How strategic Etsy SEO, listing expansion, niche-based product positioning, and advertising optimization helped HollowWoodworks recover last year’s performance in the first month and achieve 17% year-on-year revenue growth by June.
From an average -36% decline to +17% Revenue growth YoY in June
The Highest ROAS of 2026 - 772% in June
40 New listings introduced (53 Active listings after expansion)
52% Traffic growth during the program
Client Overview - An established woodworking kids' stools brand with exceptional products but limited search coverage
HollowWoodworks is a long-established Etsy shop specializing in handcrafted, personalized wooden products for babies, toddlers, and children.
The shop’s signature product is its personalized name puzzle stool, a functional children’s step stool that also works as a name puzzle, educational toy, nursery feature, and keepsake gift.
Unlike many mass-produced alternatives in the category, HollowWoodworks creates its products using high-quality maple wood rather than MDF. The wood is carefully selected to avoid knots and visible blemishes, giving each product a clean, premium finish designed to last for years.
This combination of personalization, craftsmanship, functionality, and emotional gifting value had already helped the shop build a strong reputation. HollowWoodworks had accumulated thousands of sales, consistently positive customer reviews, and a proven history of producing products that families frequently purchase again for siblings, grandchildren, nieces, nephews, and other special occasions.
However, when the client approached Artery Team, the business was experiencing a prolonged decline.
Revenue had been falling on a year-on-year basis since October 2025. By the beginning of March, when we stepped in, the shop was still ~20% behind the previous year’s revenue.
The first goal was recovery.
We needed to help the store reach the previous year’s performance, stabilize its visibility, and stop the downward trend. Only after restoring that foundation could we begin working toward sustainable year-on-year growth.
Despite the revenue decline, we immediately identified strong product-market fit.
The products were differentiated, highly giftable, supported by excellent craftsmanship, and backed by years of customer trust.
The problem was that the shop’s Etsy visibility did not reflect the full range of customers, occasions, product categories, and search intents it could serve.
That became the foundation of our SEO Success Program.
Challenges
Before making changes, we conducted a full Etsy SEO and performance audit covering the shop’s revenue trends, traffic, listing structure, keywords, active and inactive products, advertising performance, seasonal positioning, and opportunities for catalogue expansion.
The main issue was immediately clear. HollowWoodworks had strong products, excellent craftsmanship, and proven customer demand, but the shop had only 13 active listings. This significantly limited its visibility across Etsy search.
With only 13 listings, the shop had a maximum of 169 tag positions. Several of those positions were being used for similar or repeated keywords, which reduced the number of different searches the store could appear for.
In 2025, buyers found HollowWoodworks through only 327 unique Etsy search phrases. Most of the traffic was concentrated around a small group of terms such as “name stool,” “name puzzle stool,” “puzzle stool,” and “toy box.”
These keywords were relevant, but they did not cover the full buying intent behind the products. The shop had limited visibility for searches connected to first birthdays, baptisms, christenings, baby showers, Montessori learning, nursery décor, gifts for boys and girls, and other important gifting occasions.
We also found that multiple listings were targeting similar keyword groups. Instead of helping the shop reach new audiences, the listings were competing with one another for the same searches.
Some titles were not using the available space effectively, while others repeated the same product phrases without adding recipient, occasion, design, age, or educational keywords.
The shop was also highly dependent on its personalized name stools. Although this was the strongest product category, the limited catalogue reduced the number of ways customers could discover the store and restricted opportunities to increase the average order value.
The Etsy Ads account was already efficient, with an average ROAS of approximately 553% during 2025. However, the shop had too few optimized listings to scale advertising and organic visibility effectively.
The Initial Strategy - Recovering the Previous Year’s Performance
When we began working with HollowWoodworks at the beginning of March, the shop was ~20% behind the previous year’s revenue.
The first goal was not immediate growth. It was to stop the decline and recover the previous year’s performance. After reaching that level, we could begin building sustainable year-on-year growth.
Our strategy focused on improving the existing listings, expanding the catalogue, introducing new product categories, and aligning Etsy Ads with the new SEO structure.
1) Full Keywords Restructuring
We rebuilt the titles and tags around a wider range of buyer intentions.
Each listing was optimized using core product keywords together with gifting occasions, recipient searches, children’s ages, design themes, educational benefits, room usage, and material-related terms.
