I checked my blog analytics for last 7 days and found a referrer list that made me stop and think. Some traffic came from the usual places Google, Baidu, and other search engines but then I saw links from Ethereum.org, TheGuardian.com, SteamPowered.com, and even Dartmouth.edu. That last one really caught my attention. It makes me wonder if my blog is listed on some academic resource page, or if someone’s watching it with AdSense placement in mind. It’s not just the .edu traffic it’s the mix. Tech, fashion, gaming, education. That’s a wide range for a blog that mostly features styled Zazzle products, and autumn season posts.  I wonder are my information/ promotion  blog posts being discussed in classrooms, shared in forums, or bookmarked by niche readers? This kind of referrer list gives you insight not just numbers. It shows who’s linking to your blog, what kind of visibility you’re getting.  I wish Zazzle gave us this kind of breakdown. Imagine knowing which external site is sending buyers/ traffic  your way.  Are you seeing similar referrers or traffic spikes, at your blog? Are you fascinated by who’s sending traffic to your blog? ... View more

I was scrolling through leggings at marketplace today and discovered that there is a blind spot in the mockup designs and that blind spot is probably costing creators sales.  When leggings are shown styled as activewear / fitness the customers may scroll past thinking “I have enough workout gear” I am not sure why creators don’t show the legging or tank top in different mockups such as a casual shopping at the mall or work at the office look. In my opinion I think showing the mockups styled with different fashion looks would help sell the top or legging.  (Attract another customer) not just activewear.  Isn’t it better to sell a possibility, with your mockup by showing them “this legging isn’t just activewear” In my opinion I think you might sell more leggings and tank tops if you showed the customer how to put together the casual, business, or date night look.   ( I am adding  3 fashion look mockups to products to show customer how to create a unique style) I want to create a need for a product, I want to sell style, plus active or jean looks.   This is what I am working on… Business look Chic Abstract Gold Dusting on Black by FunkyAbstract_Gifts     Seasonal Look Autumn Leaves on Black by Susang6 Shopping Look Black and Silver Glitter Zebra Print Chic by Susang6 Dressy Casual look Abstract Copper Feather Print on Black by FunkyAbstract_Gifts ... View more

