Uploading Digital Prints to My Website to Sell
Sell digital products online like an expert
Digital products provide all the pros of online shopping – comfort, convenience, unlimited options – and none of the cons. Picture it: you lot're browsing on your laptop, you detect an cocked print that you honey, and… done! The file's on your desktop faster than you can modify out of your pajamas.
Selling digital downloads is an easy way to create a corking customer feel. Merely how practise you lot get started?
There are a few different sales channels at your disposal. You tin either sell through an online market, or set up your ain online store. An online marketplace is quicker for y'all to set up up, but an online store more effectively communicates your brand personality to your shoppers. And presenting a brand that people identify with is vital: 89% of shoppers stay loyal to brands that share their values.
This might feel similar an information overload, which is why nosotros've organized our findings afterward hours of research to bring you the best platform for each sales channel.
three of the Best Places to Sell Digital Products
- Etsy is an online market that will assist yous sell quickly and easily
- Squarespace is an ecommerce website builder that'due south feature-rich, easy to use, and takes care of all the behind-the-scenes techy stuff for you
- WordPress is a more advanced CMS, which you'll take to host yourself. If you have the technical know-how, then WordPress can help you create a powerful online store
Read on for our full breakdown of each platform, and find out which is all-time for your own digital goals!
Want the total scoop on how to make money marketing your music? Explore our detailed guide to selling music online.
i
Etsy
Etsy is the queen bee of online marketplaces, with 2.6 meg active sellers – and, more chiefly, 44.8 million active buyers . It's managed to shake off the corporate ecommerce stereotype, and has instead get known as the platform of choice for creative, handmade, and original artwork and crafts. In other words, it'southward the best online marketplace for selling digital products.
Etsy Key Features
| Cost | 20¢ listing fee, plus 3.five% of your sale price |
|---|---|
| Pros | Huge popularity gives you a built-in audience Extremely quick setup process |
| Cons | Lots of contest for buyers' attention Not every bit customizable every bit Squarespace or WordPress |
| Who is Etsy best for? | Those looking to sell fast |
Because Etsy is already a household name, you won't have to work very difficult to build trust amidst your customers. You also won't need to worry about driving traffic to the site – Etsy already promotes itself, and does so very successfully.
The downside of this popularity is competition. In that location are currently over sixty million items for auction on Etsy, and like nosotros said earlier, in that location are two.6 million agile sellers. That means customers have a lot of options. And while yous won't have to worry most getting people onto the site, you will need to think nigh how to stand out from every other seller.
If you're willing to try to cut through the racket, then Etsy is a slap-up fashion to start selling chop-chop. All you accept to do is create an account and start uploading your products – it really is that simple.
Etsy is free to bring together, but you'll have to fork over 3.5% of your sales, and pay the 20 cent fee to list each product. A off-white tradeoff, nosotros'd say, considering the ease of use that the platform provides.
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Squarespace
Squarespace places fourth in our overall ecommerce website builder rankings, which we've determined through hours of testing and research. Squarespace has all of the necessary tools for selling online, plus the best template designs that nosotros've seen – and so it'll be actually easy to give your store its ain personality and mode.
The do good of ecommerce website builders like Squarespace is that y'all get a ready-fabricated, just notwithstanding easily personalized shop at an all-in-i price. A professional person client service team is on hand if you lot demand it, and you won't have to recollect about hosting at all – everything is taken care of for you.
Unlike ecommerce heavy-hitters similar BigCommerce and Shopify, Squarespace makes it a lot easier to customize your brand. That's because information technology's more geared towards modest and medium-sized shops who don't have the time or money to hire a defended digital team.
Most chiefly, Squarespace is the best website builder for selling digital downloads. Non simply is it cheaper than other ecommerce builders, with higher quality templates to emphasize digital products, but information technology also:
- Has the digital product selection built in, while other builders like Shopify require an app
- Offers time-sensitive download links that expire in 24 hours, to minimize unauthorized sharing
Squarespace besides offers unlimited storage space on every plan, which is perfect for keeping multiple digital products in your store.
