What are digital goods? In plain sight, it seems pretty straightforward. These are the types of goods you either buy or sell that lack tangible features. You cannot hold it with your bare hands. You can only see it and enjoy the services it provides.
Digital goods have gained popularity since the emergence of the internet. While it doesn’t replace physical goods, it’s still useful and provides the same level of satisfaction. And if you take a closer look, you’ll see that digital downloads carry many benefits that physical goods don’t have.
If you’re a budding online entrepreneur, you already know that you need a big business capital and expenditure to operate a business. To illustrate, if you want to sell clothes, you must rent a commercial space, buy stocks, hire manpower, and pay for pre-operating expenses. The list even goes longer as you move forwards with your business.
One of the best ways to earn online these days is to sell digital products. When you offer digital goods to a market, you virtually have an infinite inventory stock. Another great thing is that these products don’t perish, hence, you’re not at great financial risk.
If all these things spark your interest, consider selling digital products. Once you’re ready to embark on this entrepreneurial endeavor, you can create a successful business that can earn large sums of profit.
But before you get to that point, here’s a quick look at the basics of digital goods and how to sell them online:
What are Digital Goods?
As mentioned, digital goods are types of products that you can create and sell just like any form of merchandise. The main difference is it lacks tangible features.
Digital goods are a great collection to sell due to the reduced risk in running a business. You won’t have to worry about deadstock because you have a digital reservoir instead. You also won’t have to pull in thousands of money upfront.
Once you have digital products to sell, you can start distributing your products without much effort. No need to rent kiosks for promotional materials and such. Everything else takes place in the online realm.
Types of Digital Goods
If you want to start selling digital products, you must be familiar with their different types first. Digital goods have various classifications and formats. Each product is also unique and caters to a specific market niche. Take a look at the list below to know the different types of digital products.
• Subscription Website
Since the insurgence of the subscription economy, many businesses have started offering membership plans to their customers. Instead of selling individual digital goods, you may group and bind them to a monthly subscription to create recurring revenue.
• Images
Many website owners, including those into blogging or photography, need ways to showcase their content. They could turn their images into digital goods and sell them online. It’s not only a great avenue to sell digital products, it's also a great way to show your talent to the world.
• Online Courses
Similar to professional services, online courses are a type of digital goods that demand your time. Fortunately, you can always sell pre-recorded classes. You can upload your online courses to your education website for people to buy and enjoy. You can add in a course certificate to motivate them to finish the course.
• Professional Services
As we mentioned earlier, having digital goods is like having an infinite inventory. But there’s a unique exemption to that case. In terms of professional services, to sell digital products online means that you’re making your time available. But your time is only finite on a specified period. You can’t accommodate all your customers to meet their needs.
• Digital Magazines
Just like electronic books or e-books, digital magazines also have an electronic form. These digital goods can be sold as a monthly subscription or at any period depending on how often you release your magazines. A great product to sell is photography magazines since many people love looking at stunning photos.
• Music and Art
Physical music discs are now obsolete. Today, most music lovers go online to listen to music. The same goes for art where digital art forms are now sold depending on each client’s needs. Both these digital goods are popular across markets. If you want to find digital products to sell, art and music are a great place to start.
Why Should You Sell Digital Goods?
Still not convinced with the advantages of selling digital products? Here are more reasons why you should sell digital goods:
- Low cost - Compared to physical goods, digital goods are much cheaper to create, promote, distribute, and sell.
- Good profit margin - Due to low overhead costs, you can expect a great profit margin from selling digital goods.
- Full automation potential - You might not even need human labor in the future with digital goods.
- Flexible products to sell - You won’t be confined to only one type of product.
- Venture into e-learning - E-learning is the future of education. It’s a great industry to venture into.
How to Make Digital Goods?
If you’re curious about how to make different types of digital products, we got you covered. Here are the common steps in making digital goods that you can sell online:
1. Brainstorm Ideas
Brainstorming is the initial stage in venturing into business. If you want to sell digital products online, you must brainstorm ideas on digital goods first. You can create a mind map so that all your ideas can translate well.
If you're working with a team, make sure to take note of everyone's suggestions and insights. Keep a list of digital goods that you want to sell too.
2. Research Market Trends
You can't just start selling digital goods that no one wants to buy. You must research market trends to know if your digital goods are viable. Doing this also gives you an idea of how well your products will do upon release.
You can also investigate the demographic profile of your target market. With this, you'll know the type of digital products that will appeal to them. And if you can give what they want, you can get better sales.
3. Creating a Website
Finally, if you want to make your digital products available, you need a website. Just like a physical store, you also need a platform to sell digital goods.
Strikingly is a great website builder that can help you build an e-commerce store in a short amount of time. It has all the features you need to sell digital goods and gain more online visibility. Look at the steps below to find out how you can sell digital products on Strikingly:
Sell Digital Goods on Strikingly
Here are the general steps in creating an e-commerce website to sell your digital goods:
1. Choose an Online Store Template
Image taken from Strikingly product
Before you can start selling digital goods, select a template first. Strikingly offers a wide selection of templates that provide pre-build menu buttons and functions. All you have to do is change the design and add sections as you please.
As you can see in the image above, there is also an option for Strikingly to create membership payment plans. You can place this by adding a new section to your website. We’ll get to payment options in a later section.
2. Add a Simple Store
Image taken from Strikingly product
Next, add a simple store to your website. This simple store serves as the platform where you can sell digital products online. This is the section that your customers will see when they want to buy digital goods from you.
Just like any section in Strikingly, you can also edit this based on your preferences. Change the layout and background as you please. Feel free to experiment with various web designs as Strikingly offers many features to make that happen.
3. Connect Your Domain
Image taken from Strikingly product
You must connect your domain to your website. Take note that you won’t be able to sell digital products if you do not have a domain connected to your site.
If you don’t have a domain yet, you can register for one through Strikingly for only $24.95 every year. You get to choose among unique and available domain names for your site.
4. Upload Digital Goods
Image taken from Strikingly product
When uploading digital goods, don’t forget to select “Digital Download” as your product type. Then, proceed to complete all the necessary information required such as the product name, description, and price. Remember to add a great product image too.
Strikingly supports various formats when it comes to digital goods. Here’s a quick look at the supported formats in Strikingly:
- Document: .pdf, .doc, .docx, .xls, .xlsx, .ppt, .pptx, .odt, .odp, .epub, txt, key, numbers, wps
- Image: .jpg, .png, .gif
- Audio: .mp3, .mp4, .wav, .flac, .m4a
- Zip Files: .zip, .zipx, .7z, .rar
5. Add Payment Options
Image taken from Strikingly product
Finally, you must add payment options to your site. As you can see in the image above, you can enable Stripe, PayPal, and Square. To make sure you’re away from fraudulent transactions, only allow online payments for digital goods. It’s also more recommended since online payment options are more convenient for most customers.
You can also set your store’s currency based on your location. Once you’re done with the payment options, you can now start selling digital goods on your website!
After doing the steps listed above, the store for your digital goods will look cleaner and more comprehensive. Take a look at the pictures below to see samples of online stores for digital goods and services:
Image taken from Strikingly product
Image taken from Strikingly user website
Digital goods have opened doors for both customers and online entrepreneurs. These are flexible types of products that a wide range of markets can enjoy. Once you've dived into the specifics of digital goods, you can head onto Strikingly today. Make an account and start creating a website to sell digital goods.
