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Ways To Selling Digital Products Online

Luke
sell digital goods online

This post will explain Selling Digital Products Online. Reeves and Sons Limited might receive a commission if you sign up for a service using one of the links on this page. Here are the results of our testing of the top 10 options, which we had chosen after weeks of research: For those looking to sell digital goods online, we still think Easy Digital Downloads (EDD) is the ideal tool. SendOwl and Gumroad, two companies that excel at online product sales, especially in the digital goods industry, are closely behind this. The ability to sell digital goods online is frequently required for edBlogs and online shops.

Ways To Selling Digital Products Online

In this article, you can know about Ways To Selling Digital Products Online here are the details below;

This necessitates a distinct software that is easier to use and flexible for providing links to clients along with download links for digital content. These digital products aren’t as tangible as physical products, therefore you’ll host them on your website and then notify the customer with a file.

Some frequently sold digital goods are, for instance:

The fact that EDD is still free (aside from any extensions and payment provider fees), that it can be integrated with virtually any website, that the reports provide accurate metrics for assessing the health of your store, and that the user interface makes things simple for both you and the user led to this decision (products show up clean on your site, and the customer receives an instant email with a link after they purchase your digital product).

The various digital selling options serve a variety of needs.

Some of them, like those that interface with existing websites, are more pre-built solutions where you must pay a monthly charge for a whole online store system.

While some plugins and pieces of software enable tangible objects, others do not

The potential to expand your site, sell on other platforms, and create your own website was one of the key characteristics we examined.

The potential to expand your site, sell on other platforms, and create your own website was one of the key characteristics we examined.

An Excellent Example: Sellfy is one of our suggested products.

It begs the question: Why not, given that it is neither our first nor second recommendation?

People who don’t want to expend a lot of effort on design are served by Sellfy.

It’s fantastic for new users who would rather invest their time in creating new products to sell than in site design.

Why You Should Trust Us

My job began in web design and marketing, but as it progressed, I began writing reviews, roundups, and tutorials for e-commerce platforms, giving me an inside look at the sector.

I had published and sold primarily digital goods online at that point (such as marketing webinars and instructional eBooks for freelance writers).

Because of this, I’ve tried out Shopify, Easy Digital Downloads, and WooCommerce as a result of my research.

However, that was primarily because I had integrated the store onto my blog after launching the blog around three years earlier. The majority of my digital book and video sales were made through a WordPress site.

I got my start in the industry by selling my own services and digital goods online, but Ecommerce Platforms has introduced me to a world where I always consider selling online.

For instance, over the course of two weeks, I painstakingly examined and analysed the leading online ecommerce systems in terms of factors like cost, payment gateways, themes, support, and marketing tools.

I am familiar with the nuances of payment processors and what merchants should look for in order to save costs.

In addition, I’ve developed the abilities to build more sophisticated online stores and marketplaces where thousands of vendors sell their wares.

In terms of ecommerce website design, payment gateway variety, app connections, customer support calibre, and shopping cart usability, the staff at Ecommerce Platforms and I have a tonne of experience.

We are fortunate to receive user input on all of our reviews because the Ecommerce Platforms website receives millions of visitors and comments each month.

As a result, a lot of opinions are formed in light of what other people have to say.

Last but not least, I’ve been known to put up thorough comparisons of websites for selling both tangible and digital goods, such as my list of the top 10 e-commerce websites ever.

When looking for a single platform, most consumers don’t want to spend the time, energy, or money required for these comparisons.

In order to give the information to my readers in formats that are simple to read, I have done the job and digested it.

Who Is This for?

At some point, everyone might be able to sell digital goods online.

The maintenance of a new home after purchase could be covered in a video training course created by a hardware store.

A magnificent eBook about web design may be created by a web design blogger and sold to programmers and designers worldwide.

A physical goods online retailer may discover that selling digital add-ons can increase their revenue (Like a clothing shop that sells style guides or videos for reselling your own clothes).

A magnificent eBook about web design may be created by a web design blogger and sold to programmers and designers worldwide.

