Passive income for designers

What is passive income?

A lot of creatives wish they had more reliable income in their business without having to work longer hours. Passive income refers to any source of income that you create once and then sell to a large number of people without much extra effort. You can create classes, sell prints or even offer a membership. The key is that you spend most of you time upfront creating something valuable that you can then sell for a long time.

The word passive can sometimes be a little misleading. All passive income requires a little bit of marketing and the occasional update, but compared to client work, they are all much less involved once it is all set up.

I have experimented with a lot of different types of passive income for my branding business in the last five years. Even more since we had our first baby and wanted more freedom and flexibility in our day to day. I will share everything I have learned and what I wish I knew five years ago.

We will look at different types of passive income, how to pick the right one for you and what to think about to make it a success.

OVERVIEW:

• Benefits if passive income

• How to find the right type of passive income for your business

• Selling templates, mockups and graphics

• Courses

• Memberships

• Youtube

• Selling prints

• Affiliate marketing

• Should you sell under the same brand as your client work?

Benefits of passive income

More reliable income

With client work, you often have times when you are really busy and times when things are more quiet. With passive income, you have a steady source of income in the background that takes away some of the stress. This means that you have more freedom to try new things and you can be more selective of which clients you work with.

It can scale easily without you spending more time

A key benefit of passive income is that no matter if you sell to one person or a hundred, the effort needed from you stays more or less the same. This means you can scale your passive income without having to hire staff or work longer hours.

Makes you more resilient

The more sources of income you have, the more resilient are you when things change. If you need to take a holiday, fall ill or the market changes and you no longer have as many clients, your passive income provides a bit of safety.

Rewarding and creative

Your passive income can be your passion project! If you love making videos, graphics or teach, find a source of passive income that matches what you enjoy. If you are just exploring passive income, try to give yourself time and see what feels right and what works. The less stress, the better.

How to find the right type of passive income for your business

When it comes to picking the type of passive income you want to focus on, start with what you know.

The more comfortable you already are with the skills needed, the more likely are you to enjoy the work and see good results. If you have never filmed a video, you can still make a course but it may be a steeper learning curve. My first source of passive income was online courses and since I did not have a film background, it took me a few months to figure out how to create the quality I was looking for.

You also want to think about how people will find out about your passive income. In some cases, you can use the organic traffic of sites that list your work. For example, I initially listed my course on Teachable, a platform for course creators. However, since I had to drive all the traffic, I had a hard time getting customers. When I listed the same course on Skillshare, people who are already on the platform found my courses and watched my videos.

If you already have a big following on social media, this might not be a big concern, but if you want to limit the amount of time you spend on marketing, research how each site works before you pick one.

Types of passive income

Selling templates, mockups and graphics

If you work in graphic design, illustration, photography or web design, there is an almost endless list of work you can sell on sites like Creative Market. If creatives or clients need it, you can sell it.

Some things to keep in mind.

• Check what percentage of the sales you get

• Check if you need to give the site exclusive access to the work or if you can sell your work in multiple places (including your own website for example).

• Get familiar with the vetting process. Are there any rules your work needs to follow?

Before you decide what to sell and where, have a look at the other work on the site. What is popular? What do the prices look like and how much time would it take you to create a competing product? Since we want this to become a second source of income, we want to find a type of product and place to post that will fit your skills and the time you have to spend.

Here are some great sites where you can list your work:

• Creative Market - illustrations, templates, graphics, photography and fonts (and much more)

• Freepik - vectors and photography

Selling courses

Courses are my personal favorite way to earn passive income.

When I first got started, I felt a little intimidated and like I had to be a seasoned expert to teach something. The truth is, you just need to know more than the people you are selling to and have a clear and engaging way of teaching.

When you create a course, a few things have to be in place.

• You have a well defined topic that you know a lot about and that people are interested in

• You have a well structured format that makes sense to viewers

• Your video quality is good

• Your audio quality is good

• Bonus if you have a way to encourage your students to take action (a workbook, challenge etc.)

When I say ‘good’ audio and video quality, some might feel a little intimidated. Having really poor video or audio quality can prevent students from signing up, but there is a point where the quality is good enough that you wont notice much difference if you improve it further. In most cases, recording in a room with a lot of natural light and soft furnishings to soften the sound works a charm. If you have a camera and mic, go for it but many creators record classes with their phone.

