Digital products that sell to begin a profitable side hustle to make money
You’ve heard digital products that sell are a great way to begin a profitable side hustle to make money but don’t know how to start. In this blog, you’ll achieve total clarity to start today! Discover:
How to create digital products that sell: 7 steps to transform your results!
What digital products to sell: 82 digital products that sell.
What digital products are in demand? How to offer what your customers want and be ahead of trends
Where to sell digital products that sell (with or without a website)
Where to promote digital products for passive income while you sleep (my worst kept secret! 😂)
Full disclosure: This post contains affiliate links that, at no additional cost to you, I may earn a small commission from.
I get it. There are many blogs out there that are no more than pure lists of digital products. So many options, so many lists of potential digital products that sell, and so many decisions to make.
You feel lost.
You want to make more money, but it isn't always straight forward to figure out how to do that and where to start…
I’m here to give you far more than a list of digital products that sell, all explained!
Plus, speed up your learning process and results and discover how I started learning how to make money with digital products and now I make $$$$$! Watch my fav FREE workshop from Louise Henry, my mentor and friend!
Get ready to get the 7 steps to be successful with your digital product, to go from just imagining what to sell to converting them into digital products that sell for you!
With my favourite tool for trends, you will also understand how to anticipate what customers want.
Especially, when you’re busy with work and other personal commitments, you want to know exactly how to begin a profitable side hustle (or an online business) with digital products to make money without wasting time on strategies that won’t work or getting overwhelmed.
You’re in the right place, my friend!
Don’t forget to pin this image!
Digital products are the digital version of traditional physical goods such as books and CDs. But digital products have several advantages over their physical counterparts.
Digital products remove the significant risk associated with holding stock.
With physical products, typically, you need to produce or order the product you will sell in advance.
It requires, in many cases, considerable out-front investment.
You could lose your stock investment if your physical product doesn’t sell. With digital products, you eliminate stock risks. Yay!
Digital products can be created faster and more efficiently than physical goods because they don’t require materials or packing for shipping.
Digital products often cost less to produce, thus allowing digital product creators to charge lower prices and still make a profit.
Digital products can be sold again and again without ever having to replenish inventory, which means digital product creators can make passive income while you sleep!
Digital products that sell are the perfect way for you to supplement your income or even launch a full-time business!
Yes, digital products can be very profitable!
The key is to choose digital products that sell, meaning that they are in demand, and create digital products that provide real value.
Usually, your most significant investment in digital products is your own time. The time involved in researching, launching and marketing, creating and managing your digital products that sell.
Many wrongly believe that the most significant time goes into creating your digital products; however, to truly achieve digital products that sell, your most considerable effort will be marketing them.
More about this later! I have a pro tip recommendation to make this easier and quicker to get results! (Shhhhhh… 🤫 It’s Pinterest!)
Why would anyone choose to sell physical products if digital products are so great?
Physical products still have a place in the digital product space. Many digital product creators supplement their offerings with physical versions of digital products (such as printed versions of ebooks).
Furthermore, many digital product creators use physical goods such as t-shirts or notebooks to increase their digital product offerings. This helps digital product creators build a brand and a following for their digital products.
It is also essential to consider that digital products are often available in more places than physical goods, such as e-commerce sites, app stores, digital marketplaces and more.
Overall, digital products that sell have many advantages over physical products, and digital product creators should take full advantage of them!
Digital products that sell can be an incredible way to make money passively. What does “passively” mean?
By creating digital products that sell, digital product creators can make money on their own schedule without having to do the work every time it’s sold.
That’s what passive income is. It’s income you don’t have to work for every time it’s earned. And digital products that sell are a great way to achieve passive income!
So, if you’re looking for your side hustle to make money, digital products could be the perfect option.
The key to digital product success is creating digital products that are of value and in demand. When digital product creators design digital products that people need, they will be well on creating digital products that sell.
Ok, I know. That makes sense, but how do you achieve that?
Time to keep on reading, my friend. You’ll find the answer to this and much more in this blog.
