When sales go quiet, it is tempting to rewrite your best listing one more time. More often the problem is spread across the shop: listings with nine tags, three photos, a shop title that never says what you sell, and twenty listings that open with the same words and compete for one search.
An Etsy shop audit finds those patterns. You review the whole shop in four passes: shop settings, habits that repeat across listings, the listings to fix first and the phrases near your niche you do not cover yet. Then you follow a 30-day plan.
You can run the checks by hand in about 30 minutes, or let the free Etsy Shop Audit do the counting in about a minute and spend the half hour on fixes.
What an Etsy shop audit covers
Whether you call it an Etsy shop review, a shop critique or an Etsy SEO audit, the job is the same: compare your shop with what Etsy search and shoppers need, then rank what to fix. Unlike a listing check, it looks for what keeps going wrong across the shop and where an hour of work pays off most.
It is not a theory of how Etsy ranks listings; for that, read how the Etsy algorithm works. It is a to-do list built from your own shop.
Step 1: Check your shop-level settings
Start here, because a shop-level problem touches every listing. Open your shop in a private window, as a shopper sees it, with Shop Manager next to it. Allow ten minutes.
| Check | Why it matters | Target |
|---|---|---|
| Vacation mode | While it is on, shoppers cannot buy and your listings are hidden from Etsy search | Off, unless you are really away |
| Shop title | The line under your shop name, which search engines such as Google can show | What you sell, in words buyers type, within Etsy's 55-character limit |
| Announcement | The first text a visitor reads on your shop page | Current, with no expired codes or old shipping dates |
| Icon and banner | The first impression of your shop | A clear image that matches what you sell today |
| Sections | Let shoppers browse one product type at a time | Every listing in a named section; Etsy allows up to 20 |
| About and policies | Answer who makes the items and how returns and shipping work | Both complete and accurate for made-to-order items |
| Reviews | Shape buyer trust | Recurring complaints traced to a cause and fixed |
Etsy's search guidance counts reviews and a completed About section and shop policies toward a shop's customer experience; check the current wording in the Etsy Help Center.
Step 2: Count the patterns across your listings
One listing with nine tags is a slip. Thirty is a habit, and fixing habits is where an audit earns its time. Count each of these:
- Fewer than 13 tags. Every empty slot is a phrase the listing cannot match.
- Fewer than 5 photos. Etsy allows up to 20 at the time of writing; with fewer, buyers guess at size, color and how the item looks in use.
- No video. Each listing can carry one video of 5 to 15 seconds at the time of writing. A slow pan across a mockup is enough.
- Very long titles. Titles near the 140-character limit tend to repeat words and bury the lead phrase.
- Thin descriptions. A sentence or two skips the size, material and shipping details buyers check before ordering.
- Several single-word tags. Print or art alone competes with a huge number of listings; two- and three-word phrases match buyers who know what they want.
- The same opening words. When many listings start with the same phrase, such as Boho Wall Art Print, they chase one search and compete with each other while nearby phrases go uncovered.
How to count them by hand
- Download your listings as a CSV from Shop Manager (at the time of writing: Settings, then Options, then Download Data; the Help Center has the current path).
- Open it in Google Sheets or Excel. Each row is an active listing.
- Add a tag count. If the first listing's tags sit in F2, separated by commas, use
=IF(F2="",0,LEN(F2)-LEN(SUBSTITUTE(F2,",",""))+1)and fill it down. Change the letters to match your file. - Add a title length with
=LEN(A2)and a photo count with COUNTA across the image columns. - Sort by title from A to Z. Listings that open with the same words now sit together.
- Total each problem with COUNTIF, for example
=COUNTIF(Q:Q,"<13")for listings under 13 tags. If the file has no video column, count videos on the Listings page.
To skip the spreadsheet, the free Etsy shop audit tool reads your shop and up to 100 active listings from Etsy, runs these checks and gives a score from 0 to 100 with a grade from A to F. Anyone sees the score, a summary and the three biggest problems; a free account opens the full report, with 3 full audits a day.
Step 3: Decide which listings to fix first
You will not fix 60 listings in one evening, so rank them on two things: problems, meaning how many of the patterns above each listing has, and sales potential, meaning sales, visits or favorites in your Stats over the last few months, or a season coming up soon. Then sort them into four groups:
- Many problems, real potential: fix first. A listing that gets visits on seven tags and three photos has the most to gain.
- Few problems, real potential: touch lightly. Fill an empty tag slot, but leave a title that already sells alone.
- Many problems, no traffic: fix in bulk later, or retire a design that never sold.
- Few problems, no traffic: the setup is fine, so the phrase may be wrong. Revisit it in Step 4.
Take your top ten through the Etsy Listing Checker one at a time. It grades each one, looks up every tag's estimated sales and competition, and writes a new title, 13 tags and a description opening to edit. Our Etsy titles and tags checklist covers the rules behind those fixes. The shop audit does this ranking for you and lists the 10 listings to fix first.
