Are you looking for a low-maintenance side gig to generate some extra income? Selling digital downloads might be the answer.
I’ve been personally selling digital downloads for over a decade. It’s a painless way to make money because you don’t have all the overhead of selling physical goods, and you can set up an online store with little effort using a free WordPress plugin.
Let me share my experiences with you and tell you how you can make $5000 of passive income per month selling digital downloads on WordPress.
Note: This is a guest post by Chris Klosowski, the president of Easy Digital Downloads, the best digital eCommerce plugin for WordPress. This is an expert column that we publish every Thursday, where we invite a WordPress expert to share their experiences with our readers.
Why Digital Downloads Are a Great Way to Make Passive Income
You’ve heard the expression, ‘No pain, no gain.’ This means that achieving something worthwhile normally requires sacrifice and hard work.
But what if I told you that you can make money with your WordPress website while you sleep?
That’s passive income.
Passive income is money that you earn with little to no ongoing effort. Think of earning interest on your savings account or renting out a spare room.
Or selling digital downloads.
Compared with selling physical products, digital downloads are a breeze. There’s no need to keep track of inventory, no running out of stock, no need to hire storage space or workers to manage it, and no shipping and handling.
Like everything, it requires a little setup. You’ll have to create or obtain the files you want to sell. And you’ll need to set up a WordPress website and install an eCommerce plugin.
Easy Digital Downloads (EDD) is one example of a plugin designed specifically for digital downloads. It lets you get started for free, and you can purchase extensions to add the features you need as you grow.
Once your online store is set up, you can continue to sell your digital product over and over again. So, the money you make will require very little ongoing effort.
You can even use automation to save time and effort and make the income truly passive.
How Much Passive Income Can You Earn With Digital Downloads?
The amount of money you can make by selling digital downloads varies a lot, depending on your skills, experience, and the type of digital products you are selling.
When starting out, it’s typical for beginners to make just a few hundred dollars a month in initial sales.
That being said, in time, it’s not uncommon for established sellers with a loyal audience to achieve $5,000 or more per month.
For example, Emily McDermott tells the story of how she made a promising $700 in her first month of selling attractive business documents. After just three months, she was making over $7,000 a month. Plus, she spends just a couple of hours a week working on her online store.
The potential doesn’t stop there. Top earners make tens of thousands of dollars each month. But this is rare and will take more effort.
This extra work may take it out of the ‘passive’ income category. But with that sort of revenue, you’ll probably want to spend more time working on your online store anyway.
A number of our Easy Digital Downloads customers have achieved this. For example, Set Sail Studios has made $236,000+ selling fonts, and Escape Room Geeks has made $390,000+ selling printable escape room kits.
Are you interested in making this kind of passive income? Your first step is to decide on a digital product to sell.
The Best Types of Digital Products for Passive Income
The best digital products for creating passive income have a high perceived value but require little ongoing maintenance. They should generate a profit and line up with your business niche.
Potential customers will only buy your digital download if it solves a problem or meets a need. A unique product in a specific niche will help you stand out and attract an engaged audience.
To create passive income, you need to choose digital products that don’t require ongoing effort.
For example, software products like WordPress plugins and themes can be quite profitable, but they often require continuing development and support. That takes an ongoing investment in time, so they are not the best options for a side gig that makes passive income.
On the other hand, a simple software program or web application that solves a common problem may be perfect. The EDD Software Licensing add-on can be used to activate the buyer’s copy of the software without your direct involvement.
eBooks are another profitable option. If your blog contains a lot of useful information, then you can easily repurpose the content as an eBook. You could create multiple books by choosing blog posts on specific topics, such as your most engaging and popular posts in specific categories.
Alternatively, you may be able to repurpose the content as an online course and sell ongoing subscriptions to access the material. This offers more value than eBooks but also takes more time to set up. I will talk more about subscriptions later.
Perhaps you gained a lot of insights when you set up your business and are passionate about helping others do the same. You could sell an eBook about the key steps to creating a successful business or offer useful business documents and Excel templates.
Just make sure you choose a product you have expertise in. For example, Sam Parrett from Set Sail Studios creates and sells unique brush fonts, and this aligns well with his graphic design website.
The types of digital products that can generate passive income are endless. For inspiration, you can read about the pros and cons of many categories in this post on the most popular digital products to sell on the EDD blog.
How to Reduce Your Workload With Automation
When making passive income, you’ll want to be as hands-off as possible. In my experience, the best way to do this is to use automation to work smarter, not harder.
Luckily, you can get your website to perform many routine tasks automatically using automation.
These include email marketing, social media, customer service, admin tasks, and more. It’s simply a matter of choosing the right automation tools and setting them up correctly.
If you are using Easy Digital Downloads, then the software will automatically email purchase receipts and order confirmations to your customers. You can even personalize your automated eCommerce emails, leading to increased customer engagement.
Using some extra tools, you can also automate your email marketing. This means that instead of writing emails manually one by one, you write them just once and set up triggers based on user activity to personalize the emails and send them automatically.
Personalized emails based on user activity are 320% more effective than generic emails.
You can set up the triggers using the FunnelKit Automations plugin for WordPress and send out the emails using a top email marketing service like Constant Contact.
Additionally, you can use automation to reduce cart abandonment. By offering incentives and reminding visitors about their forgotten purchases, you will be able to build customer loyalty and encourage future purchases that contribute to your passive income stream.
For example, OptinMonster‘s exit-intent technology will watch the user’s mouse to determine when they are about to leave your website. It can then automatically display a popup just in time, offering an incentive to complete the visitor’s purchase.
I mentioned earlier that you can get started selling digital downloads by using the free version of Easy Digital Downloads. Let me introduce you to some paid marketing tools and add-ons that can help you make even more passive income.
In my last guest post, I talked about how order bumps are one of the best ways to encourage customers to spend more money on digital downloads. This is when you offer the buyer extra or upgraded products during checkout.
This is a great strategy when you are selling multiple digital products. You can automatically add order bumps with the EDD cross-sell and upsell add-on to boost your sales.
