Should you sell POD and digital products on Etsy? The truth about Passive income.

a huge problem with trying to do POD and thinking it will be passive is that its very hard to weed out what pod partners and products are good quality. so you have order your own products to do quality checks and when they are bad quality deal with the customer service and change pod partners so your customers dont suffer.. etc.. some of these pod providers quality is sub par, that can destroy a business, and customer service is never passive.

THIS!!!!! is why I love you!!!!!

Def not passive 😂. Thank you!

I died when I seen that skeleton 🤣🤣🤣

Ooohh!! I love the phrase "Digital Income"! I sell digital supplies, My work days are about 5 to 8 hours long. It's only me. I do everything like SEO search, design, list, social media, and customer support. Designing takes up the bulk of my time, the second would be SEO, and 3rd would be customer support. I use to love designing, and I still do, but it is a different kind of "love", but what I do is work. It didn't take long for me to understand that I need focus on what my customers want and not what I enjoy making.

I am a watercolor painter and started by making postcards to send to friends, but more friends wanted them than I could make, so I started a POD Redbubble shop. Then friends wanted different products, so I expanded to Society6. Then they wanted MORE different products, and they wanted to shop at a more trusted online site, so I added Etsy. I have sold the most on Redbubble, but I’ve made the most on Etsy. My demographic trusts Etsy. That means, though, that I spend several hours creating listings for just one painting - and that’s after the hours spent planning and painting and tossing and trying again and scanning. I do get views on a few specific prints, but I’m still figuring out what will capture a buyer’s attention. I really dislike how expensive my prints have to be to cover Etsy fees and Printful costs. I cannot seem to wrap my head around what sort of section organization would be best, or which POD products people who don’t know me might want. The standard descriptions are “meh,” so they need to be rewritten multiple times, and some products only have 2 or 3 mock-up images. I enjoy the work, but it’s a LOT of work, especially since I’m also a full time professor and writer.

I have spent hundreds of hours on my digital shop, and as a new shop if really didn't make much with subscriptions, Etsy fees etc. It's starting to pick up, but hours and hours and nothing to show at first. It's worth it to me because I enjoy it, and it is picking up FINALLY.. but it's a lot of work!

So refreshing to hear an honest take on “passive income”.

My shop is 100% digital (though I occasionally destash some fabric or craft supplies because I have an audience for it, so why not...) and I've about doubled sales from year 1 to year 2 - I'm entering year 3 now and while it's income, it's not all that passive. My patterns are 100% my own, drawn using CAD and that's the fastest part of the process. It's the description, listing, images, samples, etc. that take all the time and without all of that being of decent quality, you won't get the sales or the growth. I spend at least 5 hrs a week on building new products and another 1-2 hours answering questions, so my income minus fees is less per hour than I make at my day job - and if I marketed that as a side job (website build/support), the earning potential as a side gig is likely much greater. But I do now have about 50 stable listings that just keep renewing and I add a couple new per month - keeping it fresh, but I'd probably do better to cold-call some businesses to do small websites on the side. I've stuck with Etsy because I really enjoy the customer interaction - it's about 99% positive, and I genuinely like helping people.

I like the term 'digital income'. What I noticed when launched my digital products is the time spend in front of a computer was huge - creating not just the pdf files, but the marketing materials/mockups for the listings took huge chunks of my day for around a week. I vastly prefer standing up and working in my workshop over sitting in front of a computer. Also, my niche is saturated with stores that are purely digital. The pricepoint for these items is quite low, so I would have to sell in volume to make it worth it. What I've found is that my physical products sell through faster - so there is still value in having some digital products to 'stock the shelves' while I work on physical stock, but I don't see a future in having hundreds and hundreds of digital products - it's not just time and profit potential, its the fact that I don't want to lock myself in a room and do digital design work, it's just not my jam.

I agree - it has the potential to be passive income if you don't care about how much you make when, but really I consider it to be "scalable income" because I can step away from it, but then can come back and do some extra work to re-grow it.