I published this post on Aug 6 but never shared it. Below is an exact copy/paste of the blog post. What I failed to mention in the post is that this explains (I think) why there is an Excessive Royalty Fee. When you look at the numbers below you'll see it helps them claw-back a little of what they're losing as total share of the sale at higher royalty. _________________________________________________________________________________ I like to dig into the math behind our earnings on Zazzle because to me it's a puzzle-solving activity that's oddly enjoyable, and sometimes it reveals interesting/important things as it did with the User Options situation for example. For Designers who are in this as a business and dependent on their Zazzle earnings income, it is vital to understand how the math works so you can set an appropriate Royalty that works for you after it all shakes out and you are looking at your Net earnings. There are five different ways earnings on a sale of your own products can be calculated: 1) None = there was no referrer, so no one is earning a referral on it, not even Zazzle 2) Cross-Promo = you used an RF# link so earned 15% as Referrer in addition to your Royalty 3) Self-Promo = you used a "clean" link so earned a total of 35-50% of the order total 4) 3rd Party - Other = the sale was Referred but you were not the Referrer 5) 3rd Party - Zazzle = the sale was Referred but you were not the Referrer For #4 and #5, your earnings are exactly the same. In both cases the Marketing Royalty Fee for a referred sale is applied but since you weren't the Referrer, you're not earning any of it back. For Zazzle though it does make a difference as if it's Other, they have to pay out a Referral commission to someone else. Zazzle doesn't make any distinction between themself and Other on any of our earnings reports and that is a very sore point that needs to change. So while technically there are only four sale types (None, Cross, Self, or 3rd), distinguishing between Zazzle as 3rd or Other as 3rd is important when looking at the big picture. So let's look at that "big picture" ... There is a "base price" for every product which includes the minimum 5% Royalty a Designer can set. For example, if you look at the CYO blank for a 16x16 throw pillow, the list price is $33.45. If you add a design and publish and set 5% as your Royalty, it's still $33.45. I have never tried to figure out the formula Zazzle uses to determine the product price after you set your royalty % but always assumed it was, uhm, "linear". (I don't know the proper math term for this.) I just figured that whatever percent of the total sale Zazzle was making, it would stay the same as the royalty (and thus cost to end customer) increased. But I've just recently discovered this is not the case. As you increase your Royalty, Zazzle's % share of the total sale amount decreases. This is mind-boggling to me. But the math doesn't lie. I've looked at this under various circumstances and can see that an increase in Royalty can lead to a significant increase in earnings to you as the Designer while costing only slightly more to the customer and decreasing the % Zazzle makes on the sale. Now I'm going to move on to some actual examples of real-world numbers. Since wedding invites are the bread & butter of many successful designers, I looked at that first. I went to Zazzle's Best Sellers page, sorted to All-Time, and then picked the first wedding invite to show up, which happened to be a flat 5x7 at 10% royalty. 10% is also the number many set to "stay competitive" so I used 10% royalty in my comparison to a higher one. The following screenshot shows a flat 5x7 invite at the current 20% off discount, set to 10% royalty vs 23.8% royalty, with the Marketing Royalty Fee in both cases being the 50% bracket as applied to wedding stationery, and they ordered 50 invites. (Full image Here.) At 10% Royalty, the total the customer pays is $100. At 23.8% Royalty, the total the customer pays is $118. (Only $0.36 more per invite to customer) The percents I've shown under the sale types are the percent of total order cost the customer paid to Zazzle ($100 vs $118). Here it is in pie chart form where we can visualize it better: (Full image Here) Look at the None sale here, it's the most striking difference. Upping your Royalty to 23.8% earns you $16.68 more (a 166.8% increase in profits!) while Zazzle only earns $1.32 more (a measly 1.47% increase) and their percent of the total sale has decreased from 90% to 77.4% whereas yours has increased from 10% to 22.6%! If you look at all five sale types your earnings increase significantly across the board even with a 3rd Party sale where they still more than double. Your percent share of the total sale also increases across the board, except for the Self-Promo sale where it dips slightly due to the Excess Royalty Fee applied. But even with that fee you're still earning $7.60/15.2% MORE. And this increase to Royalty that significantly increases your earnings as well as shifting the % split between you and Zazzle in your favor, it only costs the customer $0.36 per invite which is peanuts in the wedding market where people who want what they want aren't going to blink at that $18 dollars in their overall wedding budget. Now lets look at another product example where the customer is only going to be ordering one instead of in bulk. Here I've used an over-sized greeting card (18x24) I have set to 22% royalty. (Full image Here) I am not providing pie charts here for visuals but you can see the same math happens as with the bulk invite sale; with the increase in Royalty %, your earnings and total percent of sale significantly increase over Zazzle's. In this case, Designer earnings on a None sale increase by $3.82 while Zazzle's only increase by $0.34. And while your share of the total sale more than doubles from 10% to 21%, Zazzle's decreases from 90% to 79%. And again, you can see this play out on all five sales types, except the Self-Promo type where our total share decreases a bit due to the Excess Royalty Fee even though our total earnings in dollars increase. This over-sized card example is for a one-off occasion where, IMO, a few cents or even a few dollars, isn't going to stop the customer from making the order. This card has sold for me multiple times at 22%, and the smaller version (8.5x11) has sold multiple times at 32.5% royalty. This is not a humble-brag. I am just trying to stress the point that a Royalty over the "suggested" 10% can make a significant difference to your earnings while having minimal impact on the customer. And it also, quite surprisingly to me, shifts the % of total sale earned. When the Ambassador Program was first announced, Zazzle used a 10% Royalty in many of their example calculations. And if you look at this page, they suggest just 5-10% as royalty which is pathetically low. I had always assumed that higher royalties would benefit both Designer and Zazzle so why wouldn't they want people to increase it? But I can see now that that is not true; the higher the royalty the more the total earnings shift in favor of the Designer instead of Zazzle. So it makes sense to me now why Zazzle recommends staying low - because despite the small increase in gross sales, it actually results in a smaller share for Zazzle where their revenue is not increasing at the same rate the Designer's is. Zazzle mentions in the above linked article being "competitive" as a reason to stay at 5-10%, and this is a concern I've seen raised by many Designers. But what's "competitive" is determined by what's in the MP. If people collectively raise their rates, than that higher rate becomes the "competitive" rate ... It's all relative, one big circle, and the change starts with you. August 6th, 2025 ~ Col's Creations ... View more

Can Zazzle acquire a series of tall fonts for use in creating the extra-bold designs typically seen on t-shirts? We have serif, san serif, bold, condensed, calligraphy, novelty, collegiate, and grunge-style fonts, but there are no tall fonts. I can achieve this look in Illustrator by stretching the font vertically, but I can’t recreate the same effect when using a Zazzle font. Thanks! ... View more

Hello! Our new Creative Community group has moved to Substack and have extended last week's "Fun Friday Share" to this new platform. We'd love to invite you. You can contribute today, tomorrow, and Thursday. On Friday, we will have a new share live. 😄  I hope you'll swing by. We are still VERY much in the early stages, so you are not behind!  Here is the Orange Fun Friday Share And Here is the "Newsletter"/GROUP if You'd Like to See What We're Up to Now ... View more

