It’s great if you are an artist and have the ability to work with paintings, pencil sketches, cartoons, caricatures, memes or designing software. If you don’t know but you have a creative mindset and can think of attractive designs and phrases to print on T-shirts, that can get the attention of others. Believe me, you can do so much in print on demand sites.
Dress designing is a very profitable sector but it has a lot of limitations. From choosing and purchasing fabric to designing, cutting, stitching and selling, there are many steps involved. Then despite the investment and hard work, there is no guarantee whether it will work or not. So, this is the place where print on demand sites come in.
POD sites offer partnership programs for creative people. They have their own manufacturing units. You don’t have to worry about purchasing material, storing, inventory or shipping products to your customers. All this work is their responsibility. Leaving this burden aside allows you to focus on your creative work that can grab the attention of customers. In Fact, it’s a good chance for artists and creative people to earn some extra income, from the comfort and safety of their home.
With a little effort and effective marketing strategy, you can surely turn your skills as a creative person into a profitable business. So, without much ado, now I will guide you about each and everything you need to know for starting your business on print-on-demand sites. But, before going into more details, let’s take a look at the important points we are going to discuss today.
Contents
- What is a print on demand site and its benefits?
- Popular print on demand sites
- How will you do the designing?
- How to get started?
- How to sell your items?
- Branding
- How to open your business store on POD sites?
- How will you set the price of the design?
- Final Thoughts
What is a print on demand site and its benefits?
A print on demand site is a way of selling your designed products with third party collaboration. No need to worry about purchasing fabric, storage, inventory and shipping arrangements. Company is responsible for all these steps. When a customer places an order for a product with your custom design on it. The order is sent to the company who prints the product and sends it to your customer and you will get your profit immediately. A good point about print on demand business is that whenever your designed item would be sold you will get the profit. This means one single item can make you a millionaire if people like it and order it again and again.
If Pullover Hoody at threadless website are sold one hundred times. Its price is Forty-Eight dollars. I also have my own account on the site. So, I know that the designer would have received $8 of each sale. Which is eight hundred dollars. That’s really great.
An additional benefit is that if a company, association or club likes your design, they order hundreds of shirts or mugs to give to their customers or members as a gift. Furthermore, these websites also select some designers for the help of their customers so that if any buyer wants to make something of his own, he can ask for designer help. If you are a good expert, you can also be included in this list.
Popular Print on Demand Sites
1- These Six websites are very popular and easy for beginners.
Redbubble, TeeSpring, Zazzle, SpreadShirt, threadless & Cafepress.
2- These sites are simple. They provide business opportunities and very popular.
Teechip, ViralStyle, TeePublic , Design By Humans & Society6.
3- These two websites are very professional, but a little difficult to work on for beginners.
Printful and Printify.
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All these sites are famous and reliable. You can create an account on all of them if you want. Another good point is that you can put the same design on different sites because no one is going to claim copyright except you. So, the site has no problem when there is no one to complain but I suggest you start working from the first six sites that I have mentioned above because these sites are much easier and co-operative than others, especially for newbies.
How will you do the designing?
You can make designs right in the print-on-demand service for free or go for any premium designing software. For your convenience, I suggest some good software that even a high school student can use effortlessly, such as Gimp, Adobe Illustrator, etc.
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There are thousands of editable templates in different categories. These templates are also available separately for T-shirts. You can select any image and change the text, design, font, color and size according to your ideas and needs. Once you have completed your work, you can save and download it in PNG format. This is the best format for designing purposes.
Sites that I recommend to you are Creative Fabrica, Designious, and Canva. People who can’t do anything can go to these sites and use free resources to create graphic design and word art. It is as simple as it is fun. All you have to do is log in to these sites, and there will be free design templates. You can edit templates online and offline, export them in PNG format, and upload them to the shirts, mugs, or mats.
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It should be clear that this is not an easy task. There’s lots of competition. You need to do something new and creative. Think of something that is attractive and appealing. A catchy type of one-liner that readers find interesting, a meme showing an attitude, or a joke about a profession with abstract art, flowers, icons or emoticons. Unlock your creativity to find success.