For example, if you sell music downloads and a customer purchases a song, you can offer them the option of purchasing the entire album while checking out. They may appreciate the suggestion and make the larger purchase.
This is a good strategy when you are selling online training or access to cloud-based software. Subscriptions allow your customers to avoid a large initial bill and bring in ongoing revenue to your business.
Subscriptions are easy to set up with the EDD recurring payments add-on. And because it’s an automated system, you will get fewer late or missing payments.
Are you looking for the best WooCommerce alternatives?
While WooCommerce is the most popular eCommerce plugin for WordPress sites, it may not be the perfect option for everyone. Depending on your needs, there are better alternatives to WooCommerce that can get the job done faster and easier.
In this article, we will share the best WooCommerce alternatives you can use to sell online.
Why Might You Need WooCommerce Alternatives?
WooCommerce is the most popular eCommerce platform because it allows anyone to launch an online store. And it’s an open-source solution, so you can download and use it for free.
Due to its ease of use and powerful customization options, it is hugely popular among online store owners. And WooCommerce powers over 23% of all eCommerce stores.
WooCommerce comes with hundreds of free and premium extensions to add powerful eCommerce features to your online store. It includes inventory management, point of sale (POS), and so on.
Now you may wonder, is there a better option than WooCommerce?
Well, there are some scenarios where WooCommerce may not be the right tool for the job.
It might not have the specific key features you need for your eCommerce business or require a learning curve. And this is where WooCommerce alternatives come in.
These user-friendly eCommerce platforms offer better solutions for specific needs and may be more suitable for your business plans.
Now, without delay, let’s look at the best WooCommerce alternatives and see when they are a better solution for your online business.
MemberPress is the best WordPress membership plugin on the market. It allows you to sell paid memberships with multi-level subscriptions, drip-content support, and eCommerce features.
It comes with support for multiple payment gateways, easy pricing tables, and other tools to help you sell and grow your membership community.
When Is MemberPress a Better Solution Than WooCommerce?
If you want to create a membership site that offers access to premium content with subscriptions, then MemberPress is made specifically for that purpose. It offers a better experience for you as well as your users.
You can do the same thing with WooCommerce, but it would soon become overly complicated. You will have to use several add-ons to get the same functionality that you get built-in with MemberPress.
More importantly, MemberPress works well with WooCommerce, and you can combine them to sell subscription-based products and physical products on the same website.
Cons Compared to WooCommerce
MemberPress does not have any of the traditional shopping cart or advanced checkout features. To sell physical products, you will need to use them alongside WooCommerce.
We recommend MemberPress as a WooCommerce alternative because it’s the best membership plugin for WordPress, and it’s PCI compliant by default, making it easy and secure to accept online recurring payments.
When it comes to top features, MemberPress lets you create multiple membership levels so you can show different content to different members on your WordPress site.
While WooCommerce is an ultimate eCommerce solution, it has fewer membership options and is not PCI compliant. You can use third-party payment plugins to ensure your online store’s compliance with payment cards and processors.
Plus, MemberPress offers advanced community building, timed content release with Drip, a powerful LMS platform, a subscription plugin, integrations with third-party tools, and more.
Easy Digital Downloads is the best WordPress digital downloads plugin made specifically for selling virtual goods. These include software, music, eBooks, movies, and more.
You can manage software licenses, accept payments, install addons to extend the platform further, and more.
When Is Easy Digital Downloads a Better Choice Than WooCommerce?
If you only want to sell digital downloads, then Easy Digital Downloads can replace WooCommerce easily. It simplifies the process and allows you to manage licenses, accept payments, manage users, and manage file downloads.
You can sell digital products with WooCommerce as well. However, it includes many key features to sell physical goods, cluttering the interface.
You’ll also need to use several addons to manage licenses, file permissions, and other virtual product features.
On the other hand, there’s a free version of the Easy Digital Downloads plugin. However, you need to use their professional business plan to get access to several features like shipping digital products.
Just like you can sell digital goods with WooCommerce, you can also sell physical goods with Easy Digital Downloads using addons.
However, if you plan on selling digital and physical goods, then WooCommerce will be a much better solution to manage your file downloads.
Why Do We Recommend Easy Digital Downloads?
We recommend Easy Digital Downloads because it is the best WordPress plugin to sell virtual products, digital goods, and software. We use it on several of our websites, including WPForms and MonsterInsights, and it works like a charm.
While WooCommerce lets you sell physical products and anything else you might want, it comes with a lot of features and options. This makes it confusing for business owners to set up their sites and sell digitally.
On the other hand, Easy Digital Downloads has a simple setup process. It comes with secure payment options, subscription plans for customers, hundreds of integrations, and more.
Easy Digital Downloads also offers addons to sell physical products. So, if you are using this plugin, then you can sell anything and everything with a few extra steps.
Unlike other WooCommerce alternatives on this list, Shopify is a fully hosted eCommerce platform that does not require using WordPress. You don’t have to manage software, install updates, or manage backups.
It allows anyone to start an online store and sell without technical skills easily.
When Is Shopify a Better Solution Than WooCommerce?
Normally, you need to manage your shopping cart software using a platform like WooCommerce.
You will need to register a domain name and buy a WooCommerce web hosting account to install software, manage updates, backups, and so on.
Shopify takes care of all that and offers you a fully hosted platform. You can use their drag-and-drop tools to build your online store within minutes.
Shopify offers a better user-friendly solution if you are looking for a completely hands-off platform. It also provides a mobile app to manage your products, process orders, and design campaigns using built-in marketing tools.
Cons Compared to WooCommerce
Shopify is a hosted platform, meaning you get less control over your website than with a hosted WooCommerce store. It also charges you transaction fees, which means your costs will increase as you start selling more.
For a side-by-side comparison, you can see our article on Shopify vs. WooCommerce with the pros and cons of both platforms.
Why Do We Recommend Shopify?
We recommend Shopify because it’s a popular hosted eCommerce solution. When we say hosted, this means that you don’t need to worry about a lot of things, including web hosting, security, and more.
Unlike WooCommerce, Shopify is a ready-made eCommerce platform for business owners to get started quickly. There’s no need to install or manage software, and you can use their drag-and-drop builder to set up your online store.