And, if you want to shortcut the process and learn the exact formula I use to make $$$$$ online, here is a very special offer for you. I can not recommend more highly. It will help you create passive income in the simplest way possible! Yeah!
Now that you know the why of digital products, it’s time to get into the how. Creating digital products can be daunting, but with proper preparation, tools and guidance, it will be so fulfilling and fun!
To create digital products that sell like the pros, you’ll follow 7 essential steps.
And, if your mind is already trying to think what product to create, wait a sec!
The most common mistake people make when starting with digital products is to rush into creating the product they want to sell.
Wrong. That’s a recipe for disaster. I’m all up for action. The right action at the right time.
So I know you feel passionate about bringing to the world that idea you have.
Or maybe you yet don’t know what it will be, and you think you need a list of digital products that sell to choose from, and you will get it done in no time.
I totally understand your motivation and the need for that extra revenue boost with digital products that sell. It’s commendable, and I need you to keep that energy throughout!
Let me show you the right way to approach success. Because you not only want to launch a digital product, you want digital products that sell.
Please, don’t skip this.
After all the effort and time of creating them, many people who fail to meet their digital products’ revenue goals will convince themselves that it was a pricing issue.
In fact, 9 out of 10 times, they didn’t research their market enough to give themselves a chance of success with digital products that sell!
Once you've got a rough idea of what to sell, spend some time doing the following:
Look up competitors: what do they sell, where do they sell, what’s the price, who do they target, what benefits do they highlight, what terms and packages... What are people doing versus gaps in the market?
Search up your target customers.
The best of all research possible is to talk to people who are ideal customers and understand their needs, their desires, and their struggles.
Note their language (you’ll use it in your marketing material!).
If you can’t talk to people, join groups or online places where they hang around and note the questions, complaints, struggles and dreams they have. These can be Facebook groups.
Analyze what you find on Pinterest or YouTube for more insights.
Summarise all you discover and make a note of gaps: is there something that you see is needed that is not being sold.
If you don’t identify a gap, is there a twist you can give to your future digital products that will make them attractive (it can be you, the way you sell it, or your free content...)
Perfect! Your research has put you in the strongest position possible! You’ve made far more progress than you think at this stage.
Time to make some decisions and plan your launch.
Decide the following:
What digital product are you going to create?
How will you be creating it?
How much will you be selling it for?
Where will you be offering it?
When do you want to launch it?
Where will you do your marketing?
Is there anything you need to make it happen: training, investment, tools, or help from others?…
Ah!!!! I hear you saying… “What is Asana?”
Asana is a project management tool, FREE, that will transform your results for your side hustle or as a solopreneur or small business owner.
It will keep you on track and remove the overwhelm. Nice!
Here is my blog about it. Don’t miss it!
Do you want to know how a 6-figure entrepreneur organises her business? I have the FREE workshop for you. I’m so thrilled to give you instant acces to Louise’s Henry FREE workshop here. Get ready to transform your days and results!
It’s time to create your sales and marketing assets.
You’ll get better at this as you go, so don’t try to do too much or too perfect. Here is what I recommend.
I’m sure you’re surprised of 2 things:
I’m suggesting you create your sales and marketing assets even before you’re digital products are ready to sell! What????
I haven’t mentioned social media?! Yeah, Pinterest is NOT a social media platform.
Creating your sales and marketing assets (graphics, content to tease the digital products before launch, sales page) will force you to think about what makes them really special from your customers perspective.
And that will help you think in the right way when you create your digital products.
If you can’t write your sales & marketing materials because you can spell out the benefits, the transformation, the feelings that your digital products will create… you need to go back to your research phase and find out!
Oh yes!
It might feel like you’re wasting time. You are not.
Once you have these answers, this piece, about sales and marketing assets become a much easier task! Yes, even without having the digital products done yet.
Trust this process. It’s your process to digital products that sell!
Secondly, social media isn’t definitely the best place to grow your audience and find leads that convert.
Pinterest has the highest buying intent when compared to social media! So make it easy for you!
