changes that will not risk the performance and user experience of the site. This is a common practice for most ecommerce sites and one that we believe is critical. With that in mind, some of the updates below will launch before this lockdown while others will launch early next year. Also, some of the changes might only launch to a small subset of users, and then over time we’ll expand to all users. We’ll provide updates on the specific timing and plans for each of these items via the Forums, Community Hub, and The Storque as we get closer to each launch.

Search and Discovery

Many shoppers, especially those new to Etsy, don’t know what they’re looking for when they arrive at the site. Maybe they are searching for a gift, or they know they’re going to find something they love at Etsy, but they’re not sure what. In addition, some Etsy shoppers describe their search experience on the site as “overwhelming” while others describe it as “addictive.” We’re looking to convert those who may feel overwhelmed into addicts. We believe a key to that lies in enabling shoppers to refine search results in various ways.

To that end, many of the features currently in development will be designed to give visitors a better view into the kinds of unique items available on Etsy and help them more easily refine the results displayed. We know that shoppers who perform a search on Etsy are significantly more likely to buy something than those who do not use the search function.

One feature in development is what we call Search Suggestions. This means that we'll suggest relevant search queries as site visitors begin to type a query into the search bar. These suggestions will be specific to Handmade, Vintage, Supplies, All Items or the Category page from which you search. The suggestions will be derived from Etsy’s search logs and will be displayed in a dropdown box as is the practice on many heavily trafficked ecommerce sites. We believe this functionality will help shoppers more quickly and easily discover items of interest on Etsy.   We're also dedicated to improving the overall search experience by focusing on improved handling of misspelled search terms, the page shoppers see when they perform a search with no results, and more.

Checkout

We remain focused on making Checkout as easy as possible for all Etsy buyers, especially new buyers. We're working on a project we call Guest Checkout, which will enable new buyers to check out on Etsy without first choosing a username and registering on the site. This type of functionality exists on many ecommerce sites and is generally an expected option for shoppers. By introducing it on Etsy, we intend to remove hurdles in the Etsy Checkout process.

International

Many buyers and sellers have asked for an easier way to communicate prices in currencies other than U.S. dollars. We plan to introduce a currency calculator on item pages so that shoppers can quickly (and without leaving the page) calculate prices in currencies other than U.S. dollars. The actual transactions will still occur in U.S. dollars.

Google Product Search

Many Etsy sellers use their Etsy shop RSS feed to schedule uploads of their items to Google Merchant Center, for placement in Google Product Search.

Later this year, Google is changing how sellers on marketplaces like Etsy upload items for placement in Google Product Search, and we're working with Google on a solution that will allow Etsy to automatically upload items from your shops into Google Base if you choose to opt in to the program. This functionality will be launched in beta form to a small group of sellers and will gradually roll out to the entire Etsy seller community. More details on this initiative will be announced soon.

Help

As mentioned in my last update, we have been working to launch a new Help site to make it easier for our members to find information more quickly along with a new set of internal tools for Etsy's Support Team. We’re pleased to report that this is about ready to launch. Please stay tuned to Etsy’s blog, The Storque, the new Community Hub, and to the Forums for further details.

Updates From the Etsy Product Team

We’re delighted to welcome Michael Craig to the team. Michael joins us as our design director focusing on user experience design. Among other things, he will focus on creating design standards for the site. Welcome, Michael, a.k.a. mcraig71!

We’re also thrilled to welcome two new babies to the team. Congrats to Beth, a.k.a. bethela, on the birth of her very cute son, Rowan! (MCR, who heads up Etsy's Sys Ops Team, and his wife also had a boy!)

We love to hear from you. You can find the Product Team on Etsy:

Sean is sean11
Tom is kutty
Eric is ericds
Beth is bethela
Amy is amydec
KC is okaysee
Jen is jendoo
Michael is mcraig71
And I’m saralouhicks

Lastly, but most importantly, we appreciate all of your input that you provide in the Forums, Storque blog comments, and in emails to Etsy’s Support Team regarding improvements and suggestions for the site. We take the suggestions from our community as one of the greatest considerations in determining our product roadmap, and we’re personally committed to make progress against them. We understand that it may seem that many long-requested features have not been prioritized, but we want to stress that we are listening, we appreciate your suggestions, and we are making progress.

There’s more ahead so please stay tuned. I’ll be back at the beginning of the year with another Talking Product post that provides an overview of our priorities for 2010. As always, your feedback is important, so I look forward to a continued dialogue around our priorities.   Thanks!

Tech Update: Upcoming SEO Improvements for Shop Home Pages

2009-10-30T19:40:00-05:00

UPDATE: We have completed the SEO improvements for shop pages, including the 302 to 301 redirect changes for username.etsy.com URLs.

[The following was originally posted on October 30, 2009.]

