The Complete Guide to Successfully Selling Prints on Etsy in 2024

Leon Walker

Oct 17, 2023

If you want to learn how to make money selling prints on Etsy, our guide will provide you with easy-to-follow instructions.

While it may appear difficult at first – brighten up, it’s much easier than you think. With Print on Demand, anyone can launch an Etsy business without investment, inventory, or logistical worries – we’ll show you how.

With this in mind, we’ll explain how to sell prints on Etsy by encompassing every aspect: how to decide what to sell, set up an Etsy store, devise a marketing strategy, and share a variety of useful tips and tricks, so you can outshine other Etsy store owners.

What Exactly Is a Print?

In a few words, prints are reproductions of art – in all its forms – made by transferring the original artwork onto a printing surface. The surface can be anything, from ever-humble posters to fine-art canvas prints.

When it comes to selling prints on Etsy, you’ve got two options:

Digital products. A digital artwork – as an example, digital images, illustrations, graphics, fan art – that is created and sold as a digital download.

Selling digital prints is a thoroughly hassle-free process with no worries about inventory or shipping.

Physical products. Alternatively, you can sell physical art prints transferred onto posters, tapestries, canvases, and other physical products.

Unlike selling digital prints, you’ll need to source products for your art prints by choosing one of the print-on-demand companies.

In the crafty world of Etsy, anyone can make money selling physical prints – it’s a matter of finding the right print-on-demand company, audience, and marketing strategy. That said, tag along as we explore how you can do just that.

How to Get Started Selling Prints on Etsy: 6 Steps To Success

With the right guidance, sound advice, and a bit of effort, anyone can start selling prints on Etsy. In fact, it’s a straightforward process – we’re here to lead you through it, one easy step at a time.

Step 1: Set up an Etsy Store

Opening your Etsy store is easy. You’ll need to either sign in or register for an Etsy account. When finished, you’ll see a silhouette within a circle in the right corner – click it and pick Sell on Etsy to begin the process.

After that, you’ll be asked to fill out all the details – language, country, currency, payment details, and other things Etsy requires.

In the registration process, you’ll be asked to add a product, but don’t focus on details at this point – you can simply create a draft, deleting it later.

To learn more about preparing your store, finding the right niche, the most suitable marketing channels, and much more, our article on how to make money on Etsy is here to help.

Step 2: Pick and Prepare Your Products

To start selling prints on Etsy, you’ll need products to transfer your art onto. To start designing your next bestsellers, sign up for a free Printify account.

As soon as you have an account, connect your Etsy store with Printify, which will allow you to add products to your store with a touch of a button.

In our catalog, you’ll find a wide selection of canvases, posters, and other products that you can customize with our Mockup Generator any way you like.

A few of our products, ready for your digital prints:

On the Printify Catalog, you’ll find a myriad of other products – more than 800 altogether – that you can customize with your art with ease, creating beautiful physical prints for your Etsy store.

If you need any inspiration from those who’ve already made it on the Etsy platform, our merchants’ – Loretta Owens and Christopher Sattes – success stories are right on the money.

When everything is set up, you can manage your orders from within Printify: set product pricing, add descriptions and tweak other details. As you publish your products, this information will transfer to Etsy.

Step 3: Set the Price Right

A big part of successfully selling prints is setting a price, all the while avoiding a price war, which may result in everyone’s profit margins becoming paper-thin.

A good rule of thumb is to check what other Etsy sellers are charging, setting your own price accordingly.

To learn more about tips and tricks of pricing, our article on how to price a product has everything you need to know to set a price that’s just right.

Step 4: Devise a Marketing Strategy

With a well-thought-out marketing strategy – no matter your business model – reaching your potential customers, retaining their interest, and increasing your Etsy sales become much easier.

Before you start marketing, here’s what you need to do:

Identify industry trends. Find out what products are currently trending. Which prints sell well on Etsy, eBay, Amazon?

In addition, check what interests people with tools such as Google Trends, BuzzSumo, or Semrush.

Analyze competition. Who is your competition? What are their bestsellers? What could you sell that other Etsy shops don’t?

Explore competitors’ social media, product reviews, and feedback. With this information, you can address their customers’ pain points, creating products they want.

Find your target audience. By analyzing your competitors, you’ll get a good idea of who your target audience is.

To get a better understanding, survey your own social network with tools such as Google Forms or Crowdsignal, and collect information from Facebook groups, Reddit threads, and various other sources.

When all of the above is done, you need to choose a marketing channel that best fits your needs. You can use social media, influencer or content marketing, email, paid advertising, or a combination of all of these.

