I love designing things, whether it is graphics online or magazine holders offline, over the years I have done lots of things. So I decided to try out Zazzle. I created some simple but funky patterns and also some text based graphics. Thankfully all but one were accepted.
I partly did it for the fun, but also thought it would be good for spreading the FreeStockImages.net brand name further around the web and hopefully bring in a bit of money too.
So you are probably reading this review to see if it is a good idea.
If you are doing it purely for the money I would stop right here. Leave this webpage and go elsewhere. Unless you can create tens of thousands of good designs you aren’t going to make good money. And realistically creating such a high volume of designs will take a long time, so the return on your time will be poor.
But if you are doing it for the fun, and also the aim of making a few extra quid over the long term then I would recommend it. Especially if you create your designs, and then not only upload to Zazzle, but also Cafepress and Spreadshirt. That way for not much more work you can reach a much higher number of potential customers.
Proof Of First Sale
Here’s my first sale. A whopping £0.07 I received for it. Notably because it was a gift card which the purchaser paid a couple of quid for.
Oddly you may notice the card was purchased near the end of February, yet it was a Valentines card. Very belated. But I’m happy they bought it.
I actually had put the most amount of effort into Spreadshirt, where I have a few more designs and total products, but the first sale has come on Zazzle. I can’t remember exactly when I uploaded my designs, but it was about 4 weeks ago, so I am pleased a sale has come in. And I only have something like 6 or 7 designs on there. I didn’t really expect anything so I was happy to get the email notification. At this time of course just making one sale doesn’t mean the site is better than its rivals, I would need more sales to be able to compare.
Ease Of Use
I found the Zazzle website overall not bad to use, took a bit of getting used to, but after a couple of hours on the site I felt very comfortable with it all. I don’t particularly like their product design process, I much prefer Spreadshirt which is a lot nicer to use. But I have managed to create my products so it’s no big issue.
If you’re here looking for a blanket answer of whether to use Zazzle or not then there isn’t one. It depends on how much time you’ve got, your skill level at coming up with designs and photos to go on t-shirts and other products, as well as your financial hopes.
As I said earlier if you are looking to make a lot of money go elsewhere. This is incredibly unlikely to make you rich. And if you want to get rich quick then you are really in the wrong place. Go and visit some dodgy forum to try and do that.
Create Appealing Original Designs
The people who will do best are those who can come up with original designs that will appeal to people. They don’t necessarily have to be beautiful, there are lots of simple slogan t-shirts that do well. And then it isn’t just a case of uploading a few and leaving it be, you need to be regularly working on it, for a good while.
Enjoy The Process
If you’re doing it for the fun like I was then you can’t lose. It is enjoyable, and if you make a bit of money from the royalties too then that is wicked.
The way to then really have the earnings take-off is if you have products that become popular and show up first in search results, and it becomes like a snowball. Keep uploading new designs regularly to appeal to a variety of tastes and at some point you may get a product which sells hundreds of copies.
I hope this review has helped.
