Print on demand is becoming one of the most profitable ecommerce business models right now! With low startup costs, high returns, and low production time, it is one of the most ideal business concepts to try out. If you have an existing store, it is very simple to start selling additional products like merchandise by integrating 3rd party print providers like Printify or Printful. However before you get started, it is important to learn some of the biggest mistakes to avoid to make sure your print on demand (POD) store is successful!
1. Avoid too many varieties - Only add a maximum of 5 color variations to your products. Giving customers a lot of options is usually a bad idea because of something called analysis paralysis. Basically when customers see a lot of different options they become overwhelmed and don’t know what to choose and ultimately choose nothing. From an analysis from Amazon Merch, they concluded that dark color shirts typically do better such as black, grey, and navy blue (black being their top selling color).
2. Check your print provider options before selling internationally - a common misconception people make is that when selling merchandise from your print provider like Printify, that Prinitfy is actually making it. However, this isn’t true! Instead print on demand services contract local 3rd party suppliers and manufacturers. These print providers will automate what print provider to make the buyers product from based on what country they are located in. If your country doesn’t have a production team then they cannot fulfill the order.
3. Make sure you have a credit card or money set aside before you start - When someone buys your product, technically you are paying for that product! This is a two transaction situation; so when a customer makes the purchase you receive the payment. You then have to pay your print provider to create and ship the product to your customer. Even though this is all done automatically you will need to keep a payment source on your print provider account or you cannot fulfill the order (credit cards are usually the best option for this).
4. Check if your written phrase are trademarked first and avoid copyrights - When it comes to find out if phrases are trademarked it is pretty easy to make a search for. Each country has their own trademark search engine. For the people here living in the United States, the website is www.uspto.gov/trademarks/search. To check if a phrase is trademarked all you have to do is type in the phrase and click search and see the results. If the phrase is not trademarked or the trademark has expired, then it is free to use! Keep in mind that each country needs to make a trademark for the respective phrase. So something might be trademarked her in the USA but might not be trademarked in a different country if you are intending to sell there.
Those were the first 4 mistakes that we see here at Covenant all the time. We like to share this knowledge because if we want to try to help people avoid the same mistakes we have already seen. We like to say that sometimes we have to go through things to help others avoid them! Stay tuned, we will be posting part 2 for the other remaining mistakes you should avoid if you are starting out in print on demand.
( Sources: merchinformer.com/pick-merch-amazon-t-shirt-display-color/, wholesaleted.com)
