Q4 is the year’s top shopping season and a time when you can make tons of money selling print-on-demand – if you do it right.
Between October and December, people buy gifts for others.
Mom and dad buy gifts for their children. Children buy gifts for their parents. Friends or colleagues buy gifts for each other.
A few years ago, I got an order for 200 coffee mugs that a company owner purchased for her employees. That was the easiest $2,000 I ever made.
You might have failed or struggled in Q1 to Q3 – but you can still win BIG this year by selling print-on-demand products in Q4.
Up to 80% of my annual print-on-demand sales happen in three months.
So, don’t chill out. It’s time to make money!
In this article, I’ll tell you what to sell, where to sell it, and give you an action plan you can implement immediately to crush your sales during the upcoming shopping season.
Okay, let’s get started.
What Print-on-Demand Products To Sell
If it was two or three years ago, I might have recommended that you sell coffee mugs. They’re classic gifts, not too expensive, and easy to sell.
But nowadays, the cost to produce and ship a coffee mug is a lot more expensive than it used to be.
Previously, the production cost of a mug was around $10. You could sell a mug for $19.95-24.95, including shipping, and make around $9.95-14.95 in profit.
Nowadays, most print-on-demand companies have increased their production fees. Making and shipping one coffee mug now costs around $13-18.
You have to sell it for $29.95+ to make a profit. In my opinion, it’s risky, because the profit margins are very thin.
I haven’t included other costs, such as marketplace fees or even refunds, which can eat into your profits.
Also, if people want to spend $29.95 on a gift, they’ll probably buy something other than a coffee mug. A mug is too expensive at this price.
So, what print-on-demand products should you sell in 2022?
Don’t get me wrong. Coffee mugs can still sell. You just have to find a supplier that can give you a cheaper rate.
I still sell tons of coffee mugs on Amazon, but they’re mostly FBA products. I have a supplier in China who offers me a cheap price and sends them to Amazon Warehouse for me.
I’ve already placed an order to send tons of coffee mugs to my Amazon Warehouse, and they’re ready for sale in Q4.
Anyhoo…
Since the cost of producing a coffee mug is increasing, I’m focusing on selling more expensive products like bracelets and necklaces.
We can sell this kind of jewelry for $29.95-49.95. The margin is around $15-30, depending on the product.
I use two print-on-demand companies for these products: Laser Chili and GearBubble.
I sell Laser Chili bracelets at $29.95 each, including shipping. The bracelets are mostly fit for men.
I sell the bracelets and necklaces from GearBubble for $49.95 each, including shipping, because the materials are more expensive. My target audience is women.
I’ve been selling these products for years but focusing on them only this year. My revenues have significantly increased.
GearBubble and Laser Chili also provide Amazon FBA service, so I’ve ordered many boxes of these products and sent them to Amazon for Q4.
Where to Sell Print-on-Demand products
Amazon is the easiest place to sell print-on-demand products.
You can create an Amazon Pro Seller account, pay $39.99 monthly, and upload an unlimited number of products.
Etsy is another good place to sell print-on-demand products, but you have to pay $0.20 for one listing that lasts for three months. So, you have to make sure that your product is solid and has a chance to sell before listing it on Etsy.
Amazon and Etsy are the top two online marketplaces where you can make tons of sales with free traffic in Q4.
I highly suggest you start selling POD products in these two marketplaces first, especially if you’ve just started your business. You just have to upload products to Amazon and Etsy and wait for sales.
Shopify is a good eCommerce platform if you want to build and grow your store. But you need to attract visitors to your store by yourself. It’s not like Amazon and Etsy, which send visitors to your products.
If you want to sell your products in a Shopify store, you have to learn how to use paid traffic like Facebook Ads or Google Ads.
The good thing about this method is that you can scale quickly once you have winning products. You just need to spend money to make money.
But … it’s not that easy.
I highly recommend that you start selling on Amazon or Etsy. Once you have some capital, you might scale up by building your own store.
The Action Plan
So, now you know what print-on-demand products to sell and where to sell them.
Next, let’s talk about your action plan.
Remember, reading without execution is useless. To make results, you need to act.
Here’s an action plan you can use to crush sales in Q4.
First, list all the niche markets you want to target. If you’re selling jewelry message cards, list all the “female” niches.
Mom to Daughter, Dad to Daughter, Husband to Wife, Father to Mother, Grandma to Granddaughter, and so on.
If you’re selling bracelets from Laser Chili, list the “male” niches like Mom to Son, Dad to son, and so on.
Second, find quotes for all your niches. Try to find at least 50 quotes per niche. You never know which quotes customers will like until you sell them. So, find as many quotes as you can.
For jewelry message cards, try to find “To [RECEIVER] … From [SENDER]” style quotes.
Like this:
To My Beautiful Mom,
Thank you for always protecting me whether I’m right or…nope I’m never wrong.
Love, Your Daughter
For bracelets, you can find simple quotes, like the ones you put on coffee mugs. They can be funny or touching. Both sell well.
You might hire a virtual assistant or let A.I. Quote do this for you.
Third, create designs using the quotes you have. The design doesn’t need to be complex.
For jewelry message cards, just use a black, dark blue, or white background. Put “To [RECEIVER] at the top, quote, and From [SENDER] at the bottom.
Like this:
Bracelets are even easier to create. Choose a simple font, type the quote in the engraving area, and center-align it.
Like this:
You can hire a graphic designer to do this for you. It will cost just a few cents or a dollar with a simple design like this.
(Note: if the design is complex, with a colorful background and a fancy font, the cost will be a lot higher. So keep it simple.)
Use one quote to create at least five designs.
Then, create and launch the products you create on Amazon and/or Etsy.
GearBubble has ten types of jewelry message cards, so you can use one design to create ten products. Launch them all. All of them can sell well.
You can use PODTurbo to launch all these products quickly. Don’t waste your time uploading one product at a time.
You can hire a VA to do it, but it will still take days and nights to upload tons of products. And if your VA charges by the hour, you’ll waste tons of money.
Learn to use PODTurbo and teach your VA how to use it. I trained my VA once, and now it takes her only an hour or two to upload more than 1,000 products.
Laser Chili has many styles of bracelets as well. Again, you can use one design to create many bracelets. Launch them all from Laser Chili.
After you’ve been launching products on Amazon for a while, you might make some sales. When you do, scale up your sales.
The easiest way to do this on Amazon is to make your winning products FBA products. When your product is FBA, it will gain a ranking advantage and sell more automatically.
Both GearBubble and Laser Chili have an FBA service so that you can place an order easily.
But be sure to ask them about their handling and shipping times first. Sometimes a product will be out of stock, and you might have to wait for weeks.
Conclusion
Okay, that’s it. This is the action plan you can use to crush your print-on-demand sales in Q4.
I’ll focus on selling jewelry message cards this year because the margins are very high, and there’s less competition compared to other print-on-demand products.
Remember, this is a numbers game. You don’t need to spend money on advertising to make money. Instead, you need to spend time and energy to make money.
Launch as many jewelry message cards as you can (use PODTurbo if you want to do it fast). Let’s end this year well!
Good luck, everybody!
—Bank K.