I have a physical products shop and a POD shop. The POD shop I started last summer (2021) which is a slow period for my handmade items. So, I put time into creating designs for the POD shop. I was probably putting in about 20 hrs. a week and was cranking out listings up until around Thanksgiving I think and then hit a wall where I was struggling to come up with new ideas and so it sat there. It gets some traffic and a handful of sales here and there and I know that's because I'm not as active as I was. Sometimes I wonder if it's worth all the time. I haven't really touched it in about a year and I am making a resolution for next year to find a nice balance to work on both without getting burnout.

Etsy is not a crockpot 😂 that’s great 😂👍🏻

I have a pdf pattern shop, 2 months old. It's a LOT of computer time to start up. Expect your butt to hurt and your eyes to turn to cotton balls for literal months. My best advice is: make small attainable goals for traffic and sales, increase those goals incrementally.

My Etsy shop is for handknit decorative items. I have a few downloadable knitting patterns listed. I've recently added about 6 or 7 knitting/crochet related (my niche) printable items; gift tags for handmade items, a knitting project planner, knitting/crochet themed games. The patterns sell sporadically. I've had the other items listed for about 2 1/2 months and have only made one sale. I think that this may be because I stayed within my niche and didn't do what they suggest in terms of making variations of what is in demand in the moment.

Hi Kara, unrelated to this video but did you have a course on blogging?

Digital income is a much better description for these kind of shops. Thanks for the chat. I have 2 shops for digital projects. As a digital artist and graphic designer, I am able to make unique products. I make digital crafting paper and junk journal pages and they take forever! My other shop is for digital art prints which also is labor intensive. I like being active and busy with what I do and it is a part time gig, but I definantely have a work schedule. I also vendor my paintings and products in the summer in shows. So thanks again for saying it takes effort. 😋

I am a retired RN who now sells earring designs by PDF on Etsy. I'm still putting in quite a few hours a day but I'm doing it from my armchair instead of spending 12 hours on my feet. To me, that's "passive income". All joking aside, there's plenty of work that goes into any successful Etsy business. To think you can just set it up and sit back is ludicrous.

Thanks for telling us the truth about this occupation. I quit my job as a medical practitioner last 3 years after 10 years in the field. It was not a easy decision. But in life we all know one thing and that it is too short to dread going to work everyday. Friends I’m not asking you to resign your job, no amount of money can buy happiness you just got to be wise.😊
I found your channel, you’re awesome.

regular work - just hit 54,000 sales!

I call it semi-passive. There is a lot of work upfront. You have to put the work in, and it is NOT passive. Semi-passive is better IMO to explain digital and what I use with my audience. Even the semi-passive term, which is what I generally say, is more like.... moderate to medium passive. It's hard to explain. However, set it and forget it doesn't work. You have to keep up with trends and items, but also stand out and do something different. For digital, you are right, more listings = better odds but again -- LOTS OF WORK. A lot of people claim XXX money on Etsy.... but it's all BS for the most part or they got lucky with a viral item. That's my two cents. Your videos are always educational and to the point, and I appreciate that.

I'm an illustrator and do follow someone who sells on ETSY and teaches how to make an income off of digital designs. I feel she is a good business person and sincere; however as an illustrator one grapples with the concern that our work will be stolen and used by an unscrupulous buyer. I know you can set up an angel agreement for buyers to read. But before digital products were a thing, I remember illustrators who sold their products online were finding their images stolen and put on products that were sold on eBay. I have put a few digital products up, and only recently sold one. I like the idea of selling my paper doll products but have decided to take other images off, as I feel there'll be less chance of copyright infringement and I'd be able to offer something to someone who really would enjoy the product. I've purchased paper doll digital items off of ETSY myself.

I've discovered three shops since my joining that create the majority of their design goods in-house. Whatever they can't make they outsource to a third party. The one thing they don't do, is ship directly to customers from the third party.

