How to Increase Sales on Poshmark

As a Poshmark seller, we all have our up and down slumps as sellers. As a new Poshmark seller you may be still working towards that first sale or maybe you’re a seasoned seller who has been listening to crickets. As sellers, we can become frustrated, overwhelmed, and stressed. We put in countless hours building our business with sourcing, listing, prepping, photographing and even sharing. In this post, we will discuss the keys on How to increase sales on Poshmark. We have sold on Poshmark for over 10 years building a fulltime business.

Keys to Increase Sales on Poshmark

When a buyer searches for an item on Poshmark before that buyer selects your listing to learn more that buyer will see the:

1) Photo

2) Title

3) Price

1) Photos

We have all heard a picture is worth a thousand words. You can share and share but if your listings are filled with BAD photos you’re losing sales. In order to increase Poshmark sales, your photos will need to catch the eye of your buyer. Photos are the first impression a buyer will have before even clicking your listing. Personally, when I am searching for an item I will filter the Brand, Size, Etc., The most recently shared items are displayed first those that have the best photos are viewed first, I rarely ever look at a listing with a horrible photo.

A recent survey of online consumers revealed that 93% of their purchases where based on the product images alone.

Types of Photos

Clean Cut (White) & Lifestyle

In product photography, you have two main styles of images, clean-cut (White Back Ground) and lifestyles. Images that focus just on the subject matter with a consistent background are considered a clean cut. In this style there are no distractions in the image, an example would be a stock photo. Lifestyle images show the product off in a realistic manner. An Example of this style would be modeling a pair of jeans in an urban environment paired with booties and a stylish top giving the buyer a style idea.

As I buy, many times I will find myself looking at the images of those photos which have a similar body style as I. I like to picture what the items would look like on, and how they will fit.

What Makes a Great Photo?

Lighting & Composition

Lighting is the most important quality when taking photos for your Poshmark Business. In order to increase Poshmark sales, you will need to most likely invest in some sort of lighting system. Most household light bulbs cast a warm yellow, using a yellow bulb will have a negative impact on the appearance of your subject. Using a yellow bulb while taking photos particularly of jeans results in degraded images.

In order to take the best photos possible to increase Poshmark sales, you will need to focus on the lighting while photographing. One of the least expensive methods for improving your photos is by using Natural Light or Window light. Placing your subject near a window with natural light will improve the overall appearance of your photos. You may not have that perfect window that aligns with the sun or live in a part of the country which is cloudy most of the winter. In these cases, you would need to invest in a lighting system. What we love the most about lighting systems is the consistency of light we receive at any point of the day.

Composition, just as important as lighting how you present your overall subject is essential to increase Poshmark Sales. You want to ensure you have a clean look whether you use a lay-flat, manikin, hanging, or modeling method. Images that appear cluttered will distract away from the actual subject. Whichever method you use you want to keep all of your images in your Poshmark closet consistent.

Take as many photos as you can. Poshmark allows you to upload up to 8 photos per listing. Detailed photos will give the buyer a great idea of the item. We always photograph flaws of items and then detail those in the description as well. Detailing provides the buyer with clear information on the item, attempting to deceive will result in claims.

Tip: Including a picture of the tag of an item can help save time in the listing process. Instead of including the materials in the description a picture will save that typing.

Shoot in square mode

With simple lighting set up, you can walk away with great photos from your cell phone. We shoot all of our listings with an iPhone. Poshmark listing photos appear in a square format. Before taking photos we like to make sure we are in the square mode on the cell phone. Shooting in this mode allows you to fill the image without worrying later on about cropping issues.

Shooting without Editing

All of our listings are tracked via spreadsheets we will then photograph all of the items and then will list. We do not edit our photos, when shooting with your cell phone you can select your item to focus on. Most cell phones will allow an exposure adjustment prior to the picture being taken. With a small lighting system and a cell phone, you can walk away with photos that not only look great but require zero post-editing!

Lighting Setup

StudioFX Lighting Kit

White Vinyl Background

White Gloss Panel

Let’s take a look at some listings, which listings as a buyer would you most likely look at?

