How Web designers get passive income

More and more freelance designers are starting to look for passive income methods. I have always liked to serve clients, but I had to endure the pressure of a few bosses and the final release of the project, which almost crushed me.

A few years ago I began to focus on my projects and think about how to make money from them. I sell the theme and template and start writing a book. Now I'm doing my own project "Job board for Designers (designer job board)".

In Smashing Magazine's previous article, I compared several ways of selling software online. In this article, I will not only compare the passive income method of designers, but also tell you what I have learned in my exploration.

Of course, I will also tell you how much money I made through these methods.

Disclaimer: The following are my personal experience. Because I've been through. For example, I never make a lot of money on a website ad and that doesn't mean you can't earn it. Please think of my experience as "I did it" rather than "you have to do it".

Design theme:

January 2009, I had the honor to register successfully themeforset (the largest theme and template trading platform site), when it was just built soon. The themeforest does not need to display the academic record and the work life, as long as the work is cool enough will give the designer returns. In fact, it really happened. Now, the top designers there can even get a six-digit income from the sales template each year, and many other unknown designs have been sold.

So, what about my income on the design theme?

It's pretty good overall. First of all, help me expand the customer, because my first group of customers from those who have seen my template. And income, in the best month to reach 1248 dollars. Now, a year later, despite the lack of a new theme, I paid a little effort to earn about 200 dollars a month.

I made about 12675 dollars in themeforest in 2.5 hours. And I completely stopped updating my theme a year ago. Since the sale of the theme is good, why did I not release the new theme two years ago? For many reasons, the main reason is because the market has changed, customer expectations are higher.

The design of the theme is not good enough. If you want the topic to be more competitive, you must support short codes, customizable back-end and configure multiple interfaces, and provide good after-sale support and documentation for online templates.

In other words, after several years of development. The design theme has changed from a part-time job to a full-time finish. But I don't want to be a WordPress madman and devote all my energy to making themes. I decided to Shang the work to the side.

Design theme is one of the best ways for designers to increase passive income, and it is also one of the jobs that require very hard work. By the way, you've been engaged for a long time and have been able to repeat the existing resources to the next topic (e.g., reusing code, simplifying workflows, etc.), and designing the theme becomes meaningful.

Positive side:

You can earn a lot when you succeed;

As long as you have enough ability, work experience and experience are cloud;

Not well-known or have no customers can do;

Shortcomings：

Need to understand HTML and CSS code, and familiar with WordPress or other CMS system;

Excellent after-sales service is time-consuming;

Need to publish more than one topic to get more than normal work income

Design icons and appropriate graphs

Note: I have never published any icon packages, brushes, and vector material. This is heard by another friend who has experienced this experience.

I have passive income for a second chance. In 10 years of freelance work, I did a lot of little vector icons that were duplicated in the design interface. At first, just some illustrator files, icons (icon), buttons, etc., I organize these elements for the next project to use.

In July 2010, I intend to do more and unify the icons. Then for free download. Icons originate from web software such as Ruby or a modular design based interface.

I spent weeks doing it and I didn't make any money. But the feedback received was impressive: in two months time, 52000 of UV, more than 1000 tweets (amount ...) Celestial cannot visit to ==!), dozens of blog reply. Even Web Design Master Jeffery Zeldman also mentioned my work. This is cool!

Now in retrospect, I don't know why I spend so much time designing icons, perhaps because of passion, which fills the feeling I've lost. I didn't plan anything deliberately, but my new career started. With these constant page visits, I can make the billing version based on this. A few months later, I released a commercial version with 750 icons. Then the miracle came.

I have money in my PayPal account. I remember being a little obsessive. Check if the inbox has a mail notification for sale. Although I didn't sell a lot of just hundreds of dollars, I found that it was possible to earn money from passive income. Sales have continued to grow over the past two years, reaching a level that can feed itself. I don't have to work with clients to put 100% of my energy on my project. In 2011, I released another set of retro-vector icons, which was also successful. Two sets of different products make sure I have enough cash flow.

Now, I have a monthly sales of thousands of dollars. I can be happy to do my own thing, even though I now have the same income as I did in my previous freelance career. But it is not enough to design high-quality content. I usually spend more time on other aspects of sales:

Set up sales page, write copy, release product website;

Establish E-commerce channels. In two years ' time, I spent a lot of time building up sales channels. I tried 4 ways and found the ideal method.