While WooCommerce gives you full control over customization and installing third-party tools to make a powerful eCommerce store, Shopify has limited options. You have to work around their provided tools and addons.
WPForms is the best WordPress form builder plugin in the market. Although it’s not a full-featured eCommerce plugin, it comes with payment options for Stripe, PayPal, Square, and Authorize.net, so you can easily create online payment forms in WordPress.
It also has a free plan, but you’ll need the WPForms Pro version to access payment options and other eCommerce functionality.
When Is WPForms a Better Solution Than WooCommerce?
If you are looking to create an order form to accept credit card payments on your WordPress website, then WPForms is the simplest option on the list.
You can use it for one-time or recurring services like consulting, lawn mowing, and more. It also offers hundreds of ready-made form templates for your ease.
WPForms is also a better solution for NGOs to create an online donation or fundraising form and automatically send email notifications to donors.
Moreover, WPForms has an excellent customer support team that can help with setting up your credit card and other payment options easily.
This is not an apples-to-apples comparison. WPForms is not an eCommerce plugin. So, you will need to install addons to handle advanced features like taxes, shipping, and more.
It’s a simple payment solution for people who want to sell online without setting up a complete online store.
WooCommerce, on the other hand, is a powerful, full-featured eCommerce plugin.
Why Do We Recommend WPForms?
We recommend WPForms because it’s the best WordPress form builder and a simple and secure payment solution. For people who don’t want to set up a complete eCommerce store and still sell from their site, WPForms is the ideal choice.
It supports all major payment options, including Stripe, PayPal, Google Pay, and more. WPForms is the most beginner-friendly WordPress plugin that lets you add a payment form with just a few clicks.
While WooCommerce is a complete WordPress eCommerce plugin to start an online store, sometimes it’s too much for small businesses with a few products. WPForms provides a way out and lets you install specific addons that get the work done without cluttering your WordPress website.
With WPForms, you can give choice to users to select one or multiple products within the online form and use their favorite payment method. Additionally, WPForms has conditional logic to accept one-time and recurring payments.
Bonus WooCommerce Alternatives
If you didn’t find the perfect WooCommerce alternative in the list above, then here are some other alternatives that may be more suited to your needs.
Magento, also known as Adobe Commerce, is a popular open-source platform that lets you easily build and manage an online store.
It allows you to accept payments from different gateways, is completely customizable, and has customer management tools, helping you create an online store of any shape and size.
When Is Magento (Adobe Commerce) a Better Solution Than WooCommerce?
If you are creating an online store on an enterprise level with a high traffic volume and a huge product range, then Magento is the ideal choice.
It comes with features for B2B businesses, including quote management, custom pricing, and credit terms, and has amazing marketing tools for targeted promotions, personalized product recommendations, and customer segmentation.
While Magento itself is open source, it does have two premium editions that add significant licensing fees.
Additionally, the platform is difficult to set up, and you may need to hire a team of developers to create an online store, which can add to your costs.
It also has a smaller community compared to WooCommerce and has a less user-friendly interface. For more details, you can see our comparison of Magento vs. WooCommerce: Which is better?
Why Do We Recommend Magento (Adobe Commerce)?
Magento is the perfect platform if you want to create a large product catalog and handle a huge traffic volume.
For example, if you have a B2B online store that sells products to other smaller stores, then Magento will be a great option with its product management, marketing tools, and extensive store customization settings.
The tool also offers 3,783+ extensions for further scalability and can easily integrate with payment gateways like Stripe, 2Checkout, Braintree, WePay, Google Checkout, Skrill, Venmo, and more.
BigCommerce is a fully hosted e-commerce platform that comes with a variety of features, including design, payment gateways, SEO, email marketing, and more to build an online store.
Plus, the platform also has a BigCommerce plugin that you can use on your WordPress site if you don’t want to move your entire store to the platform itself.
When Is BigCommerce a Better Solution Than WooCommerce?
BigCommerce can be a great solution if you are a beginner and looking for an all-in-one solution that manages everything for you, from site security to backups.
BigCommerce is super easy to set up and offers a very intuitive interface with its drag-and-drop builder, making it easier to create an online store.
Plus, the tool is also fully self-hosted, offers 24/7 customer support and unlimited bandwidth, and has fixed monthly pricing, which can make budgeting easier.
The solution is completely hassle-free, can handle large product catalogs, and has built-in SEO and marketing features, which WooCommerce does not offer.
Cons Compared to WooCommerce
As BigCommerce is a self-hosted solution, it gives you limited control and flexibility over your site design. It also offers fixed pricing plans, limited themes, and integration apps, which can stunt your store’s growth.
On the other hand, WooCommerce is completely free and offers full control over your website. However, you will have to face scalability challenges as your site grows.
We recommend BigCommerce if you are a beginner and want to easily start your online store on a self-hosted platform that manages all the security, scalability, and backups for your site.
BigCommerce has a drag-and-drop builder, reporting and analytics, social media integration, customer management, and premade templates that can help you launch an online store of any size in just a few minutes.
It lets you create an online payment form, has premade templates, comes with a discount coupon codes field, and lets you collect payments from gateways like Klarna, AliPay, Affirm, and more.
When Is WP Simple Pay a Better Solution Than WooCommerce?
If you want to add a simple payment form to your site and accept Stripe payments, then WP Simple Pay is your go-to solution.
The plugin can be used to accept consultation fees, organize fundraisers and donations, or for small businesses like cleaning service subscriptions, dance lessons, landscaping, martial arts lessons, laundry service payments, and more.
It can also work if you have a very small online store with a limited product catalog.
Additionally, WP Simple Pay can integrate with other tools like WooCommerce Shipping, FunnelKit Automations, EDD, or WPCode to create an automated workflow.
You can also schedule your payment forms, customize the payment page, and send email notifications as a payment receipt to customers.
Cons Compared to WooCommerce
WP Simple Pay is not a complete eCommerce plugin. It is a simple solution that accepts Stripe payments and is only recommended if you want to sell services instead of multiple products on your online store.