Starting at the Top Left moving Right

Dress- The photo is clean slightly underlit but will work for Poshmark.
Black Top- Improperly Rotated, non-clean background.
Shorts- The photo is clean with great lighting.
Leggings- Yes they are new! But the buyer cannot see what they look like.
Shirt – Cropped tight, clothing is very wrinkled.
Shoes- Lifestyle Image with great lighting.
Skort- The image is cropped to add the brand text, buyers will have a hard time seeing the actual skort. Use the full space to grab the buyers attention.
Leggings- Great lighting, great composition, and background.

2) Listing Titles

You have taken a great photo for your listings the second most important item your potential buyer will see after the photo is the Listing Title! You have just 50 characters including spaces to attract that buyer. You want to use as many words as you can as well as clear precise words that describe what you’re selling!

Brand + Name of Item+ Style + Category+ Color + Size + Descriptive

Brand– The first key to building a title that will attract a buyer is the brand. I have seen numerous listing’s where the brand is either missing or the brand is spelled wrong. I have also seen where some users will attempt to use a popular brand such as LuLulemon to attract a buyer on an unbranded nonrelated item. I immediately skip past those listings for the simple fact that if you are trying to deceive me with a title what else are you trying to deceive me on.

Name of Item – With each letter and word in the title the second priority in the title is the name of the item you’re are selling. If you are selling LuLuLemon leggings you want to find the name of those leggings. Example “ Wunder Under” “All the Right Places”

What if you do not know the name of an item?

You can either search the brand’s website, Search listings for that brand and category searching for similar listings. Asking a reseller group, or brand group.

You can also find information on items by reviewing the tags on the items.

How to Find the Brand

If you have a clothing item with a tag, search for the RN number. RN stands for Registered Identification Number. It is a number issued by the FTC to U.S. businesses that manufacture, import, distribute, or sell products covered by the Textile, Wool, and Fur Acts. Businesses can use this number on product labels instead of the company name.

RN Search DataBase

https://rn.ftc.gov/Account/BasicSearch

How To Find the Style

All brands are a little different in where you may find the style number. On tops typically you will find an additional tag on a side seam, you know the ones that are itchy! On that tag, you will find the style number, a simple google search of the brand and number will most likely result in the correct name of that item.

Style – Next we like to build our listings with the style of the item we are selling. Sticking with our example above you would use something like “High Rise”, “Crop” or “Low Rise”.

Category– The 4^th element of the title is the category. This is the question you will ask yourself, Is this a Pant, Legging, or short?

Color– At this point in your title you are running very low on space. Your listing should have the correct color built into the actual listing. For those potential buyers that are not using color filters to search for items placing the color in the title will benefit if the buyer searches a term such as “ LuLulemon black legging”. Be cautious when listing a color that is different from the color in the actual listing. Using a term such as “Slate” when in your listing you have select black could come back to haunt you if a buyer opens a case claiming they thought the item was slate and its black. Moral of the story use consistency.

Size– If space is available adding the size to the title is recommended. Instead of writing out the word “Size” one can abbreviate “Sz”. When you first set up your Poshmark account you set up your sizing information. Unless you change that buyers are only shown items within their preferred size range when searching Poshmark.

Descriptive– Lastly if you still have space available you will then use any other words you feel a buyer may search.

What Does a great Title Look like

LuLuLemon + Wunder Under + Crop + Leggings + Black + Sz 6

Google Searches

Using a full title will not only benefit your closet on Poshmark but will increase the possibility of your listing showing on google-searches by non-Poshmark users. When conducting a simple search of “Louis Vuitton bag” on google, it yielded two Poshmark listings. One of those listings showed first on the entire google search!

Let’s take a look at listings with great titles versus those that are not so great.

Starting at the Top Left moving Right

Leggings- Title gives the buyer all the information. Google will love it too!
Jeans- The title contains only one word, additionally the brand was not listed in the brand field. Users searching by brand filters will never see this listing.
Sports Bra-Title gives the buyer all the information. Google will love it too!
Leggings- The [] around the brand are meaningless, the seller also used NWT text although the listing indicates that NWT to the right of the title.
Jumpsuit- Brand is missing from the title as well as the brand field, this listing title does not maximize the full title field.
Nike – Title gives the buyer all the information. Google will love it too!
Bag- Seller is selling a $2000 bag an elected to use emoji’s. The brand is missing, The name of the bag is missing as well.
Shoes- Title gives the buyer all the information. Google will love it too!