I hear you saying... help I know nothing about Pinterest!
I’m here to help.
Check out my FREE Pinterest workshop to learn how to Grow Your Leads On Autopilot With The Power Of Pinterest Without The Social Media Burnout .
If you want to take your prep for launching one step up, here is another pro tip. Careful, this is not for everyone right at the beginning.
It is always best not to get overwhelmed.
If creating a freebie feels too much, leave it to later. But please don’t forget that having your email list is ESSENTIAL as you progress.
Plan to up-skill to build your email list with the SPI email marketing online course: Email Marketing Magic.
Here comes another pro tip!
Remember what I said about researching customers’ language? Here is the perfect opportunity to use it!
Write copy for sales pages, freebies and newsletters with words that your customers use when talking about their struggles.
And please note I haven’t mentioned creating your own website, blog, or YouTube channel. Give yourself grace, and don’t try to get all this done at once! You can do all of this with time.
The same goes for tools. Your phone is more than adequate for photos and videos in most cases.
Good luck in your digital product journey – with a bit of research and effort, you can make digital products that sell like hotcakes in no time!
Are you ready to be shocked?
The absolute #1 strategy that helped successfully sell my online course was launching it before I created it!!! Yes, you’ve read correctly.
So this may not be possible for all the digital products that sell, but hear me out.
There is nothing like offering your future product to your email list (or several people if you haven’t got an email list yet) and being open about the fact that it isn’t available. You commit to making it a reality within a given timeframe and start making money now.
Here is another one!
Here is my #1 advice! Don’t try to work it all out by yourself. ensure you get results in the simplest way possible by learning how to do it.
I’m thrilled to give you FREE access to phenomenal workshop from the person I learned it all whne it comes to online launching, Louise Henry. Don’t it it, it makes a huuuuuuuge difference!
All digital products that sell should be of excellent quality and well-designed... but it doesn’t mean they need to be perfect!
Be prepared to spend some time creating your digital product. This can be anything from online courses, ebooks or digital assets such as digital prints or digital planners. You’ll need to think about the content you’re creating, how it will be presented, how long it will take to create, the customer experience you want to provide.
Make sure that you’re creating high-value digital products, and make sure they meet the needs of your customer base. This is where your research comes in super handy!
I can’t insist more on the above point.
If you’re a perfectionist like me, you’ll naturally want to make digital products that sell with the best design and content possible. But please note: it’s not necessary!
Get out there and start creating digital products that make you money online.
Now, to achieve digital products that sell, you need to have them for sale somewhere!
When you did your planning, you decided where to sell them.
It can be on your own website shop, but you can start without needing a website and list your products on online marketplaces like Shopify, Etsy, and Creative Market...
You can also publish digital products to Amazon, Apple, Google Play and other digital stores.
These digital stores let you reach a wider audience and are a great way to make your digital product stand out from the crowd.
But no matter where you are selling digital products, make sure there is a straightforward checkout process for your customers. And don’t forget about digital product delivery!
You absolutely want to differentiate yourself from the competition in digital product delivery and customer service.
Now it’s time to turn your digital product into digital products that sell!
The most effective way to promote digital products is through digital marketing strategies such as email campaigns, Pinterest content marketing, video content or blog posts, etc. You can also do digital advertising in platforms like Facebook Ads and Google Ads to boost visibility.
It would help if you also considered exploring collaborations with other online entrepreneurs or digital product influencers who can help you promote your digital product to their audience.
Many create unique digital products that sell but don’t manage to sell enough because they put all their energy into digital product creation and not enough sales and marketing.
Here are the priorities when you start your sales and marketing efforts:
Create a business account on Pinterest and create valuable content for your ideal customer. It doesn’t need to be just content about your product.
Create a lead magnet and build your email list.
Obtain testimonials or reviews.
Once you have sold a few of your products, you can consider investing in ads. It is absolutely NOT a must.
Maximize your conversions by testing and optimizing digital products that sell.
Pay attention to what digital products are selling well and customer feedback so you can tweak your digital product offerings and digital marketing strategies accordingly.
