Seller Handbook

The following is a transcript of a podcast episode released in May 2022. The transcript has been edited slightly for this format. You can listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Or stream it via the Spotify player above.

Tess: Welcome to the show, Jay! Thanks so much for being here.

Jay: Hey Tess, thanks for having me.

Tess: I’m excited to talk with you about the work that your team has done around intellectual property rights. But first I want to talk about you. What do you do at Etsy?

Jay: I’m the director of legal response and enforcement on Etsy’s Trust and Safety team. My team helps protect Etsy buyers and sellers—as well as brands or other intellectual property rights holders—from the risks of potential intellectual property infringement on our marketplace.

Tess: OK, got it. So we’ve heard a lot from sellers about the importance of keeping the marketplace unique and special, and ensuring that Etsy remains a place where their creativity and the special items they sell can really shine. Earlier this year, we let them know that we’d be investing in keeping our marketplace a safe and secure destination for handmade, vintage, and special items. One example of that is a big project that you worked on: the Etsy Reporting Portal.

Could you talk about what the portal is and how it works for anyone who may not be familiar?

Jay: Definitely. The Etsy Reporting Portal allows intellectual property rights owners to register their brand and easily report any listings that they believe infringe on those rights. The idea here is to give intellectual property rights holders a convenient way to browse listings and identify, compile, and report potentially infringing listings to Etsy’s Trust and Safety team.

Here’s how it works: Using your Etsy account, you can register your intellectual property rights on the Etsy Reporting Portal. You can find the portal by going to etsy.com/ipreporting. After you register, you’ll be able to view all of your intellectual property rights and reports in one place. You’ll be able to use keywords related to your brand, search millions of listings on Etsy, then browse, compile, and report any suspected infringing listings to our dedicated team. The portal also has bulk upload features that allow you to load multiple listing URLs or ID numbers.

Once reported, our Trust and Safety team will quickly investigate and take any necessary action. You’ll get a notice on the outcome of your report, which will remain viewable in your account. If a listing is removed, the listing owner will be notified and provided with the reporter’s contact email.

Tess: This is so huge. Your team is always doing behind-the-scenes work to keep the community safe, and this launch in particular is such an important way to bolster the Etsy marketplace as a trusted experience for buyers and sellers. But I’d really love to hear from you about why the portal is so important.

Jay: Of course. We often hear from the Etsy seller community that intellectual property rights and laws can be complex. And we receive a lot of inquiries asking for clarification and more transparency on Etsy’s intellectual property policies. We’ve heard you. It’s important that we ensure that Etsy remains a place for unique and handmade goods while also enforcing the rights of Etsy sellers who are also brand owners. This is not only important for sellers who are rights holders and want to own, protect, and grow their brands on Etsy, but it’s also important for all sellers on Etsy.

For Etsy sellers who are also intellectual property rights holders, one of the biggest challenges is that most are businesses of one, selling their own handmade and unique products from their homes. Intellectual property rules and licensing models haven’t historically accounted for or even considered the value of this unique world of creators, both as rights holders and licensees of intellectual property. The portal is a step in changing that.

Tess: I totally agree. Etsy sellers are so creative and many just want all the time that they can get to be their authentic, creative selves. So anything we can do to make these complex policies and legal matters more streamlined and easier to understand, the better.

Another question for you: Can any intellectual property rights holder use the portal, even if they aren’t an Etsy seller?

Jay: Yes, third party brands that don’t currently sell on Etsy will be using it too. Since the portal allows them to also quickly and easily report suspected violations of their intellectual property, this will help us remove more listings that potentially violate brand rights and don’t meet our policies. In turn, this helps ensure that Etsy remains a safe, trusted place to buy unique and handmade items.

We support creativity and innovation. And we want to make sure that we can help protect the rights of creators and brand owners—big and small—so Etsy can continue to be a safe and supportive place to buy and sell.

Tess: That makes a lot of sense, and I’m happy to hear that it’s so accessible. Another thing I was curious about was how you and your team went about creating the portal exactly. Can you give us a peek behind the curtain?

Jay: Happy to. First, we recognized the need for Etsy creators to have a better way to report potential intellectual property violations, with strong search features and an intuitive interface. We sought input and requirements from the seller community, as well as from commercial brands who we’ve partnered with to help keep Etsy safe and compliant.

To address that need, we built a strong cross-functional team that brought together representatives from Etsy’s Product, Engineering, Legal, Research, Marketing, and Trust and Safety teams. Together these teams aligned on the scope, product requirements, and timing for the portal.

Feedback from creators and brand owners was critical at all stages of development, not only in the early designs but also throughout prototype phases. We turned that feedback into features and new functionality. We also benchmarked key industry players and we designed a system that we think greatly streamlines the intellectual property reporting process, improves rights holder and reporter verification, and makes the reporting experience easier for all types of reporters. We also set a goal to reduce opportunities for potential fraudulent reporting, as this was an important concern of our creator community.

Tess: I’m glad that our team gathered feedback from Etsy sellers and brand owners. It’s so important to hear about their experiences when building new tools like this.

So as we both know, Etsy is a global marketplace. Is the portal global too? Is it open to countries outside of the United States?

Jay: Absolutely. The seller community deserves confidence that Etsy has their back and makes tools available for them no matter which country they originate from or sell into.

Tess: I agree, they do deserve that. Another thing I’m wondering about is the copyright registration number. Do you need one in order to submit a copyright report?

Jay: You don’t. Someone located in the United States might have a copyright registration number because they registered their copyright with the US Copyright Office and received that number from there. But that number is not required to report a copyright violation. There’s a field for your copyright registration number if you have one, but that field isn’t required.

Tess: Awesome. I bet that there are some brand owners and creators out there who are relieved to hear that.

Earlier you mentioned how intellectual property rules and licensing models haven’t historically accounted for the unique needs of Etsy sellers. What other steps has the team taken to help address this?

Jay: Again, we know that intellectual rights can be complicated. And without a solid understanding of intellectual property rights, some sellers who may want to adhere to our policies might not comprehend the risks of the items they’re listing. So in addition to the portal launch, we’re focused on providing more transparency and education around policies on Etsy. This starts with the launch of our new Ultimate Guide to Intellectual Property.

This Ultimate Guide answers common questions that we’ve seen from sellers about intellectual property, and covers common policy violations that we see and how to avoid them. It also gives detailed insight into our policies on counterfeit items, reselling, and what constitutes vintage. It has a chapter on what to do if you think you’ve been copied, and it explains the United States Fair Use doctrine as it relates to fan art.

We also published a Help article for any sellers who receive an intellectual property infringement report. That article goes into why they might have received the report and what options they can consider for next steps, such as reaching out to the reporter.

Another step that our team is taking toward addressing sellers’ needs is continual assessment of our systems, processes, and communications. We’ll continue to assess these in order to meet the needs of the seller community and help protect the rights of intellectual property owners.

This is only the first iteration of the portal. At Etsy, we’re constantly in contact with sellers to understand their needs and get their feedback on what will better support them. With the Etsy Reporting Portal, we’re collecting feedback and working through potential additional features and improvements to best support seller rights holders and brands.

As usage of the portal increases, we’ll review user feedback to drive product features and enhancements. We hope to continue increasing registration and usage so we can ensure that all rights holders can effectively enforce their brands on Etsy. We’ll also continue to add relevant content to our seller education around specific Etsy seller scenarios. We’ll do this so we can meet sellers where they are, and equip them with the knowledge they need to help them stay compliant.