3) Pricing

Without proper pricing of your items in your closet or over-inflated prices compare to your competitor’s buyers will pass over your listings. Pricing is at the top of our list to increase Poshmark sales since the price is visible to a buyer before a buyer selects the listing to learn more about that item.

Learning to Price

Pricing items in your closet depends primarily on one factor for success.

Comps of the Sold items.

When sourcing you should be asking yourself, “What does this sell for on Poshmark?” or “What are buyers actually willing to pay for this?”.

When browsing listings to compare with, depending on the pricing of other sellers active listings will not benefit your item. I see it over and over where sellers are selling used items and pricing those items at nearly full retail. Those same sellers are the sellers who are on social media complaining of zero sales.

How To Check Comps

When pricing if you price yourself out of the market buyers will browse right by your listings. To price competitively you want to check the SOLD comps not the live listings. Checking comps for items can be done by searching for an item you are about to list, with those results you want to filter for the SOLD listings. Once you have filtered the Sold listings look for sold items similar to yours. Do not spend too much time a quick review will give you a great idea of where you should enter the market on pricing.

Pricing Strategy

We have all had items which have sat and collected more dust then we would like. With our pricing strategy, we hope it will increase Poshmark sales in your closet.

The Goal of being in business is to make Profits.

Keeping a spreadsheet of your purchases will help you track what you paid for your items. In the next column, you can list an average of what those items are selling for while checking the comps. With that information, you can then factor in the commission rate of Poshmark which is 20%.

Poshmark allows you to send offers to any users who have liked your items. When determining our listing price we like to factor in sending offers to potential buyers. When sending an offer it will need to be at least a 10% discount and include a shipping discount. The offer feature has three presets which you will not need to calculate when sending offers. You can select 10, 20, or a 30% discount, Poshmark will calculate the math so that you can send multiple offers on the fly.

Creating a Price Structure within your closet

Many sellers will sell in multiple categories on Poshmark. How does a seller keep track of offers sent or how much of a discount you can accept on an item? We like using a coded system if we have sourced a pair of leggings for $6.99 and after researching comps for that item and believe the listing price should be $30.00. The lowest price we could accept to break even would be $10.00, As Poshmark sellers we are here to make profits not to break even! ($10.00x (20% Posh Fee + 6% Sale Tax)= $7.40. When sending an offer your expected earnings you see do not take into account sales tax. The expected earnings take into account the Posh fees only.

Moving back to the example above of our purchase of leggings at $6.99 and sold comps averaging $30.00. We could price them at 31.00. Why $31.00, we calculated the bottom break-even at $10.00. Looking at the 2nd and 3rd digits are 10, our bottom break even. There are many other methods a seller can use to keep track of break-even within their listing price. Another example a seller could use is just the one’s place of your listing price. Listing an item at $25.00, the 5 could be your key that your breakeven is $5.00.

Other methods sellers can use is the percentage key. Listing an item at $25.00, the 5 could indicate that you can discount up to 50% on this item.

Sellers can also use a structure of padding on categories. For shoes, in your closet, you may inflate the price over comps by $10 + $7.11 Free Shipping. For jeans, you may inflate by $15 + $7.11 Free Shipping.

The above methods are to provide different ideas at which you can price items in your closet to increase Poshmark sales. We like to use the % method for the simple fact of the offer presets. It allows you to send offers or quickly accept or counter a buyer while in our busy lives. Yes, you can insert the cost of an item in your original listing. We find it a bit time consuming when sending an offer to have to dig into a listing check the price versus just being able to send an offer.

Keeping spreadsheets of your inventory helps not only track your purchase cost but also when you purchased an item. Sellers can also create key within their listings to track the date of purchase in their listing with an SKU. Create a system that works best in your business.

When to Send Offers

As sellers thinking about the habits of your buyers can lead to the success to increase Poshmark Sales. When are your buyers most likely receiving a paycheck? Friday or those on biweekly the 1^st and 15^th of the month. We like to send offers twice a month typically the 1^st and 15^th of every month. Again this is our personal structure and what has shown the greatest success with our Poshmark business.

4) Listing Description

You have taken great product photos, you have built a great title that has now caught the eye of a potential buyer, they click your listing, YES! Just wait a moment…Your description is lacking the key information your buyer is looking for!

Building the perfect description which converts a buyer browsing to a… I got to buy this buyer will increase Poshmark sales.