It is worth trying out the options you already have before purchasing any equipment.

So how do you sell your course?

There are three main ways to sell your course.

• On your own website

• On a course site where you sell your course for a set price

• On a course site where the viewers already have a subscription

If you sell on your own website, you need to drive traffic to the course sales page. This is also largely true for some course sites like Teachable. For sites where viewers already have a subscription, like Skillshare, you can often get visitors from people searching the site.

The way you get paid is also a little different depending on where you host your course.

If you host your course on your own website, you can set your own price and way of collecting payments. If you use a course site, you either get paid per signup or per minute watched. Some sites let you set whatever price you like and some make recommendations for what price ranges typically work.

Ready to make a course? Here are some great course sites where you can list your course (and get inspired)

• Skillshare - subscribers watch the courses and you get a royalty (a % of their subscription fee)

• Teachable - you list your course for a set price and mainly drive your own traffic

• Udemy - you get paid per student and can benefit from their large audience

• Domestica - courses for creatives - you apply to become a teacher

Memberships

If you have knowledge or products that others are interested in, you can create a membership. It can seem daunting or like you have to create a lot of content, but it can actually be really easy to set up.

Typically members pay a monthly fee to access your content, but you can also charge a lifetime fee if you prefer. The benefit of getting paid from customers on a monthly basis is that your income becomes much more predictable.

There are many different ways to host your membership. If you want to keep it really simple, you can use a private Facebook group to post videos, helpful resources and give advice. As someone makes a payment through your website, you can add them to the group.

If you want to have a more branded experience or include something that is not possible on Facebook, you can have a members area on your own site. This is easy to set up if you use Wix or Squarespace. I run a branding studio for sustainable businesses and we created a membership for small businesses to create their own brand. Since we use Webflow for our website, we used Memberstack and I found it incredibly easy to use.

Before you launch your membership, decide on what you are offering and why someone would like to become a member (and stay one!). If you offer a monthly membership, it is a good idea to think about the type of content you will be creating and when and how it will be posted.

To make this a little more concrete, I will share our schedule for the membership as an example. We have one challenge each month where we have prerecorded a video and members complete a task. Members also get access to a bank of helpful content and a private Facebook group.

• 1st of the month - Email announcing the monthly challenge

• 2nd of the month - Facebook post welcoming new members

• 5th of the month - Facebook post with helpful tips for moving your business forward

• 7th of the month - Facebook post prompting members to ask questions about the challenge

• 10th of the month - Get it done day - Facebook post where members post their goals

• 14th of the month - Facebook live answering questions about the monthly challenge

• 20th of the month - Post in the Facebook group: asking what content they want us to add to the membership site for next month.

• 24th of the month - Facebook post where members can find collaborators

• 27th of the month - Facebook post with helpful tips for moving your business forward

Even though it can look like a lot, almost everything can be created at once and scheduled weeks or months in advance. All we really need to do day-to-day is the actual live session and engaging with the members in the group.

If you want to launch a membership, the first thing you want to do as soon as you have your idea (even before you create anything) is to set up a landing page and an email list. This is especially true if members are expecting to interact with other members. Start telling your followers that you will be launching a membership and offer a founding member deal. This can be a discount, a chance to have a say in what content you create or a freebie. Make it easy and engaging for people to start this membership with you, it does not have to be big or perfect for you to launch.

Youtube

Most of us turn to Youtube to learn something new, have fun and get inspired. The great thing about Youtube is how easy it is to get started. Take out your phone or camera, record and then upload. However, making a passive income from Youtube is a long term project for a few different reasons which we will have a look at.

The way you make money on Youtube is mainly from ads, brand deals or using your audience to sell other things.

Let’s start with ads.

In order to get monetized on Youtube, you need at least 4000 hours watched in the last year (365 days) and 1000 subscribers. The more consistent you are and the better you understand what your viewers are interested in, the faster you will reach those numbers. According to Tubefilter, the average time it takes channels that post consistently to reach 1000 subscribers is 22 months.

Once you reach those numbers, you can apply to the partnership program and start earning money from your videos. Even thought this source of passive income might take a little longer to set up, a big upside is that videos are often watched months or even years after they were posted. This means that a video you create can keep generating revenue for a long time, compiling your efforts over time.