Squarespace Fundamental Features
| Toll | $eighteen/month, plus three% transaction fee |
|---|---|
| Pros | Huge option of congenital-in features Easy to use, merely notwithstanding customizable Congenital-in client support services |
| Cons | Have to promote your own site Less customizable than WordPress |
| Who is Squarespace best for? | Those who desire the virtually personalized store |
The cheapest Squarespace plan that you tin sell digital downloads with is the Business plan, which costs $eighteen per month. With this plan, yous can sell unlimited products and manage your inventory with ease.
Every Squarespace plan besides comes with a xiv-day gratis trial, then y'all can endeavor this builder out take chances-free.
3
WordPress
WordPress.org – not to be confused with its simpler analogue, WordPress.com – is a Content Management Organisation (CMS). A CMS is a more powerful, scalable tool than a website architect, and tin can adjust more files (i.e. content).
WordPress is highly customizable, only you won't enjoy whatever of these benefits unless you accept a degree of technical know-how. If you don't know how to code, you lot'll struggle to alter your site much beyond the initial theme you choose.
WordPress.org is a self-hosted platform, which means you lot'll accept to choose a hosting provider yourself. WordPress.org has been recommending Bluehost's hosting plans since 2005, and this provider really earned the " Best for WordPress Specific Hosting " title in our own research. Bluehost's seamless integration with WordPress and WordPress plugins makes it a reliable hosting pick.
WordPress Key Features
| Price | $iv.95/calendar month (minimum) |
|---|---|
| Pros | Extremely customizable Lots of scalability |
| Cons | More than circuitous setup process Technical knowledge is mandatory No dedicated help and support squad |
| Who is WordPress best for? | Those who plan to calibration their shop |
The almost popular ecommerce plugin for WordPress is WooCommerce – but if you merely want to sell digital downloads, then WooCommerce is really non your best option. You lot can sell digital products with WooCommerce, but it will too come up with too many features that simply apply to concrete products, such as shipping options.
Instead of WooCommerce, y'all'll want something more specific. Another WordPress plugin, chosen Easy Digital Downloads, ticks all the correct boxes. Information technology is designed to work with any WordPress theme, though there are too themes created specifically for Easy Digital Downloads. You can easily take payments via Amazon or PayPal, and you can upload any kind of digital file to sell on your site. Depending on what you'd like to become out of this plugin, you lot tin can opt for the gratis or paid version.
WordPress is an open up-source software, which means the original source code is freely bachelor for users to change and redistribute equally they like. This ways that there is no dedicated WordPress help and back up team; instead, you'll have to rely on help from cyberspace forums.
To start a WordPress site with Bluehost, y'all'll take to buy a Bluehost plan. There are a lot of hosting services to choose from, but to sell digital downloads, we recommend Bluehost's Bones WordPress hosting program .
The introductory price for the Basic WordPress plan is $4.95/calendar month when y'all pay for i year in accelerate (you can also pay for three years in advance at $two.95/month, but ane yr is a lower-run a risk commitment). After the first twelvemonth, that $iv.95/month renews at $7.99/month, which is a pretty standard pricing jump for the hosting industry.
While hosting is the merely definite cost you'll accept with a WordPress store, there will realistically exist a few other things y'all'll end upwardly paying for, like advanced ecommerce functionalities or heightened site security. Of grade, it's upwards to you lot how much y'all terminate upwardly spending across the base hosting cost, but it'due south good to keep in heed that WordPress pricing is less all-inclusive than that of an ecommerce website builder.
Tips for Selling Digital Products Successfully
By now, you know which platforms are best for selling digital downloads. But do you know how to sell digital downloads successfully?