It’s important to track sales performance data to identify which digital products perform best and measure their success over time.
Assess what you could change in your sales page, language, and marketing in general.
You can quickly find what works best by constantly evaluating and testing digital products that sell and maximize your sales!
You got this! With a bit of effort, you can create digital products to begin your side hustle to make money and help you make some extra cash.
If you want to read other related blogs:
So here is the brilliant news! Digital products sell very well.
It is less about which one sells better than another but more about your learning journey when you begin your side hustle to make money.
For instance, creating an online course is a fantastic way to have big-ticket items as your digital products that sell. It is very tempting to start with something like an online course because of that.
If you decide to do so, you need to do it with the knowledge that the learning curve will be steep and lengthier.
I personally started with Canva templates. They’re faster to create, allowing me to launch much faster. Make my early mistakes and adapt.
There isn’t a right or wrong. It’s your choice. It depends on your expertise, previous online business experience and the time you have to make that passive income.
Here is a list (in no particular order) of digital products that sell that are simpler to create:
Digital media assets, graphic design, and artwork:
Canva Templates
Graphic design assets
Animations
Gradients
Palettes
Patterns
Printables
Wallpaper for mobile or desktop
Wedding signage templates
Digital art and painting
Illustrations
Photos stock (photo stock for niche businesses works best than a significantly larger niche, like travel photos)
Photo presets
Video stock
Video LUTs (filters for video)
Video graphics (titles, animations)
Music
Sound files
Audio recording
Fonts
Licenses to digital assets
Mock-ups
Time management digital products that sell:
Digital planners
Project plan templates: Asana, Click-up, Notion templates
Wedding digital planners
Mindset digital products that sell:
Affirmations
Digital visual board template
Goals tracker
Habits tracker
Content marketing digital products that sell:
Content planning templates
Content ideas bank
Pinterest templates
Social media templates
Post captions
Marketing plan templates
Business digital products that sell:
Presentation templates
Swipe copy for email marketing
Business plan template
Customer onboarding templates
Customer testimonial fillable questionnaires
Customer feedback fillable questionnaires
Portfolio templates
Contract Template
Legal templates
Ads templates
Online launch assets (webinar templates, social media promotion, email swipe copy...)
Digital assets for affiliates
Discovery call templates
VIP days templates
Mastermind templates
Retreat templates
Tools & other made-for-you files:
Worksheets
Checklists
Cheatsheets
Playbooks
Budget tracker
Budget calculator
Ad calculator
Pricing calculator
Other digital products that sell:
Ebook
How-to guides (step-by-step)
Destination guides
Recipe ebook
Exercises to prep for an exam
School material for kids
Ready-to-use teachers’ lessons plans & exercises
Brain teasers pdf
Learning digital products that sell:
Online course
Paid masterclasses or workshop
Summits, Tickets are different from other digital products because they are usually related to a time-based event at a physical location.
Memberships digital products that sell:
Memberships
Directory
Access to a private podcast
Access to a set of information (database, courses...)
Templates:
Website templates (Squarespace templates, Worldpress templates)
Landing pages templates (Kartra, Kajabi)
Tools:
3D printer design files
Virtual model files
Web extensions
Plug-ins
Mobile apps
Art:
NFTs
In this list you’ll find digital products that sell to begin that side hustle to make money. Get ready to see those sales pop up in your inbox!
Remember that to get those sales happening, it’s crucial that you drive traffic to your shop or your landing pages.
The absolute simplest and quickest way to achieve traffic is to use Pinterest! So, watch my FREE Pinterest workshop if you want to know more about how I grow my blog while I sleep.
I include a whole mini-course about Google SEO on my signature programme, The Profitable Pinterest Secrets, so that you can achieve two things at once: get Pinterest to make you grow online and get Google SEO working for you! You won't find that combo anywhere else.
Interested to know more about the programme, The Profitable Pinterest Secrets? Check this out here!
So do you choose? What digital products that sell are in demand now?