UPDATE: We're happy to announce that all the search engine optimization (SEO) changes described in the post below are now live on Etsy, except for the 302 to 301 redirect change for username.etsy.com URLs, which will roll out over the next 24 hours.

[The following was originally posted on October 28, 2009.]

As part of our ongoing initiative to increase SEO effectiveness on Etsy.com, we will be releasing an update within the next 24-48 hours that is designed to improve page rankings on search engines such as Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc.

Search engines look at the number of links into a web page, such as a seller’s shop or product listing page, and the quality of those links to determine the relevancy of that page in response to a search query. Our change will ensure that ALL incoming links to Etsy pages are counted by the search engines.

Prior to this change, all links to your shop URL (username.etsy.com) were 302 redirects to www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=123456, which many search engines viewed as temporary and therefore did not count in their algorithms. From a technical perspective, we changed 302 temporary redirects to permanent 301 redirects, which are counted.

In the process, we’ve also updated the current shop page URL (www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=123456) from a format that uses a numerical “user_id” to one that is SEO-enhancing as well as shopper-friendly: www.etsy.com/shop/username.

We anticipate that you’ll have questions and hope to address the majority of them below:

Do I need to make changes to all the current links to my site?
No, you do not need to make any changes to your current site references — whether you’re using username.etsy.com or www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=123456. Both will be automatically redirected to www.etsy.com/shop/username. In the future, if you’re embedding the link to your shop page on another site, please use http://www.etsy.com/shop/username. If you’re marketing your site and need a URL that’s easy to remember, continue to use username.etsy.com in your marketing materials.

When I create a new shop, what URL will be generated?
When a new shop is created on Etsy.com, two URLs will be generated: username.etsy.com and www.etsy.com/shop/username. Etsy will automatically assign www.etsy.com/shop/username to the page URL. Shop owners can continue to use username.etsy.com for marketing purposes — this will be automatically redirected to www.etsy.com/shop/username.

When can I expect to see the results of these changes?
Once changes are made on any site, it takes search engines a few weeks to recognize that change and reflect it in page rankings. Search engines crawl Etsy.com more frequently than most websites because of its size, number of inbound links and frequency of change.

Tell me more about 302 vs. 301 redirects.
On the Internet, there are different types of redirects used for different purposes by the search engines. The redirect from username.etsy.com to www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=123456 was a 302 redirect. Search engines assume 302 redirects are temporary and therefore do not count links to 302 redirects towards the number of links to a page. In contrast, 301 redirects are seen as permanent, and do count towards the number of links to a page. We're changing the 302 temporary redirect to a 301 permanent redirect to make sure all links to username.etsy.com are counted by search engines.

We’d like to recognize and thank our partners at SEOmoz – Rand, Lindsay, and Jen – for their involvement in our initiative. SEO is an ongoing process and as we continue to roll out enhancements, we will communicate them on The Storque. If you have questions or comments, please join us in this discussion thread in the Forums. We’d love to hear from you.

P.S. If you want to get the breaking, vital Etsy news as it happens — delivered straight to your email inbox, then sign up for Etsy News Alerts emails. Read more about it here. Expect this as an Etsy Alert email in your inbox if you already subscribe to the list.

You can also get an RSS feed of all TechUpdates here.

Not-So-Top-Secret: Policy Sneak Peek

2009-10-20T10:32:00-05:00

Psst ... Secret Squirrels! You may not know this, but for the past few months, a special task force at Etsy has been locked away in a tiny conference room, buckling down to polish up Etsy's site policies. I've just smuggled some highly classified documents out of the heavily-guarded, steel-doored Lawyer Hole over at Etsy HQ. I think you'll want to take a look at this file — it contains proposed revisions to the DOs & DON'Ts of Etsy.*

It’s been over a year since we last updated the DOs & DON'Ts of Etsy. During that time, the team has received feedback on our existing policies from the Etsy community — through the Forums, emails, Virtual Labs and in-person meet ups. Thank you for your input! Keeping our policies clear and up-to-date is one way we can help preserve the integrity of the site. We want to continue working with the community to better our services and our marketplace. This sneak peek preview provides another way for us to improve the site together. The revised DOs & DON’Ts will be posted on a special page for about a week to offer the opportunity to read through the document and respond with your thoughts about the proposed changes. If necessary, we may make final tweaks before we go live with the new DOs & DON'Ts. Our other policy documents, as well as Help content, will be updated to reflect the revisions to the DOs & DON’Ts at that time.

We understand that the changes may have a direct impact on some members and shops. Once we go live with the new policies, we will institute a grace period of several weeks to allow all members to edit existing account information, shops and listings as needed.

Visit this special page to see the preview of the revised DOs & DON'Ts of Etsy.

