How To Sell Print On Demand In WooCommerce

In recent years, the development of eCommerce has brought about a number of new business models, one of which is print on demand (POD).

There is a considerable increase in the number of people choosing print-on-demand to make money online and earn a lot.

In the article today, we’ll provide you with the ultimate guide on how to make money with print on demand WooCommerce. Please explore it right now!

If you are a newbie to print on demand business model, surely there are several questions in your mind. What is Print on Demand? How does it work? Please keep reading to know that.

What is Print on Demand?

Print on Demand works when your own designs are printed on white-label products such as T-shirts, custom hoodies, and mugs. They will be your branded products. The special thing here is that only when an order comes in, the product starts to be created. The print-on-demand company will be responsible for the fulfillment process, from storing, printing, and packaging to shipping the goods to your customers. You don’t need to worry about production, inventory management, and delivery.

Print on demand vs Dropshipping

Basically, there are many similarities between print-on-demand and dropshipping models. Even many people consider WooCommerce POD to be a type of dropshipping. That being said, they differ from each other on some points.

Inventory selection

Dropshipping offers you more options than print on demand. With dropshipping, you can sell any product that is highly profitable. But print on demand will limit your choices around customizable products like shirts, mugs, hats, bags, and towels. Let’s explore print-on-demand coffee mugs.

Personalization

When learning how to start a business with WooCommerce dropshipping, you will sell a variety of items available online. Customization seems a stranger to this model. In contrast, print on demand allows you to add customized elements like names or years.

Quickness

While print on demand requires your own designs, dropshipping doesn’t. You can choose any from available products to sell without taking time and effort to think about customization ideas.

Competitiveness: dropshipping will be more competitive than print on demand. It’s simply because so many dropshipping businesses sell the same exact items. Meanwhile, print on demand provides customers with highly-personalized products.

Here is the way the dropship model works:

Print on demand WooCommerce will work as the image below illustrates:

Why sell Print on Demand in WooCommerce

The print-on-demand model has a distinct fulfillment process. Therefore, to sell print-on-demand WooCommerce products, your will need special functionalities for your store. With remarkable features and add-ons, WooCommerce will make it easy to run a print-on-demand WooCommerce store.

Following are the reasons why we should sell print-on-demand WooCommerce products:

Free download

WooCommerce is a free plugin. You don’t need to pay any fee to use WooCommerce. However, WooCommerce only provides you with basic features. To improve your store, you will need to install some plugins and add-ons that require payment.

Easy setup

The installation of WooCommerce doesn’t require in-depth technical knowledge. You just follow a few simple steps to set up it and start selling different items in WooCommerce. With WooCommerce, it is also quite simple to learn how to create a print on demand website.

A large library of templates

With pre-made templates and other features, WooCommerce will help design the website quickly and easily. There will be a wide range of ideas and options to create uniqueness for the store.

Full customization and control

You can find dozens of WooCommerce themes, plugins, and add-ons out there. Each will help customize something in your store. With over 6,000 plugins available, they almost meet all the needs of store owners.

Product search

This smart feature allows users to search the products by name, type, quantity, and so on.

Fast and accurate calculation of total orders

The feature will minimize order calculation errors, making users feel more secure in ensuring revenue for the store.

Different payment methods

Common online payment methods such as PayPal, credit card, and cash are all used in WooCommerce. You can select the one that is the most convenient for you while selling WooCommerce products.

Order status track

It is so easy to connect your WooCommerce store to any fulfillment service. This can help store owners track the whole order fulfillment process. You can manage the order and know the existing status of the order, which helps avoid missing orders and causing loss of store revenue.

How To Sell Print On Demand In WooCommerce

1. Choose print on demand WooCommerce products

Different from other business models, POD only covers customizable products that can be printed.

When it comes to the best selling print on demand products, we can’t ignore T-shirts, the industry’s flagship product. Experiencing over a decade of innovation and development, it seems that the demand for custom T-shirts has never decreased. And the print-on-demand T-shirt market probably will continue to grow in the coming years.

For this reason, T-shirts are often the print on demand items that many new merchants want to start with. Nevertheless, apart from T-shirts, you can also think about other products that are also potential for growth while being less competitive. Below are some print on demand product ideas for you:

• Bags
• Hats
• Hoodies
• Mugs
• Notebooks and books
• Phone covers/phone cases
• Posters
• Stationery
• Stickers
• Towels

The best way to determine what to sell is by doing target audience research. Then, you will know what they like or need and how your products can meet your demand.

2. Find your niche

After determining the product type to sell, you need to find a niche for your POD store. Especially if you are a newbie to making money online, it is advisable not to invest in large markets. The reason is that you won’t be strong enough to win against your competitors who have enormous financial potential.

There are many different ways to find a niche for your POD store. Right now, we will list out the 3 popular ways that bring impressive results.

