hey what's up guys thank you for joining
me for a new video today i'm here with
tia tia tx on youtube thanks for uh
taking time out of your day to be here
with me
yeah no worries thank you i'm really
excited thanks yeah i wanted to learn
more about like your in general passive
income journey i know you do print on
demand i see you're on youtube um i love
the complimentary nature by the way of
basically
doing anything and then talking about it
on youtube and kind of building an
audience there so um yeah like how did
your passive income journey get started
i know you're a lot younger than me too
yeah so first of all i want to say a
massive thank you for all your content
because i've learned a lot um especially
on the etsy front um so it's been really
helpful and for me i'm a medical student
so
um i started this whole passive income
thing in high school uh well middle
school really when i was like 15. so the
first thing i was doing was selling my
revision notes on a website called
test.com which i talked about on my
channel and managed to make a decent
amount of money from that so i was just
looking uh constantly thinking about
other ways to make passive income online
and then um
looked around on youtube came across uh
like drop shipping and then i got really
like deep into drop shipping for about a
year um so start my own stores and then
like it didn't really work out the way i
planned it to because the profit margins
were kind of low and then i was losing
money in the end um but then i decided
to start
well i had stuff going on so like i had
high school and uni applications so i
had to stop doing all of that because i
was like a lot of customer requests and
stuff um and i think drop shipping is
really harder than it seems because
there's a lot of legal stuff involved as
well um so yeah i had to stop doing that
stuff and then took a break came back
um and i was looking for more sort of
flexible ways to make money online so
came across print on demand redbubble uh
your channel and other people's channels
talking about how they made money on it
and i thought it was really flexible way
to do it because the company handed
handles all of it so i just call it
essentially like branded drop shipping
um and that was how i was able to use
like the skills i guess i learned from
being in the e-commerce space for a
while um our transferable skills to
print on demand and
manage make sales
yeah i like that uh you're highlighting
the complementary nature of really just
spending time diving into launching any
e-commerce business like even if it ends
up not being a good fit
and in the end you know you can
pivot and get in you know you went from
drop shipping to what i call drop
shipped print on demand because it is
but it is drop shipped and uh you know a
lot of those skills and the comfort
level too even you know going from like
not having any experience like i have no
experience drop shipping i've got
friends that do it and they do it i have
some friends that do it like more
successfully than others but um you know
it just didn't attract me to um
to that business model like i like
more or less when i feel like i'm
building on top of my previous efforts
which i feel like in print on demand
um maybe i'm wrong you know i guess with
drop shipping maybe if you have an email
list but uh
yeah i like the yeah go ahead
i think um drop shipping is a lot harder
than it people sometimes make it sound
because
once your store gets more sales you have
all this legal stuff and customer
requests and then um you know it's just
a lot of a handful to deal with and i
think now that i have the experience i
do with um other e-commerce ventures i
would be more comfortable starting a
dropshipping store if i was to do that
now
than before that's interesting yeah um
and probably makes more sense too
because yeah when you go down the route
of like shopify too you're it's like
opening pandora's box and i'm like too
much of a perfectionist i'm worried that
if i like whenever the day comes when i
do launch a store you know i'm gonna get
sucked into one to make everything
perfect and uh it's gonna be a lot you
know advertising building the list
getting the website perfect and uh so
anyways you don't do drop shipping
anymore right so what are you focusing a
lot of your time on like what's in an
average day when you have time away from
med school like to to work on the
e-commerce business like what are you
spending a lot of your time uh doing
um so mainly now it's print on demand
and youtube so just trying to get as
much content on youtube as possible
because youtube was something that
really helped me when i was starting out
in print on demand and even drop
shipping so i really want to be able to
sort of give back in that sense um and
give all the tips i have and then
something else i've been doing is
working on a wordpress site so i'm
currently
i'm just experimenting not really
planning to launch it anytime soon but
i'm building a multi-vendor e-commerce
website on wordpress with my friend um
so that's something i'm working on as
well and then also um i have some other
random passive income streams like
tutoring affiliate
income and stuff like that
oh very cool yeah and i mean i like that
as long as it's like complimentary and
what are you tutoring by the way do you
mind me asking like e-commerce or is it
um no no it's um it's in like math uh
science that kind of stuff just for
people that are trying to get into med
school
um i love that you're like it's like
