Graphic design is impactful & covers a broad scope of design work across virtually every industry. If you’ve been working as a graphic designer for a while, you’ll likely have a catalogue of work that would make excellent assets to speed up your workflow. Ever wanted to sell your design files online? I’ve been doing just that for several years now, & I thought I would share my two cents.
So you’ve thought to yourself – “I could probably make some extra money from this”. Selling digital products online came to my attention during my university days. I know it can be challenging to find the correct information about the ins & outs of earning a substantial income from it. While I’m still a practising designer working for other studios ( & therefore have not concentrated all my efforts into making a full-time income online), I do know a little something about how to make your endeavour a success.
I’m often asked by other creators who want to do this, what they need to do & what sells; therefore, I’ve put together a step by step guide along with some helpful tips & tricks I wish someone had told me in the beginning. Here’s everything you need to know about selling your graphic design files online:
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Step One –
Figure Out Your Why.
Selling artwork to earn passive income in digital products or resources is a growing attraction for many designers & artists. However, it would help if you accepted that greater accessibility for all naturally increases your competition. You also need to be aware of the many rip-off artists waiting to replicate the next hot commodity & that despite your best efforts, you may find they attempt to steal your work. You can try & spend hours sending DMCAs, but, quite frankly, it’s a fruitless pursuit.
It’s best to accept this as a liability of selling your work online as playing detective is soul-destroying & a waste of time. You will also need to repeatedly need to educate customers about their obligations & terms of use to get them to rectify the situation because there will be customers who breach the licence agreement terms.
With this in mind, it’s essential to establish your reasons for selling your digital creations online & use them as a motivating factor to keep you going through the roadblocks. I sell my work online because I love to create & enjoy the independence selling online gives me. I also hate waste & can’t bear the thought of good work just sitting there doing nothing. Why not create & sell products that can help others achieve their beautiful designs? All worthwhile endeavours come with a downside.
Step Two –
Define Your Customer to Define Your Products.
From prints, digital files to physical products, there’s a vast online market for design-led wares that comes with a choice of virtual platforms. Knowing what does well on each of these platforms can inform and guide you. Start with your target audience in mind. Who are they? Where are they likely to shop, what type of issue does your product solve?
Look for digital assets similar to what you plan to sell & find out what’s on offer & for how much. I wouldn’t try to create products that please everyone, because again – fruitless pursuit. Instead, please the customer base you think is best suited to your style & type of products you love creating. I would also keep an eye out for under fulfilled niches that you think people would benefit from too.
Analyze other sellers with similar products. It might not be the best idea to go head to head with the best selling authors at the beginning of this journey, but it’s worth looking at how their aesthetic sits with yours. What product marketing images have they used (if applicable) & do you think this effectively generates sales? For example – have they uploaded instructional videos on how to use the products and is it evident that this has increased sales. Can you replicate on quality? Does the platform have established methods (such as keywords or categories) to help customers find products?
Whenever I create a product, my genuine aim is to help my customers with their work or projects by creating time-saving resources. Just because you saw another product do well, doesn’t mean creating something similar will lead to success.
Graphic Design Files That Sell.
FONTS, LOTS OF FONTS
Creatives, especially graphic designers, often have faced paced working hours & we need to communicate our concepts fast. A bank of beautiful fonts is a staple resource that we go to time & time again. However, this field is competitive & getting your fonts noticed will take trial & error when it comes to the marketing or product images. Once you have the font ready, it’s important to present it well in mockups of different kinds.
Even though I am yet to sell fonts personally, I’ve noticed the following categories to do particularly well on Creative Market:
Cursive or Script Fonts: An all-time favourite or people who consume fonts online are the script fonts.
Novelty Fonts: Unique & specialized fonts are fun & memorable.
Non-Western Fonts: Fonts designed for non-western languages do well globally. These are usually created in English.
MARVELLOUS MOCKUPS
As a designer who frequently works on branding concepts during my day job, I need to quickly apply my logos to realistic mockups to sell an idea to a client. Mockups are the no.1 timesaving resource to make designs look like the completed project. Include “smart object” layers in your mockup files. I’ve observed that product, packaging & branding mockups seem to do quite well but you can also expand to scene creators, signage & more.
LANDING PAGES
Websites need landing pages for lead generation or maintenance notices. Create webpages for specific purposes, either for popular themes like DIVI or design them in code for designers to customize. Landing pages for lead generation are, particularly in high demand. They need to be UX optimized & users need to customize the content. Make the code easy to read & keep it in order.
HIGH-RESOLUTION IMAGES
Backgrounds & stock photos are versatile & in high demand. To get good sales for stock images & backgrounds, make sure they are high quality & tiled for greater versatility.
UX & UI TOOLS
Tools for UX & UI design are timesaving godsends. If you’re going to sell these, keep in mind that they should be well designed to be worth it for other designers. Think of usability & practicality when creating these tools.
Wireframes: A wireframe kit is a timesaver for a UX designer creating a website or app. Research popular wireframe kits so that yours can compete with the best.
UI Kits: A UI kit contains all the visual aspects of a website or app to function. This is comprised of menus & buttons etc. matching in colour & style.
DESIGN TEMPLATES
Professionally designed templates serve a wide range of customers from amateurs to professionals. Templates are best sold in bundles for different kinds of purposes. Always sell these as .eps, .pdf. or .ai formats.
Social media packs: A favourite in the template world is Instagram post sets or Instagram story sets. These usually include at least ten or many more templates for easy use & minimal editing.
Powerpoint Presentations: Presentation templates are always in demand across virtually every industry.
VECTORS & ILLUSTRATIONS
Vector files are always in demand by both designers & non-designers. The best vector designs are versatile.
