Selling on Etsy is a good way to start and a risky place to stay. Etsy brings the shoppers, and in return it takes a fee on every sale, keeps the customer relationship and can change the rules of your shop without asking. Your own website costs more to set up, but the customers, the margin and the brand become yours. For most sellers the honest answer is to build the website alongside the shop, then let it take over as it grows.
This covers what Etsy really costs, what you do not control there, what a website of your own involves, when staying on Etsy is the right call, and how to move without losing the customers you have.
Is it better to sell on Etsy or your own website?
They do different jobs. Etsy is a market: people arrive already wanting to buy something handmade, and you borrow its footfall. Your own website is a shop you own: nobody arrives unless you bring them, but everyone who does is yours.
| Etsy | Your own website | |
|---|---|---|
| Shoppers arriving | Etsy’s existing audience | Only the ones you bring |
| Fees | On listings and on every sale | A platform plan and card fees; no cut to us |
| The customer list | Etsy’s | Yours |
| How it looks | Etsy’s layout, with your name on it | Designed for your brand |
| If the rules change | You adapt or you leave | You decide |
| Setting up | An afternoon | A proper build |
The question is not which is better in the abstract. It is which one you want your sales to depend on.
What does selling on Etsy really cost?
Etsy’s fees come in layers, and each one is small enough to ignore on its own:
- Listing fee. $0.20 per listing. It is charged again each time a listing renews, every four months, and for each extra quantity sold from the same listing.
- Transaction fee. A percentage of each sale. See Etsy’s page for what it applies to.
- Payment processing. A percentage plus a fixed amount on each order.
- Offsite ads. If Etsy advertises your item elsewhere and a sale follows, a further percentage goes to Etsy. Etsy’s fees page explains when this applies and whether you can opt out.
- Regulatory operating fee. Etsy lists a regulatory operating fee for some regions; check its fees page.
We have not quoted the percentages here, because Etsy changes them and they are not worth getting wrong. Etsy publishes the current rates on its own fees page. Add them up for your average order and you will have a figure for what Etsy takes from every sale you make.
That is what matters. Etsy’s cut of every sale is what works like rent. Card fees are the cost of taking a payment anywhere, Etsy included. The transaction fee on top is what you pay for trading on Etsy’s ground, and it grows with your success. A year in, the question is no longer whether Etsy is worth it. It is how much of your profit you would keep elsewhere.
What do you not control on Etsy?
Money is the visible cost. The ones that hurt more are about control.
The shop itself
Etsy can suspend a shop, hold payouts or remove a listing under its policies. Not every seller meets this, but those who do find that years of reviews and a trading history sit on an account that is not theirs to take elsewhere.
The customer relationship
Your buyers are Etsy’s customers first. You cannot build an email list from them, tell them about a new range or ask them to come back directly. If you want repeat custom, you pay in fees and promotion to reach people who already bought from you.
Search placement
How high your products appear depends on Etsy’s ranking, and Etsy changes it. A product that sold well last month can slide down for reasons you cannot see, and the shoppers who would have found you are shown a competitor’s listing next to yours.
The look of your brand
A shop on Etsy looks like every other shop on Etsy. That is fine for being found and a poor way to charge for what makes you different.
What does your own website cost?
More up front and less over time. There are two costs to be clear about.
The build. Onlineify builds online shops as a product with published prices: £5,500 for a Set range storefront, or £6,950 for an Open range one that is built to grow into new kinds of product. Both are ex VAT, paid once. Our online shops page explains the difference.
The platform. Your storefront runs on Shopify, in your own Shopify account, so you pay Shopify directly. At the time of writing its Basic plan is £19 a month on a yearly plan, or £25 a month billed monthly, plus Shopify’s card fees on each order. That is the cost of the checkout, payments and stock doing their job, and it is stated here so that it is never a surprise.
There is no commission to Onlineify, ever. We are paid once for the build, and we take nothing from your sales. The Shopify account, the domain, the code and the content management are all in your name from day one. The same Shopify question is answered at more length in our guide to clothing brand websites.
When should you stay on Etsy?
Sometimes the right answer is not to move at all.
- You are new, or testing a product. Etsy lets you find out whether anyone wants it for the price of a few listings. That is cheaper than a build.
- Etsy is where all your customers are. If almost every sale comes from Etsy search and you have no audience of your own, a website would open to nobody.
- You sell a handful of items a month. The fees are small in absolute terms, and the saving would not cover a build for a long time.
- You like how little there is to run. Etsy handles discovery, payment and trust. That is worth something.
Running both is also a sound plan, and it is a common approach. Etsy stays a shop window, and your own website is where the customers you want to keep end up.
When is it time to move to your own website?
A few signs that the balance has tipped:
- Etsy’s fees are now a line in your accounts that you notice every month.
- You have repeat buyers you cannot contact.
- Your products have a story, a range or a look that a marketplace listing cannot carry.
- You have started to worry about what a suspension or a policy change would do to your income.
- You sell through other places too, such as social media and craft fairs, and want one shop that holds it together.
Moving from Etsy to your own site: how to do it
Do not shut the Etsy shop on the day the website launches. A quieter move works better.
- Build the website while Etsy keeps selling. Your income does not pause for the build.
- Write your own product descriptions. Etsy listings are often written for Etsy search. Your own site can say more about materials, sizing and care, and it gives Google your words rather than a marketplace’s.
- Start collecting email addresses. The customer list is the thing Etsy keeps from you, so give people a reason to join yours: a sign-up on the website and a way of mentioning it that Etsy’s rules allow.
- Check what Etsy lets you do. Its policies on directing buyers away from the platform apply, so read them on Etsy’s own site before you add anything to orders.
- Move the range over, then decide on Etsy. Some sellers keep a smaller Etsy shop as a way in. Others close it once the website is steady.
Where Onlineify fits
Onlineify is a productised build for sellers who have outgrown a marketplace. Every shop is a custom storefront written from nothing rather than a theme, with Shopify running the checkout, payments and stock on your own domain. You edit the pages yourself in Sanity, and a first draft of the page copy is written for you. Every account is in your name.
You pay Shopify directly, and you pay us once. See Onlineify for online shops, or what a website costs.