All products come to them for inspection, sorting and storing. I've seen my fair share of 'helpful' videos that communicate the reality of working on the platforms they're discussing. The copy what others do suggestion has lead to lots of headaches for some artists I know as they are constantly filing DMCA's with sites to get their work removed.

I'm in the middle of a break right now for Etsy but do hope to get back into the swing things so (currently revamping). Love the transparency in all your videos.

Yep I got sucked into it because I was told it would be passive... however I ended up being okay with the discovery that it was not actually passive because I learned that I LIKE creating listings and managing my shop 😅

😂😂😂 loved your intro! I started POD in October. I never thought it would be passive and I wasn’t expecting getting rich over night, however i was expecting being found in search and that was a huge reality check and a downer. I love doing the designs and I have endless ideas, but at the end of the day that’s such a small portion of the work. It’s doing mock-ups, videos, listings,,etc. It take enormous amounts of time (before and after work) and not to mention taxes… taxes are a pain and when I calculated all the fees and taxes (sometimes even double tax😭), it turned out I had to bump my prices super high just to get 5 usd out of one product. I also had to remove all the sales and discounts Etsy pushes sellers into, because when I did the calculations I realized I would be selling with a loss. So, yeah… not the best business model if you come from where I’m coming from and you want to do things legally.

Just paid for Marmalead after being turned down yesterday for a huge order for a local travel football league. My husband and I talked if it’s time to just be a hobby or go all in. I told him I want all in on Etsy so here we go. I’ve got 80 sales, but here’s to getting to 100 by Christmas and then up from there. 😬😬 Thanks for all of your advice, Kara!

What's also risky is if the POD close their doors. Then you're screwed

I reworked my shop into a digital photo art shop. My first goal is to get at least 100 items listed in the next couple of months then really focus on promoting my shop while still listing new items. "Passive income" is a long game.

I also laugh at passive. It's not correct regarding POD. I spend hours daily with drawing. Inspiration requires my attention, doesn't just fall out of the sky. Keywords, reading the listing Completely to avoid my adult tees being listed with tumblers (oh yes, watch for that when your listing populates on etsy, ugh!). Price decisions, revisions, mockups, being clever in description... it's a merry go round of WTF am I doing this for?😉 So yes, it's about 8 to 9 hours a day and weekends. I would not be able to also handle physical product and a large $ outlay so POD is my choice. Started with two other platforms that were easier than etsy, but sellers were flooding the sites with multiple stores and there was no outside advertising there that worked for me. Pulled the plug on that, moved to old stomping grounds etsy. All this since March 2022. I'm determined to do something with my invested hours of art and what I have learned with POD. If it's passive, you aren't doing it right.

Passive income means you work your ass off 12-14 hours a day , work while others play, sleep 😂😂😂

Started my digital elopement/wedding/baby shop in March where I sell Canva templates. The first few months I was selling holiday dinner menus and putting in maybe 10 hours a week and earning 75$ a month. Now I’m putting in close to 30 hours each week designing products and optimizing my shop and am making about 800-1000 a month. It’s a slow process and not “passive” at all!!!

I have a couple of digital downloads in my shop and I considered them to be passive once I listed them and I create a pin for them on Pinterest. I have done nothing else and they keep selling every year. 😊

I've just started selling digital downloads - the work is massive, especially in the beginning. There is only one thing I like about all those copied products - they give a me hu-u-uge platform to stand out... :D
While I have always been aware that the so called passive income is not passive, I've never focused on the fact that it IS a misconception. Thank you for pointing it out. It is the same as the "work/life balance" - as if these two are oppsites... Can anyone have work without life? :D We can all get the idea, but the wording is way too wrong...

Cheers,
~ Maya

Started a digital shop on etsy 5 months ago and been working 8 to 12 hours a day to build it up. So happy with its growth and love what I am doing but digital is not passive, not if you want to offer customer service that reflects your desire to offer true value, then it takes so much time. I worker harder than I ever have but this time it's for me, so worth it.

