How to Add Digital Products on Shopify? 3 Easy Steps

Looking for guidance on adding Shopify digital products? Statista predicts 5.5 billion digital Commerce users by 2027. It's a huge opportunity; however, selling alone won't maximize earnings.

This article discusses digital products and Shopify for companies entering the digital market. In this extensive guide, you'll learn how to sell and optimize Shopify digital products to maximize revenues.

What Is A Digital Product?

In eCommerce, digital items are intangible things saved electronically. These aren't real things; they're files or material you can download online. Digital items come in many varieties:

Customers may buy and immediately download digital downloads. Content like eBooks, music albums, software programs, graphic design templates, video files, and more are usually purchased once. 

Customers pay for the download and get digital material immediately without delivery.

Epic Shop, in the picture below, is an excellent example of digital downloads. It offers a variety of digital downloads, including gaming assets, sound effects, and digital resources for game developers and content creators.

(image source: store.epicgames.com)

Customers pay for continuous digital content or services via digital subscriptions. This paradigm is standard in streaming services, online publications, e-learning platforms, and software-as-a-service (SaaS) companies. 

Customers subscribe to content or services monthly or annually.

The photo below shows MasterClass, a great digital membership. MasterClass provides online culinary, writing, music, and other programs taught by famous specialists. Video classes and instructional information are available to subscribers.

(image source: masterclass.com)

Reference Shopify Digital Product Sales Apps

Shopify is a powerful eCommerce platform with many tools and apps to improve merchants' selling experiences. Many applications on the platform speed up digital product sales, manage sales, and enhance consumer experiences.

This section covers a variety of Shopify digital goods sales applications. These tools help Shopify retailers sell and manage digital items. The highlighted applications include:

Sky Pilot ‑ Digital Downloads

Explore Sky Pilot's fascinating universe! Unlock music, eBooks, PDFs, and videos carefully designed to engage your audience. Use cutting-edge subscription apps to mix digital and physical items for recurring revenue seamlessly. Customize product tags for maximum personalization and file security. Transform your digital sales with a simple setup and get excellent results now!

Rating and Reviews: 5/5 (209 reviews).

Primary Features:

• Sales Increase with Diversified Digital Offerings: Digital media, including music, eBooks, PDFs, and films, may all be quickly sold with Sky Pilot. Having more digital content alternatives available increases the product range's variety, attracting a larger audience and boosting sales potential.
• Smooth Digital-Physical Integration: Merchants may seamlessly integrate digital and physical goods using Sky Pilot. This connection allows subscription apps to generate recurring revenue and provide vast offerings.
• Customization and Enhanced Security: Sky Pilot also secures files, reassuring retailers and consumers of digital transactions. Customization and security boost client happiness and trust.

Pricing:

Digital Downloads - Filemonk

Digital downloads by Filemonk allow Shopify sellers to offer digital downloads and items quickly. Up to 2GB of downloads are free. Selling digital things like books, manuals, movies, and software is simple with digital downloads. Upload files, connect them to a product listing, and activate email distribution in 3 easy steps. 

Rating and Reviews: 4.9/5 (151 reviews).

Key Features:

• Simplicity: Quickly sell any digital goods in 3 steps. Read their guidelines for 24/7 assistance!
• Flexible and protect the seller's copyright: Customize anything for your brand. Protect material using PDF watermarks, streaming & download limitations with sale licensing keys, and quickly offer bespoke digital items like artwork.
• Customers get files immediately: Give them a fantastic download immediately after purchase.

Pricing:

SendOwl

Sell and automatically distribute downloads, subscriptions, e-books, films, music, PDFs, designs, access codes, online courses, and more with SendOwl. It makes selling, distributing, marketing, and analytics simple and personalized.

Rating and Reviews: 4.5/5 (160 reviews).

The main features:

• Automated Safe Delivery: SendOwl sends secure download links after checkout to automate digital goods sales. This feature expedites and protects digital product delivery, boosting customer satisfaction.
• Flexible and Complete Platform: Downloads, subscriptions, e-books, movies, music, PDFs, designs, access codes, and online courses are all handled by SendOwl. It simplifies operations by allowing organizations of all sizes and kinds to manage varied digital product offerings on a single platform.
• Complete Digital Goods Marketplace: SendOwl offers digital product delivery, marketing, analytics, and customization. Merchants may promote, sell, and evaluate digital product sales on this one-stop platform.

Pricing:

FetchApp

User-friendly software automates digital goods delivery. Merchants can easily store, distribute, and monitor digital downloads using FetchApp's Shopify integration.

Rating and Reviews: 4.7/5 (42 reviews).