On the other hand, WooCommerce is a fleshed-out eCommerce platform that lets you manage your product inventory, add different payment gateways, and create a scalable online store.
We recommend WP Simple Pay because it is completely secure and makes it easy to sell online.
If you sell services, want to accept donations, or take registration fees from users, then WP Simple Pay is the best solution because it comes with premade templates, different payment methods, and recurring payments.
However, if you want to build an online store that sells physical products, then you should opt for WooCommerce or another alternative.
What Are the Best WooCommerce Alternatives?
Finding a better eCommerce solution than WooCommerce is not difficult if you know exactly what you need as an online business owner.
We recommend MemberPress for creating a fully functional membership site. It’s user-friendly and works with WordPress out of the box.
And if you want to sell digital products with better features and flexibility, then Easy Digital Downloads is the right provider.
There are many other WooCommerce alternatives that we didn’t mention in this list to avoid confusion. For example, you could use BigCommerce, Magento, Ecwid, Opencart, or Square.
These can be good eCommerce solutions, but we wanted to share only the best WooCommerce alternatives for beginners and small business owners.
We hope this article helped you learn about the best WooCommerce alternatives and when they can be a better solution. You may also want to see our other guides about WooCommerce, online businesses, and eCommerce sites.
Frequently Asked Questions
Here is a list of some questions frequently asked by our users about WooCommerce alternatives.
What is the cheapest way to sell on WordPress?
If you want to start an online store to sell physical products but have a shoestring budget, then you can use WooCommerce because it is completely free and easy to use.
Similarly, you can also accept payments for your services with WPForms Lite, which is free.
Can WooCommerce handle high traffic?
WooCommerce itself can handle a high amount of traffic on your website. However, several other factors can influence the store’s ability, including your hosting service, site optimization, themes or plugins, and custom code.
If you are still doubtful about WooCommerce’s ability to handle traffic, then you can opt for a self-hosted platform like Shopify or BigCommerce. These platforms will manage the hosting, site speed, and backups all by themselves, and you won’t have to worry about a thing.
Is there a better option than WooCommerce?
WooCommerce is the most popular eCommerce platform for WordPress because it is free, easy to use, and completely customizable.
However, considering the type of products or services that you want to sell, WooCommerce may not be the best option for you.
For example, if you want to sell ebooks, then Easy Digital Downloads is a better option than WooCommerce because it is specifically designed for selling digital downloads.
Similarly, if you want to start a wholesale store that sells products to other online stores, then Magento would be better to help you manage your large inventory and high traffic volume.
On the other hand, if you want to accept donations, host fundraisers, or accept fees for your services, then adding a simple payment form with WPForms or WP Simple Pay is the better choice.
Are you wondering if WordPress is good for eCommerce and what the pros and cons are?
WordPress is the most popular website builder platform and is the most recommended platform to start an eCommerce business.
In this article, we’ll explore if WordPress is good for eCommerce and what the pros and cons of using it are.
Why Use WordPress for E-commerce?
WordPress is the world’s most popular website builder, powering more than 43.1% of all websites on the internet. A large number of these websites are eCommerce stores.
The massive popularity of WordPress makes it the most recommended eCommerce platform to start your business.
Some of the most compelling reasons for using WordPress for eCommerce are:
Freedom – You own your eCommerce store, and no third party controls how you run it.
Massive community – Using WordPress, you become part of a huge online community of business owners running their businesses on WordPress.
Wider Availability – WordPress supports more payment gateways than any other eCommerce platform. It also supports multilingual eCommerce stores in most currencies and locales.
Growth Hacking – Being the most popular solution, it has integrations for most marketing and growth hacking tools you may need. This makes it super easy for you to grow your eCommerce business over time.
For more details, look at our complete WordPress review for more in-depth coverage of its advantages and disadvantages.
What are The Pros and Cons of Using WordPress for E-commerce?
Like every business decision, you would want to consider the pros and cons of using WordPress as your eCommerce platform.
Let’s look at some of the most important pros and cons of using WordPress for your eCommerce business.
Pros of Using WordPress for Ecommerce:
1. WordPress is Free
WordPress software is available for free. You can download, customize, and use it anywhere you want.
You’ll still need to pay for eCommerce hosting, domain name, and add-ons. For more on this topic, see our explainer on why is WordPress free, what the costs are, and what’s the actual catch.
2. Zero Transaction Fees
Unlike most other eCommerce platforms, WordPress does not charge you for transactions. The only fees you pay for transactions are to your payment service provider (Stripe, PayPal, etc.) and your bank.
3. You Control The Costs
With WordPress, you control the costs. You can choose your hosting service, premium add-ons, and marketing tools.
With this freedom, you save a ton of start-up money, which you can then invest in growing your business and making more sales. For more details, see our article on the cost of building an eCommerce website.
4. Thousands of Plugins
WordPress has over 59,000 free plugins. Think of plugins as apps for your eCommerce website. You can install one when you need a certain feature, like adding a contact form or customizing the shopping cart experience, among others.
With so much choice, you can add almost any feature to your eCommerce store with just a few clicks. Look at our expert pick of the best eCommerce plugins for WordPress for some inspiration.
5. Countless Payment Gateways
WordPress supports all popular payment gateways like Stripe, PayPal, Authorize.net, and more. It also supports lesser-known payment services and countless regional payment service providers.
You can add as many products to your website as you want and make as many sales as you can. Unlike many other eCommerce platforms, WordPress doesn’t restrict you to a set number of products or sales.
8. You Own and Control Your Website
Many online eCommerce platforms have terms and conditions that allow them to shut down your eCommerce website at any time, with or without a reason. They can hold your data and any unprocessed transactions.
With WordPress, you own and control your website. Even if, in rare circumstances, a hosting company terminates your account, you can easily use a backup to transfer your website to a different hosting company. You own all your data, transactions, and payments.
Cons of Using WordPress for Ecommerce
Now, so far, we have covered the advantages of using WordPress and they are plentiful.
However, WordPress has its disadvantages as well, and it is best to keep them in mind.