What you said about the amount of time it takes to do the digital products being more than the amount of time it takes to do physical products hit home with me. I've had to learn how to resize images effectively so that customers will be able to print them out in the size they want. That takes much more time than just posting photos of a physical product.

Exsactly, Oh my god truth told in so few words!

I'm just getting started in POD while working full time and it is a lot of hard work. Working before and after the regular job to get it up & going. Eventually I want this to be my main job. Getting traffic when you already have no spare time to work on one more thing is hard. I really appreciate your honesty and telling it like it is.

"Etsy is not a crockpot!" 😄

Good video as usual. I think people who call it passive mean to say side hustle. At least that’s what I call what I’m doing on Etsy right now because I work full time and it was a way to bring in extra income and to see if I could even make it work in the long run. But it requires a ton of effort!

I would consider my eBay shop more passive as I don’t market it whatsoever, I don’t do keyword research and have the ability to copy similar listings. I only put some effort into descriptions and photos and let the items sit, I might have to fiddle with prices and my auction stuff seems to do well, but I just throw things up I no longer want and it’s been yielding much better results. I just started last month too, so it’s frustrating when I’ve put in a ton of effort into Etsy since last year and making my stuff, but little effort into this other place and I’m making some good money from it. I don’t know if it’s just the platforms or what.

I started it because Etsy wasn’t supplying me with the extra income I wanted and had things I no longer wanted. I know the economy is tough but when someone is willing to pay me 200 plus dollars for a stupid Pokémon card it makes it feel like I’m doing something wrong on Etsy 😔

Which is strange because Etsy is where I’ve gotten my first commissions from! In fact a repeat customer just reached out to me late last night asking for help with another project. It’s just hard to justify my efforts into new listings right now.

The only kind of income that I can think of that's really "passive" is if you happened to be lucky enough to either inherit or be given a dividend-paying stock. How many of us are that lucky? Just about everything else, even buying and holding dividend-paying stock, involves some kind of research and action. I think of my instant downloads as a "front-loaded investment" business model, because I have to put in the work of creating and listing it before I see a penny, and even the first several times it sells, it won't have paid me enough after fees to make that work worthwhile. It can take years for some items to start being truly profitable. By that time, maybe my memory of the work has faded enough that it ALMOST feels like "passive" income, but I always know it's not.

POD in Etsy is really hard work needed. I started in may 2021 and my first sale come in the middle of August. But after that... nothing till the end of 2021. At the beginning of 2022 I decided to transform my shop in digital designs shop and then I have some success. Now I have around 600 designs and the same sells approximately. So by my opinion Etsy is not good for POD, a lot better options is Redbubble, Amazon and Teespring. They do everything for you from shipping to customer service. In Etsy everything is your responsibility

This is a great video and 100% on point. We are starting a POD shop now and it has been about 3 weeks. I can say that it has been a hard grind. Early mornings before work and late nights after work researching, designing, listing. Nothing passive about it. All while getting very little, if any, traffic to the shop (I presume because we are new and it is a saturated market) We like the model because we love the design process and couldn't afford the printing equipment we would need to do it ourselves. We'll keep with it and give it an honest go, but again, 100% not passive.

Tesa's expression says it all

I so appreciate your practical, truthful advice! Thank you!

Yes, I've been saying 'passive income' isn't passive for ages! I watched a video by one of these so called passive income experts who was saying you need to make 200 designs a day and not go to bed until they are finished and uploaded. That doesn't sound very passive to me!!

Very spot on❣️It takes follow-up like any other business. Great to add these in if traveling or caregiving. I just refer to this digital option as “Virtual”. Thanks for talking about this topic. 😍

I agree with you 100%. Digital Income is more appropriate too. It takes a lot of work and time to come up with unique design. It took months before I got my 1st sale for my digital products. It is true that “ever green” is not forever.