Key features:

• Custom File Management: File handling showcases FetchApp's versatility. Users may connect several files with one product or many goods. The platform offers exact download management based on time, amount, or both, adapting to different product kinds and purchasing circumstances.
• Order management and control efficiency: Consolidating orders from various carts and gateways into one interface improves order administration. Merchants may manually expire, reopen, and resend orders. Centralized digital product sales management improves efficiency and response.
• Cost-effective, commission-free sales: By not charging commissions, FetchApp makes selling digital items affordable. The price strategy is based entirely on storage demands, ensuring predictable costs without a sales cut. Free and self-hosted plans meet various company demands and budgets, making them financially beneficial for sellers.

Pricing:

Read more: Top 12 Shopify Digital Download Apps

3 Steps to Adding Digital Products On Shopify

Shopify makes selling digital items worldwide easy with its intuitive UI and powerful capabilities. 

Here's a quick, 3-step-by-step tutorial to adding digital items to your Shopify business:

1. Set Up Your Shopify Digital Shop

Read step 2 if you have a complete Shopify shop account. If you're new, read this section carefully. Selling digital items requires more than uploading files! Build and launch the remainder of your online shop.

Starting with a Shopify shop for digital items is the first step. Shopify has a 3-day free trial and $1/month for 3 months. 

If you're new to Shopify and need help getting up and running, we've got you covered in this comprehensive tutorial post that will walk you through the process step by step.

Customising Shopify Shop Design And Branding

Many free and premium Shopify themes exist. Many themes are available from $0 to $350 (one-time price) to meet your brand style and company needs.

Click Online Store > Themes in Shopify admin to browse all themes. 

Next, scroll down to view Popular free themes and Explore more themes.

Pro Tips: Not a web designer or coder? No problem! The EComposer Page Builder can help. It lets retailers easily construct pages and sections using a live drag-and-drop editor, from landing pages to 404 error pages and theme sections. It also includes third-party sales extensions, saving time and resources.

2. Upload Digital Products To Shopify 

The Shopify Dashboard lets you add digital items like the way you create physical Shopify products. To add digital Shopify products, follow the steps below:

To see all Shopify options for various actions, click Setting in the bottom left corner. 

On the left sidebar, click Products. After that, click Add Product in the dashboard center.

For clarity, create Shopify product descriptions now. 

Next, you can add the images through the "Media" menu (see screenshot below):

After reviewing your product description and photos, click ‘Save.’

To add the digital product itself, go to the product information page, click the "Actions" link in the upper right corner, and then select "Add digital file."

This leads you to options that enable you to choose how to give a product download link to a client (automatically via email or manually at your convenience) and the maximum number of times a digital product may be downloaded.

Note: You should select ‘Digital Product or Service’ under ‘shipping’ if your product is digital-only.

3. Selling And Managing Digital Items Via The App

To manage Shopify digital orders more efficiently, you can install additional apps.

Note: For this tutorial, we assume you're selling your goods using Shopify's ‘Sky Pilot ‑ Digital Downloads" app, although other digital download applications work similarly.

Search for the Sky Pilot ‑ Digital Downloads in the Shopify App Store and click the black "Install" button. 

Then, confirm the installation again.

After linking, Sky Pilot's simple interface lets you sell and stream ebooks and music in your shop with automatic downloads.

Now, you've finished the 3 steps to adding and selling digital items on Shopify.

Common Shopify Digital Product Sales Mistakes And Solutions

Successful Shopify digital product sales require avoiding common mistakes that might slow development. This section lists common merchant errors like product descriptions, marketing, customer feedback, and checkout confusion and provides easy fixes:

Inadequate Product Descriptions And Images

ResearchGate found that product visual information (images/videos) affects consumer trust, click-through rate, and purchase decision. 

However, for numerous reasons, Shopify digital goods sales often have poor product descriptions and photos. 

Writing informative product descriptions and taking good photos may take time. Therefore, some Shopify merchants may rush to add new goods. This might lead to generic illustrations and low-resolution photos that weakly represent the product.

Also, sellers may lack the knowledge or money to develop good product descriptions and photographs, resulting in substandard material that fails to promote digital items.

Are you experiencing these? Relax—ChatGPT with EComposer Builder Page will simplify product descriptions and change your e-commerce store's content. EComposer's specialized tools and ChatGPT's natural language processing make crafting compelling product descriptions easy. This powerful combination boosts online sales and customer engagement by rapidly helping you generate well-structured, high-quality reports.

 Since the things are digital, some sellers may assume a wide, unfocused advertising and marketing plan would work. However, without a defined and targeted approach, the message may become buried in the vast online marketplace, making it impossible for potential consumers to see things.

John Wanamaker, advertising pioneer. He said, "Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; I don't know which half." This comment shows the difficulties of measuring the efficiency of unfocused advertising and marketing.

So, you should use Google Analytics, Adobe Analytics, or other systems to measure website traffic, user behavior, and campaign performance. Businesses may reduce the hazards of unfocused advertising and marketing and increase conversion rates and ROI by concentrating on suitable channels, appealing messages, and customer value.