Description Templates

We love to use templates when building descriptions on Poshmark. Building templates either in Microsoft Word or Excel prior not only speeds up the listing process but provides a streamline look throughout your listings in your closet. Providing a clear and precise description will not only increase Poshmark sales but will provide a level of protection against claims if they arise. The more information provided will help minimize questions buyers will have.

What Measurements should you include?

Let’s take a look at some listing descriptions.

Listing A- Very depth description but, How high is the heel?

Listing B- “No size tag, but think it’s a size 4” Are or are they not? Measurements?

A buyer can look at this listing without asking questions and make that decision to buy.

5) Sharing Consistently

Sharing is one of the most important methods to increase sales on Poshmark. Without sharing, the items that you have spent hours of time prepping beforehand will never be seen by your BUYER! We have tested many different sharing strategies over the years. Creating a schedule or a plan is the key to increasing sales on Poshmark. Let’s think about it in this manner, the majority of your buyers work Monday-Friday, 9-5. Think about the habits of those potential buyers.

What time will they wake up in the morning?

What time is their lunch break?

When will they leave work?

When are they going to bed?

With those questions on your mind think about your phone habits. When you first wake up in the morning what is your routine. Do you wake up and jump right on your phone or are you busy getting ready, showering, eating breakfast and then have a few moments to browse your phone? Also, think about the days of the week, Monday most just had the weekend off and are busy getting back into the office and the last thing they are doing is searching Poshmark. What about Friday’s? Everyone has just worked a long work week and is now out with friends and family. Creating a sharing plan with the strategy while keeping in mind your potential buyer’s daily habits will result in more views which results in increases in Poshmark sales.

According to 12 million Instagram posts, marketing firm Later.com compiled data on the best time to post to receive the best user interaction.

Sharing can become overwhelming for those who have closets with over 1000 listings it may take an hour each time you share. Then factor in sharing 2-4 times daily, you are spending 14-28 hours weekly just sharing! Closet Assistant was built just for this reason. Closet Assistant can help share your closet and reduce the time it takes you to share with a single click.

How many times daily should you share?

To positively increase Poshmark sales you need to share your closet 2-3 times daily.

When sharing throughout the day you want to also share other users listings and sharing to at least one party each day. When sharing other users listings the one method which we love to use is sharing items from the top brands. Navigating to the brand’s page on Poshmark, the brands are listed in order under each category from the most popular to least popular. Sharing other user’s items from these pages has resulted in a large number of return follows and shares from the users which you just have shared. Sharing your closet 2-3 times daily, sharing to a party and sharing popular branded items will help increase Poshmark sales. Closet Assistant can share your closet, other user’s closets and even share to parties.

6) Following

Just as important as sharing, following other users will return follows to your Poshmark page. When other users follow your account, items that you share will then display on their feed pages when they log in or open the app. We all want to have a large a following of users, if you’re the type of user who wants to have a large follower base but does not follow back users, other users may not follow you as they see their chances of receiving your follow are slim. With the help of Closet Assistant, you can follow users with ease. Closet Assistant allows you to follow a user from nearly any page on Poshmark.

Posh Tip: Following and Unfollowing celebrity accounts when new accounts are launched can boost your closets activity dramatically. When a new account is launched, the key is to follow that celebrity and then a few hours later unfollow and then follow them again. Other users who are following the celebrity want to follow the same users following that person. This process can result in a few hundred follows daily during the early stages of a celebrity account. See our blog Celebrities on Poshmark

7) Target Buyers

Targeting buyers requires a bit of work and grind. Let’s say you have a closet full of Free People clothing or another particular brand. What if you could target customers who like those brands? You can!

You can also target potential buyers from searching items similar to the items you are selling and following those users who have liked similar listings on other user’s pages.

8) Google Visibility

Did you know you can enable Google visibility on your Poshmark listings? You can! This option should be automatically selected. You can verify that your listings are visible on google by the following:

Account Settings – Share Settings

Near the Bottom

9)Popular Brands & Trend

Sourcing popular brands can increase Poshmark sales in your closet. Poshmark regularly will communicate or publish its top-selling brands on the platform. Visiting the brand’s page on Poshmark, the brands are listed in order under each category from the most popular to least popular. Poshmark regularly will post on its blog or issue reports such as it’s “2020 Social Commerce Report” https://www.report.poshmark.com/ Visiting the blog of Poshmark can help you view data behind popular brands and trends of Poshmark buyers. Learning the trends will not only provide you with guidance while sourcing but give you the competitive edge!