To learn more, our article on marketing your Etsy store has all the information you need, so you can implement the right marketing strategy from the get-go.

Step 5: Learn and Adjust

When your store is up and running, don’t forget or neglect the power of statistics. With Etsy Stats, you can see how your store is performing, where the traffic comes from, and how shoppers engage with the prints you sell.

By clicking on Stats in Shop Manager on Etsy.com, you’ll see a wide range of information:

Metrics overview. Here, by clicking on a metric, you can view Etsy shop-level data: visits, orders, conversion rate, and revenue.
How shoppers found you. You can also see how much of your shop traffic comes through Etsy search, ads, marketing, social media, and other sources.
How many shoppers viewed your listings. In addition to views, you can see how many shoppers ordered your products. For each, you can see views, favorites, orders, and revenue.

By analyzing this data, you gain insight into what works well and what doesn’t. Look for patterns and trends, so you can refocus your efforts and make adjustments to increase the amount of the Etsy orders you get.

Start Selling Prints Today!

Start Selling

What Are the Best-Selling Prints on Etsy?

As often is the case, an artful touch is all it takes to make a place a home. Without a doubt, customers know that, which is why personalized art prints feature as one of Etsy’s year-round bestsellers.

Here are a few other ideas that sell well:

Canvas prints with inspiring scenes
Products with original artwork
Prints with flowers
Pop art series prints
Vintage posters

If you create art that stands out, selling prints on Etsy – no matter their shape or form – is a great way to make money, pursue your passion, and share your creativity with the whole world.

Sell Prints on Etsy With Printify

Whatever your goals may be, our mission remains unchanged – to help people make more money with less effort.

Printify offers a print-on-demand service that seamlessly integrates with Etsy, allowing anyone to start their own business without any investment, the hassle of creating a website, or worrying about sourcing products.

After you sign up for a Printify account, you can choose between more than 850 high-quality products that you can personalize in our Mockup Generator to fit the needs of your target audience and print shop.

Whether you want to start selling photo prints on Etsy or one-of-a-kind artwork transferred onto physical products, we’ve got all the tools you need to get started.

When a customer purchases from you, we take care of everything else – printing, inventory, and shipping.

Start Making Money Selling Prints Today!

Start Selling

5 Practical Tips for Successfully Selling Prints on Etsy

While the world of Etsy is welcoming to everyone, selling art and various prints is a fiercely competitive venture. To succeed, your Etsy shop and prints need to stand out, attracting customers and leave a lasting impression.

Here are a few ways you can get ahead of your competition.

1. Brand Correctly

With a clear brand identity, it’s easier to separate yourself from the crowd – it helps people to recognize your Etsy shop and the quality of prints you’re offering. Your brand is essential to successfully selling prints on Etsy.

A few things your shop should have:

A shop icon. A logo for your business on Etsy, representing your store across the marketplace. Design an icon that conveys something meaningful about your brand, reflecting the heart and soul of your business.

If you need help creating an icon, you can use Canva, which makes the whole process incredibly easy.

A professional banner image. Your shop’s banner is your greatest branding asset – the most prominent graphic people see when visiting your store, so try highlighting your best photography that defines your business.

For best results, follow Etsy’s guidelines for uploading images.

Information about your store. Share your story, add a shop owner photo, and tell people about your business. This will give them greater confidence in your products and inspire brand loyalty.
Perfect your policies. Set realistic expectations with your shop’s policies – they’ll help in future communications. Let your customers know how long the shipping takes, what payment options you offer, whether you accept returns, and other information they might find helpful.

To learn more, explore Etsy’s guide on how to set up shop policies, outlining everything you need to know.

Add FAQs section. With a frequently asked questions (FAQ) section, you can demonstrate your expertise, providing valuable information to customers before it’s even asked.

As always, check out what your competition is doing – adopt the successful aspects of their approach, alter the less-productive ones, and add your own unique twist.

2. Optimize Your Store

If you want to successfully sell prints on Etsy, optimizing your store is essential. When done correctly, it’ll help you appear in more search results, gain more customers, and get more sales.

Here are a few ways you can go about it:

Use high-quality photos. Create Etsy listings that feature lots of beautiful photos of your product from varying angles. Place the best photo first – that’s what buyers see in search results.
Include keywords in product titles, descriptions, and alt-texts. To gain better visibility, you’ll need to use keywords. Try to put the most important ones at the beginning.

You can find the most popular keywords using Sale Samurai, eRank, or a wide range of other tools available online.

Use all 13 tags. Every tag you add is an opportunity for your product to match with the shopper’s search. Add tags that describe what your product is and who it’s for. Make them unique.

