How to Make Money Selling Your Designs on Vector Stock Marketplaces
As a graphic designer or artist, selling your vector art on a vector stock marketplace can be a great way to generate income. The best thing about selling on stocks is that you create a design once, then each time it is downloaded, you receive a commission. That makes selling vector graphics a very passive way to earn income from your designs, for months or years to come. If you’re looking for a way to add an income stream apart from your main design job, selling vector art is a good option.
What Is a Vector Stock Marketplace?
Visual content is needed more now than ever before. As social media has exploded, with individuals and brands posting content 24/7, the need for unique images has ramped up. Stock media marketplaces have come on the scene to meet that need.
These marketplaces allow artists to upload their designs and illustrations for sale. The images are available to be purchased, licensed and used by anyone who needs them. Illustration stocks make it easy for content creators to simply browse and purchase designs they like.
These marketplaces give artists a great way to earn extra income when their designs are purchased. They also provide a way to gain exposure and potentially work with clients all over the world.
What to Know About Joining Vector Stocks
Before you choose to sell your vector designs on a marketplace, you’ll want to be informed about the pros and cons. A major benefit to selling your art in this space is that the vector graphic market is still relatively untapped compared to the saturated stock photo market. This presents a wide open opportunity for graphic designers to meet buyer demand for vector art.
Second, unlike the stock image marketplaces out there, not just anyone can create vector graphics, because of the software required. As a graphic designer who is familiar with tools like Amadine or Adobe Illustrator, you’ll have less competition selling vector art. People with no graphic design experience often shy away from vector creation programs either because of the cost or because of the perceived complexity in learning to use them. As a graphic designer, you have an advantage here. You can start right away by selling what you already know how to create. Let’s look close at how you can capitalize on this niche and turn your creativity into profit.
Setting up Seller Accounts
To get started selling vector designs, choose one of the marketplaces and set up a seller account. These platforms have different requirements and approval procedures for accounts, as well as slightly different requirements for submitting your work. Be sure to check out the requirements carefully. Also, note the file type and file size required for the marketplace you choose: SVG, EPS, AI. There may also be specifications for creating your listings, and adding descriptions and hashtags to increase visibility. You’ll want to be familiar with these before you start listing.
After opening a seller account, you’ll set up the most important component: the way you get paid. Some platforms use PayPal, and others pay directly to your bank account through a payment processor. You’ll want to pay close attention to all of these elements as you choose a marketplace. Do the research first, to make sure you can meet the requirements of the platform before you create designs.
Reading the requirements in advance and setting all the details up successfully will make the process smooth so you can focus on creating unique vector art to sell.
Generating Ideas
Constant generation of new ideas is sometimes not an easy challenge for a designer. But do not be afraid, because there are topics that are constantly relevant for stock marketplaces, such as holidays and events. You can safely make a content plan for the year, for the holidays of different countries and draw them annually. Almost every organization and company is preparing for the holidays and, at the same time, needs fresh, high-quality design materials for the marketing department or for congratulating its employees. Nevertheless, note the following: if you want your works to be bought as much as possible, then prepare and load them into the stocks several months in advance. After all, the tasks of preparing for the holidays are not happening in one day.
Once your account is set up on a marketplace, you may want to search for inspiration for what to create. The article on graphic design inspiration gives lots of tips on where to get ideas that fuel your own creative process. From museums to design books and social media accounts of artists and brands, there are endless sources out there to spark your creativity.
Choosing a Tool for Vector Work
Last but not least, you want to choose a graphic design tool that makes it easy to create vector art. Adobe Illustrator is the industry standard but the absence of the lifetime purchase and prohibitive price for the monthly subscription may make this tool too pricey for a beginner or amateur not ready to invest a lot into vector design.
Amadine meets all a designer’s needs for creating vector stock illustrations: both versions for Mac desktop and iPad and iPhone mobile devices makes it universal. Moreover, the mobile app is free for download and trying out all the tools. It’s user friendly with a gentle learning curve. Amadine makes it possible for even a novice to jump into designing vector art. And whatever file format or file size you need, it’s easy to resize your vector designs to fit a range of requirements. But make sure you don’t try to add to Adobe Stock, which only requires AI files, which Amadine cannot produce.
List of Stock Marketplaces to Sell Your Vector Art
Graphic artists are in luck today: there are loads of places to sell your vector art online. Below are some of the best marketplaces to start selling.
Adobe Stock is a common place buyers go to look specifically for vector art, and it offers artists a 33% royalty on sold work.
Creative Market is a massive marketplace that offers millions of designs from artists in over 190 countries. It’s a great place to start listing vector art. By default, shops earn 50% of their list price for each sale.
Shutterstock is most popular for its stock photography, but they also offer vector stock. It has active forums and support for artists who list on the marketplace. There are 6 separate earnings levels for images and for videos, ranging from 15% up to 40%.
Freepik is a marketplace for photos, vector art and PSD designs with a strong community and a referral program. Contributors are paid depending on their content downloads, which is known as the pay per download method.
iStockPhoto by Getty Images is highly rated among professionals as a source for photos and images, so this is a great marketplace to gain exposure. For content licensed through iStock, royalty rates start at 15% for photos and 20% for videos and illustrations. Exclusive contributors can earn between 25% and 45%.
GraphicRiver is a sizable marketplace for vector files, and is part of the larger Envato Market, which offers stock images, photos, videos, music, fonts and more. For a non-exclusive contributor the Author Fee is always 55% of your Item Price, but the final earnings must be calculated through a more complicated formula: List Price/Purchase Price - Buyer Fee - Withholding Tax.
Pond5 is a marketplace for multimedia art that offers up to a 50% royalty share on vector art graphics.
Alamy has a broad and unique collection of media for sale, so artists can be seen by a wide range of buyers. The site offers up to 50% royalty fees.
Finding Success Selling Stock Designs
Selling your vector art is a great option for artists who want to make income from their creativity. The ones who are most successful on these marketplaces are those who consistently upload new designs, and who put thought into their listing descriptions.
As an artist who wants to sell vector designs, it is key to keep on top of trends and seasonal topics. Keep your eye out for the styles of graphics that appear often on social media and in corporate branding and logos, so you can offer what buyers need. Consider creating vector designs that are themed for holidays and occasions throughout the year. Take a look at what is selling well on the marketplace you’ve chosen to gain ideas about what you should create to sell.
Success selling stock vector art won’t happen overnight, but if you keep offering high quality designs that are in line with what buyers are looking for, you will develop a steady stream of sales.
Conclusion
It’s easy to jump into selling your vector designs on a stock image marketplace, and it’s a great way to start earning passive income from your art. There are loads of marketplaces to choose from, and you can list as many designs as you can create!
The competition on these stocks is high, but creating vector art can give you an edge. Spend time researching what sells well and what is trending. Upload your designs consistently and offer a variety of styles until you find what sells well for you.
Though the journey can be challenging, dedicated artists who research trends and refine their craft can successfully build a valuable income stream from selling vector designs.