First of all, you need to play to your strengths! Think about what you already know or have and are an expert on.
That’s where your efforts need to go at the beginning. Why?
To begin your side hustle to make money, you’ll have a range of things to learn on how online business works and the best ways to market and sell your digital products for passive income.
So don’t make it more difficult on you by choosing to create a digital product that you sell that you know very little about.
Beyond making it easy for you, let’s also look at how you know what digital products that sell are in demand now.
Particular niches have demand for digital products that sell no matter when!
Parenting advice and tools
Easy recipes
Fitness exercises
Well-being and mindset
Home Decor
Home buying/selling
Digital products for small businesses
However, many digital products that sell have seasonal demand peaks.
Depending on what your digital products that sell, think seasons and how that affects the desirability of what you offer, in particular:
New year
Valentine’s day
Easter
Spring
Taxes year-end
Summer season
Back-to-school
Halloween
Thanksgiving in the U.S.
Holidays
To optimize your passive income for your side hustle with your digital products, create marketing and sales campaigns to take advantage of the seasonal trends. You’ll notice the difference!
Keep an eye on new trends that pop up. These are opportunities where there aren’t that many players around, and that means that they may be more gaps for you to shine with your digital products that sell.
For example:
Checklist of gear and tools to create your van for van life travel for digital nomads.
Mini-course to build your own tiny house.
Depending on the economy and several other external factors, your ideal client for your digital products that sell will be inclined toward certain things and not others.
It’s always a great exercise to understand your niche trends to create and market digital products that sell.
When you understand the heartbeat of your ideal customer, you’ll see how that side hustle to make money you’ve started to make sales and more sales!
A fantastic tool to analyze and spot trends in your side hustle niche is the Pinterest trends tool.
You will need a Pinterest business account. You can upgrade to business for free.
Here is how it looks! Once you access it, you’ll play with it and see the goldmine of trends Pinterest has for you!
Do you want to know how powerful Pinterest is beyond the trends tool? Time to watch my FREE workshop:
Once you create digital products, you need to find a place where to sell your products.
You can create your website and shop on it. For that, you will need to then drive traffic to your website. All of this is possible, although you must remember that the process will take time.
The easiest and fastest way to gain traffic to your website is Pinterest. Pinterest is a visual discovery platform where you can create content marketing and product pins to drive, with links, to the shop on your website.
You can, at the same time, learn Google SEO and make your website rank on Page 1 of Google searches.
If you want to learn both and speed up the time to results, join my signature course, The Profitable Pinterest Secrets, here:
You can also sell your digital products for passive income in digital marketplaces.
What are digital marketplaces?
Digital marketplaces are digital shops where digital products live. You need to list your digital product and get paid when somebody buys it in the digital shop. Here are some digital marketplaces:
Shopify
Etsy
Creative Market
Gumroad
Sellfy
These marketplaces will charge you a fee. It is a good idea to read their terms and conditions before listing your digital products, as they may have particular requirements for selling digital goods.
You can also use digital platforms like Kartra, Udemy, Kajabi, Teachable, Skillshare or Thinkific to host digital courses and other digital products created with video lessons.
My platform of choice for my online courses and digital product is Kartra, combined with my Squarespace website. Especially if you’re a course creator, I strongly recommend that you read my review about Kartra:
Kartra is an all-in-one marketing and sales platform that makes my life as an online entrepreneur and course creator much more straightforward and brings me sales while I sleep.
My perfect combination is:
Pinterest for audience growth and lead-generation engine
Kartra for all my landing pages, digital product setting, course hosting, video hosting, email marketing, sales funnels, automations, quizzes, countdown timers, affiliate marketing, and more!
Squarespace website for my blog as my long-form content beyond Pinterest.
If you’re starting and don’t want to pay digital marketplace fees, you can also sell digital products for free on certain websites.
Here are some:
Knack Market
Indie Made
Send Owl
I haven’t used any of these and I can’t recommend them. Choosing free platforms always comes with trade-offs and will end-up in complex technical migrations down the line. I would avoid at all costs if you can afford it.