Not Reading User Reviews

User reviews reveal consumers' real-world product experiences. Bizrate Insights found that online reviews drive shoppers 50% more than discounts. And only 2% of buyers never check internet reviews.

If businesses do not read these evaluations, they lose out on consumer happiness, product performance, and improvement opportunities. This neglect may prevent product flaws or benefits from being identified, which might affect sales and consumer satisfaction.

Additionally, customer evaluations may inspire product improvements, feature additions, and new product creation. 

So, sellers should use these tools to avoid not checking user reviews and handle client feedback:

• Yotpo: Review, picture, and Q&A material are collected and shown on Yotpo.
• Trustpilot: Review management systems from Trustpilot to collect and show customer ratings.
• ReviewTrackers: This application lets companies collect and analyze client feedback from review sites and social media.
• Brandwatch: Social media listening and analytics solutions from Brandwatch monitor brand mentions and give insights.

Poor Checkout Design Or Confusion

Did you know that if your checkout process takes more than 30 seconds, 50% of your consumers will leave their carts?

A confusing checkout procedure might frustrate customers and cause them to abandon the transaction. Customers may leave a purchase if the designs are confusing or needless hurdles, such as numerous form fields or unclear directions.

Additionally, poor checkout design might erode faith in transaction security. Unprofessional checkout processes or personal and financial information worries might cause consumers to leave their carts, costing the firm revenue.

Solutions: Merchants may customize page types and parts using EComposer Page Builder, including the checkout page.  Retailers may enhance checkout page performance, aesthetics, and usefulness using built-in extensions and speed-up tools. Revenues and conversions may rise.

Related Articles

• Best Shopify Digital themes
• How to Sell Digital Products on Shopify

Tips For Selling Digital Items On Shopify

Success in this changing industry needs strategic preparation and execution. This section reveals essential Shopify digital item sales tactics. These techniques are essential for digital marketing success, from protecting IP to presenting items well and targeting marketing.

Offer Samples or Previews

Did you know 74% of customers would remove a significant drawback of internet purchasing by trying on a product first? 

Giving customers a taste of your digital products can help them make educated purchase choices. Customers who may experience your goods and services before buying are more inclined to trust them. 

Also, samples and previews may improve digital product interest. These previews or pieces may be prominently displayed on your Shopify site to entice clients and encourage digital product purchases.

Some Shopify tips for selling digital things with samples or previews:

• eBook Seller: Give out a chapter or a condensed eBook. For instance, a cookbook vendor may give a free download of a recipe collection to entice clients.
• Online Course Creator: Freely provide an introduction module or movie. For instance, a language learning platform may give a complimentary sample session or a brief film demonstrating its methods and efficacy.
• Music Artist: To give buyers a flavor of an album's style and quality, a musician may play a 30-second preview of each track.
• Graphic Designer or Artist: An illustrator might provide free watermarked copies of their work to encourage buyers to buy the high-resolution, watermark-free versions.
• Content Creator: A content developer may give a free blog post or video instruction to demonstrate their competence and encourage readers to buy more.

Protecting Intellectual Property

If you sell digital things on Shopify, you should protect intellectual property (IP). Here are crucial digital asset protection tips:

• Digital Rights Management (DRM) platforms: Locklizard and FileOpen provide DRM solutions to govern digital material access, copying, and use.
• Watermarking tools: Digimarc and Adobe Photoshop may apply visible or undetectable watermarks to digital files, making them more challenging to abuse.
• Copyright registration services: U.S. Copyright Office and Copyrighted.com can help you register your digital material for copyright protection, proving ownership.
• Legal services: LegalZoom and Rocket Lawyer help with terms of use, licensing agreements, and infringement lawsuits.

High-Quality Product Presentation

Product presentation is critical to attracting and engaging consumers for Shopify digital sales. Some suggestions for good product presentations:

• Shopify's built-in image editor lets you modify and improve product photographs to display them in the best light.
• Explore Shopify's App Store for applications that boost product displays. These tools let you build picture galleries, add videos, and customize product displays to promote your digital goods.
• Video creation tools: Create high-quality digital product demonstration films and tutorials with Adobe Premiere Pro, Final Cut Pro, Canva, or Animoto.
• Responsive design themes: EComposer Landing Page Builder themes for your online stores offer a mobile-responsive, visually attractive, and user-friendly device experience.

