What You Should Know Before Commiting to a Print on Demand Service

Print on demand sites for artists are becoming more popular and making it easier for artists to generate extra income. Are you interested in learning how to sell art prints with no upfront costs? In this post, I'm going to go through the Pros and Cons of this service, how to find the best POD site for your art business and some other options available to increase your sales baby!

Selling prints of your artwork can help you generate more income from one piece of art you created and figuring out how to get your artwork printed can feel a bit overwhelming at first. If interested I've included a link to selling art prints if you want more information on that. There are three options you will have if you are interested in selling prints of your artwork.

.: You can have a local printing service print your art in bulk.

.: You can make prints yourself at home gurl

.: You can use on-demand printing services.

Before we get started I want to mention the importance of taking high-quality images of your art for print-on-demand printing. If you're completely clueless about this I highly reccomend that you take some time to learn how to photograph your art. The quality of your images will not only help you sell your original art online, but it will also increase your sales, practice makes perfect.

Practice by taking images of your art every day and familiarize yourself and become an expert at photographing art. Photography is a definitely a skill you will not want to overlook.

Theres been a recent surge in print on demand companies that have become available for artists and is now a prominent business because of the demand. A Print on Demand site is a company that prints images or text per order. All you have to do is upload a high-res image of your art or photograph to a POD service and drive traffic to the listing. The amount of money you will make per print will depend on the print on demand site you are using. 

Straight up, you're not going to make as much money selling prints using print on demand as you will with a local printer, but there are no risks. The primary goal of these big print companies is to make money, and unfortunately, this can come at the expense of the artists. Because these sites are handling a lot of the duties, they, of course, are going to take a larger percentage of your profits.There are print on demand companies that only focus on fine art prints while other companies offer prints on merchandise like mugs, t-shirts and countless other items.

Here are some of the best print on demand sites that I have come across. My personal preference of these compainies os based on the actual quality of the products produced and the price.

• Printful
• AbsoluteArts.com
• DeviantART
• FineArtAmerica.com
• Society6
• Redbubble
• SaatchiArt

Become familiar with each site’s terms and conditions before committing and if you're going to choose another u familiar site not on this list, beware! Do not be fooled by some claims of having higher quality prints. Not everything you read on the internet is true! Do your research and check into the quality of their website and customer service department, too. Their site should be easy to browse and buy from. Sometimes it’s best not to take chances. You should even go as far as ordering one of your own printed products to judge the quality for yourself. Another downside with some websites is you don’t get to control your brand. Some companies market, package, and ship products with their logo attached to them, not yours. You miss the chance to tell the story behind your work, the chance to form an emotional connection with potential buyers

You should ask yerself some questions before committing to a service to make sure it's the right step to take as an artist. Such questions could be..

• How much will you make per print?
• When will you recieve payment?
• What thee quality of the merchandise is like?
• How much traffic does the site generate?
• Does the site have professional tools that will work for your goals? 
• Is the site easy to use?
• Does the site allow you to customize the look and feel of your store?
• Does the site offer analytics?

How To Be Successful Selling Prints

The number of sales you generate from selling prints will come from the amount of time you spend on marketing your art. Don't think that you can upload an image and then forget about it. You have to learn how to market your art and drive traffic to your print on demand site where people can make a purchase. Block off some time every week for marketing. If you are new to selling art, you will need to focus on the basics. Visit Sell Art Online Startup Plan to learn how to build a solid foundation for your art business. If you have not already done so, sign up for my free newsletter. I send out monthly articles to help you and your art business.

If you notice a particular print is selling well, you can decide on an alternative printing method so you can make more profit per sale.

Final Thoughts On Print on Demand Sites For Artists

Selling prints of your art is a great way for you to generate more money from a piece of art you have already created. Take some time to decide what will be the best solution for you, either purchasing prints in bulk, printing yourself or using a POD site. You might want to consider using a print on demand site and learn how to market your prints before you invest in a printer or purchasing prints in bulk.