Advertising and promotion, I spend a lot of time to find the best site traffic.

Promote market and SEO, build and learn how to use MailChimp, Google Analytics, Getclicky, SEOmoz, Curebit

Use Google/b test to improve conversion rates

I spend only a few minutes a day in the sale, but will reply to the customer as soon as possible. I spend a lot of time writing and using documents to avoid repeated answers to the same questions.

Therefore, it is possible to make a living by selling a fee-based product. But creativity and design are not the key to success. You need to take the time to learn to exercise all the business involved in the content, including: marketing, marketing, writing, SEO, data analysis and so on ...

In fact, it would be nice to launch your own product: When you can notice the business overall, and start mastering the use of business skills. You no longer become a better designer because of your beautiful design. When you stand in the customer's perspective to see the product, and not stay in the product's appearance. Please believe me, if you can increase the sales of customers, they will gladly pay you.

But the downside is that the market is becoming more competitive. And the same trend as the template market. Fierce competition, resulting in the work content is no longer a few weeks to release some icon is enough. Designers need to launch their own complete icon products.

I have watched more than 50 sales icon sellers, their icons in quality and quantity are greatly improved.

Moreover, the product is afraid of the increasingly popular discount promotions, now only a little money can buy a lot of icons. There is a risk of the market becoming dry. When designers put their material in their own database, I'm not sure if the market is going to expand or stop people buying icons at the current price.

The growing competition has allowed me to spend several months this year turning the number of icons from 750 to 1500, and fine-tuning the different software styles, like PowerPoint and Keynote. I pay other freelance designers to help me repair and refine my other products and vector graphics. Recently, I also paid a large price for a calligrapher to help me design logo to enhance the brand sense. The cost of time and money is increasing.

Another problem: I don't think my design is as creative as it used to be. I'm more concerned with creating content and marketing, thinking like a businessman and lacking design passion and creativity.

Positive side:

You have the ability to design icons

If you use a website like istockphoto or graphicriver, you don't have to consider building a website or promoting your own product

If your aftermarket documentation is good enough, you will hardly need a service

Your business skills will be enhanced and expanded by business-centric

No need to write English

Negative side:

Time consuming

Buyers have high expectations for the quantity & volume of their products. Free packages are everywhere.

The market competition is very intense, not only needs the outstanding work also to have the marketing ability

Advertise

Remember carbon allowed my site to be his ad affiliate, and I was happy to flip it. Eventually I made money out of online advertising. Of course, I don't expect to make a living just by advertising fees, but it's a good cash flow – a hundreds of-dollar advertising fee per month.

If you've ever put an ad on a website, you know what's going on: the first advertising fee is about 5 dollars. Of course, advertising on your site is less fun unless you have a lot of clicks or a bunch of ads on the site.

After that, I joined the Fusion Ads, YOGGRT. Toolbox monthly effect also do 2W UV. Income of 30-60 dollars a month. My blog may be a bit of a success (a higher click rate). The highest time reached 100-200 dollars a month. Average of 50-100 per month.

Add up to six months with about 600 dollars in advertising revenue. As I thought, advertising costs are just for the weekend. Unless you want to be a full-time blogger, blogs don't earn much.

Positive side:

Don't need to do anything

Joining the online advertising alliance will bring a good reputation to your website

Negative side:

Can be used to pay for meals if you are lucky enough.

You may not learn anything.

Write a book

It may seem easier to write an ebook or publish a book. After all, everybody writes, doesn't it? In fact, I don't think writing a book is the hardest. In fact, it's hard to remember articles that have content but are tedious to write, and writing skills require a good workout. So the real test is how to articulate what you think.

You need to make a good outline before writing a book, and more importantly, you have enough writing skills. You can write superficial articles on blogs, but people can't write about them by buying articles.

When you have many years of experience, enough to write it in a book, then consider writing a book. Make sure you write without errors before publishing. The real test moment begins in the sales book.

You will face a series of questions such as: how people find your books, why they buy them, why they buy your books instead of others ' books, etc.

If you want to use a personal website sales book, build a page in Jarroy Drysdale. Drysdale will send an email to the mailing list after the book is published with a sample chapter and questions about the recipient. Maximize your ebook by creating Web pages and message boards.

Another good strategy is targeting people. That's why I focus on the interface designer.