A physical goods online retailer may discover that selling digital add-ons can increase their revenue (Like a clothing shop that sells style guides or videos for reselling your own clothes). When you’re trying to give away digital products, keep in mind that digital selling platforms can also help. Let’s use the fictitious clothes store as an illustration.

A autumn style guide might be more effective as a draw for customers to your store. Consequently, you are able to offer it away without charge whenever someone buys a shirt or pair of pants. You can distribute the files to consumers automatically using programmes like EDD and SendOwl without having to

A autumn style guide might be more effective as a draw for customers to your store. Consequently, you are able to offer it away without charge whenever someone buys a shirt or pair of pants. You may automatically send the files to consumers without charging them using programmes like EDD and SendOwl.

People who wish to smash a window every time they see a bill from their existing digital selling platform should also read this tutorial. The same holds true for people who believe their user interface to be overly challenging to utilise. Our suggestions take into account both user experience and price.

Because of this, EDD is far and away the best option with no cost at all, and SendOwl is best for users who want a monthly fee rate over a percentage or transaction fee.

This post serves as your resource for choosing the best product if you’re new to digital selling.

You’re better off keeping with what you have rather than going through a transition process if you already have a way to sell your digital goods and are happy with the design tools and the prices you pay.

How I chose and tested ways to sell digital goods online

We can now look at the top 10 tools for doing so after discussing the benefits of using a digital selling platform and who should use one:

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Digital Downloads That Are Simple

I evaluated each of the aforementioned instruments on an equal footing from the beginning. I started looking at the elements I believe are most crucial on a platform that aids in the sale of digital products because there was no bias against any of them.

Although these are the more prominent tools, I chose three must-have characteristics to begin reducing the options.

I also considered how user-friendly each platform’s features were, which led me to immediately rule out a couple for the top recommendation.

The following are the three requirements:

After examining the essential components, it’s time to assess which ones actually stand out in terms of optional features, marketing possibilities, and fun extras that enable the systems to function for virtually any website.

Since I would love to be able to expand my website at my discretion and it would be wonderful to have total control instead of being forced to use a platform with constrained design and capabilities, the following features are focused on flexibility and control.

The following elements are listed in order of significance, but overall I looked into each one, checked to see if the tool or feature was available on each platform, and then came to a conclusion as to which platform offers the most potential toolkit for all different kinds of digital online merchants.

Consequently, these are the additional features I looked at:

The ability to integrate with any website –

The number of merchants who can utilise a platform is greatly increased by the possibility to put a digital selling tool on any current website.

Those who already have websites that they would like to convert into online stores are hampered if they have to sign up for a brand-new account.

A store for add-ons or extensions –

The main goal of additional apps, which come in all forms and sizes, is to have an additional space to increase the strength of your online store.

You won’t be forced to use a website that doesn’t accept commissions or more complicated payment processors in this way.

You might want to sell some of your digital goods for free or incorporate MailChimp, for instance.

With the aid of extensions, apps, and add-ons, these activities are frequently made simple.

Advanced user capabilities (wishlists, saving a cart, making a profile) –

As we go through these capabilities, you’ll see how powerful an app store is because many of them can be added with the aid of an add-on.

However, your consumer shouldn’t have total control over their profile just because you’re creating a straightforward digital goods website.

Contrarily, it may be necessary for your customers to download their files in the future. Therefore, it’s crucial to offer a profile to which users may log in to locate their recently acquired files from earlier purchases. Bonuses include wish lists, cart adjustments, and other such features.

Can you identify which of your customers have recently visited your website and made purchases? If not, resolving complaints and target marketing will be difficult for you. Let’s imagine a customer approaches you to complain that they were overcharged for their transaction.

If you can’t go back and check how much they spent, you’re essentially compelled to pay them back without your awareness. More significantly, knowing who your target market is will help you shape your future marketing and sales strategy. Discount codes and promotions – In the world of online shopping, discounts come in many different forms.

It’s not too different with digital selling.

You’ll probably want to advertise specials all year long, but especially around the holidays.

Discounts are crucial for generating revenue without going into the red because you’ve likely already paid for all the costs associated with a digital product during the creation process.