Step 4: Find the gaps in your niche
Gaps are about what you do not sell yet. Start from your most-used tags, since they describe what your shop is really about:
- Run each as a seed in the Etsy niche finder, which returns only phrases with opportunity of 55 or more and competition of 45 or less.
- Look up your main phrase in Etsy competitor shops by keyword to see which shops take its sales and whether one dominates.
- Open the leader in the Etsy shop analyzer for its sales, reviews, age and best sellers, which often point to a theme you have not tried.
Note each phrase that fits your style and that no listing of yours targets. The shop audit runs a version of this too, finding low-competition phrases near your most-used tags in Etsy marketplace data tracked by eMarketInsight and turning them into product ideas. Scores compare phrases; they are not search counts.
Worked example: auditing a 60-listing wall-art shop
This is an example. The shop and its numbers are made up to show how an audit plays out.
Picture a print-on-demand shop selling botanical and boho wall art: 60 active listings, about 140 sales, a 4.8 rating and views flat for months. The shop pass found a shop title reading Welcome to my little shop, an announcement still promising last year's Christmas delivery, and 31 listings in no section. The listing counts, then and 30 days later:
| Check | Day 1 | Day 30 |
|---|---|---|
| Active listings | 60 | 63 |
| Fewer than 13 tags | 38 | 4 |
| Fewer than 5 photos | 22 | 7 |
| With a video | 3 | 15 |
| Titles over 120 characters | 19 | 2 |
| Descriptions under 40 words | 17 | 5 |
| Three or more single-word tags | 26 | 3 |
| Opening with Boho Wall Art Print | 21 | 5 |
| In no section | 31 | 0 |
| Shop score | 54 | 79 |
The cause was plain once counted: one tag set and one title formula copied onto every new design. The first fix went to a sage line-art print that drew steady visits on seven tags and three photos.
Over the month, the seller changed the shop title to Boho Botanical Wall Art, Framed Prints and Posters, sorted every listing into seven sections and gave each design its own lead phrase, such as sage line art print or mid century plant poster. They added mockup scenes to 15 listings, made 12 short videos by panning across mockups and published three listings for gap phrases.
The score rose from 54 to 79. A score measures setup, not sales, so the seller kept a dated log of every change to match later moves in views to a specific fix.
A 30-day plan after your audit
- Days 1 to 2: fix everything in the Step 1 table in one sitting.
- Days 3 to 9: for your top ten listings, fill all 13 tags, give each its own lead phrase, trim long titles and open each description with a sentence that names the item.
- Days 10 to 16: bring the same ten to at least five photos and add a short video. Mockups and scene images count.
- Days 17 to 23: work through the listings with many problems and no traffic in bulk, starting with tags, the fastest fix.
- Days 24 to 28: publish two or three listings for gap phrases from Step 4.
- Days 29 to 30: audit again, compare the counts with day 1 and pick next month's top ten.
Log each change with its date. Results show up in Stats over weeks, and the log tells you which fixes helped.
Etsy SEO service or a do-it-yourself audit?
If you are pricing an Etsy SEO service, a typical one starts with the checks in this guide: shop settings, then tags, titles, photos and descriptions across your listings, then keyword research. Some deliver a report, others rewrite your listings, and the best add judgment that software lacks: photo style, brand voice, pricing and which product lines to drop.
The checklist part you can do yourself, by hand or with the free AI Etsy shop audit, which returns the score, ranked problems, listings to fix first and product ideas in about a minute. If you then hire someone, pay for judgment rather than counting, and ask:
- Will you rewrite my listings, or send a report for me to act on?
- Where do your keywords come from? Etsy does not publish search volume, so any demand number is an estimate.
- How will we measure the result? Nobody can promise a ranking, so be careful with anyone who guarantees page one.
FAQ
How do I audit my Etsy shop?
Check shop settings first, then count how many listings share each problem, such as fewer than 13 tags. Rank listings by problems and sales potential, fix the top ten, then look for phrases near your best tags that you do not cover.
Is there a free Etsy shop analyzer?
Yes. The Etsy Shop Audit scores a whole shop's SEO and lists what to fix, while the Etsy Shop Analyzer shows a shop's sales, estimated revenue, reviews and best sellers. Both are free with a daily allowance.
How often should I audit my Etsy shop?
Once a month, plus after you add or edit a large batch of listings. Compare the counts with your last audit.
What is a good Etsy shop SEO score?
Etsy does not give shops an SEO score, so any score comes from the tool that made it. Use it to track your own shop over time, not to compare numbers across tools.
Is an Etsy SEO service worth paying for?
It can be, if you want an expert view on photos, branding and product range. Run the checklist part yourself for free first, then hire for judgment if you still need it.
