Window Shopping Is the Best!

Coo coo ka-choo, how do you do?

    Isn't window shopping just the best? Imagining all the stuff you can do with what you could buy? It's fun to get caught in daydream loops, but I have to remember to pull myself back into reality afterwards! I spent the last week looking at more upgrades to the site, both paid and free, so let's see what changes I've made.

     I have been messing around with themes, mostly just seeing what happens if I change the homepage to brand colors and put some product images in. I feel like I personally don't have such a wide variety of items that I'd need the type of themes that I think look nicest. Most are built for drop shipping, so just little ol' me can't make 70 collections worth of unique item categories. I probably should split up hats, cowls, etc. into their own collections regardless. I am a sucker for over-organization and folders within folders to the point of inconvenience, so if anything starts being sorted into smaller and smaller categories, please stop me! I probably won't end up with any of the super expensive themes, but I might go with a more bold design so I can properly put the brand colors on display.

     No, I did not get any more crochet patterns! Why do you ask? I recently got some more anime themed ones, particularly... the produce from an show about finding a treasure across an ocean. They look complicated, and I haven't personally seen the show past about episode 40 a few years ago, so I'm in the dark for what the majority of them do LOL. I was thinking about making a bucket hat in the style of the main character, referencing the parade balloon mishap. One of my family members is a big fan of the show, so I wouldn't mind adding more themed merch from it.

     Speaking of themed merch, I've been wondering how I will skirt the copyright problem on a lot of the items I have planned for my store. So far it's just vague references to the media and using an annoying amount of thesaurus.com. It's what I tend to see pattern makers do, so I'm hoping it'll work for me too. I'm not sure if I'll attempt to fight the mouse if my store gets big enough, so if I ever make the Michael and Minerva dolls available, they might be limited from the start. I'm already dreading getting regular everyday paperwork, I'd rather not get served anything else.

     Automation wise, I know Shopify has been yelling at me to make all the annoying additions built to make my customers anxious about not buying something right that second. Every time I change something, I check the page to see if the site would be one I would be comfortable browsing. One add-on that had otherwise useful tools put an obnoxiously bouncing purchase button on every product! Another built for emails wants to send one every couple hours to someone who hasn't purchased yet and then again every few days once they get pressured into buying! Please let me know if you ever start getting any level of spam from my store. I hate getting it so I know I will hate being the source of it! 

     I am so annoyed by how drop shipping centered this entire storefront is, so I have a lot on my plate to make sure I'm not agreeing to aggressive sales tactics without realizing it. Testing out themes, trying out add-ons and extensions, it's tough! This is on top of actually making the products themselves, which also doesn't take a particularly short amount of time. I don't want visitors to come to my store and get hit with flashing countdown timers, sign up promos, and chat bots! One of the (unreasonably expensive) themes I explored had a "Sign up now!!" popup that took over the page and derailed my customization after every single change! It's so scummy! I hate stores like that! It is the worst that that is the standard and you have to go through tons of settings, or possibly a subscription, to stop it! So don't be alarmed if a feature appears and/or disappears over the course of a couple weeks when it starts trying to force marketing on myself or other visitors.

   To summarize, it's fun adding things to an outrageously expensive theme and watching it break because I don't have photos and videos of every product! I'm sorry, I'm basically a one person crew! I don't have a handful of models on standby for professional photoshoots with... a melon keychain LOL! If anybody models anything on my store, it'll probably be myself, a friend, or a family member! I love to imagine what it would be like to be able to use all those features to the maximum, but then the reality of maintaining all those items just makes my head spin! Routinely making a blanket originally designed for a six month CAL? No thank you!