Nosotros've compiled all of the necessary tips and tricks that will requite your business that extra push button. Here's what you need to do to accept your digital downloads to the adjacent level:
- Know the difference between licensing and ownership
- Don't skimp on scanning
- Employ SEO best practices
- Build your social media presence
Know the departure between licensing and ownership
You own your artwork/photography/digital content. When you sell that content online, whoever buys it is buying a license to use it. This is unlike from ownership and selling in the concrete sense. If yous buy a dresser at a thou auction, yous now own that dresser, and have the correct to then sell information technology to someone else. This is not true for digital content, which means your work is protected from unfair redistribution.
There are different types of licenses that you tin can choose to grant to your buyers. For example, yous can requite customers the right to print out multiple copies of your work, or simply i. You tin besides give buyers the right to employ your work only in the ways specified past your listing – for instance, you have command over the way your artwork gets copied, distributed, and/or displayed.
Don't skimp on scanning
Some of your work may take been created online, which makes uploading it to your website elementary. But if you're wondering how to sell digital downloads of physical artwork, this next section is for you.
There are two basic options for getting concrete art online with ease: scanning and photographing. If your physical fine art is 8.5" 10 eleven" or smaller, you'll be able to use an at-dwelling scanner that connects to your reckoner. For larger artwork, you'll want to have it scanned at a printing shop. From there, you can get the file sent to your e-mail, or you can provide a wink drive for it to be uploaded to.
The photography option is a petty riskier – you'll have to use a quality camera, similar a DSLR, and brand certain that each photo is taken at a high resolution. No matter what yous practice, resist the temptation to take a photo with your smartphone. No thing how quality the image looks, the screen on a prison cell phone is too small to let for the file to be printed conspicuously later.
Use SEO best practices
SEO is ofttimes the deciding factor in whether or not your products will get the viewership that they deserve. The more recognizable your particular listings are to search engines, the college your production pages volition rank in the SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages), and the more people will find them.
Search engines desire their users to have a straightforward experience, and a large part of SEO is making certain your details and descriptions are clear. There are a few simple actions you can take to assist your products stand out:
- Use keywords. Relevant keywords turn into relevant tags for your detail listings – recall about the kinds of phrases you'd search for as a consumer looking for your product, and stick to them!
- Requite your production a descriptive championship tag. A skilful championship tag will encourage potential buyers to click. The title tag is the clickable headline on the SERPs that leads people to your product page, then you'll desire to go on it simple and concise.
- Write a dazzling production description. A product clarification is the re-create that users will view equally a summary of what you're selling, so you lot'll desire to keep it specific and engaging – and, like the title tag, it should tell people exactly what your product is.
- Add alt text to your images. Alt text is the descriptive text that appears in place of an prototype when it has problem loading. This chemical element is important in whatsoever case, but especially for ecommerce SEO, because buyers desire to know exactly what they're going to be getting.
Build your social media presence
Social media is a promotional tool that will benefit you regardless of whether yous're selling on Etsy, Squarespace or WordPress. Consider platforms like Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook as opportunities to widen your audience and engage with people. In one case yous've built a name for yourself on social media, y'all can use those platforms to bulldoze traffic dorsum to your site.
Some companies use social media actually well. Square Sayings sells wall art, phone cases, and the like, all decorated with funny sayings that have gotten a lot of engagement on its Instagram page, which has an impressive 163k followers.
By letting users interact with products earlier buying anything, Foursquare Sayings has generated a ton of fizz around its make.
With Squarespace and WordPress, you tin can as well use social media-specific apps and plugins to add certain features to your site, like icons that link to your various profiles, or a form that lets users annotate and share your website posts on their own social pages. In other words, Squarespace and WordPress make it piece of cake for customers to spread the word about your products!
seven Digital Products to Sell Online
In case you're in need of inspiration, here are seven examples of digital products you can sell online:
- Music
- Art
- Services
- Ebooks
- Photography
- Designs
- Tech software
1. Sell Your Music Online
Selling your music straight from your website is a groovy way to monetize your talent other than creating merchandise and selling gig tickets. This way, you lot can release new music straight to your fans, and promote your work someday, anywhere.