2020 Social Commerce Report

https://www.report.poshmark.com/

The Trend Report

https://blog.poshmark.com/category/the-trend-report/

10) Top Items First

When a buyer first visits your closet Listing popular or the best items in your closet have a great impact. First impressions always seem to stick with us. Would you rather a buyer see your best or worst? Showcasing the best items will help prevent buyers from bouncing on to the next closet.

11) Posh Ambassador

As a new seller, a goal should be to become a Poshmark ambassador. Once an ambassador Poshmark randomly selects a number of ambassadors daily and displays those ambassadors on its “Connect With Posh Ambassador List”. The list is refreshed daily, ambassadors who appear on the list can expect an increase in followers.

Requirements:

5,000 Community Shares
5,000 Self-Shares
10 New Poshers Shared
50 Available Listings
15 Sales
4.5 Average Purchase Rating
<3 Days Average Ship Time
1 Love Note Given

12 ) Respond to users questions

Responding to the buyer’s question in a timely manner could mean receiving a sale or losing a sale. I cannot count how many times users will ask “ Are you able to ship these tomorrow?” or “ I am going on a vacation do you think you can have them shipped in time?” Waiting two days to respond to a buyer’s questions typically means that the buyer has already moved on to another seller’s closet, on top of that chances of having that buyer return are slim. We live in the age of technology customers expect fast if you can not provide that they move on.

13) Branding

The first impression you give a buyer when they visit your closet will either increase the time spent on your closet or have what we like to call a low click-through rate. A low click-through rate is when a user will spend little to zero time on your page and then bounce to another closet. In order to attract the buyer creating a brand for your business is an important element to increase Poshmark sales. Branding starts with your profile picture and banner image on your account. Branding is creating consistency and a professional look throughout your business. When looking at your closet do you use the same method of photographing your images? If you use a lay flat method using the same style on each listing presents itself as professional and appealing. If some of your listings are lying, some hanging, some on a manikin, and some are lifestyle it can appear like a goodwill bin!

Which closet has a clean branding and style? Closet A or B?

14) Repair Clean Items

Prior to listing items in your closet repairing and cleaning items that need attention will not only look more aesthetic but will also give buyers the confidence to return for future purchases. Unless you can note and write descriptions with all the flaws of an item precisely you’re opening the door for claims.

15) Asking for Host Picks

Reaching out to a party host prior to a party requesting consideration for a host pick can increase attraction in your closet. How do you ask a host? You can ask for a host pick either by visiting the host’s account and on their about listing simply commenting or introducing yourself. You can also select an item in your closet which you think would be a great host pick, on that listing you will tag the host of the party and ask for a host pick. We have hosted numerous parties over the years every party which we have hosted we will receive hundreds of requests. When asking for a pick one thing to avoid is using emoji’s! It’s just obnoxious, we never select those that appear to be begging. A simple short note goes a long way.

Host About

“ (@Host Name) Congrats on hosting XYZ Party! I would love to have you consider an item from my closet as a pick for the XZY Party”

On your listing

“(@Host Name) Congrats on hosting XYZ Party! I would love to have you consider my Listing for the XZY Party”

Give it a try for the next party!

Hosting Parties will draw a large audience to your closet. Every time we host a party we have a large bump in sales before and after. It may take 6 months to a year after requesting to host a party. We like to send 2-3 requests per month.

16) Prompt Shipping

In the day and the age of Amazon Prime where a buyer can purchase an item while at work and arrive home with a package on the doorstep. As a seller, we need to keep shipping in mind to attract return buyers. Providing prompt shipping will show your buyers that they can count on you in the future. Waiting 3 full business days to ship could make or break a return buyer.

17) No Spamming

Poshmark takes spamming very seriously in addition to attempting to communicate for offline transactions. Leaving comments repeatedly on other users listings or about listings may result in a user reporting your account!

18) Social Media

Part of branding is building a social media presence creating an Instagram page for your Poshmark business will only promote your listings further. Share your closet with your friends and family!

Think like a Buyer

Placing yourself in the shoes as a potential buyer and their potential shopping habits, social media habits, fashion trends with a well-constructed closet will increase Poshmark sales.