If you want to read related blogs to be productive working from home, here you have a selection:
Once you have digital products to sell, it is time to promote them. Here are some places where you can promote digital products:
Email marketing
Pinterest (great to drive traffic and for lead-generation)
Your website
Your blog
Social media channels (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter)
Online communities
Paid advertising such as Pinterest Ads, Google Ads, Facebook or Instagram Ads
With digital products, you can easily make money on the side while having fun creating digital goods! Get started today and start making money with digital products!
Yes, digital products can be sold on Amazon in the digital services section.
However, digital downloads such as ebooks and digital music are not allowed. You will need to create a professional seller account with digital services enabled to sell digital products on Amazon.
Yes, digital products can be sold on Shopify. You can use Shopify to sell digital downloads such as ebooks, music files, digital art, digital photos and videos. Shopify also has a range of apps for digital product delivery and download management.
Etsy is a digital marketplace that allows digital goods such as digital art, graphics, patterns and fonts. You can also sell digital products such as ebooks and printables on Etsy.
Yes, digital products can be sold on eBay. Digital downloads such as PDFs, ebooks, digital music and digital photos are eligible to be listed as digital products on eBay. You will need to create an eBay digital goods store to start selling digital items on eBay.
Yes, digital products can be protected under copyright law. Register with the U.S. Copyright Office or an international equivalent to ensure that your digital products are adequately protected.
Additionally, you may want to include a digital rights management system to protect against digital piracy and unlicensed use of your digital products.
Digital products are digital goods you create and sell, while affiliate marketing is a form of marketing where you can earn commissions by promoting other people’s digital products.
Digital products require more time and effort to create but have the potential for higher returns than affiliate marketing.
Affiliate marketing requires less time and effort to start but also has the potential to bring in less income.
Yes, digital downloads can be printed depending on the format of your digital product.
For example, digital photos and art can easily be printed at home or in stores. Digital documents such as PDFs and ebooks also have the potential to be printed but may require some additional formatting first.
You should always include the applicable digital product guidelines to clarify to your customers whether your digital downloads can be printed before they attempt digital product printing.
Digital products can fail for a variety of reasons. Poor digital product design, outdated digital marketing strategies, lack of promotion on digital channels, and incorrect pricing are just factors that can cause digital products to fail to reach their full potential.
Additionally, digital products must be protected against digital piracy and unlicensed use. It could lead to digital product loss and decreased digital profits.
To avoid digital product failure, digital creators should take the time to research digital trends and create digital products that are designed for success.
Importantly, invest in learning internet marketing and content marketing. You know it by now, I can help you with this!
In some cases, digital products may require sales tax to be collected and remitted. For example, digital items sold within the United States may require sales tax to be collected depending on the state or local jurisdiction in which the digital product is being sold.
Before selling digital products, you should always check with applicable sales tax laws, as taxes may vary from state to state, and from country to country.
Your digital products could give resell rights which allow the original buyer to resell or distribute the digital product. Resell rights are typically granted by the digital product creator (you) and must be specified in the digital product’s terms of use.
If you are considering selling digital products with resell rights, include applicable license agreements in your terms and conditions.
Additionally, you will need to ensure that digital products with resell rights are appropriately protected against digital piracy and unlicensed use.
Start your digital products journey today and start making money on the side!
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Hi! I’m Isabel
For years and years I have created and produced content, in particular visual content. You can find me very often with my cameras and tripod out and about!
My passion: to help you with your online presence and drive business growth through my blog and visuals collections (marketing templates, styled photos & video).
Ah, I have also worked for 24+ in the corporate world, leading quite a mix: transformation, marketing, coaching, sales, productivity, programme management, investments and product management.
I love sharing all these skills with you in my blog.
I am also founder of Agavea Properties, our family holiday rental business. My husband and I lead it with the passion with one goal in mind: serving our customers to create a memorable holiday experience for them.
So there you have it, that’s me! Ah... I almost forgot, my happy place is by the sea.
Thanks for being here with me!