• Do a search on famous eCommerce sites like Amazon, AliExpress, eBay, and Walmart: When visiting these large sites, you will find different markets, sub-markets, and niches. All of them are arranged systematically. Then, you can find various categories quickly and easily. After that, you use Google Keyword Planner for niche research. It will help you find which niches are potential for your print-on-demand WooCommerce store.
• Find the niche based on your strength and passion: If you are knowledgeable about any area, you can turn your knowledge into business ideas. For example, if you have a passion for fitness, then you can think about offering unique, stylish T-shirt designs for gym lovers.
• Use a tool: This is how you use professional tools to find trending products in the market, and then you refer to other people’s designs. Merch Titans and ResearchBase by Talk on Demand are the two useful tools that can do that for you. The advantage of this way is that it helps you quickly find design ideas and know exactly if your design can sell or not.

If you are just a newbie to making money online, then it is advisable not to invest in it.

3. Create artwork for print

As mentioned above, print-on-demand products will only start to be printed when the orders come in. The items haven’t been customized as customers require. As a POD store owner, you will have to prepare artwork for printing. Artwork will be the key that decides whether your store can earn profits.

If you are creative enough to produce artwork yourself, that’s incredible! If not, you can hire a designer or refer to attractive designs from popular online marketplaces like Etsy. When you visit Etsy and enter your niche into the search bar, you will find numerous best-selling designs that are so eye-catching. Apart from Etsy, there are some ideal resources for you to visit, such as Pinterest, IndieMade, and Subreddits.

No matter which way you choose to create artwork, it is noted that you need to comply with copyrights and trademarks. If your designs are unique or you have invested significant time into creating them, it’s worth consulting experts to safeguard your work. For instance, seeking guidance from Heer Law can help ensure that your intellectual property is protected from potential infringement, giving you the peace of mind to continue innovating.

4. Build your POD store in WooCommerce

To sell print-on-demand WooCommerce products, people will select one of the two options, selling them on a marketplace or building an eCommerce store. Right in this article, we only tell about the latter, particularly, with the WooCommerce platform that offers necessary features for your print-on-demand store. To set up a store for print on demand, please follow the steps below:

Step 1: Buy a domain name, hosting & SSL certificate

Step 2: Set up WordPress

Step 3: Set up your WooCommerce store

Step 4: Download a fast WooCommerce theme for your niche

Step 5: Install WooCommerce plugins

Step 6: Select a WooCommerce print on demand plugin & integrate WooCommerce with it

Step 7: Upload POD products for selling

To get how to cover the steps from 1 to 5 in detail, please refer to Ultimate Guide on Starting an Online Store. About step 6 and step 7, please scroll down to see the next parts.

5. Choose the best print-on-demand company and site

If you want to sell print on demand for WooCommerce, you will need to have a partner to cooperate with. Your partner will be responsible for printing, order fulfillment, and shipping. All these tasks are very important, therefore, it is necessary to find a high-quality POD company.

Being highly compatible with many plugins, WooCommerce can be able to work well with most print-on-demand plugins. After installing one of these plugins, you will upload your designs to the site. Then, the company will put your artwork on blank products like T-shirts or hoodies. After that, they use digital printing technology to produce printed items for your customers. Just have your own designs and connect a print-on-demand site (company), then you can rest assured that your partner will cover the whole process.

When you choose POD companies for your store, it is advisable to think about the factors below:

• Diversity of products: Think about the types of products you want to customize and sell and make sure your print-on-demand company has them. This won’t be an issue for popular brands like mugs and T-shirts because almost all the companies offer these items. But if you’re selling specialty items, then you’ll need to select a suitable one for your product. In addition, you should consider this as soon as possible because when you want to develop your store, you also need to supply more products from the company.
• Printing services: not all companies offer all-over printing services. For T-shirts, some only cover the back and front. Therefore, carefully consider if the service selected matches your designs. Besides, it is important to learn more about their printing methods and equipment to be sure of the product quality.
• Return policies: You also should read their return policies to know how their companies deal with this problem.
• Commercial policies: Check the policy of the POD business you are considering. How long is their return & exchange period? When will you get your money back? How much will your business charge? These have a significant impact on your business, so choose a company with suitable policies. If you are a newbie, it is best to find a company that asks a flat amount for the actual costs of the orders.
• Quick delivery: Shipping speed considerably affects customers’ satisfaction. Then, don’t forget to consider this issue when finding a company to cooperate with. An ideal service should complete both printing and shipping in a maximum of one week.

You also can read some reviews on the service you want to choose. Then, you will have more confidence in your decisions. Here are some top names for you to refer to. They are Printful, Printify, CustomCat, CloudPrinter, and Printrove. They are all of the top quality with the ability to ensure print quality and quick delivery.

How to Connect WooCommerce with Printful

For example, you choose Printful Print on demand WooCommerce Integration as your fulfillment partner. Then, we will show you specific steps to connect your POD store with Printful, which allows you to upload artwork, create mockups, and set print on demand pricing.

Step 1: Create a Printful account

You first need a Printful account. Visit the website of Printful and select Start Selling. Then, the site will require you to enter your personal information.

After covering this section, you will have a Printful account for free. When you login to your Printful account, you will be taken to the Printful dashboard. Look at the Your Next Steps section. Follow all the steps shown here to be ready for selling products.