Finally, I strongly recommend establishing partnerships with relevant websites, such as Appsumo and Hyperink. In order to open up sales channels.

Writing an ebook makes me feel great. Made 8000 dollars within 2 weeks of the successful publication of my book. Then, sales gradually fell. But I got 6000 dollars in the 4-month release. The key reason is that with Appsumo and Dealotto to establish a partnership, they returned after the high tide of sales to bring me thousands of of dollars in extra income.

Positive side:

Almost no after-sale support

No Technical requirements

Negative side:

You need to have something to write about.

Need to do a lot of promotion

The market is very competitive and many competitors

The peak of the book is over soon.

Software for developing application classes

Unlike freelance design, it takes a lot of work and communication to build a business. The establishment of a software based service input and revenue will be proportional. Some services are charged only once. Of course, this passive income is contractual because they advance your cash and guarantee a steady flow of cash.

The skills needed to develop software applications are clearly challenging for visual designers. But despair, you can find a partner, even self-study this skill. You don't have to do all the work. When I chat with founders who don't know the technology, I often find that only WordPress can develop a very good preview Web application.

If you dig further, you realize that opportunities are everywhere. For example, WordPress contains a number of member-Class Plug-ins. Even using MailChimp can change the way newsletter subscribe. Jump out of the box to integrate the existing plug-ins, anyone who knows a little bit of technology can build a most preliminary application.

A year ago I released Folyo, a website that helped customers find the right entry-level freelancer.

For the first few months, I only used it as a platform for posting recruitment information, using Wufoo as the information publishing platform. No need to develop backend without database and user account. This has reached my expectations and can develop a real app. I found someone in the Ruby Developer Forum and spent about 3000 dollars on app apps.

At the same time, I began to teach myself ruby. Therefore, I can develop my own part, and the other part uses the way of exchanging the other design to let friends develop. Is it worth it? If my focus is on freelancing rather than Folyo, I will earn more. But I still like to do my own project.

Now I can get 1000 dollars a month from Folyo, which is enough to support the minimum cost of living for one year. More importantly, while perfecting Folyo, it is also increasing its value (unlike serving a customer project, what you do this time will not help you complete the next project).

Of course, when I do folyo, I only do very little design. In fact, my working schedule is as follows:

Email and customer Support: 20%;

Write Blog: 20%

Write code: 40%

Miscellaneous Chores: 10%

Design: 10%

Therefore, if you plan to develop your own software, it means you will have less design time.

Positive side:

In theory, it's a very lucrative thing to do, even if Google or Facebook gets enough.

Work can be very passionate.

You can do anything you want.

Negative side:

You'll be far from the fields you've known

The chances of failure are high.

Every day you do not have a large amount of design

Experience Summary

What have I learned from the examples listed above? If I could start from scratch, what would I do differently? I realized it was important to build relationships. Whether you want to be a well-known designer, blogger, and have a lot of fans on Weibo, you need to be in touch with people.

Of course, there are a lot of great designers who just want to do good design and not care about other people except themselves. Maybe the designers are still in touch with the class students in the art school. Or maybe they often attend designer meetings. Either way, I can guarantee that the most successful designers have a certain relationship, even if they don't realize it.

Blogs and microblogs (foreign Twitter, domestic microblog ==!) is the easiest digital communication tool. It is very difficult to take care of all of them, so the sooner you cultivate these relationships, the better.

In addition, I have a strong suggestion: try to stand out and let everyone know who you are. You can do it in your own unique way: high profile participation, participation in the project, I think the best way is to have their own projects.

If you want someone else to do it, you can learn about visual Ldiot. A designer who puts his good design skills and humor into gosquared, though no one knows his real name online.

It sounds obvious, but the reality is that working to help you build connections or images doesn't make you profitable (in fact, they don't usually help you make money). So it seems that it is more tempting to create an intranet for a pharmaceutical company than a Web site that uses JavaScript as a cat, and will make more money.

But a beautiful hospital site will not be the concern of outsiders, and the kitten site may cause more people to notice you.

All these years I've learned to look far and invest in myself rather than make a quick buck.

The plan is simple: build relationships with a distinctive image to make sure everyone knows who you are and then have a product that can be managed.

Of course, it's easy to say, but it's hard to do. Each step usually takes several years.

Original address: http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2012/08/27/designer-passive-income-experiments/

Address: http://davidw.cn/translate/designer-passive-income-experiments/