My name is Bernadett. I’m currently living in Budapest, Hungary. I was born and raised here, but spent three years in Germany, mainly during the pandemic.
I’m the Head of Product Marketing at Xolo, previously I used to work for a German Mobile Network Testing company as a Product Marketing Manager. I moved to Germany because I found it a great opportunity for my career, but after finding Xolo (where we work fully remotely) I decided to relocate to my original base.
I survived the pandemic in Germany 😆 where everything was completely shut down for most of the time. I’d always had a special relationship with graphic design; I’d begun this at 20-years old as a marketing assistant thanks to my knowledge in graphic design.
When the pandemic hit, I realized that digital and physical wall-art prints were booming in the US and Germany. I began illustrating and designing them, doing predominantly minimal, fresh design work. When I felt ready, I created an Etsy shop. The rest is now history.
Etsy is a super user-friendly platform! You need to create mockups for your art, add descriptions and that’s about it.
As a newbie on Etsy, you need to keep in mind that Etsy has its own SEO and search engine. As a marketer myself, I had the privilege of knowing the basics of SEO and just had to transform the best tactics to Etsy’s search engine. (Like using high-performing keywords with high search intent and low competition)
I realized quickly that I had zero patience for printing and shipping the posters myself. Also, post offices weren’t treating the packages nicely––even if I added multiple stickers on the parcels saying “fragile, do not fold.” I eventually realized that packaging my prints post-safely would be too costly so I had to look for an alternative solution and I came across print-on-demand companies, who print and ship products directly to your end-customers, globally (of course for a high-price).
The tricky part with POD companies is defining a price for your products that generates a profit after paying the POD company and also after paying Etsy’s fees.
Working with digital products is much easier; you just have to upload your high-quality files to Etsy and once someone purchases it they can download and print it themselves.
In Germany, you can earn up to €11k without opening a company, so I started like this in the first 3 months, but I realized that in the long term I would exceed the threshold and would need to look for an alternative business management and accounting solution.
First, I tried to find all the information about opening a German company, but as an expat who didn’t speak the language this turned out to be a nightmare experience. I remember only finding one outdated online guide on how to do it. Finding an English-speaking accountant felt like Mission Impossible at the time. When I finally found an English-speaking accountant, the person lacked expertise with services like Etsy. It was a disaster and my anxiety and fear of the German tax authority was out of this world.
It wasn’t until years later that I came across the Estonian e-Residency offering and realized that it would have been a much easier procedure and setup for me.
I really wish I had spent more time looking for operation alternatives outside of Germany. I wasted so much time figuring out the system––what I should have done was look into Estonian e-Residency.
It handles everything from business management to tax declaration. I like to have full control of everything, but taxes and accounting isn’t my strong suit. And in this case, finding a reliable partner who is an expert you can trust with your finances is a must. From setting up an Estonian e-Resident company, to handling the tax declarations reported through the Estonian Tax Authorities; Xolo handles all of it.
My Etsy shop largely runs on autopilot, thanks to Etsy SEO that drives sales and a POD company that handles printing and shipping my posters automatically. Recently, I switched from my previous business management tool to Xolo after we launched e-commerce support. It’s perfect for my needs and lifestyle.
Now, all I need to do is provide Xolo with a monthly CSV download from Etsy, and they take care of registering my sales for accounting.
Xolo is the all-in-one solution for solopreneurs and freelancers, offering a seamless and efficient way to streamlined business management.
Embrace the future of accounting with Xolo and know that your finances are in good hands. It’s time to say goodbye to the complexities of traditional tax advisors and welcome a new era of financial management that is automated, cost-effective and tailored to meet the unique needs of freelancers.
Change the way you handle finances with Xolo →