Print On Demand For Beginners: How To Get Started In 2022
Looking to start a clothing business without any investment?
If so, then this article is definitely for you!
In this post, l will share with you some of the basic fundamentals about a business model called print on demand.
Not only that, but l will also walk you through step by step on how you can get started with this business model.
So read till the end if you're interested in learning more about this topic.
What You'll Learn:
Without wasting much time, let me jump straight into the meat of this blog post.
What Is Print On Demand?
In simple terms, Print On Demand is a business model whereby you come up with your own designs then you partner with an established manufacturer who is willing to manufacture and ship your products on your behalf.
Print on demand is a great business model since it requires little to no capital in order to get started.
The reason being that you don't need any inventory, printing equipment, employees, etc.
You just focus on creating designs then your supplier will do all the dirty work for you i.e. manufacturing and fulfilling your orders.
Thus, print on demand is a great business to consider if you have a passion of starting your own clothing brand but you don't have the much needed resources needed to establish your own manufacturing plant.
Print On Demand Products
• T-shirts
• Hoodies
• Hats
• Mugs
• Phone Cases
• Pillows
• Socks
• Stickers
• Posters
• Bags
How Much Does It Cost To Start A Print On Demand Business?
Basically, a print on demand business can be started with no investment upfront.
This is so because you don’t need any inventory or machinery to get started thus you can easily leverage the resources of other established companies like Printful, Teespring, Redbubble, etc.
If you're doing the free way, you might need to establish some social presence on various social platforms such as Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, etc.
This way, you will get some free organic traffic which is 100% free.
However, you should keep in mind that the free methods requires a lot of patience since organic traffic takes time i.e. months or even years.
For this reason, you might need to invest into paid ads so as to reach more people in the shortest time possible.
And the beauty part about paid ads is that they are highly scalable thus you can start to see great results in a matter of few weeks.
Although this does cost some money, it is a great strategy to get your products to as many people as possible.
Another thing to note about the numbers is that you have to pay your manufacturer a certain fee every time you get an order.
For example, let's say that you're using Printful for your t-shirt business, you have to pay $7.97 for every order that you get.
But the beauty part about print on demand is that you can easily determine your profit margins since you can charge any price above the base price.
The numbers differs from one manufacture to another since each print on demand site has its own fees.
Another thing to note is that some print on demand sites might require you to have a certain amount of money in your credit card in order for them to process your orders.
The reason being that some sites directly charge your credit card to cover for the item cost but you will get all the money which is paid by the customers on your store.
Either way, you will still be able to recover your money when a customer pays for the products so its not a big deal.
Now that we have clarified about the numbers, let’s dive into the core meat of this article i.e. How to get started with print on demand.
Steps To Setup & Run A Print On Demand Business
1. Choosing A Niche
Niche selection is very crucial and this will determine whether your business will succeed or not.
You should be very clear about ‘who' you want to serve since you cant serve everyone in the market.
Once you know your ideal niche, it will be much more easier to come up with ideas for your designs.
A good way to research about hot niches is to use Google Trends since this platform gives you data related to what people are looking for.
The beauty part about Google Trends is that it pulls data from Google's own database based on what people are actually searching for hence it is more reliable.
You can also use tools like Merch informer since there is a ton of tools out there which were designed to facilitate this process.
2. Create Your Print On Demand Store
Now that you know your niche, its now high time to create your print on demand store.
Using platforms like Shopify, you can easily create a stunning online store even without any prior experience.
You can find a ton of free YouTube tutorials on how to create a Shopify store thus you don't need to stress about figuring this process on your own.
But if you have some few extra bucks to spend, you can hire a professional developer to design your store for you since there is a ton of great developers on platforms such as Fiverr, who are more than willing to design the store for you.
Although this does cost some money, its a great option if you want to come up with a great looking store which is more advanced.
Whether you design the store by yourself or you hire a freelancer, the key is to come up with a niche store which is more appealing to your target customers.hcustomers.
3. Find A Print On Demand Provider
Now that you have your store setup, it is now high time to look for a print on demand provider who will manufacture and ship your products on your behalf.
When looking for a print on demand provider, you should take into account their product quality, shipping times, item cost, integration options etc.
You should find a provider which integrates with Shopify so as to make it easier for you to upload your products to your store.
Bear in mind that other providers might have lucrative item cost but then terrible shipping conditions or vice versa.
Or some might have bad product quality which might lead to high refunds since customers hates to pay for poor products.
With that being said, there’s a ton of print on demand sites which you can use nowadays and they all have different conditions.
But in my opinion, Printful is the best print on demand platform right now since it offers great quality products at cheaper prices, as well as favourable shipping terms.
Thus, l highly recommend you to check out this platform is you're looking for a more reliable print on demand provider.hprovider.