Other audio products include:
- Audiobooks
- Sound effects
- Recorded language lessons
2. Sell Your Fine art every bit Digital Downloads
Gallery fees are expensive, hiring out a store is expensive, and carrying your fine art around the streets to try and sell to tourists is tiring. Why not sell your art online instead? If you create digital prints of your work, you can plow them into wallpapers or avatars for employ on phones or online.
Other ideas for those with the artistic touch include:
- Video animations
- Custom illustrations
- Printable calendars
iii. Offering Your Digital Services
You don't have to meet your client in person to offer your services online. Yous can run online courses, offering translation services, or editing jobs, to proper noun merely a few. By creating courses online and working with clients digitally, you can work from the comfort of your own dwelling house, at whatsoever hours suit you, and you save time travelling to and from each job.
Other examples of digital services you can offer include:
- Pattern services
- Fitness plans
- Tutoring
4. Create an Ebook to Sell Online
If you have an expanse of expertise or niche knowledge, you might want to write an ebook or create an online course that people can purchase and download. People like learning online because information technology gives them the flexibility of fitting their interests into their own schedules.
There are tons of dissimilar ways yous can put an ebook or online learning form together – think about including:
- Presentations
- Videos
- Quizzes
5. Monetize Your Photography Skills
Perhaps yous take photos for the love of it, or maybe you never thought to monetize information technology because setting up a studio or popup store was across your upkeep. Yet, by digitizing your photos or taking your photography skills online, yous tin can make some money straight from your website.
Here are some ways yous tin can monetize your photography skills digitally:
- Create stock imagery
- Sell your lightroom presets
- Offer photo editing
six. Commencement Designing For the Spider web
Design skills are perfect for digitizing and selling online, and there's a lot of choice involved if you take the right skillset. Creating logos is a great fashion of getting started, as there'due south a pretty high demand for proficient quality designs.
Other means of selling digital design products includes:
- Creating infographics
- Designing fonts
- Branding websites
vii. Sell Tech Software
It makes sense that selling tech software online would exist a popular, and frequently lucrative, way to sell digital products. Whether you lot develop apps or WordPress themes, you're in a great position to concenter customers to your digital store.
Here are some actress examples of tech software you could sell digitally through your site:
- Hosting packages
- Games
- Browser or website plugins
Hopefully y'all're now feeling inspired and ready to start selling your own digital products!
How to Sell Digital Downloads: Summary
At present that you know the basics of selling digital products successfully, y'all take a few decisions to make! The first is determining whether an online marketplace, an ecommerce website builder, or a self-hosted WordPress site is the best sales channel for you.
To help you start selling digital products sooner, we've narrowed the all-time platform for each sales channel:
- Etsy: best online marketplace
- Squarespace: best ecommerce website builder
- WordPress: best self-hosted CMS
If you're having a hard time choosing, Squarespace provides a great blend of the sales functions you get with Etsy and the customization you get with WordPress – information technology'southward the best of both worlds.
Regardless of which platform you cull, you tin can trust our height tips for successfully selling products online. To epitomize, these are:
- Know the deviation between licensing and ownership
- Don't skimp on scanning
- Utilise SEO best practices
- Build your social media presence
And if yous're in demand of some inspiration, we likewise whizzed through some examples of digital products to sell online. The key is playing to your strengths besides as playing to the market, and then have a think about what you've already got to offer. To sell digital products online, consider:
- Music
- Art
- Services
- Ebooks
- Photography
- Designs
- Tech software
…and now you're prepare to get! Skillful luck with your site, and let us know which platform yous like best in the comments!
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Source: https://www.websitebuilderexpert.com/building-online-stores/how-to-sell-digital-downloads/
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