﻿Want to run your own print-on-demand store, but have no idea where to start?
You’ve come to the right place. Hey! I’m Michael from Printful.
In this video, I’ll walk you through the process of starting your business
with Printful. What is Printful?
First things first. You might be wondering—what is Printful and how will it help me start my
business? Printful is an on-demand printing and dropshipping company that takes care of fulfilling
your orders and ships them out to your customers. With Printful, you'll have access to a wide range of
products and different techniques, from printed apparel to embroidery to engraved jewelry. Just
create a store on an ecommerce platform, link it to your Printful account and you’ll be able
to focus on the fun parts of doing business. We’ll do the rest. So let’s get started with
our step-by-step guide. Create a Printful account
The first step is easy. If you don’t have a Printful account, you need to create one.
Just go to our page, click Sign up and fill in your info. It’s quick and completely free.
Find your business niche Before you move on to store and product setup,
you should have a good understanding of your business idea and your target audience. You
know the old saying: “When you’re selling to everyone, you’re selling to no one.” So think
about your business niche, a smaller section of a broader market where your product will stand out.
Here are two examples of brands that partner with Printful. This is Katheriin, co-founder of Muhoov.
Muhoov is an Estonian clothing brand that lets you show off your love for your hood, or your neighborhood or your city
The concept is quite simple. You can have whatever your favorite place name is, printed on in front of the sweatshirt.
So Muhoov literally translates to my backyard.
It's very similar to "my hood" but it's just a more local, Estonian way of saying that
And this is Joe, owner of the PAL Campaign. His store focuses on Catholic t-shirts. Here’s what
he says about finding your business niche. I think it's really important for new owners
to find a specific niche that they're a part of or that they're really passionate about.
to be successful within Printful, or any business for that matter
Instead of doing something like streetwear, because there are many companies that are doing streetwear
and really doing it well. Maybe it's streetwear for people in a city that you love.
So finding a specific tribe, a loyal tribe. And whatever it is, whether it's people who like baseball or Christian t-shirts
or, like, cats. I think if you really target that, there's a genuine authenticity to what you're bringing to the table
it's just gonna make the process a whole lot easier. Once I stopped the store and restarted it with Printful
I was able to not worry about inventory and shipping myself.
Think about the communities you’re a part of—you’ll find your target audience there.
We have great resources on this subject.
I’ll link a couple below. Create a product template
So you have your Printful account and you know your target audience. The next step is to create
your first product template. A product template is a Printful product with your added design—like a
ready-made item you can then quickly add to your store and sell. Go to your Printful Dashboard and
in the side menu, choose the Product templates tab. Click on Create your first product template
and pick the product you want to sell.
Now you can start designing. You can use a design software and
upload your designs on Printful. Just remember to follow the print file guidelines prepared
by our graphics specialists. You can find them in the File guidelines tab under every product.
I’ll also link some resources on design preparation in the description below.
Or, you can use our free Design Maker where you’ll be able to experiment with over 50 clipart
collections made up of more than 3000 customizable design elements. Are you looking for cute
balloon animals? Got them. Or elaborate classical sculptures? Here they are. You want it—we've got it.
Once you’re done with designing, click Save product template. This is the final product
you can now add to your store and sell. You can always access or edit your design for each product
in the Product templates tab. Connect your store to Printful
If you don’t have an online store, you’ll need to create one to start selling with us. You can
set up your store on an ecommerce platform or an online marketplace. With your Printful account,
you have a lot of options to choose from. If you’re a little confused about where to build your
online store, then head to our integrations page, and find information about setup times, prices,
and other things you should take into account. You can also try our quiz—it’ll help you understand
which option is best suited for your needs. After you’ve created your store, you’ll need
to connect it to your Printful account. The process to connect your store to Printful is
different based on the ecommerce platform you choose. You can follow our step-by-step video
tutorials to get a head start. Add products to store
The next thing on your list is adding products to your store. Choose the Product templates tab
again. Pick the product template you want to add to your store
and click Add to store. Here you can choose the colors and sizes of the product, add mockups,
write your product description, and set your price. Once you’re done with these steps,
click Add to store and voilà! There it is.
The process of adding your products will differ platform to platform. To learn how
to add a product to your store on your chosen platform, go to our integrations page where you’ll
find a step-by-step video tutorial. Set up pricing
Figuring out your product pricing is a real balancing act between two prices—the
Printful price and your retail price. The Printful price is what you pay us for product fulfillment.
The retail price is what your customer will see and pay you. Now you have to figure out how much
profit you’ll want to earn per product and add that on top of the product fulfillment price.
Setting your profit margin can be a tricky thing. If it’s too high and you can’t justify it,
your customers won’t buy your products. If your prices are too low, you may only cover the product
fulfillment cost but you won’t be able to cover the extra costs that come with running a business.
Remember to take into account things like taxes, ecommerce platform fees,
advertising, and so on. Have a look at our payment guide for more information.
Add payment methods Another thing you need to set up
is payment methods. Here’s what happens when a customer buys from your store:
1. Your customer pays you the retail price on your store’s platform
2. You pay Printful for fulfillment, shipping, and relevant taxes
The payments are not linked with each other. When your customer places an order in your shop,
Printful does not have access to the money your customer pays for the order. So, two payments
take place—one from your customer to you on your store’s end, and the other from you to Printful.
These payments happen simultaneously. This means you need to set up two payment methods.
First, a payment processor in your store that will ensure transactions between you and your
customer. This can be by a direct bank transfer, an online payment gateway, or anything else your
platform supports. And second, you need a way to pay Printful for fulfillment for the orders
you receive. You can manage your payment methods under the Billing tab in your Printful Dashboard
side menu. Choose Billing methods and there you can add your card or PayPal account to be charged
automatically once an order is made, or you can choose to top up your balance manually via the
Printful Wallet. To learn more about payment processing within Printful, watch our video.
I’ll leave a link below. Order a sample
This step isn’t mandatory, but I’d recommend that you order a sample of your products. Designs you
see on the screen may look a little different when printed on fabric, so ordering samples
will help you make sure that you’re satisfied with the final result. Seeing your products in
real life will also help you understand if you want to make any corrections to the design. And,
of course, knowing what your products look like in real life will make it easier for you to write
better product descriptions. Start marketing
Alright. You’ve got your store, your products, and your payment methods all set up. Now you can start
selling. This is where your marketing skills come in. A good marketing strategy will drive
customers to your store, so you should think about branding and your social media presence.
Learn from others for inspiration. Have a look at what your favorite stores are doing, figure
out what works for them, and if it would work for you too. Experiment! There are a lot of good
resources on marketing out there. You can explore the Printful Academy course on digital marketing,
or head over to our blog and find everything a Printful beginner needs
to know.
There you have it! Now, go have fun starting your business!
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