The next way you can earn money from your channel is through brand deals. If your channel has a clear focus and audience, brands might be interested in sponsoring a video. This typically means that you give the brand a shoutout in exchange for a pre-determined sum of money based on the expected number of views. Most brands are looking to work with more established channels with an engaged audience and you can expect to charge around $10 - $50 per 1000 views. Although this can be a great source of income, you don’t have to worry too much about brand deals until your channels has been around for a while.

Lastly, many Youtubers make money by promoting their other passive income streams or through affiliate marketing (getting a small percentage of the sale when you promote other brands). The great part about this revenue stream is that you can technically start seeing benefits from this right from the beginning, no need to wait until you have 1000 subscribers. If you don’t have another source of passive income, you can find clients for your creative business through your Youtube channel. Offer helpful tips that your clients are interested in, offer a free pdf or other freebie to join your email list and then build the relationship over time with a newsletter.

Youtube can be fun and a good source of passive income but since it needs a long term approach, I really suggest seeing the channel as a passion project and commit to a consistent schedule of posting at least once per week for at least 6 months before you expect any real results.

Selling prints

If you are an illustrator or graphic designer, selling prints can be a great source of passive income.

With prints, we are referring to any type of design that can either be printed on something (poster, stickers, phone cases etc.) or used digitally as screensavers or wallpapers. You can even sell printables for organising your work or planning out your food for the week. What you design is super flexible and completely up to you.

To sell your prints, you have a few different options.

• Sell through your own website

• Sell on sites like Etsy where you list your products

• Sell on sites like Society 6 where you upload your design and they print for you

Selling through your own site gives you more control and you don’t have to pay a listing fee or a percentage of the sale, but you have to drive all the traffic to your site yourself.

Here are a few quick tips to help your shop succeed

• Find your niche and make your shop feel consistent and targeted at a specific customer

• Spend some time uploading a nice photo of yourself and write a good bio

• Create a few pieces to start with so customers can have a look around

• Look into shipping options and VAT, what do you need to charge and declare

• Pick a strategy for social media - will you use a new account and what will you post?

When it comes to promoting your work, customers always love to learn more about your process and who you are. Pictures of work in progress, items being packed and shipped and videos of you talking about your work are always a hit! If you want to take it even further, studio vlogs are a great way to build your brand as a printmaker.

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Affiliate marketing

If you have a following on social media or a lot of traffic to your website, affiliate marketing is a great way of earning passive income.

This is how it works. You get a unique link from a brand or online site like Amazon. When you share the link and your followers buy something using your link, you get a small percentage of that sale.

A surprising number of brands actually offer affiliate marketing. My suggestion is to think about what sites and brands you already use and trust. Since you are recommending them to your followers, you want the sites to be reliable and relevant to your audience.

The more natural you can make it, the better.

For example, if you have a blogpost talking about your favourite business books, you can link each book to a site with an affiliate link. This way, if your reader wants to buy the book, it is easy for them and creates passive income for you. You might have noticed this is what we did when we linked to Skillshare earlier in this article. When you click our link and start a trial, it is a source of passive income for us since we have classes on Skillshare.

Since affiliate marketing relies on a larger audience (although you can start at any size), it is a great compliment to other sources of passive income.

Should you sell under the same brand as your client work?

You already have a brand, you have worked hard for it and now you are starting a new passive income stream. Should you create a new brand for your passive income or sell under your current brand name?

The simple answer is, if you have the same audience, keep everything under one brand. If not, create a new one.

For example, if you are videographer and you are creating Skillshare classes on making videos as your passive income, chances are your followers would love to watch them. However, if you are a videographer making printables for weekly recipes, maybe you need separate brands. Of course, it might not feel this cut and dry.

The goal is to not dilute our marketing with too many messages so it really depends on what your brand stands for. If you are seen as a specialist, you might want to keep your new passive income separate to keep that impression. If you are selling yourself more as a multidisciplinary creative, having everything in one place can make sense.

Many creatives choose to create a personal brand separate from their business. If you are creating classes or a Youtube channel, this can be a great way to build a more personal relationship with your followers that benefits both your passive income and your core business.

A great way to find out it what is best for you is to post about your passive income process, like creating the work and planning the new store, to your existing followers. If you feel like you get a good response and interest, you can always try to keep everything under one brand and see how it feels.

I hope this was helpful and that you feel excited to try out passive income, it really can be a life changer and give you more freedom to create. Let me know your passive income ideas in the comments!

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