4. Create Or Outsource Your Designs
Ok, so you now have your store setup, you have found a reliable print on demand provider, what's next?
Its now high time to come up with the designs!
Using platforms like Canva, you can create stunning designs with little to no experience.
Canva comes with some premade templates which you can easily edit to come up with your own designs.
You can play around the templates and make some few twerks in order to come up with your own unique designs.
The key is to ensure that your designs have a transparent background and the right image pixel so that they can perfectly fit on your products.
However, if you don't like to make the designs by yourself, you can hire a freelancer on platforms such as Fiverr, Upwork, or any other freelancer sites.
But my favourite platforms when it comes to t-shirt designs is called 99 Designs.
This platforms has a ton of talented graphic designers from all over the world thus you can get nice designs on this platform.
The beauty part about this platform is that you can setup a contest in order to choose the ‘best' designer for your project.
All you need to do is to create your design specs, start the contest, then sit back and relax whilst you watch different designers submitting their samples.
You can choose designers based on their samples thus allowing you to work with the ‘best’ designer for your project.
This platform also offers a generous money back guarantee meaning that you can ask for a refund if you're not pleased with the final design that you get.
Thus, l highly recommend you to check out this platform if you want to come up with nice designs for your store.
5. Upload Your Designs
Ok, so let's assume that you now have your designs, what's next?
Its now time to upload your designs to your print on demand store.
The process of uploading designs to your store is easy and straight forward since it is just a matter of playing with drag and drop elements.
The key is to ensure that your designs are correctly positioned so that the final product looks great.
If you fail to correctly position your designs, the final product will just look awkward!
If you're not so sure about how your design will look like on the physical product, you can order some samples to clearly see for yourself.
This allows you to make some corrections when there is some errors on your design.
Remember l mentioned about integrating your Shopify store to Printful earlier in this post.
This allows you to simultaneously upload your designs on both Printful and Shopify store at once thus you wont need to do double work.
Pro Tip
If you want to maximise your conversions, you can utilise a tool called Placeit.
This tool allows you to upload your designs to ‘human templates' that are available on this platform.
Thus, your designs will look more real and appealing rather than just relying on static t-shirt images that are less appealing to the eye.
Your customers will be able to see how the final product will look like when it is on someone’s body.
Thus, you definitely need to check out this tool as well if you want to boost your conversions.
How To Promote Print On Demand Products?
You have created a nice store!
You have uploaded nice designs!
What's next?
Its now high time to start driving traffic to your store.
Without traffic, your store cease to exist!
Most people gets stuck when it comes to getting customers since most people always try to complicate this process.
But it should not be that hard in this modern day and age.
There are various free and paid methods which you can use to promote your print on demand products.
You can leverage popular marketplaces such as eBay and Etsy in order to get some free organic traffic to your products.
These platforms receives a ton of free organic traffic on a daily basis thus your products can get in front of more eyebrows without doing too much work.
The key is to optimise your listings for SEO so that they can rank higher on those marketplaces for specific search terms.
The beauty part about Printful is that it also integrates with all these big marketplaces thus you wont need to stress about listing your products.
You can easily list your products on eBay and Etsy right from your Printful account – Super Easy!
Another great strategy to promote your print on demand products is through social media.
You can create a page on Facebook or Instagram and you can start posting content related to your products.
The key is to build a following of people who know, like, and trust you hence allowing you to sell your products to them.
Although social media takes time, it is still a great strategy for the long term since it is 100% free.
However, you can choose to run paid ads if you have some extra bucks to spend.
Paid ads are a great way to get traffic ‘quicker' since they allow you to reach more people in less time.
The key is to learn how to run these ads effectively so that you wont waste your money on unprofitable campaigns.
Although they cost some money, paid ads can be a great way to get more traffic to your store in the shortest time possible.
Is Print On Demand Profitable?
Print on demand is profitable if you're selling high volumes items.
The reason being that the profit margins per single item are very limited i.e. less than $5 in most cases.
For this reason, you must focus on selling more products in order to get significant amounts of money.
Also, other print on demand manufacturers are willing to offer some exclusive discounts to people who receives large orders at once.
This helps to increase your profit margins since your cost of production will now be lower.
Pros Of Print On Demand
• Does not require huge initial capital
• No need for inventory
• Little to no overheads
• Easy to manage
Cons Of Print On Demand
• No control over product quality
• No control over shipping times
• Profit per item is very low thus you need to sell high volumes
Wrapping Up
I hope that you've gained some valuable information from this post.
I believe that you're now equipped with the basic knowledge which you need to know in order to get started with print on demand.
Most people reads information like this but they never take any action to implement these tips.
But l hope that you're not one of them!
Take action now and start your own print on demand business today.
You May Also Like:
Resources Mentioned:
Want To Test Your IQ?