Discounts with set terms, limitations on the number of discounts one person may use, digital discount codes that must be entered, and timed promotions that end after a set period of time are a few examples of promotional tools.

Advanced reporting – Reports improve your understanding of how your store is performing, but they also need to be clear and easy to understand.

When evaluating alternative platforms, I use Easy Digital Downloads as the standard because they provide my favourite statistics and metrics.

Your total earnings according to the period range and categories are among the things to search for.

Additionally, you want filters on your tax forms, exportable data, and download and sales graphs.

Access to an API is extremely important for some consumers.

Others won’t give it a second thought, though.

Although I didn’t give an available API much consideration, I now recognise that more knowledgeable consumers will at least be aware of the alternatives available for merging and creating external apps.

API access: Keeping downloads under your control discourages theft and sharing and encourages customers to return to your store for fresh digital downloads.

In general, file access control enables you to set download limitations and expiration dates for paid-for files to prevent duplicate downloads and sharing among users.

The file access control essentially guards against unwanted access to your digital files.

Marketing tools (such as affiliate programmes and email marketing) –

For filling up the gaps with marketing tools, you can typically locate apps online (like adding MailChimp to your website).

The majority of individuals would concur, however, that integrated marketing choices simplify life for those running an online business.

For instance, a viable marketing strategy includes a store on your Facebook page and social media sharing buttons.

Calculators for Shipping and Taxes – Since consumers have been known to leave carts if you neglect to disclose shipping or tax prices early in the checkout process, calculators help you and the customer build trust.

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Variable product possibilities – When selling physical goods, the majority of merchants solely consider product variants.

Digital goods might, however, come in a few different varieties.

Your online video training programme, for instance, might come in a variety of packages.

If so, you can use product variables to implement rapid dropdowns and selection.

Sell Subscriptions and Memberships – Memberships and subscriptions collect recurring payments.

In this area, not every digital selling platform is made equal.

In fact, several of the solutions are best suited if you run a subscription or membership website.

This also applies to content dripping, or the gradual dissemination of your content to subscribers.

In an online course, for instance, you might not want to provide all of the course material right away.

As a result, until each section is finished, people only receive a portion of the course material through the content drip.

Our pick for selling Digital Goods: Easy Digital Downloads

Easy Digital Downloads stood up as the best option after weighing each of the aforementioned features. However, EDD offers the best features, the clearest frontend interface, a bevy of fascinating capabilities, and can be used by virtually any type of business to sell digital material. That’s not to suggest that other solutions aren’t beneficial in certain circumstances.

Another consideration that should be considered is the cost, which is another factor in our decision to use EDD. I view it like this: Webmasters frequently wind up spending money on the add-ons, many of which are essentially necessary for a full-fledged ecommerce business, even though EDD can be downloaded for free.

For instance, MailChimp costs $29 whereas the Stripe Payment Gateway costs $49. Overall, spending money is not necessary for the simple sale of digital goods. In actuality, the majority of basic stores will just wind up spending money on hosting and getting WordPress and EDD installed gratis.

However, bear in mind that depending on how sophisticated you want to create your site, more charges could materialise.

Read on to see how EDD fared with each of my more salient features:

The only people who can download the files via EDD are the people who purchased them because file access restriction is turned on by default.

To avoid an absurdly high number of downloads from one user, you can also set a file download cap.

Marketing tools (like email marketing and affiliates) – An extension is needed to connect your preferred email marketing solution.

You essentially have one option when it comes to affiliates: Affiliate WP.

This works right out of the box, but if you’d like not to pay a charge, you may also test out some other affiliate WordPress plugins.

Calculators for shipping and Taxes – The Simple Shipping addon facilitates the shipping of smaller, more basic parcels, but I anticipate that you’ll primarily be selling digital goods that don’t require shipping.

The key extension for this is the Variable Pricing Switcher, which handles variable product options and prices.

According to my investigation, the product doesn’t come with a fix.

Sell Subscriptions and Memberships – It took me a moment to discover that EDD has the ability to sell memberships and subscriptions, but I was able to find it under the extensions.

Recurring Payments must therefore be paid for, as well as maybe the Restrict Content Pro Member Discounts addon.