1. Comes with a Slight Learning Curve
WordPress comes with a slight learning curve. Like any new software you use for your business, you’ll need to familiarize yourself with WordPress and how it works.
Luckily, WPBeginner got you covered. We have free step-by-step WordPress video tutorials made specifically for WordPress beginners. These courses will get you up to speed much more quickly.
Most beginners who start a WordPress business quickly graduate to advanced-level users with some hands-on practice.
2. You Manage The Software Updates and Backups
Like any software or app, WordPress regularly releases updates. As the website owner, you are responsible for installing these updates to keep your website secure and access the latest features.
It is just as easy to install updates in WordPress as on your phone or computer. You’ll get a notification about a new version, and then you just click a button to install it.
Similarly, you are also responsible for keeping backups of your website. This allows you to easily move your website, secure your data, or restore it in case of a hosting failure.
Luckily, there are excellent backup plugins for WordPress, like the Duplicator Pro. Once properly set up, it will automatically make regular backups and store them on the cloud.
It will also help you restore your website with just a few clicks or move it to a different hosting company if needed.
3. Scalability May Increase Costs
We recommend all new businesses start with a low-cost hosting plan from companies like Bluehost and Hostinger.
Unlike other eCommerce platforms, this flexibility helps you save a ton of money when starting your business.
However, as your business grows, your website will need more server resources. You’ll need to upgrade to a managed hosting service like SiteGround or WP Engine.
This will increase your costs. However, the upside is that your business will now be able to afford these extra costs, and it will still be cheaper than other eCommerce service providers.
4. You Are Responsible for Security
Like updates and backups, you are responsible for keeping your website secure.
Now, this may sound a bit tricky, but luckily, many WordPress hosting companies also take excellent measures to protect sites hosted on their servers from malicious attacks.
Both, Cloudflare and Sucuri provide a website firewall that blocks malicious traffic even before it reaches your website.
What Kind of Ecommerce Solutions Available in WordPress?
When comparing eCommerce platforms, you’ll notice some of them are good for selling specific types of products and not so great with others.
For instance, Shopify is great for selling physical products that require shipping but not for selling online courses.
In comparison, WordPress is the only eCommerce platform that is equally great for selling all types of products and services using its powerful add-ons.
Here are some of the top eCommerce solutions you can use with WordPress, depending on your business.
WooCommerce – Available as a free WordPress plugin, WooCommerce is the world’s #1 eCommerce platform. It allows you to create any type of online store and can be used to sell physical goods as well as digital products.
MemberPress – A powerful eCommerce solution that helps you sell subscription based products like online courses, premium content, pay-per-view website, memberships for communities, and more.
Easy Digital Downloads – Made specifically for selling digital products like software, ebooks, music, digital art, and more.
WP Simple Pay – Selling a handful of products or services? WP Simple Pay makes it easy to accept online payments without using a shopping cart plugin on your website.
WP Forms Payments – Allows you to accept online payments by creating your own custom payment forms. Perfect for selling individual products, services, online bookings, and more.
How Does WordPress Compare to Other Ecommerce Platforms?
WordPress compares neck and neck with all top eCommerce platforms and outperforms them in flexibility, cost-effectiveness, and broader availability.
What Does WordPress Do Better than Other Ecommerce Platforms?
WordPress is better at saving you costs when starting an eCommerce business. You can start with the bare minimum and only pay for tools/services you need.
WordPress doesn’t charge you for individual transactions. This makes it easy for you to create a sustainable business plan for growth in the long run.
It doesn’t limit the number of products or sales you can make. Many top eCommerce platforms will force you to upgrade your plan once you reach a certain threshold of products or sales.
You own all your website and its data and can move it to any other hosting platform or eCommerce solution when you need it.
For details, take a look at these comparisons with individual platforms.
How to Start an Ecommerce Business with WordPress?
To start your eCommerce business with WordPress, you’ll need to make a WordPress website.
There are two types of WordPress available.
First, there is WordPress.org, which is the WordPress software that we talked about in this article and what we recommend. Then, there is WordPress.com, which is a hosted website platform like Wix or Squarespace. For details, see our article on WordPress.com vs. WordPress.org.
To start with WordPress.org, you’ll need a hosting account and a domain name.
Normally, pricing for starter hosting plans starts at $7.99 per month (usually paid annually), and domain name costs around $16.99 per year.
Luckily, Bluehost has agreed to offer WPBeginner users a generous discount on hosting with a free domain name. Basically, you can get started for $2.75 per month.
If you sign up with Bluehost, they will automatically install WordPress for you. All other hosting companies also offer a 1-click WordPress installer, which you can find under your hosting account.
By selling your books as downloadable audio files, you can make money without having to pay for shipping or printing. You can also sell the same audio file an unlimited number of times.
In this article, we will show you how to easily sell audiobooks online using WordPress.
Another option is recording that information as an audiobook. This is a great way to collect everything you want to say into a single, downloadable file that’s easy to distribute and sell to other people.
Unlike traditional printed books, you don’t have to pay printing or shipping fees for your audiobooks. You also don’t have to worry about physical storage, supplies, or managing your inventory. All of this means lower costs and bigger profits, which makes audiobooks the perfect way to make money online with WordPress.
If you have an ebook, then there are plenty of services that can help you turn it into an audiobook including ACX. Every audiobook you make on ACX will be available on Audible.com, Amazon.com, and iTunes, but it’s also a good idea to add the audiobook to your own website.
With that in mind, let’s see how you can sell audiobooks online. Simply use the quick links below to jump straight to the method you want to use.
Unlike general eCommerce plugins, Easy Digital Downloads has the specific features you need to promote, sell, and distribute digital products with ease. This means you don’t have to waste time and effort with unnecessary settings, such as configuring your store’s shipping.
Even better, if you’re using SiteGround then Easy Digital Downloads already comes pre-installed on their EDD plan, so you can start using it straight away.
Upon activation, go to Downloads » Settings in the WordPress dashboard.
Even though you’re selling audiobooks, you’ll need to set your store’s location. This allows Easy Digital Downloads to auto-fill some fields in the order form, which will help improve the customer experience.