Try to use language that sounds natural. Including multi-word phrases – for example, custom digital prints – frees up another tag for you to use.

Refresh your listings. To keep search results fresh, Etsy’s search algorithm reviews how recently an item was listed or relisted. If possible, try to update your listings once in a while.

Small changes can bring big results. If you want to learn more, our article about how to get noticed on Etsy provides a variety of tips and tricks you can use to improve your Etsy store.

3. Add a Video to Your Etsy Listing

For many shoppers, descriptions and photos aren’t enough. They want to view the product in a more visually appealing way – in the form of a video.

With video listings, you can:

Get more sales. By allowing the shoppers to see how the product looks in real life, you’re giving them more confidence to buy.
Build trust. A great way to establish trust and create a stronger connection between your store and customers.

In addition, Etsy video listings are great for showcasing the best qualities of your prints.

Here are a few tips for stunning Etsy videos:

Pay close attention to the whole frame. Consider everything in the frame, arrange it in a professional way. If you want to sell prints on Etsy, background matters.
Follow Etsy’s guidelines. The video may be 5–15 seconds long, with the ideal resolution of at least 1080px.
Stabilize the camera. Unless your hands are really steady, use a tripod or even a stabilizer.
Have good lighting. Try to create the video in a well-lit environment, so that potential buyers can see your print properly.

Etsy listing videos are a great way to stand out as a professional and reliable seller. You can learn how to add a listing video from Etsy itself.

4. Sell Smart Using Print-On-Demand Business Model

The greatest benefit of Print on Demand is its convenience. With this approach, anyone can run an entire business from the comfort of their home.

No need to print anything, keep inventory, or worry about logistics – printing companies do it all for you.

What is more, print providers begin manufacturing only after you sell a product, which means you can add to your Etsy shop as many different products as you want without any additional investment apart from Etsy’s fees.

5. Engage With Your Target Audience

When it comes to engagement, building meaningful relationships with your customers is essential.

After identifying who they are and what type of content they may like, create such content and devise strategies to engage with them.

Here are a few tips to help you build and maintain a good relationship with your customers:

Thank your customers for their purchase. On Etsy, you can leave a short note to your customers, thanking them for their purchase, informing them about the standard shipping time, or providing other information they may find useful.

To set up this message, go to Shop Manager, then to Settings, and finally to Info & Appearance. Scroll down until you see the Message to Buyers field. When done, don’t forget to click Save Changes.

Advertise yourself. Your shop’s About Me section is a great place for advertising your blog, website, or social media sites.
Interact with your customers on social media. The beauty of social media is that it can easily reach a wide audience. You can build hype around your store by offering various discounts, giveaways, or promotional deals.

While there are other methods, these are some you can begin implementing right away. If done right, not only will customers be more likely to return and purchase from you again, but they’ll also spread the word about your business.

Frequently Asked Questions

How to make money selling prints on Etsy?

With the Print on Demand business model, anyone can start a profitable business without any up-front costs.

Whether you want to sell prints, pop-culture posters, or original artwork, Printify has got everything you need to start making money online.

While Etsy has listing fees, signing up for a Printify account and designing products is 100% free.

How much money can you make selling prints on Etsy?

As with any business, the average profit depends on the popularity of your store, pricing strategy, how many prints you sell, and how much effort you put into marketing.

The profit may range from a few hundred dollars a month to thousands, depending on the amount of work you’re willing to put into the venture. That said, when approached strategically, selling prints on Etsy can be very profitable.

How to start selling prints on Etsy?

With Printify, selling prints on Etsy has never been easier. To begin your entrepreneurial journey, here are the steps you should follow:

Open an Etsy store
Sign up for a free Printify account
Pick your next bestseller from our Catalog
Connect your store with Printify
Start marketing and earning money

While it’s easy to start, to become a successful entrepreneur, you’ll need to create unique products, bring your marketing A-game, and build a loyal customer base.

Selling Prints on Etsy: Closing Thoughts

As we wrap up our guide on selling prints on Etsy, we hope you found this article helpful, giving you enough confidence to give it a try. Although it requires dedication and determination, rewards are well worth the effort.

Whether you choose to sell physical or digital prints, don’t forget it’s still a business, hence should be treated as such. To start off on the right foot, it’s important to plan accordingly, so here’s a quick recap of the steps you should take:

Set up an Etsy store
Prepare your products, use your best prints
Set the price
Devise a marketing strategy
Adjust and optimize your Etsy store

With the right mindset, design ideas, and print-on-demand company, anyone can turn their passion into a thriving business without any up-front costs, inventory, or logistical hurdles.