If you’re considering hiding some of your information (like a video course) but simultaneously taking monthly or weekly payments, I’d advise merging the two.

The Runner-up: SendOwl

Since you don’t need to be familiar with WordPress, SendOwl is a more straightforward solution that nevertheless offers effective tools for promoting and selling your digital goods online. Actually, the fact that SendOwl is a solution for absolute beginners is the main reason I like it.

What prevented SendOwl from taking the top rank (along with some of its benefits)? One of the key distinctions between SendOwl and its rivals is its ability to integrate with any website.

The ability to integrate with any website – You can either have an existing website or build a new one because SendOwl functions on the majority of websites. You might wish to use it on a WordPress or Shopify website, for instance.

You shouldn’t have any issues with the majority of content management systems or e-commerce platforms since it mostly involves installing a little amount of code.

A store for add-ons or extensions – SendOwl does not have an app store, but it appears that the firm is making an effort to integrate the majority of the required capabilities inside the platform itself.

Advanced user capabilities (wishlists, saving a cart, profile) –

SendOwl provides opportunities for customers to save carts and return to the checkout along with a gorgeous responsive checkout. I was a little perplexed because I couldn’t locate a shopping cart symbol with a product count because it’s generally managed without the user being aware of it. Although there isn’t actually a wishlist, if you add two items to the cart, they will both be there when you check out.

Simple and intuitive customer management – Compared to EDD, customer management is a little more diluted, but you still get to keep track of the customers you sell to. Also check LocalCryptos Reviews

When you instal the membership feature, the real customer management begins. Discount codes and promotions – You can go in there and track which of the codes are performing well. The discount codes may be restricted to a particular time frame, product, or amount paid. My favourite feature is that, based on how customers shop, the discount coupons may be utilised to target certain people or groups of people.

Advanced reporting – Other than the fact that it provides you with the necessary numbers, there isn’t much to say about the reporting. You can test which products sell and which do not thanks to the sophisticated reports. A few metrics are also provided for your affiliate programme. API Access – All developers have access to the API, which they can use to integrate with various systems and possibly strengthen your company’s backend.

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File access control- Control is an area in which SendOwl excels. There are many different file access techniques, from download limits to membership and subscription-based content limitations. Marketing tools (like email marketing and affiliates) – There is no need to look for a plugin because the affiliate programme is built-in.

Your main goal is to discover new affiliates as SendOwl handles all of the administrative duties, reporting, and commissions. You can also integrate with programmes like MailChimp, oh yeah. Calculators for shipping and Taxes – Physical objects are permitted, however there aren’t many shipping choices available.

For the purpose of automatically calculating taxes for the consumer, a tax calculator is offered. Variable product options and prices – Costs are managed through unique checkout fields. In essence, you may provide a new field that inquires about the preferred product version.

Sell Subscriptions and Memberships – SendOwl includes drip capability that allows you to share some of your content for free and give a little bit more when individuals pay or advance through a programme, in addition to impressive subscriptions and memberships. As a person progresses through a training programme, for instance, you might wish to give further courses.

The Top Pick

In terms of starting up and scaling up after you’ve made progress with your store, we’ve found that Easy Digital Downloads is the most helpful.

Our Pick for Simplicity and people who Don’t Want/Like WordPress

SendOwl contains the majority of the necessary capabilities, although some are missing, such as shipping calculators and more potent variable product controls. But if a business misses EDD because it doesn’t have a WordPress site or the new webmaster doesn’t like WordPress, I would still advise it.

Without having to use WordPress, E-Junkie is another good option for creating a digital store on your website.

The backend interface doesn’t appeal to me much (it is archaic and clumsy), but the pricing is reasonable and you gain access to tools for subscriptions, marketing, and much more.

Our pick for Creatives Like Artists and writers

The concept behind Gumroad is that artists and writers should spend more time creating new works of literature and visual art. Remember that Gumroad will charge you per product sold because it handles the majority of the work for you. The monthly cost is $10, but you also have to pay 3.5% plus 30 cents per sale after that. Very’s a sizable chunk, particularly if your things aren’t that expensive.

