Wouldn’t you like to make money while you get a good night’s sleep?
I know I will!
For a full-time content creator and influencer, brand campaigns are never a guarantee of a stable income. That means finding as many sources of revenue as possible. Thankfully, the internet is your oyster, and you can tap into its power by selling digital products.
What are digital products?
Simply put, digital products are things you create digitally or electronically. They can be media files, swipe files, templates, resources, and designs, and we can go on and on and on! Once made, digital products don’t need to be touched, and they have an unlimited supply.
Why bother with selling digital products if you are getting brand deals?
- First is extra income. Passive income is the best income, no matter how big or small. So why would you not want more money if there’s a possibility?
- Second, you don’t need to worry about investing in manufacturing, maintaining a physical inventory, or bothering about logistics. Digital products have none of these costs involved.
- Third, there are no shipping costs involved either. Once a customer buys a digital product from you, they will receive the product instantly.
- Fourth, there are pretty much endless permutations and combinations you can try to see what sells and what doesn’t. There’s a lot of room to experiment with.
Easiest digital products an influencer can sell to make more moolah
1. Educational courses
Any influencer can create courses that teach the chops of your trade. If content creation is a side hustle, then you can create a course around your main job. Or if you are a full-time creator, sell courses around social media growth, management, and hacks. Sell your course to DYT and promote them among your followers to gain traction.
2. Sell eBooks
Similar to creating courses, you can write ebooks to share your knowledge. A travel influencer can write guides on how to manage your holidays or how to travel solo. A beauty influencer can create skincare guides or look books.
Honestly, there’s anything you can do, from guides to advice to personal memoirs. As long as you know there is an audience for it, eBooks, once made, can serve you for a long time. All that is left is to host it on a platform like Gumroad for a small price and watch it compound over time.
3. Sell stock photos
Photos are a great way to sell digital products. It’s much more than just uploading photos to Shutterstock or Pexels. Whatever goes on your social media, you can license it as a creator.
If you’re specifically into photography, then as an influencer you can sell your pictures directly to brands, websites, or blogs in need of them. The more niche you are, the more you can narrow down your client pool.
4. Sell stock videos
Like photos, videos are great digital products that sell like hotcakes. If you have a drone, there is a huge demand for stock drone footage. Or generic shots of people, animals, and abstract objects are also fine.
Digital marketing agencies and brands often purchase stock photos and videos from content creators rather than buying from stock websites like Shutterstock or Envato. High-quality videos will fetch higher fees.
5. PDF checklist
Checklists are kind of like eBooks, but smaller. Say you are a fitness blogger and have a website. With good copywriting and strategic placement of a CTA, you can sell a PDF checklist like “15 best exercises to tone your abs – a step-by-step guide.”
Since the reader on your website is looking for fitness ideas, a small purchase of this PDF might help them in their workout plan. Similar checklists can be made for all other niches as well.
6. Templates
Anything can be formulated into a template and sold. Share knowledge about time management, a daily journal, or a timesheet. Maybe you have a collection of the best email subject lines or the 10 best answers to personal questions in an interview.
7. Website design and art
As an artist and influencer, you can make graphic designs, sell comics, create custom portraits and caricatures, digital printables, and much, much more. Not everyone has the skill or the tools to make them, and that’s where you come in.
Host your products on your social media and make a payment page using Shopify. Or simply host your entire product catalog on an artist-centric marketplace like Etsy, Bonanza, or Indiemade.
8. Audio and music samples
Artistic content creators can dabble in music too. Create samples of music or unique sound templates. Or sell things like audiobooks, recorded lectures, ASMR sounds, relaxing sounds like rain and wind, etc.
And if you are actually a music person, you can upload music on apps like Spotify. Expect to get paid after you cross a few thousand streams, with payouts also varying on how many followers you have on the app.
9. Services
Lastly, you can sell your own services online as a product too. You will be commodifying your time and selling it in exchange for a pre-decided outcome. This doesn’t come under passive income since you’re actively going to be working on it.
Services may include being a virtual assistant, a consultant, a social media profile auditor, or a social media community manager. Not going to lie, these do sound like actual jobs. Hence, they take the bottom place in our list (not that there was any hierarchy to begin with).
Tips on selling digital products as an influencer
When selling digital products, there are some important things you need to keep in mind:
- Your goal should be to sell unique information that isn’t otherwise available on the internet for free. If it’s free, why would anyone even bother to buy it from you?
- In situations where your content has a free alternative, structure your product in a way that makes it easy for a person to choose you over the cluster of scattered information on the internet.
- Presentation is key. Spend as much time on design as you would on research. Remember, a bouquet only looks nice when presented beautifully.
At any point, if you feel overwhelmed and need help navigating the treacherous paths of influencer marketing, know that we are just a click away. We will help you do your thng, and make your influencer journey a tad bit easier!