Easy Digital Downloads also uses your location to calculate sales tax.
To add your location, simply open the ‘Business Country’ dropdown menu. You can then choose where your business is based.
Next, find the ‘Business Region’ field.
Here you can open the dropdown and choose the region where your store operates from.
After making these changes, go ahead and click on Save Changes to store your settings.
In the Payment Gateways section, check the box next to each gateway that you want to add to your WordPress blog or website.
If you add more than one payment method, then you’ll need to choose a default gateway.
You can use any gateway you want, but Stripe can accept credit cards as well as Apple Pay and Google Pay. This is why we recommend using Stripe as the default payment gateway.
With that done, click on the ‘Save Changes’ button.
You’ll now see some new tabs where you can configure each payment method.
Configuring the payment gateway will be slightly different depending on which gateway you’re using, but Easy Digital Downloads will walk you through the process.
Once you’ve set up at least one payment gateway, you’re ready to start uploading audiobooks to your WordPress website.
To create a digital product, select Downloads from the left-hand menu. Then, click on the ‘Add New’ button.
You can now type a name for the product into the ‘Enter download name here’ field. This will appear on the audiobook’s page, so you’ll want to use something that catches the visitor’s attention and accurately describes the book.
Next, type out the description that will appear on the ebook’s product page. You’ll want to give visitors all the information they need to decide whether this book is right for them.
Many online stores use product categories and tags to help shoppers find what they’re looking for. If you’re selling lots of audiobooks, then these categories and tags help visitors find related audiobooks, which can get you more sales.
You can create new categories and tags in the Categories and Tags boxes.
Next, you’ll want to set a price by scrolling to the Download Prices section. Here, type in how much visitors will pay to download the audiobook.
You’re now ready to upload the audio file that you want to sell. When it comes to audio, WordPress supports mp3, ogg, and wav. It also supports m4a, although this format may not work on all browsers.
In the File Name field, type a name for the file that shoppers will get when they buy the audiobook. Then, simply click on ‘Upload a File.’
You can now choose any audio file from the WordPress media library, or you can upload a new audiobook from your computer.
Finally, you’ll need to add a product image, which will usually be your audiobook’s front cover. Simply scroll to the Download Image section and then click on the ‘Set Download Image’ link.
This launches the WordPress media library where you can choose an image or upload a new file from your computer.
When you’re happy with your digital download, click on the Publish button to make it live.
Easy Digital Downloads will now create the audiobook as a downloadable product, but visitors still need a way to access the product page.
This might mean adding the page to your website’s menu, creating a sales page where you advertise all your audiobooks, or even adding the book to a custom home page.
No matter what method you choose, you’ll need to know the audiobook’s URL.
To get this link, simply go to Downloads » Downloads. Then, find the audiobook you just created, and click on its ‘Edit’ link.
You will then find the URL directly below the product title.
Now, you can link to this product page from any area of your website, simply by using its URL. To learn more, see our step-by-step guide on how to add a link in WordPress.
Easy Digital Downloads also creates a ‘Purchase’ button for this particular audiobook. Visitors can click this button to add the audiobook to their cart.
You can add the button for this book to any page, post, or widget-ready area. This allows visitors to start the purchasing process without even Needing to visit the individual product’s page.
To get the audiobook’s shortcode, simply scroll to its Download Settings section. You can then copy the text in the ‘Purchase Shortcode’ field.
Every time someone buys an audiobook from your website, Easy Digital Downloads will send them an email and download link.
While this email has everything the customer needs to access their download, it’s a good idea to customize it. For example, we recommend adding your own logo and branding.
To customize the default email, simply go to Downloads » Settings. Then click on the ‘Emails’ tab.
When you’ve finished making changes, you may want to send a test email so you can see how the message will look to your customers.
To do this, simply click on the ‘Send Test Email’ button and Easy Digital Downloads will send an email to your admin email address.
Have you clicked on the ‘Send Test Email’ button, but haven’t got a test email? If your site isn’t sending emails correctly, then customers won’t be able to download your audiobook.
When you’re happy with how the email looks, you can go ahead and click on the ‘Save Changes’ button.
This is all you need to start selling audiobooks online. However, Easy Digital Downloads has lots more advanced features that can help you sell audiobooks.
Method 2. How to Sell Audiobook Memberships (Best for Recurring Revenue)
Another option is using your audiobooks to create recurring revenue streams.
For example, you might offer members unlimited monthly or annual access to all your audiobooks for a membership fee. In this way, you can get reliable recurring revenue over a longer period of time.
A membership site is also a great choice if you’re releasing your audiobooks as a series.
If you want to get recurring revenue, then MemberPress is the best WordPress membership plugin. It allows you to accept payments, create an unlimited number of membership levels, restrict access to audiobook pages based on membership subscription, and more.
Upon activation, go to the MemberPress » Settings page to configure the plugin settings.
To start, you’ll need to set up a payment gateway.
Out of the box, MemberPress supports PayPal (Standard, Express, and Pro), Stripe, and Authorize.net. You simply need to select the payment method you want to use and then type in the required credentials, such as your PayPal email address.
You may want to add multiple methods, so members can use their preferred gateway. When that’s done, don’t forget to click on the Update Options button to save your settings.
With the setup out of the way, it’s time to create one or more membership levels. These are the subscriptions that visitors will buy to access your audiobooks, or other content.
MemberPress allows you to offer different content for different membership levels. For example, you might create Bronze, Silver, and Gold memberships and then give members access to different audiobooks.
To create the first membership plan, go to the MemberPress » Memberships page and then click on the ‘Add New’ button.
On the next screen, you’ll need to provide a title for the membership plan and then add details in the post editor.
After that, you can set the pricing, billing type, interval, and expiration under the ‘Membership Terms’ section.
Next, scroll to the Membership Options box below the editor.
Here, you can customize the plan permissions and membership options.
When you’re happy with how the plan is set up, go ahead and click on ‘Publish.’ To create more membership levels, simply repeat the same process described above.
Once you’ve created all the membership levels, it’s time to add some access rules. These allow you to restrict access to your audiobooks based on the user’s membership plan.