Step 2: Install the Printful plugin for your WooCommerce store

You need to cover this step to connect WooCommerce and Printful so that you can sync

In the WooCommerce dashboard, you go to Plugin > Add New.

Next, go to the search bar and search for Printful. Once the plugin appears, select Install Now. After having the Printful plugin for WooCommerce, you activate it.

To make the plugin work well with WooCommerce, you select WooCommerce > Settings > Advanced > Legacy API and tick the checkbox Enable The Legacy REST API. Then, click on Save changes to update this setting.

Step 3: Connect WooCommerce with your Printful account

After completing the WooCommerce settings, it’s time to connect the two systems. In the menu, choose the Printful tab and click on the Connect button.

A new window will display. Here you click on the Approve button.

After that, you will be redirected to the Printful website. Here you have two options: create a new Printful account or log in to the Printful account that you created before that.

Here we select Continue to finish the Printful WooCommerce integration.

6. Create your POD products

After going through the steps above, you start to add print-on-demand WooCommerce products for selling. In particular, you will upload your artwork to your partner’s site, then add the completed products to your WooCommerce store.

Step 1: Upload artwork to Printful

After being taken to the Printful dashboard, you go to the Stores section. The WooCommerce site you connected with Printful earlier will display here. Select Add Product.

Next, visit the product library to see printable items. Select the product you want to design for.

Once clicking on the product, you will come to the screen as below. Here you will choose the printing technique, colours, and sizes.

After adjusting these elements, you look right and click on Drop your design here to upload your design to Printful.

Step 2: Edit the design on Printful

When your design is uploaded to the site, you will see several editing options on the Design tab. Especially, you should pay more attention to the print quality shown by Printful. It is noted that your product will be only printed of good quality if the image has a “Good” status and the DPI is in green. In case the status is in red, you need to upload a higher-resolution image.

Moving to the Product tab, you will find the colour and sizing options. Printful offers order product samples. You should make an order to see how your item looks with this colour printing and check some sizes as well.

Besides, there are several tabs on the right, including Back, Outsite label, Inside label, Left sleeve, and Right Sleeve. You will upload your design to each if your product has the design for that part.

After finishing the artwork upload, click on Proceed to Mockups.

When coming to the mockups page, you will find lots of mockup images with various styles. Please choose one and click on Proceed to details to come to the next step.

Step 3: Add product details

Next, Printful brings you to the area where you will cover product details, including product title, description, size guide, product visibility, and product categories.

Step 4: Set up pricing

Now it’s time to price your product. The table offered by Printful will show the three columns, including Printful Price, Retail Price, and Profit. The first column of Printful Price is fixed while you can freely change the retail price. Based on this adjustment, Printful will help you calculate the profit you gain from each order.

Step 5: Sync between Printful and WooCommerce

Hit the Submit To Store button to sync your product from Printful to WooCommerce. As a result, your store will have all the product descriptions, pricing, and images uploaded on Printful before that.

To see if your product syncs, please go to the product list on Printful. Click on View in WooCommerce or Edit in WooCommerce to check the product in your store.

Now, move to your WooCommerce store. In the dashboard, you visit the Products tab, then you will find the Printful product in the list. From here, you can choose to view and edit the product.

You can edit any product details. But if you want to change the colour or replace the current design, then it is highly recommended to cover this task with Printful and sync the product to WooCommerce later.

7. Promote your print-on-demand WooCommerce store

You already have good-quality print-on-demand WooCommerce products, but it is not enough for you to earn profits from selling them. You will have to learn how to market print on demand products to get more and more leads.

Right now, we will introduce you to some effective ways to promote your POD store.

Run promotional campaigns

Promotional campaigns often bring great results for store owners. When selling in WooCommerce, you can consider offering discounts on new or inventory items. With each sales campaign, customers will pay more attention to your products, thereby attracting them to your store and boosting the shopping demand. If that is an effective campaign, it will bring about positive effects, helping to accelerate the number of items sold. That being said, it is necessary to do thorough research to choose the right products for sales.

Send emails and newsletters

Emails are an incredible tool for connecting sellers and buyers. As a smart seller, you should take advantage of email marketing to make your sales campaigns approach customers as quickly as possible. That being said, you should consider the number of emails to send. Too many emails sent may make people annoyed, which won’t bring beneficial effects.

Run ads

One of the most powerful strategies for sales optimization is to run ads. Effective advertising is the one that helps your products access a great number of potential customers. If you can create such advertising, it will considerably influence your print-on-demand WooCommerce store.

You can think of a form of video advertising that will help increase the visual impression of your product. Your video should be of appropriate length, around 30-45 seconds, which makes ensure customers watch from start to finish.

In conclusion,

The article has provided you with the ultimate guide on how to start a print-on-demand business with WooCommerce. Just follow our instructions, then you will easily start a print-on-demand business on the WooCommerce platform.

Is print on demand worth it? It is the question raised by many newbies. We can say for sure that it is worth trying in the coming time despite the fact that, of course, some niches will be competitive. Anyway, we hope that you will have the best overview of selling print-on-demand WooCommerce products as well as useful tips on gaining huge profits from this business model. After all, we wish you to run a successful POD business with WooCommerce.