How to get started?
In this profession, initially I suggest you limit yourself to designing simple items, until you get some experience and reach the status of a professional designer. You can start with mugs, T-shirts, pillows, and door mats. Making designs for these items is very simple and easy. What you have to do is to make a design and apply it on the single side, if you want to apply it on the other side too, it can be easily applied by selecting the other side.
On the other hand, Leggings, school bags, mobile covers and other items that have to be designed all around or on the whole body are a bit difficult. You have to use some complicated software for this purpose. Similarly, the work of jewelry also requires a lot of finesse and professional skill, but if you find a pendant or bracelet, which is easy to design, there is no problem in trying. You can use the same design on different sites. Because no one can copyright claim except you, so the site has no problem when there is no one to claim.
How to sell your items?
In the beginning you have to work a little harder to start sales. It may take time. You need to advertise your designed items or your shop on your Facebook page, fashion groups, T-shirt groups, Instagram, Pinterest or free ad posting websites to sell your products. In particular, you can target the European community who are the biggest buyers of these items. You can easily find them on Facebook groups, Twitter and Instagram. If you succeed to do it smartly, soon your sales will start from somewhere.
Branding
Branding is one of the most important factors of a successful business. Having a brand name improves your credibility. It helps you create a unique impression of your business. It’s a good idea to keep a brand name of your store and make a monogram logo of it which must be affixed somewhere around the text or design you create. So that, people can easily recognize your work whenever they see a product that’s designed by you. Try to make the logo artistic so that the customer coming to your shop will be impressed. Surely it will help you to boost your business.
How to open your business store on POD sites?
You can open your online store on a POD site in a few simple and easy steps. For business you will see the Partnership Program tab on the site which has a different name on each platform, for example, Designers Login, Sale, Your Design, Start Selling, Login to Make Money and so on. After registering from the designer’s specific tab, you have to enter your real personal data so that in case of any hacking or payment transfer problem you can prove ownership of your account. Make sure that you have a PayPal account for money transfer. Otherwise, you’ll not be eligible to work with POD sites. You may find some other options too, such as Payoneer or a bank account, but PayPal is the most popular and easily acceptable payment option on all online sites.
Once you have registered with the Proper Channel and logged in, you will find the work menu and the settings menu on the main page. From this menu, you can go to profile settings and create your profile. Now you can upload your designed products to your store easily. All these steps are very simple. No technical expertise needed at all.
How to set Pricing?
Each site has its own way to set prices. Some websites show two boxes for the price. In the first box they list the value of the product according to the market price. In the second box, you can write the price you want to charge for your design. On the other hand, some websites show only one box for pricing. In this box they have set a price according to the market standard. You are allowed to increase pricing but whatever you increase the price of the item, you will get fixed percent of it. Whatever the price method you find, I advise you to keep your product price in accordance with the market under normal circumstances. Because people know what the price of this thing is in the market. Websites also keep the price in accordance with its market. So, if you want to improve your sales, it’s better to follow market standards.
Final Thoughts
Nothing is difficult in this process except that I have given you a general idea about the procedure rather than introducing each site menu and interface separately. The reason is that all sites are doing the same work with slight differences. Their procedures are quite similar which you can easily understand with a little effort.
The main agenda of writing this guide is to help those people who have a creative mind and want to earn some extra income with the comfort and security of their home. Working on POD sites is a great source of passive income. Especially in the current pandemic situations, you should try it. After all, it’s totally free. You’re not going to spend a single penny, so there’s nothing to lose.
Did you ever work on print on demand sites?
If yes, don’t forget to tell us about your experience in the comments below. NewOfferSee is always willing to hear from you. As well as if you find this guide helpful, don’t forget to share it. As you know a Facebook/twitter share can help more people, who are looking for some extra sources of passive income.
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Author: Asif
Asif is a freelance writer who shares his knowledge and experience on how to build and run a successful online business. Whether you are a beginner or a pro, you will find valuable tips and resources on his blog » NewOfferSee Digital Time »
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