Just go to MemberPress » Rules and then click on the Add New button.
Here, you can create all kinds of access rules, but you’ll typically start by selecting the audiobook that you want to restrict access to.
Under ‘Protected Content,’ open the dropdown menu and choose an option from the list. This might be the specific page where you embedded the audio file, content that has a particular tag, or any other option from the list.
After that, open the ‘Access Conditions’ dropdown and choose ‘Membership.’
In the second dropdown menu, select the membership level people will need in order to access this content.
There are more settings that you can configure, but this is all you need to create a simple access rule.
When you’re happy with how the rule is set up, click on ‘Save Rule.’ To create more access rules, simply follow the same process described above.
Now that everything is set up, you’ll need to make sure visitors can buy memberships and log into their accounts. Thankfully, MemberPress comes with ready-made forms that you can add to your site.
We recommend adding the MemberPress login widget to a widget-ready area, so members can log in from any page.
Simply head over to Appearance » Widgets and add the ‘MemberPress login’ widget to the sidebar or similar section.
Don’t forget to click on the ‘Update’ button to save your widget settings.
There are a few different ways to add a signup page to your website, but MemberPress automatically creates a registration page for each membership level. This means you can simply add these pages to your main navigation menu.
In your WordPress dashboard, go to Appearance »Menus. In the left-hand menu, simply click to expand the ‘Memberships’ section.
You’ll now see a list of all the different MemberPress levels.
To add a membership to the navigation menu, simply check the box next to it and then select ‘Add to menu.’
When you’re happy with how the menu is set up, click on ‘Save Menu.’
At this point, you’ve created a website where visitors can buy audiobook subscriptions. However, MemberPress has lots more settings you can use to sell audiobooks, grow your brand, and get more members.
Method 3. How to Sell Audiobooks With WooCommerce (Best For Online Stores)
Easy Digital Downloads makes it easy to sell audiobooks on any WordPress blog or website, without you having to configure lots of unnecessary settings like shipping and handling.
However, if you’ve already created a WooCommerce store, then you can sell digital products like audiobooks using this popular eCommerce plugin.
Although it’s mostly used to sell physical products, you can add support for digital products by going to WooCommerce »Settings and then clicking on the ‘Products’ tab.
Here, click on the ‘Downloadable products’ link.
You can now open the ‘File download method’ dropdown and choose an option from the list.
When you’re selling digital downloads, there is a risk that customers may share the direct link with other people. This allows people to download your audiobook without paying.
‘Force Downloads’ helps to protect your site from direct linking, so it’s the recommended method. However, just be aware that very large files may result in a timeout, especially if your server has limited resources.
If this happens, then you may need to change your WordPress hosting plan or select a different file download method.
You may also want to enable the checkbox next to ‘Allow using redirect mode (insecure) as a last resort.’ If WooCommerce encounters any problems, then this setting will deliver the audiobook via an unsecured redirect link rather than showing an error.
This is a much better customer experience.
The second option is ‘X-Accel-Redirect/X-Sendfile,’ which serves the file directly to the customer. This protects the audiobook from unauthorized downloads without impacting your site’s performance.
However, this method requires you to install and enable the X-Accel-Redirect/X-Sendfile module on your server, so it’s not very beginner-friendly. Depending on your plan, you may also need to speak to your WooCommerce hosting provider.
The final option is ‘Redirect only,’ which uses a direct link to the file. This means your audiobook isn’t protected and anyone can access it using the URL. That said, we don’t recommend the ‘Redirect only’ method.
After selecting a download method, you can choose whether visitors must be logged into an account in order to download the audiobook.
To make this decision, either enable or disable the ‘Downloads require login’ checkbox.
By default, customers can download the audiobook while their order is processing.
If you want to wait until the order is complete, then uncheck the following box: ‘Grant access to downloadable products after payment.’
By default, WooCommerce will download the audiobook to the customer’s computer.
Most of the time this is the best customer experience, but you can set the file to open in a new tab instead. The customer can then decide whether they want to save the file.
There are some use cases where this may be the better option. For example, if you’re showing the customer a free sample, or your audiobooks are short enough to enjoy in one sitting.
In this case, you may want to check the box next to ‘Open downloadable files in the browser.’
When you’re happy with the settings you’ve entered, click on ‘Save Changes.’
With that done, you’re ready to add the audiobook as a downloadable product by going to Products »Add New. Here, you can type in a title, add a description, upload a product image, and set the price as normal.
Then, scroll to ‘Product Data’ and check the box next to ‘Downloadable,’ which adds some new settings.
To start, click on ‘Add File.’
You can now either choose the audiobook from your media library or upload a new file from your computer.
After that, type in a filename for the audiobook.
By default, customers can download the audiobook as many times as they want, for as long as they want.
If you want to limit the number of downloads per customer, then type a number into the ‘Download limit’ field.
If you want the download link to expire after a certain number of days has passed, then type a number into the ‘Download expiry’ field.
When you’re happy with how the audiobook is set up, click on the ‘Publish’ button. The audiobook will now appear as a downloadable product on your online store.
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The eCommerce market is emerging intensely on the entire web from the last decade. There’s no doubt that the eCommerce businesses are focusing on the future with the latest trends and approaches. Let’s say you’ve found the right product. The next thing that comes to your mind before starting an eCommerce business is to choose […]
Do you want to create an online marketplace using WordPress? An online marketplace website allows users to buy and sell items by setting up their own mini-stores within your eCommerce platform.
It allows you to make money by sharing your online marketplace platform. Due to low overhead costs, it has become a popular online business idea.
In this article, we will show you how to easily create an online marketplace using WordPress without spending thousands of dollars.
What Do You Need to Start an Online Marketplace using WordPress?
First, you need to make sure that you are using the right website platform, and since you’re reading this article, you’re in the right place.
There are two types of WordPress available: WordPress.com vs WordPress.org. One is a limited blog hosting service while the other is known as the self-hosted WordPress which you’ve likely heard tons about. See the full comparison between WordPress.com vs WordPress.org.
We recommend using WordPress.org because it gives you the freedom and access to all WordPress features out of the box.