However, the main objective is to support people who don’t want to invest much time in planning and marketing. In contrast to Gumroad, Sellfy operates more like an online market similar to Etsy. So you build a website using Sellfy (it’s ridiculously simple), but you lose control because all the pages have the same logo.

(Update: The Sellfy team now provides a WYSIWYG editor for store customization. Now, customers can revamp their storefronts to reflect their current brands.

When you choose the Prop and Pro Plus plans, the transaction fees go down from the initial high starting point of 5% for the basic plan.

If you would want to pay $99 each month, you can set up 0% transaction fees.

Our Pick for No Transaction Fee

The Pulley solution is exceptional in terms of cost and cost savings from transaction fees. It’s a straightforward choice for artists of all sizes and shapes, and there are no transaction costs to pay aside from what PayPal charges. The plans begin at $6 monthly (selling 25 products).

Although the backend tools are less robust than those of Sellfy and Gumroad, there are situations when that is all you want. For instance, you continue to receive features like social media selling buttons, automated delivery, download history, customisable emails, and a BigCartel integration.

Our pick for those with lots of Physical Products to sell

A store that sells both physical and digital goods will occasionally exist. You can choose EDD or SendOwl for the majority of smaller stores. WooCommerce (or Shopify with the Digital Downloads App) offers superior support if you intend to provide a larger assortment of physical goods in addition to your digital offerings.

Both of these platforms are generally used for physical products, making them both better suited for swiftly launching a site with shipping tools and physical product versions.

For instance, Shopify offers hundreds of templates from which you can pick, after which you can connect a payment gateway, modify your settings, and begin selling your actual goods. The Digital Downloads software can then be installed, allowing you to sell whatever digital goods you want. A website selling both tangible and digital works of art is visible in the snapshot. Also check Qualys Alternatives

Our pick for selling on Multiple store

Transaction fees are not charged by DPD either. That’s a big plus, then. The unique dashboard for each stores, however, is the main feature. As a result, everything is managed on a single DPD dashboard whether you want to have a music selling website as well as sell a few eBooks on another website.

Starting at $10 per month, the pricing looks reasonable, and you get access to several useful capabilities including support for physical products, built-in shipping and tax calculations, API compatibility, multilingual checkout, and an upsell function.

Beautifully managed subscriptions are supported, and PDF stamping is supported to stop anyone from distributing your work. Oh, and DPD is compatible with pretty about any platform you can think of. They provide product widgets and buttons that can be customised. Although this is typically simple to accomplish, I can see that some creative business owners would prefer to spend as little time as possible coding.

One of those is FetchApp, which forgoes transaction fees in favour of offering you a variety of pricing plans for greater flexibility as your store expands. The cheapest plan, for instance, is totally free but only gives you access to 5MB of storage capacity. Smaller stores could find this to be perfect, but many will want to go beyond that.

Each month, they provide plans for $5, $10, $20, $30, $50, $100, $150, $200, $300, and $500. A little bit extra storage space becomes available each time you upgrade a plan.

So long as the items don’t take up too much storage, you can have all the products you want and use all the features without having to pay more.

Some final Thoughts and Things to Remember

You can see that it’s a little more complicated than one might think to decide how to sell digital goods online. Check out Easy Digital Downloads first, that’s my main piece of advice. It may be downloaded for free and functions well on a free WordPress website. I also appreciate recommending services like FetchApp that have free plans. Although you won’t typically obtain the comprehensive feature set seen in EDD or SendOwl, you will at least be able to save some money while experimenting.

The lesson of the tale is that you can use multiple channels to sell digital goods online in any specialised market. I would develop a list of the characteristics that are most important to you and go over the list we discussed previously. By doing this, you can realise that you’d want to forgo WordPress and do away with EDD.

Or perhaps you don’t want to sell any actual goods (making Shopify and WooCommerce a little too complex to mess with.)

I wish you the best of fortune with your online digital goods sales. Digital items typically cost more time than money to manufacture, but it can be a pretty satisfying process.

As a result, you may concentrate more on creating new products rather than worrying about how much goods would cost.

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