As you will see, most policies remain the same. In many areas, we've just clarified existing information or elaborated upon current practices to include these items formally in the DOs & DON'Ts document. Below I’ll highlight the changes, but be sure you preview the updated DOs & DON'Ts in their entirety.

Membership: A few notable policies that apply to all members have been moved up to the Membership section, like our policy for linking from a shop or profile to another selling venue. Collectives (seller accounts involving multiple people) have been further defined with the categories of Collaboration, Sharing a Shop and Shop Management Help. We clarified our rules for younger Etsians; collectives that include minors under the age of 18 may not utilize community features unless otherwise stated.

Conversations: You may not use Conversations to interfere with a transaction (with details on this in the Transactions section, too). We've also elaborated on the definition of "spam" as it relates to Etsy Convos.

Transactions: We’ve added information to the Transactions section, describing the roles of the seller, the buyer and Etsy in a transaction. Additionally, we’ve detailed various concerns or scenarios in which a transaction may be disputed, including: non-payment, non-delivery, refusal of service, dissatisfaction and interference. We’ve also clarified the circumstances in which a transaction may be canceled. In general, the additions to this section outline in greater detail the processes and policies already in place for transactions.

Feedback: To better accommodate custom orders and international transactions, we will be increasing the timeframe for submitting feedback from 90 days to 120 days. (This will go into effect when the policies are "live.") Additionally, we’ve clarified the circumstances in which Etsy will review feedback for removal, and we've lifted the 30-day limitation to requesting a feedback review for policy violation.

Shops and Listings: Formerly called “Selling,” this section has been expanded to include detailed policies about shop set-up, listing items, tagging and specific rules for handmade items, vintage goods and supplies. The section on Tagging is entirely new to the DOs & DON’Ts, but most of this information was available in Etsy’s Help section or through guides posted on Etsy’s blog, The Storque. Expanded sections on rules for handmade, vintage and supplies items should help sellers understand what can be sold on Etsy and how to list items for sale.

Charitable Shops and Listings: Etsy appreciates the spirit of giving back. Due to some laws and the existence of unsavory individuals who may try to take advantage of this spirit, we have added a section for charitable shops and listings.

Prohibited Items: In response to a variety of community concerns, we have clarified our prohibited items list. These items — though they may be handmade, vintage or a crafting supply — are not allowed to be listed for sale on Etsy.

Showcase and Treasury: Making a first time appearance in the DOs & DON'Ts are specific sections for participation in the Showcase and the Treasury. We have gathered information from other areas of the site about these interactive features to formalize as policies in the DOs & DON'Ts.

The DOs & DON'Ts of Etsy, Terms of Use, Privacy Policy, Copyright and Intellectual Property Policy and the Help site all will be updated for consistency. Once we gather your feedback and make any changes, we will launch the final versions of everything together. At that time, we will send an email notice to all members. As stated above, we will also allow a grace period for all members to edit their existing content to comply with any changed policies.

*OK, so I admit it. I'm a lousy spy and a loyal Etsy employee. I totally made sure I had permission from the head honcho before I released this not-so-top-secret sneak peek of our new policies to you, the Etsy community. Truth is that we really want your feedback. Be sure to read the preview of the entire revised DOs & DON'Ts to provide us with the most accurate feedback, and then join us for discussion in this Forum thread.

All About Etsy FAQ: Welcome to the Community Hub

2009-10-09T16:00:00-05:00

Today we're excited to unveil your new Community Hub!

There's a lot going on in the Etsy community on any given day — at any given moment. This page is designed to gather together the main streams of activity so you can see the latest at a glance. You can participate in any way you want. We hope you'll join us!

The Community Hub is linked in the main Etsy top navigation bar found on every page on our site — just click on Community. If you want to bookmark it, use this url: http://community.etsy.com

From the Community Hub you can:

get quick updates about goings-on
access the Forums and Chat (there's also a "From the Forums" feed with some of the latest topics)
pop into the Virtual Labs for real-time, interactive events
reach the Teams pages on Etsy, where groups of members self-organize
jump to The Storque, Etsy's blog, where we post content ranging from shopping to seller how-to's
check out the Resources pages for helpful tools and graphics
join in community shopping polls with the Voter

Social networking has taken off in the Etsy community, so we're streaming in our Twitter feed. We're also providing you with the links to our other social networking pages, such as Facebook, and our media feeds, such as YouTube, Flickr, and iTunes (coming soon). There's much to explore, so dive in!

For upcoming events, check out the calendar embedded on the page.

Stay tuned for more improvements to some of these pages. We'd love to hear your feedback, so please share your thoughts in the comments below.

UPDATE: Due to some limitations we had to remove the top links from the new Community Hub (e.g. Cart, Sign In, Favorites, Conversations, etc.). If you are Signed In to Etsy when you visit the Community Hub you will still be Signed In even without the top links. We understand that this is a confusing experience and longer term we hope to find a solution to improve this. In the meantime, you can always go to www.etsy.com to view your top links.