You will need the following items to build an online marketplace website using self-hosted WordPress.
A domain name (For example, wpbeginner.com)
Web hosting account (This is where your website’s files are stored)
The entire setup can take up to 40 minutes, and we will walk you through every step one by one.
Ready? Let’s get started.
Step 1. Setting up Your Ecommerce Platform
The first step is to buy a domain name and a web hosting account. You don’t just need a web hosting, but you will need a service that specializes in WooCommerce hosting because this is the software that we will be using as our eCommerce platform.
Typically a domain name costs $14.99/year, web hosting 7.99/month, and SSL certificate 69.99/year.
Now, this seems like a lot of money if you are just starting out.
Fortunately, Bluehost an officially recommended WordPress and WooCommerce hosting provider has agreed to offer our users free domain + SSL and discount on their cloud WordPress hosting.
Once you have purchased hosting, then follow our step by step tutorial on how to start an online store for complete setup instructions.
You would now have a WordPress website with WooCommerce installed on it.
However, by default WooCommerce assumes that your website is a single vendor website, so it is not possible for other users to add their own products and services to your website.
Let’s change this.
Step 2. Turn Your WooCommerce Site into an Online Marketplace
WC Vendors is a marketplace solution for WooCommerce. It simplifies building a marketplace website by turning WooCommerce into a multi-vendor platform.
Each vendor can sell their products while you keep full control of the website as the marketplace owner. You can choose your own business model, payment methods, product types, and more.
Upon activation, head over to WC Vendors » Settings page to configure marketplace settings.
First, you will see the general items. You need to make sure that the ‘Vendor Registration’ box is checked to allow users to sign up as Vendor on your website.
You can review other items on the page and then click on the ‘Save Changes’ button to store your settings.
Next, you need to click on the ‘Commission’ tab to set a commission rate for vendors across your website. This is the amount you’ll pay to the vendor for each sale.
Note: The global commission rate can be overridden for individual vendors and products.
Next, you need to click on the ‘Capabilities’ tab to set sitewide rules for vendors. This part of settings comes with three sections.
The general capabilities include allowing vendors to view and edit products and orders. The default options would work for most sites.
Next, switch to the ‘Products’ section and from here you can select which type of products vendors can add. For example, you can limit vendors to only add digital downloads or a physical product.
You can also select which data Vendors can see and use on the ‘Add Products’ page.
Lastly, switch to the ‘Orders’ section under ‘Capabilities’ to select what information vendors can see about the orders.
After setting up the capabilities, it is time to set up marketplace related pages on your website.
Switch to the ‘Display’ tab under plugin settings to set up pages. You can simply go to Pages » Add New to create a new page for each item and add the shortcode displayed in the settings to the page’s content area.
After creating all the pages and adding shortcodes to them, you can select them here.
Below the pages, you will also find ‘Store settings’ option on the same page. This where you can select a prefix to use in Vendor shop URLs, allow them to set custom headers for their shop pages, and use HTML in shop description.
Next step is to set up payments for your vendors. Most marketplace websites set a minimum threshold for their vendors and pay them on a monthly or weekly basis.
We recommend using manual payments to vendors as this gives customers enough time to request refunds or give feedback about the products.
However, if you want to payment withdrawal system for vendors, then you can buy premium add-ons. WC Vendors has add-ons available for Stripe, MangoPay, Escrow, and Manual Payouts.
Depending on the payment gateway you choose, you will need to set up a payment gateway by entering your API keys. Don’t forget to click on the ‘Save Changes’ button to store your settings.
Now that WC Vendors is ready, let’s set up WooCommerce for a multi-vendor environment.
Step 3. Enable Account Management in WooCommerce
First you need to visit WooCommerce » Settings page and click on the ‘Accounts’ tab. From here you need to check the boxes next to customer registration option.
Don’t forget to save your changes.
Step 4. Setting Up Navigation Menus
Now that your multi-vendor marketplace setup is finished. It is time to make it easy for your users to find their way around your website.
To do that, go to Appearance » Menus page. From here you need to add your user account and checkout pages to the navigation menu.
Don’t forget to click on the ‘Save Menu’ button to store your changes. For more detailed instructions, see our guide on how to add navigation menus in WordPress.
If you don’t have a My Account page, then simply create a new page in WordPress and add the following shortcode in the post editor
. [woocommerce_my_account]
Step 5. Testing Your Marketplace Website
Your online marketplace website is now ready for testing. You can visit your website in a new browser window and create a new account by clicking on the My Account link at the top.
From here, both customers and vendors can log in to their accounts as well as create a new account.
Once users create a new account, you will receive an email notification. If you are unable to receive email notifications, then take a look at our guide on how to fix WordPress not sending email issue.
You can also view new vendor applications by visiting Users » All Users page. You will see all new vendor requests as ‘pending vendor’, and you can approve or deny applications by clicking the link under their username.
Once approved, these vendors can log in to their accounts and add their products by visiting their vendor dashboard. They can also view their orders and sales reports.
The first thing your vendors need to do is to set up their shop settings by clicking on the ‘Store Settings’ link.
Depending on the payment methods you set up, they will need to provide their PayPal or Stripe email address to receive payments. They will also be able to provide bank account information for direct manual payments.
Once a vendor adds a new product, you will get a notification email and see an icon next to the products menu. You can then edit a product, approve it, or delete it.
Your shop page will clearly show the products sold by vendor’s shop name.
Step 6. Growing your Online Marketplace Website
First, you may want to choose a design for your marketplace website. WordPress comes with thousands of free and paid themes but not all of them are eCommerce ready.
See our pick of the best WooCommerce themes to find a suitable theme for your marketplace platform.
You would want to track which products are getting more traffic and which vendors are bringing more users. For that you will need to enable customer tracking in WooCommerce on your website.
The biggest hurdle in growing any eCommerce website is abandoned cart sales. Learn how to recover abandoned cart sales like a pro to increase your profits.
We hope this article helped you learn how to create an online marketplace using WordPress. You may also want to see our ultimate WooCommerce SEO guide to get search traffic to your website.
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