Implementing Targeted Marketing

There are several tools and platforms available to help you execute focused marketing tactics to sell digital things on Shopify. Here are a few such examples:

• Email marketing platforms: Mailchimp, Klaviyo, and Constant Contact interact with Shopify and enable powerful segmentation and automation to send personalized email messages to particular client groups.
• Social media advertising tools: Facebook Ads Manager, and Instagram Ads enable you to precisely target your audience by demographics, interests, and behaviors.
• Content marketing tools: HubSpot, SEMrush, and Ahrefs can help you create content, study keywords, and optimize SEO to generate organic traffic and engage your audience.
• Retargeting platforms: Retargeting with AdRoll and Google advertisements lets you display advertisements to Shopify shop visitors who have engaged with your store, driving conversions.
• Influencer marketing platforms AspireIQ, Influence.co, and Upfluence can help you find and work with influencers who can promote your digital products to their followers, enlarging your target market.
• Analytics and optimization tools: Google Analytics, Shopify's built-in analytics, Hotjar, and Crazy Egg may help you optimize your marketing plans based on data.

FAQs

1. What Does Shopify Charge For Digital Goods Sales?

Yes, it does. Shopify starter plan charges a transaction fee for each sale. Transaction costs for digital product sales vary per pricing plan. General overview:

• Basic Shopify Plan: With the Basic Shopify account, the transaction cost for each sale is 2.9% + 30¢ for online credit card rates. Choose Shopify Payments as your payment gateway to minimize transaction fees to 2.2% + 30¢.
• Shopify Plan: The transaction cost for each sale on the ordinary Shopify plan is 2.6% + 30¢ for online credit card rates. When using Shopify Payments, the transaction cost is decreased to 2.0% + 30¢.
• Advanced Shopify Plan: For the Advanced Shopify plan, the transaction cost for each sale is 2.4% + 30¢ for online credit card rates. With Shopify Payments, transaction fees are lowered to 1.8% + 30¢.

Note that these prices are based on online credit card rates and may change for in-person or foreign purchases. Third-party payment gateways may cost more than Shopify Payments.

2. How To Modify A Digital Downloads Order?

Modifying Shopify digital download orders takes these steps:

• Enter your Shopify admin dashboard.
• Locate the digital download order to alter. Visit "Orders" in Shopify admin to find orders.
• Click the order for details. Changes may provide you with options:
• Update product info: Editing product information to change the version, download file, and other digital download product aspects.
• Alter customer email: Digital download customers can alter their email addresses.
• Change order info: You may adjust order quantity, price, and delivery.
• Finally, Save changes to alter the order.

3. Can Shopify Bundle Downloaded Files With Physical Products?

Yes, Shopify lets you package downloadable files with physical goods. If you wish to sell digital downloads with tangible things, this functionality may help. How to set this up:

• Set up digital download: Product options allow you to choose the digital file included with the purchase. This might be a PDF, audio file, software, or any digital material you intend to provide physical goods to buyers.
• Delivery method configuration: Shopify lets you customize digital download distribution. You may email consumers the download link or include it on the order confirmation page after their purchase.

4. Which Shopify Themes Are Ideal For Digital Products?

If you sell digital items on Shopify, you need a theme that exposes your products and gives buyers a good experience. These Shopify themes are good for digital product sales:

• Broadcast: One of the finest Shopify digital item themes streamlines transactions. Its fast setup, improved cart and checkout, and powerful marketing capabilities boost conversion rates for high-volume and physical retailers. Merchandising and product discovery are easy with dynamic picture sliders, straightforward navigation, and sophisticated search.
• Label: It is ideal for digital and physical businesses because it blends solid functionality with gorgeous images. Visual storytelling, cross-selling, promo banners, and an improved search system transform your e-commerce business.
• Electro: It is easy to set up, accommodates non-physical items, and streamlines cart and checkout for high-volume shops. Its powerful marketing and conversion capabilities, unique merchandising features, and straightforward product discovery make your online shop stand out.

Also, check out Ecomposer Builder themes. Before choosing, check out these themes' demos and see how they fit your digital product identity and presentation.

5. Does Shopify Restrict Digital File Sizes?

Yes, Shopify has size restrictions for digital files. A digital product's maximum file size is 5 GB. 

If your digital file exceeds this size restriction, consider utilizing an external file hosting provider and giving your consumers a download link after purchase. This may enable clients to access bigger digital files without facing size constraints on the Shopify platform.

The Bottom Line

We've covered the basics of optimizing Shopify digital product sales for optimum profit in this post. The process is simplified from understanding digital items to building up a Shopify site for digital offers. We've explored how detailed product descriptions, targeted marketing, customer feedback, and a seamless checkout experience boost sales.

However, digital market success demands more than the essentials. Merchants benefit from EComposer Landing Page Builder. EComposer is more than a convenience—it drives achievement. The ability to easily create a landing, homepage, collection, product, blog, cart, footer, coming soon, 404, and theme sections and integrate third-party apps improves operations, saving time and increasing revenue.

Using the EComposer Landing Page Builder and the tips in this post, merchants can confidently navigate this terrain and improve profits by selling digital items on Shopify.