If you sell goods on Etsy, the American eCommerce website that focuses on handmade or vintage items and craft supplies, you might have noticed data reporting and analytics features are rather lacking.
However, if you want to run a successful eCommerce business, even just as a side gig, you need to know the basics at the very least, including your revenue, profit and cashflow.
You could try and do it yourself manually, but are you sure you know what you need to be recording and why? And all it takes is one tiny mistake to massively misrepresent your entire business, which could be a disaster.
But by connecting your sales transactions and sales invoices with your online accounting software, such as Xero, you can automate your data entry, significantly reducing the chance of data entry error.
You can also use it to sync your orders, products, discounts and more. You’ll also be able to manage your sales data more easily while benefiting from real-time, up-to-date data anywhere and anytime.
The good thing is that there are multiple ways to integrate Xero and Etsy. Let’s go through each of them.
Use A2X to connect Etsy and Xero
Using A2X is by far the simplest way to connect Xero and Etsy.
A2X categorises all your transactions and sends them to Xero in summaries that match your Etsy deposit exactly. It really is that easy to reconcile your accounts with your bank deposits each and every month.
A2X also includes a ‘cost module’ that calculates the cost of goods sold for each of your Etsy deposits before sending the information to Xero.
This feature not only ensures that you’re tracking sales in real-time but the gross profit. It also eliminates the need for manual data entry, which saves time and you from human error.
Use Make to integrate Xero and Etsy
Make, formerly known as Integromat, similarly lets you connect your business apps, including Etsy, so you can move data between apps without the need for manual data entry.
It works with a visual editor, which allows you to design your workflows (known as ‘scenarios’ in the app) by creating a trigger in one app that causes a resulting action in another. The visual nature of Make means it’s easier in practice than you might think.
You can do all this by clicking the ‘create a new scenario’ button on the main dashboard and select Etsy and Xero, the two apps you want to integrate, before following the on screen instructions.
The challenge is knowing exactly what steps you need to Make to, well, make. There are a lot of guides on the web for you to follow, or you could cut down the research time and send us a quick email.
Integrate Xero and Etsy with Expandly
Expandly is our final suggestion to connect Etsy to Xero. With this eCommerce software, you can digitally link your Etsy account with your Xero accounting software so you can sync orders without spreadsheets or manual input.
To get started, you need to log into Expandly and ‘select configuration’. Then, select ‘configure Xero’.
You’ll then be able to customise your setup by using a series of drop-down menus to add your Xero account to Expandly. Once you’ve added Xero, you can then set up your workflows by using the left-hand menu in your Expandly dashboard.
As Xero Accountants, we can help you if you’re having any problems integrating Xero and Etsy. Just get in touch today.