Read more posts in the All about Etsy FAQ Series | Visit the Community Hub

Tech Update: Site Maintenance 2009 Schedule

2009-10-02T17:00:00-05:00

UPDATE: Our engineers will be working on the site on Monday, November 16, but the site will not be taken down for this maintenance window. That the site will be accessible during maintenance is actually part of the improvements that have been made.

We apologize for the back and forth. We are getting down to the final preparations before the holidays and we are working hard. One new factor appeared on the scene: the new baby of MCR, our chief Sys Admin, and his wife. No, this is not the sole reason for the shifting schedule, but it is the only one with a high enough cuteness factor to be worth mentioning.

As I wrote back in January, we have planned a number of behind-the-scenes changes and improvements for the rest of the year that will enhance the stability and scalability of the site, but require site downtime. To put those improvements in place, I announced monthly maintenance windows in which the site would be unavailable while we make these changes Since then, we have realized that we need more frequent maintenance windows to make these improvements more quickly, so we will now be doing these maintenance windows roughly every two weeks. To give everyone the most notice possible, we are publishing the new schedule below.

Our first maintenance window on the new schedule will be next Monday, June 8 from 2 a.m. - 6 a.m. ET. During this time period, all functions on the site will be unavailable, and all Etsy users will be directed to a page that notes that the site is undergoing scheduled maintenance. For updates during the maintenance window, please see http://fix.etsy.com. (Note: Any sellers who have purchased a Showcase that would run during this maintenance window will receive a pro-rated credit for the 4-hour maintenance period. You can expect your bill to be credited within two to three business days after the date of the maintenance.) The new schedule for maintenance windows is as follows (all are 2 a.m. - 6 a.m. ET):

Monday, October 5 postponed to October 12 (2 a.m. - 8 a.m.)
Monday, October 19 (cancelled)
Monday, November 2
Monday, November 16

We are still thinking about and discussing the maintenance schedule for after November 16, since we want to be as sensitive as possible to the holiday shopping season and minimize any disruptions during that time.

We will communicate these dates in advance each time as a reminder. While there may still be occasional emergency maintenance windows, our goal is to use these regular planned maintenance windows to proactively make changes that will minimize emergencies.

Thanks in advance for your patience during our site maintenance periods, and thanks for using Etsy!

*To translate these times into your local time zone, please click here.

[The previous schedule was published on January 21, 2009.]

Tech Update: Filter Search Results by Category

2009-09-28T18:00:00-05:00

Today we're excited to announce a useful new addition to the Etsy Search experience — you can now filter your search results by category.

When searching on Etsy, you often get a lot of results back. We think it's important to provide shoppers ways to narrow down their search results, while highlighting the wide variety of amazing items on Etsy, from Handmade, Vintage and Supplies.

Let's look at the search results in Handmade for "Halloween," for example. Under the Handmade heading on the left side of the page, you will now see links to the top seven categories ordered by the number of results for that search term in each. You can click the "see more categories" link to view all the categories with results. You can also jump to the results for your search term in Vintage, Supplies or All Items.

In this example, we see there are 1,919 results for "Halloween" within the Handmade: Art Category. Clicking the link for the Art Category will take you to those results with the option to drill down further into the applicable subcategories.

Now we see there are 238 results for "Halloween" within Handmade: Art: Photography. Let's drill down further to the 60 surreal Halloween photographs.

At any time, you can jump back up to any of your previously chosen filters. In this version, starting a new search will clear your filter choices. You can also clear your search term and simply browse all the items available on Etsy by category.

We hope you enjoy this new way to make discoveries on Etsy! Tell us what you think in this Forum thread. (We'll close comments on this blog post so that we can consolidate your feedback on the thread.)

Tech Update: New Checkout Updates

2009-09-24T19:20:00-05:00

As we mentioned in the previous Checkout Update, we're working to make Checkout a simpler, smoother process for shoppers, and we are rolling changes out gradually to make sure they improve buyer conversion. ("Conversion" is the percentage of shoppers who complete Checkout.) Improving buyer conversion helps more shoppers get a taste of Etsy and leads to more orders for Etsy sellers. In short, more happy Etsy members!

Today we're rolling out a change to a small percentage of Etsy traffic that removes non-essential elements from the header of Checkout pages, to make the process clearer and faster. Simplifying the page header in the Checkout process is an e-commerce practice used by many great shopping sites, such as Amazon and Apple.

Here's a preview of the shipping information page with a simplified header:

We're going to see if this change makes it easier for shoppers to complete Checkout, and we'll make adjustments as we learn more. If we're certain the changes improve the Checkout experience for shoppers, we'll roll the changes out to all of Etsy's traffic.

We'll update this post as we learn more.