these doors are there right and you know
if you have the time and the desire you
know open the door i don't think i've
ever done this i've done tutoring in
like high school but um
yeah i mean teaching is a great way to
just kind of keep up with with the the
knowledge and really become an expert in
the field so i like that yeah
cool and so we talk a lot about print on
demand on this channel um i do do some
you know amazon fba other stuff but the
youtube algorithm i like to say like it
rewards me when i talk about print on
demand so i talk about a lot of print on
demand so like can you offer up any um
really insights let's say maybe going
back to
even the beginning when things are
really slow and you just need some like
little wins to prove to yourself that
like you're you're gonna be a good print
on demand seller and i guess you belong
in this industry um any tips you can
share with the audience
yeah absolutely so um i would say
for me it took me i would say um
less time than the average beginner to
get my first sale on redbubble and so it
took me like nine days which i mentioned
in my first video
whereas the average seller i think takes
around three months and i think that was
because of my
e-commerce background i guess so
understanding the fact that um people
are really wanting to buy stuff that
you know they want to buy instead of
just making random stuff um obviously
that works it's they it's your
creativity um some people might like
what you create but i would say for
every like my biggest tip would be for
every design that you put out that you
spend time doing um
maybe just have an idea in your head of
why you're doing that design so
validating to yourself at least why you
think it might sell um like if you can't
explain to yourself why you think a
design might sell then is it really
worth the time putting it up that would
be my best advice
okay i like that and um i have to ask
too do you consider yourself a good
designer
um well i did a
high school
exam in graphic design so i know things
like how to use photoshop and just basic
stuff like cad cam i'm not sure if
you've heard of that um but
yeah so i have some basic background in
graphic design uh i use you know the
paid tools canva i also have um an app
called procreate which i think is really
good on my ipad
um but in terms of like being really
really good i don't think so at all i
think
i really rely on those paid tools as
well
um so i use canva most of the time and
also photoshop
got you so you're
in agreement then that like you don't
have to be a professional graphic
designer to have a chance at making some
money no no absolutely like i have a
video on my channel talking about like
100 free way to design for print on
demand using canva and photopia um it's
completely free and it's got me sales at
the beginning so i would definitely
recommend that for anyone that's
starting out definitely i actually
should not have waited this long to plug
your channel on youtube which of course
will be the top link in the description
if you guys want to go check out tia's
content
um you talk a lot about so graphic
design uh for print on demand i know you
mentioned redbubble and you were telling
me that you're also selling on etsy do
you want to share anything about like
your journey on etsy so far
yeah well it's been a bit of a rocky
road on etsy um so
the first time i applied for etsy i
connected printful to etsy and
the about a week in so i made the sale
on the first day that i connected it
which was really good cool um and then
about a week in i got suspended um not
really sure why so i wrote to them and
then i got unsuspended and then i've
just been making sales since then so
uploading stuff that i've been uploading
to redbubble works and also
um doing research inside etsy so i know
there's some tools i really like um
it's like sale samurai i think you
mentioned another tour on your website
on your channel as well um so those are
really useful but the thing about etsy
is um they're really notorious for
suspending people for no reason like
because i've got two accounts suspended
and i've got them both back
but people have emailed me and commented
several times that they've just got
suspended and they couldn't get their
account back and stuff like that so i
would say like
it is good it does have potential but
don't rely on it as your only source of
passive income
definitely agree um
like it's you know it's bad when there's
like
a bot army on youtube that does one of
those things where it like drops a
comment then it responds to another bots
comment and it's all about getting your
etsy account unsuspended like
it must be a pretty darn bad problem
because they're making money writing
these youtube bots to sell a service
that probably doesn't even work for
being honest uh
but yeah love the tip of diversification
uh you know actually you know it's crazy
i have a call with
and it's not the first time this has
happened but i have a call tomorrow and
i don't know if i'm gonna post it to
youtube or not but um with somebody
that's a top 150 etsy seller
and i've had another call at the top 100
etsy seller um not necessarily print on
demand but that are like worried about
their business that they're going to
lose their business because etsy
literally just terminates you like you
said for no reason so definitely
diversification
of the uh platforms that you make your
products available on is a great tip and
that leads me to my next question even
though i know the answer i bet you
somebody's gonna ask