Step Three –
Pick Your Online Platform.
If you want to make money working from home by creating & selling your products like vintage posters or doodle art, it’s essential to decide where to list them. How do you ensure you’re selling where potential customers are looking? Many online marketplaces claim impressive traffic statistics, but visitor hits won’t tell you what’s making money. Different marketplace sites work differently, giving you more or less of a hand in the overall process. Please do your homework.
Note that platforms with their own End User License Agreements mean your work will fall under their agreement & not yours. Read their license terms carefully. Ensure you are happy with what they allow the end-users to do with your work. With that in mind, I’ve listed some of the top online platforms to sell your graphic design work on:
CREATIVE MARKET
Creative Market is a major contender on this list. This is a website where you can sell your website themes, print templates, graphics, fonts, & other works online. Just set your price of the design work online.
DESIGNHILL
Designhill is a leading marketplace where creatives come together to create design work.
ETSY
Etsy has that cute handcrafted feel. This is another globally recognized marketplace that allows sales of all types of designs. The price of listing an item here is $0.20 for four months. You will face fierce competition, which means only high-quality design items have the chance to sell at a reasonable price.
REDBUBBLE
One of the advantages of uploading your products to Redbubble is that you can decide & set your profit margin rate. The site is also home to many artist groups, which serves as an inspiration.
ART WEB
You can sell pretty much anything from digital downloads, art, graphic designs, prints, illustrations, paintings, shirt printing designs & other works on this e-commerce site. It’s also a great place to build a network. A useful feature of the site is that it functions on a no-commission base.
DESIGN CUTS
Design Cuts is a community-driven platform where you can sell your very high-quality design works at attractive prices. A useful feature of the site is that it functions on a no-commission base. If they enrol you as a member, you are assured of easy access to their large base of loyal customers.
THREADLESS
The great thing about Threadless is that you can open your shop for free. This marketplace also has a large community of like-minded artists looking to network. What’s also great about this platform is the public review feature.
MYFONTS
If you’re a master at creating fonts, you’ll want to list your work here.
NOT ON THE HIGH STREET
Not On The High Street is a large site similar to Etsy where you can sell your design work online. With the marketplace having two million visitors coming to it per month, this platform offers many potential buyers all in one place.
DESIGN BY HUMANS
If you are an illustrator, you can sell your creative collection of illustrators at Design By Humans. You can easily find customers for your products.
SOCIETY 6
Society 6 allows you to open your store for free. You can feature a wide range of products & sell them at a profit. If that weren’t enough, the site would produce & ship the products to the customers on your behalf.
ARTFIRE
ArtFire is another great site to sell your design work online. The site gives you the required tools to help you build your storefront to sell your work.
CAFEPRESS
You can sell whatever you design. With this site, you have the freedom to put your customized online shop & sell from there. What is more beneficial to the designers is that the site does not charge any upfront fees.
GRAPHIC RIVER
Graphic River is the leading platform to sell your graphic design files. You can upload pretty much everything from vectors, textures, infographics, add-ons, logo design, icons, to design templates. You can also share screenshots & description of your work & get opinions of the community.
SAATCHI
Saatchi boasts of around 65,000 artists from across the globe as part of its community & the best part of this platform is the network you can build when you sell your work.
GRAPHIC LEFTOVERS
I find the name of this platform quite fitting. Graphic Leftovers is the online site where you can sell a wide range of designs such as logos, templates, illustrations, icons & many more. You can expect a 40% commission on the sales.
FIVERR
Although Fiverr is a service-based website & was initially launched for the freelancers to find work, the site is an excellent place to sell your graphic design ideas and skills. You can converse with your potential buyers of design services & ideas directly through the site to get your creative work’s desired prices.
PIXAPP
You can earn a considerable profit margin at PixApp as the site gives away 90% of commissions to the designers who are selling their work.
Step Four –
Select & Prepare Your Graphic Design Assets.
Most online marketplaces will ask you to provide samples of the work you plan to sell when you apply to join them. Some people make a lot of money & some barely anything, what matters is how commercially viable your illustration is & creativity & quality. Once you have become accepted onto your chosen platform, you need to upload some work.
Each file must be to a high standard, so make sure everything you upload is your best. Ensure your files are organized & labelled correctly with the correct file formats etc. Because download numbers matter, make sure your work is adaptable & can be used in several different designs.
If you want to make a quick buck putting something up there, you can make you some money as marketing departments will probably want to download it. Things like textures, stylized design elements, scrolls, backgrounds, ink & paint splatters, icons & frames are great for designers to download & use on their project.
Volume does matter, so keep adding more products when you have spare time & build up your portfolio slowly. It will take a few months of steady uploading to see significant downloads, so you need to be patient, persistent, & not get too downhearted. If you are skilled & you stick at it, you will get results.
Step Five –
Figure out How Much To Charge.
Your earnings come from selling the same low priced item over & over to hundreds, & hopefully, thousands of customers. It’s becoming increasingly competitive to sell digital products.
Customers have more & more choices, plus they’re constantly bombarded by really cheap, all-in-one bundles that seem too good to be true. Often quality is compromised when products are churned out to be bundled & sold for next to nothing.
While this kind of strategy does have results, I don’t subscribe to it. I made a conscious decision not to try & compete with the mass, super-low priced products, but rather concentrate on creating quality over quantity & focus on building my unique style & use that reflect my values & style.
Undercharging in the hopes of attracting more sales will be damaging & demotivating to you in the long run. Just remember to respect your time as a designer & in turn, respect your customer’s money by providing them with high-quality work that provides value.
Wrapping it All Up.
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