The goal was to give every listing a specific purpose within Etsy search.
Instead of having several products compete for the same phrases, we created different keyword clusters for boys, girls, birthdays, baptisms, christenings, Montessori gifts, nursery décor, and other relevant niches.
This helped reduce internal competition and expanded the number of searches through which customers could discover the shop.
2) Expanding the Name Stool Listings
The personalized name puzzle stool remained the shop’s core product, but it could be positioned for many more audiences.
We created separate listings and thumbnails for boys, girls, and gender-neutral designs. We also introduced variations based on popular themes such as construction, trains, princesses, sports, dinosaurs, animals, flowers, music, and nautical designs.
Each listing was optimized for a different combination of recipient, design, age, and occasion.
We also positioned the stools for major gifting searches such as first birthday gifts, second birthday gifts, third birthday gifts, baptism gifts, christening gifts, newborn gifts, and baby shower gifts.
This allowed one proven product to reach many different customer groups without changing the shop’s core identity.
3) Introducing New Product Categories
To reduce the shop’s dependence on name stools, we used competitor and market analysis to identify additional products that matched the HollowWoodworks brand.
New listings included personalized busy boards, wooden growth charts, book ledges, children’s coat racks, name puzzles, educational puzzles, tooth fairy boxes, toy storage, and nursery products.
These additions expanded the shop into new Etsy categories while remaining connected to its established strengths in personalized wooden products for children.
During the program, approximately 40 new listings were introduced, increasing the catalogue from 13 listings to more than 50.
This created significantly more keyword opportunities, product entry points, and advertising options.
4) Creating Educational Bundles
We also created bundles that combined several complementary learning products.
For example, personalized name puzzles were combined with numbers, shapes, and colors puzzles to create a complete Montessori-inspired educational gift.
These bundles helped increase the average order value while giving customers a more complete gifting option.
They also allowed the shop to target broader searches related to educational toys, toddler learning, Montessori activities, and personalized children’s gifts.
5) Paid Ads and Organic SEO Alignment
As the catalogue expanded, Etsy Ads had more optimized products to promote.
We aligned the advertising strategy with the organic SEO work by focusing on proven bestsellers, newly optimized name stools, occasion-based listings, educational products, and new categories.
The goal was not simply to increase the advertising budget. It was to give Etsy a larger and more relevant product selection through which it could find potential buyers.
This approach helped HollowWoodworks achieve a 772% Etsy Ads ROAS in June, one of the strongest advertising results in the shop’s history.
Results - Reversing the 9 Month Downward Trend
The results began appearing during the first month of the program.
When we started, the shop was ~20% behind the previous year. Through the first SEO improvements and listing expansion, HollowWoodworks recovered the gap and reached the previous year’s revenue level within the first month.
This confirmed that demand for the products remained strong. The shop did not have a product-quality problem. It needed broader and more structured visibility.
During the following months, we continued introducing new listings, niches, products, and keyword combinations.
Traffic increased significantly as the shop began appearing for more searches connected to children’s gifts, birthdays, baptisms, christenings, nursery décor, Montessori learning, and personalized furniture. June marked the most important result of the program.
For the first time in nine months, HollowWoodworks moved from a year-on-year revenue decline into growth and revenue increased by 17% compared with the same period in the previous year.
At the same time, Etsy Ads generated a 772% ROAS, showing that advertising remained highly efficient while the shop expanded its product catalogue and search visibility.
Conclusion
HollowWoodworks already had an exceptional product, strong customer reviews, proven demand, and a clear competitive advantage through its high-quality maple craftsmanship.
The main limitation was the shop’s narrow search footprint.
With only 13 active listings and repeated keyword targeting, the store was reaching only a small part of its potential market.
By restructuring the keywords, expanding the personalized name stool listings, targeting specific gifting occasions, introducing new product categories, and creating educational bundles, we significantly increased the shop’s visibility.
The initial objective was to recover the previous year’s performance, which was achieved during the first month.
By June, approximately four months into the program, HollowWoodworks had reversed a nine-month revenue decline and achieved 17% year-over-year growth.
The result was not based on a temporary promotion or one successful product. It came from building a broader, more diversified SEO and product foundation that positioned the shop for continued year-round growth.