are you taking advantage of merch by
amazon
um yeah i've been asked this before on
my channel i actually haven't been able
to get in i applied five times and got
rejected every time um i think it's
because most of the time like three
times i applied in q4 and i applied with
my dad's account got rejected applied
with uh my mom's amazon account got
rejected so i'll probably be applying
again this year um maybe avoiding the q4
time
yeah good luck with that i'm sorry to
hear that and um
i mean i i'm just saying like i don't
know i don't work for amazon but i've
known people in the uk that specifically
have had a really tough time getting on
so i think where you live like can make
a difference for sure um yeah that kind
of sucks it's not really fair but
especially when they opened up the
amazon merch um uk market so
it's a little odd right yeah that's good
to know though
cool um so i actually found your channel
because you're uh talking about bubble
scout uh briefly and like talking about
red bubble niche research so any um tips
that you might have because i know
redbubble people love redbubble all
right i love redbubble but um
the tag spamming thing and like for some
reason they just like won't fix it and
so me and redbubble have had a little
bit of beef since
uh people have kind of realized about
the tag spamming and started exploiting
it but like as far as niche research
goes what's your process you have any
tips for anybody that you would like to
share
yeah so on my channel i actually have a
six minute video breaking down like my
entire process but since then i found a
lot more other tools so i found bubble
scout um and a viewer mentioned like
other like bubble redbubble tags tool
popular tags tool um so
yeah i think bubble scout is a tool i
would definitely recommend because it's
basically like three websites in one so
i used to go into uh
red old like trending tags and then
popular tags tool like list all of the
trending stuff um
but bubble scout basically does that
with one click of a button so i really
like that tool for that reason um but
also i would just say like focus on
trending stuff because people often ask
me like is it better to do focus on
niches uh so evergreen niches or
trending niches and i would say like
focus on the trending ones because the
trends never like fully die out if you
know what i mean like you just sort of
stay there for a while and even once
they do die out like you've already
moved on to other stuff so
that's what i would say if you want to
get sales as fast as possible
yeah i agree and um
it's weird right because you can get
like halloween always pops into my mind
because like you'll make halloween sales
outside of october for whatever reason
like people just can't get enough of uh
of halloween so that's the one that pops
up into my mind as far as like trends
that
just sell year-round and you don't know
why um and yeah i think the average
person like watching these videos is
probably still going like trying to get
over the the self-doubt phase
and so you know if you still aren't sure
if like you're going to make it as a
print-on-demand seller for sure like i
agree with tia
chasing trends is going to get you those
however many uh sales that you need in
the near term before you're like all
right cool now i'm going to try to you
know post some designs that can sell any
day of the week any day of the year you
know
um that's been my focus since i'm in
amazon merch like tier 200 000 but i
know most people aren't into your 200
000 yet yet i know you guys will get
there but uh
you know so evergreens has been my focus
but any anyways tia thank you for being
here like anything else that you'd like
to share before you wrap up
yeah no worries um so i would just say
a point i would highlight is diversify
as much as possible um so don't rely on
any one income stream and also um a
topic that i've just talked about on my
channel is cyber security as well um so
make sure you set good passwords and
stuff like if you're running an
ecommerce store or something then make
sure you've got your uh safety
you know dialed in because the worst
thing is to like lose your account i
mean getting suspended is one thing but
then getting someone else hack into it
is another thing so
yeah i would just
bring up that point
yeah no that's always good advice uh i
definitely like i have the i.t
background as well and um
you know i i literally will snapchat uh
scams like email scam spoofing scams
like things that i worry about that my
family's gonna fall for like i just
literally snapchatted to them we have a
little family group and i'm like guys
amazon scam don't do it or like fake
paypal suspended scam yeah like ever
since my youtube channel has been
growing i've just noticed so many
phishing emails like random emails with
suspicious links and i'm just thinking
well like some of these people might be
my viewers so that's quite scary to
think about
guys uh we you know we definitely want
everybody's like accounts to be kept
safe yeah absolutely i could go down
like a whole rabbit hole of stories yeah
just you know two-factor authentication
is annoying but it's yeah it's probably
worth it if you are doing anything of
value online so definitely good advice
there
cool
hey well hey guys i'm also going to be
doing an interview on tia's channel by
the way too so make sure you check it
out it's going to be the top link in the
description subscribe over there and
look out for that video as well but tia
thank you for being here yeah no worries
thanks for having