In the Poshmark community, it matters to build your network among buyers and even fellow sellers matters. As a social e-commerce platform, they are all about creating high visibility. Whether you are selling or buying, it helps all kinds of users to achieve their goals. These take in the form of Posh parties, connecting with hosts, and even with a Poshmark ambassador.
Beyond attending these events, there are clever ways you can increase sales as a seller. One of which is sharing. It is not enough for you to create and publish your listings. You also have to keep sharing the items from your closet as it gives you further exposure to the community and attracts more potential buyers. You must keep in mind that there are two different types of shares, and exploring each one helps you identify which one works best for you.
Types of shares
For new users, especially sellers, you may be wondering what sharing is all about. When you post a listing, you can share this with your followers via the app or website. To do this, you only have to tap on your listing page, select the items you want to share, and click the share icon.
For long-time sellers, you already know that this is called Self-share. You manually select which of your listings you want to gain extra exposure to the Poshmark feed, to your followers, and even to your social media accounts. This is the easiest way for your closet to be visible to others and direct potential buyers to your Poshmark account.
The other type of sharing is called Community share. This means you are sharing people's listings via your account to your followers' feed. Other users can see what kind of items you are also into or find attractive.
Why share?
You may be wondering, why go the extra mile to share people's listings? What does this do to my items or my entire closet? Sharing is a powerful marketing tool that allows you to further increase your followers and/or keep your listings at the top of the Poshmark feed. Even if you have quite a several followers already, these are somewhat small when you compare them to the millions of existing Poshmark users.
When you self-share, the item is marked as a "newly-updated listing" and bumps it up to the most-visited pages on the app or website. It shows people that you have an active closet, and they would want to check out your items. What is good is that this completely free! You are doing self-promotion without any cost.
Now when you do Community sharing, this is flattering for the part of the seller whose listing you shared to your feed. They would think you are friendly and have good standing that you are willing to promote their items.
This is a good way to grow your list of followers because, most likely, they would return the favor by sharing your listings to their page. On average, one Posher shares back one to five items from your listings! Imagine the network effect of you sharing other people's closets; yours will now reach numerous new customers! Your items have a better chance of being noticed and eventually sold. It is a win-win situation.
Overall, sharing reinforces the behavior of promoting other people's items and creating a sense of community.
How much sharing is enough?
There are several factors or criteria to consider when doing Community share, such as the seller's number of followers, the closet size, standing in the platform, and similar. Some recommend that 25-50% of daily shares are Community shares.
More than half of daily shares are recommended for those with more inventories and followers. Remember that if you want to make sales, you need to have an increased network which translates to increased potential customers.
Disadvantages of sharing
Whether you're a new or a long-time seller, sharing your listings is very helpful. However, you must know that several factors may not help you even when you share listings.
Offering little help to others
If you are a new seller or member of Poshmark, you probably do not have many listings and followers yet. As much as you would want to do Community sharing, you may have to think twice. Other Poshers will notice your limited listings and will think there are not many options or items for them to share.
Additionally, since you have a small number of followers, fellow Poshers may think your sharing doesn't help them. Only a few people see what you share, and in turn, only a few will get directed to that seller's page. In this case, this is not a win-win situation for both of you.
No boost in rankings
Doing community shares doesn't automatically increase your popularity level or searches within the app or website. Sure, you are doing Poshmark sellers a favor or a good deed by sharing their listings with more users. However, this doesn't immediately grant you a high ranking. It still takes several other factors to climb your way to the top. This includes creating more attractive listings, self-sharing, crossposting to other platforms, closing more deals, and more. It takes a lot more effort than simply sharing people's listings.
Takes away self-sharing
What if a top seller shares a listing that you didn't want to promote that much? What if you have an urgent item you want to sell, but you aren't able to because others prefer your other listings? Community sharing takes away the opportunity for you to promote what you want. Rather than targeting certain listings, fellow Poshers may direct their attention to those you don't want much emphasis on.
No automatic followers
Sharing does make you more visible to more users, especially since they receive notifications that you shared their listing. However, this doesn't mean these people will automatically follow you. What if they were asleep or busy when you kept sharing their items? What if when they checked on your profile, they thought your account was not attractive enough for them to follow? What if they simply didn't see the purpose of following you back?
You have to consider all these and more when you do Community sharing. Poshers can be selective in their followers, especially since they will frequently see their posts on their feed.
No curated sharing
There is a certain strategy or balance to sharing. Avoid oversharing to the point that for every user you follow, you share their listings already. This can be a bad practice as these people will start questioning why you keep directing attention to their page, almost as if you are doing it randomly.
When you overshare, your followers or other fellow users will get overwhelmed. They will get bombarded with all these items on their feed that sometimes, they don't care about. Doing so may turn people off and may decrease your credibility. Randomly sharing is never a good habit for a seller.
That is why it is always better to be selective in your Community sharing as well. This way, you can show people your style or taste, and if it matches theirs, they would be interested in checking out your account.
Make sharing easier
Poshers know that sharing is the key to increasing followers, customers, and eventually, sales to stay on top. However, this entails a lot of work and requires so much time from you. Hence, it is important to be aware of how top sellers in Poshmark do this.
Self-sharing is your priority to promote your listings, especially during Posh parties when more people are active. You can also better manage how you do this by setting up a schedule. Be strategic such as identifying the best time when Poshers are most active. When you share during peak hours, more users would see what you reposted and, most likely, interact with them.
If you are pressed for time but still want to customize your Self-sharing, use automated tools like OneShop. The platform can share your items up to 28,000 times a week across different online marketplaces like Mercari. This feature saves you time and, at the same time, gives you better exposure than doing Community-sharing.
To achieve a balance of showing people you have an active closet, do Community-sharing. But again, be selective in the sellers and the items you share. Curate as much as possible, and choose a few items. Aim for a balance of doing share-backs so that you earn lots of likes, possible followers and increase your credibility as a seller.