Before getting down to the money part (which you are here for), I’d like to give some context.
I initially did not intend to write online, let alone sell my products.
But last year something sad happened.
I stopped getting regular work and my entire future flashed in front of my eyes.
I made exactly $0 for about 4 months in the latter half of 2022, and this made me realize how fragile making a living online is.
Seemed like freelancing was over for me, and I had to take up a job — but alas, moving out posed another issue (I’ll get into details someday later).
That’s when I remembered those generic quotes that went like …
- Build once, sell twice
- Earn while you sleep
- You will never be rich selling your time
And they made some sense. I was indeed not making any money selling my time.
I decided to not give up, because I didn’t have a backup career in case design failed.
I took some weeks off, and studied other designers who had various different streams of income and one thing was common among all of them — digital products.
Why Digital Products ?
There are numerous reasons why they’re (slightly) superior to traditional products …
- Almost $0 capital needed to build something
- Easier to scale, download it infinite times with no extra production costs
- Profit margins are almost always >85%
- Regular maintenance isn’t needed
- A designer’s target audience is generally other designers, who will use digital products more
- It can be a passive income source, while you focus on freelancing or job
It’s also better from a labor perspective as well — we often underestimate how much mental and physical effort it takes to make products in a factory.
Building a digital product pretty much removes all those so you can also focus on other things.
How I Bring Sales
I gave a good synopsis I believe, now onto my strategy to attract customers.
Since I’m a newbie and the biggest criterion for making millions selling anything online is reputation, I figured I had none.
Even you guys reading now don’t know me.
Thus I had to choose the path less taken — giving away freebies.
And who doesn’t love free stuff, huh ? basic human psychology.
This allowed me to build an email list that I can’t mail to (thanks Gumroad), get initial feedback from customers (mostly 5 stars) and gain more trust in my skills, that I can also add some value.
Selling is cool, but you also need to bring attention to your products somehow.
And that’s where my Medium & LinkedIn comes into play.
If you’ve noticed towards the end of all my articles, I attach a link to my products for people to visit and see if they find something useful.
I take a more lazier approach on LinkedIn, I’ll just directly post the download links there. I don’t find that platform much useful for growing an engaged audience.
One principle I stick by, through all this, is to never hard sell.
I don’t want to come off as a typical salesman, I just want people to take a look and buy something if they feel like it.
And for sparking that initial interest, I write about my process here.
With people being able to see how I build my products, I get them invested in the process and lead them to my Gumroad.
Very subtly!
$$$
Now the main thing, is how much I have made so far in the past 3 months.
It’s a whopping…..$15!!!
Did I disappoint ? sorry for that.
All my products are on a “pay what you want” mode, which means they are free, but you can pay me if you feel like it.
And honestly, I’m surprised I even made anything at all.
At the time of writing, this is what my sales breakdown looks like.
I also received my first payout of $11.25 this morning itself, which will allow me to buy 3 plates of biryani.
But the silver lining is, my sale conversion rate has improved compared to my first month.
I am also working on my first paid product, so the $$ might be around the corner if I play my cards right.
What This Taught Me
It’s harder than it seems, like really, you guys won’t believe how much mental energy it takes me to come up with something from ideation to putting it out.
But I’m glad people liked what I made and absolutely no one had any complaints with the final outputs.
I was sure people would rage their way into my inbox and make fun of me for creating something terrible, but the review section says otherwise.
Also I realized that I’m absolutely shit at marketing, my sales should’ve been 2x atleast if I marketed it correctly.
Now I want to create more, share my process and secure that bag!
Hi there 👋🏻 I’m Sharanya — a freelance UI/UX designer writing about design here.
Check my free digital products over on my Gumroad.
Sign up for my newsletter over here!
You can find me on Twitter, Dribbble & LinkedIn or reach out directly via email for freelance projects!
