Fearing Failure, thoughts about time commitment

I am sitting at home today (home from work), wondering what I should do. I got a little work done this morning, but I slept for most of the morning. MUCH needed sleep. I have been staying up too late trying to finish my intro to Photoshop tutorial scripts so that I can be ready for my maternity leave.

I am doing very little for my digital download card Etsy shop. I think I still want to do it, but I am not getting any costumers and I have not been doing enough promotion and I am struggling to stay interested in it myself. I have not made a card in at least 2 weeks.

I didn't expect it to take off right away...but I did think that I would have at least have had one sale. So much wasted time...

Time.

I think about how much time I have been spending on it...and while I do enjoy actually creating the cards, I am really struggling with the promotion. I am not a marketer by nature and all of this Pinterest, SEO, Etsy teams, and all of the other promotion things that I should be doing to market my product is both confusing and aggravating.

The more I mull it over in my head, the more I want to stop working on my Etsy shop, or at least take a break. I know that if a person wants to grow a business they should push through these feelings, but I just feel overwhelmed thinking about everything that I need to do:

• spend time with the Lord
• be a good wife and mother (keep the house tidy, spend time with my family, provide opportunities for my son to grow and learn, serve my husband well), 
• prepare for baby #2, 
• teach, 
• sponsor the FCA club at school, 
• prepare for maternity leave, 
• make quality photoshop tutorials that could eventually be sold for a profit.

I am sure that there is more that should be added to that list, but those are the main ones. I am feeling burned out by it all and I know that this is part of the issue.

But is there really anything that I could take out?

Figuring out Pinterest...sort of

I have done almost no promotion for my Etsy shop. All I have really done is joined a team that helps me get views and favorites.

I have kind of put my Etsy shop on hold since I found out that I will not be able to use this FANTASTIC website that had an excellent tutorial that the kids could follow while I was on maternity leave. So I have not created any new cards for my Etsy shop since the last post, I am now creating my own  photoshop tutorials geared toward art teachers and plan to record them this week.

I figure that I can eventually use these tutorials to sell online when I make my art teacher lesson plan website. Which, I have been very tentative about up to now, but since I don't have any free tutorials, I have been spring boarded into creating content for it, I have pretty much decided to go ahead with it. But it will likely still not become a website until this summer sometime.

I don't want to give up on my Etsy Shop, although I am pretty disappointed in its progress, I know that I need to give it more attention...but I have so little time...

I bought a little ebook about how to promote on Pinterest and read a couple blogs about it, but I still feel uneasy about it.

My ebook gave me some steps to follow:

Tip 1: Visit Your Pinterest Page Often and Be Active
Tip 2: Get More Followers
Tip 3: Find New Undiscovered Pins
Tip 4: Create a Great Pin
Tip 5: Create A Great Board
Tip 6: Get Your Shop Items Pinned 

I read this last week and I have done none of these things.

Another source that I found some good information was at 12 Ways to Get More Pinterest Followers:
1: Add the Pinterest Follow Button
2: Add the Profile Widget
3: Share a Lot
4: Comment on Popular Pins
5: Mention Others
6: Connect Your Social Networks
7: Find Friends From Other Social Networks
8: Promote Your Individual Boards
9: Contribute to Others’ Boards
10: Follow Others
11: Run Contests
12: Keep Your Followers Happy

The last site was at 6 Pointers for Using Etsy and Pinterest Together:
1. Open a Pinterest Business Account
2. Try to Earn Sales
3. Participate in the Community
4. Form Group Boards, Invite Others
5. Make Pinning a Habit
6. Remember that Pinterest Is a Visual Medium

The ones that I have highlighted seem to be on multiple pages. They seem to be saying the same things, but at the same time, there seems to be a lot here at the same time. So I guess I will make my own list and try to go through it this week:

1. I have already created a business account. (so that one is already crossed off my list!)
2. Start Pinning (often) (this is going to be a difficult one for me because I am not consistently on Pinterest) I should look into a program that will do this for me, but for now, I will just plan to pin during my plan period at school (shhhhhh, don't tell anyone) and before bed at night.
3. Join an Etsy Pinterest group and start using it daily.

Well, that's the plan at least. We shall see how it goes. The last two points will be my Immediate goals.

My Long Term goal will be to make a sale...sigh*