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6 Reasons Why Photographers Should Sell Online Courses

6 Top Ideas for Selling Photography Online for Passive Income

11 min read

Do you have a steady paycheck for your 9-5 job? That’s cool! Deep down, might want more—a side hustle or passion project, and that’s okay too. More money, more flexibility, and more freedom. Now that you have made the decision to start up a new project, it’s time to act.

The truth, which is unknown to many, is that there are diverse passive income ideas to consider as a photographer. Among these include selling videos, stock photos, digital goods like presets, renting out your camera gear, creating a blog, selling photography prints, and conducting affiliate marketing for your photography.

You’ll notice a similar element to these options, and that is the internet. You can sell photography online to make extra income, and without necessarily stressing about it. Given the wide growth of the ecommerce space, the best time to consider taking your online store to the Internet and owning a website to sell photography is now. And Ecwid’s ecommerce solutions are the right fit for your endeavors.

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Photography Online For Passive Income

In this post, we will discuss some of the viable ideas to make passive money from photography. We will also consider some of the best ways to sell photography. These ideas are suitable for beginners and are flexible enough to let you do other things. Read on to learn more about how to sell photography online.

Passive income means money earned without lots of activity to make it happen. In most cases, you can do the majority of the work upfront with only additional effort alongside to earn a reasonable income. It is synonymous with making money while you are sleeping.

Photography, like other crafts or freelance gigs/skills, is one with which a person can make some extra cash. There are numerous ways to make passive income by doing what you like to do best, which in this case, is taking photos.

Selling Photography Online- The Ways to Earn Passive Income

1. Blogging

You probably have heard this countless times. But blogging in this case does not imply vlogging or blogging about the events of the day.

Blogging is a great way to build an audience in any kind of product or service, photography inclusive. It indicates that blogging can help draw traffic to your photography website as long as you can meet people’s needs and answer their questions. Consequently, you can monetize the traffic, and there are various ways to do that.

2. Sales of digital goods including lightroom presets

You can also monetize your photography site audience online by selling digital goods and lightroom presets. You can make photo filters in Adobe Lightroom, then go ahead to sell the presets through a reliable ecommerce platform.

The interesting part of this idea is that you can add the solution to any website building tool like Wix. Likewise, you can sell other digital goods in demand by photographers to embellish their crafts. Once you have an active online audience that shows interest in your offering, making passive income from sales of digital goods becomes a reality, rather than a dream or wish.

3. Renting Camera, Lenses, and Gear

If you have extra cameras, lenses, and gear, you can rent them out to make extra money. One excellent way to do that is to rent them out online through stashii, Kostok, or neighbors. These are online websites known for renting personal items.

This method is preferred to renting out in person because of the level of risks involved. Besides, the sites offer insurance such that your stuff can hardly be stolen. There are, however, a few reliable websites to sell photography if you are looking in that direction.

More so, selling photography online and making extra money through this means is pretty easy as the company will do the bulk of the work for you. That is inclusive of the promotion of your offer to collect payments. While it may seem like a fairly passive means to make money with just a little investment, you can make cool money regularly depending on how big your audience is.

4. Sales of stock videos and photos

This idea, being an excellent means of letting go of the tremendous number of photos and videos you have in your store with no intention to use them anytime soon, is one of the best ways to sell photography online. But letting go of these items brings you a reasonable amount of money in return. Although it may sound like a grueling task, it is a proven way of earning passive income.

For instance, Shutterstock is a website that will readily pay you good money for quality photos. You can also check online to identify the different photography sites where you can sell your best photos. In addition, those quality videos you had shot that are lying idle on your device can be sold on the internet to make money. The approach is simple: choose topics around people, architecture, or nature and sell these items on different websites.

5. Affiliate marketing

As a photographer seeking means of making passive income online, an affiliate is one excellent option to consider. Simply put, by helping people sell their items online, you can get some extra money in return. This method can give you a substantial stream of income, is reliable for long-term goals, and helps you promote your favorite items.

Meanwhile, you have to make sure to have passion for any choice you make. There are valid examples of people on the internet who simply act as an Amazon affiliate and recommend their favorite photography gear on the pages. That way, you can provide quality reviews for your audience and get an affiliate commission from every purchase made after a visitor clicks on the links.

6. Use the appropriate keywords

This is perhaps the most important element of online marketing. An individual in search of something on the internet simply types some words inside the search bar and expects a return of reliable sources to pick from. In the case of photography, only the photos with the most relevant keyword will appear on the screen, and that is why it is essential to pay attention to the use of keywords.

Irrespective of how relevant the photo is, without a proper tag, it has little chance of appearing in search results. To get the optimum result, make sure to study the search trends about stock photos. That way, you have a proper idea about the demand for the photos in the market.

Best Places to Sell Photography Online

It is not enough to know how to make passive income from selling photography online. The knowledge of where to sell is also necessary. Hence the need to consider some of the reliable, top-class options regarding selling photography online. They include:

  • Your website: where you can set your prices, take the totality of your money without anyone else taking a cut, have absolute control over the way you display your photos, and set your terms and conditions as it suits you. Apart from yours, there are also a number of world-class websites to sell photography.
  • Adobe Stock: a photo marketplace recognized as the first online place to sell photos.
  • Shutterstock: with more than 200 million music tracks, images, and videos, Shutterstock has millions of customers that are ready to buy anything you put up for sale.

Others are Alamy, Fotomoto, Crestock, 500px, Snapped4u, PixaBay, GettyImages, and PhotoShelter.

In addition, you could look up the internet on how to sell photography on Etsy. Etsy is one of the most sought-after options when it comes to selling photography prints. Therefore, if you are not too sure where to sell photography to make passive income, try Etsy.

Final Thoughts

You can convert those photos of household objects and old vacation pictures to extra money as long as you get the hang of the business of selling photography online. Selling photos can be a fascinating way to earn money passively.

But the caveat is that you have to do it the right way. Several people leverage the idea as their only source of living. That is an indication that you can also make some good money from it. Only stay consistent, and ensure you have quality photos and videos to sell. And as with other things regarding selling online, the best way to sell photography online and achieve success is to take it very seriously, plan your images well, and consider your audience.

Also, you can take advantage of Ecwid’s ecommerce offers to stand a higher chance of owning your store online and integrating the company’s widgets to your store for more guaranteed success.

Do you want to learn more about selling photos online?

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About the author

Max has been working in the ecommerce industry for the last six years helping brands to establish and level-up content marketing and SEO. Despite that, he has experience with entrepreneurship. He is a fiction writer in his free time.

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