Hi Creators,  Have you seen the latest addition to the marketplace? An Oven mitt and pot holder set. 🥰 Check them out here and let us know what you think!  ... View more

It looks like Benable is becoming a revolution among Zazzlers. Share your invitation code here if you want. I also have a Pinterest board to share lists there, feel free to join. Benable invite link   Pinterest board    ... View more

Are Zazzle’s embroidered products out of stock or discontinued? Every item is listed as out of stock, which makes me wonder if Zazzle has actually discontinued that service. It’s really picking up steam on Etsy…. ... View more

Hello,  I am a Zazzle creator  Zazzle team  informed me two weeks ago that w-8 form has been processed and that my account has been updated. However, when I looked at my payment settings I see nothing changed. It's written in that they can't pay me because my payment setting hasn't been completed and that W8-Ben form hasn't been collected yet.  I send an email to Zazzle team two weeks ago and no one responded to me . I wonder when the settings will change and when will I receive my payment. Can someone in Zazzle team here respond to me ?  ... View more

I hope this post inspires and helps some of you who are either at the edge or feeling the full impact of burnout whether from being a busy entrepreneur on Zazzle or something else.  ----   Burnout isn’t just “being tired.” It’s when your body, brain, and spirit all hit a wall at the same time. For me, months of poor health, chronic pain, and overwork left me running on fumes. I was foggy, exhausted, and honestly scared. The medications I was on made it worse—memory lapses, confusion, even dementia-like symptoms. And yet, like so many entrepreneurs, I kept pushing. Until I couldn’t anymore. The Breaking Point One day, I realized I was done. I was mentally and physically exhausted to the point I couldn't do it anymore. So I did something deeply unpopular in the hustle-driven, “always on” world of entrepreneurship: I put everything down. I stopped grinding. I gave up ... which isn't very glamorous! In an ideal world you stop grinding or rest before you reach this point. I didn't .. I pushed myself way too far. And compounded with chronic health issues my body said " enough !" I decided to lean on faith—the belief that the universe had my back, even when I couldn’t show up at 100%. I've done this before as I've had an 'eventful life' and it didn't let me down so why I didn't just keep my faith I don't know ... we all falter and it's worth remembering that sometimes it's not only good but vital to trust in the power of those forces we do not understand! What Happened Next I expected my print-on-demand business to crumble without me. But it didn’t. Sales stayed steady ( ish). They'd have been steadier if not for the overnight changes Zazzle introduced every now and then! Fee hike being the latest. Orders kept coming in. My passive all be it declining income carried me while I focused on healing. It wasn’t “luck.” Along with faith it was the quiet power of systems, designs, and products I had built when I was well. And it reminded me of something else beyond faith that's important: this is why we create businesses that work for us, not the other way around. My Recovery Wasn’t Glamorous Healing wasn’t linear or neat. It looked like: Doing brain games to sharpen my mind again Fighting for better sleep with a new routine Coming off medications that were making things worse Exploring natural alternatives and lifestyle changes Watching my diet like my life depended on it Drinking more water than ever before Moving my body as much as my back would allow Some days, “progress” was just making it out of bed. Honestly it was dire and chronic depression wasn't helping.  But slowly ( very slowly) I started to feel a shift. My mind felt clearer. Ideas began to flow again. Creativity returned. This is a recent change! So it's been slow ... but recovery when your body needs rest shouldn't be rushed! If it is a relapse is imminent so I'm taking it easy! What I Learned Rest is a strategy, not a weakness. Stepping back doesn’t mean you’ve failed—it means you’re protecting your ability to keep going. Passive income is a lifeline. My Zazzle and print-on-demand shops supported me when I couldn’t show up. Build systems that don’t collapse when you take a step back. Faith matters. Whether you call it luck, the universe, or divine timing—sometimes you have to trust that when you care for yourself, life will carry the rest. Your business needs you at your best. Entrepreneurship requires clarity, energy, and spark. You can’t build anything lasting if you’re constantly running on empty. The Comeback I still live with chronic pain. I still have health struggles. But I’m fighting back. I’m prioritizing hydration, healthier choices, and sustainable routines. And most importantly: my zest for entrepreneurship is alive again. And that feels like a miracle. Takeaway: Don’t be afraid to step back. Don’t be afraid to rest. The unpopular path might just be the one that saves both you and your business. Give yourself permission to rest and trust it will be ok!! Forgive me if this post seems indulgent and I suppose in some way it is but one thing  I have also realised this past year is trying to appear tough and untouchable , built of steel when the reality is the polar opposite isn't helpful because eventually the cracks appear. So that's another take away ... keep it real and ask for help when you need it! Heres to good mental health!  x ... View more

I have created lots of jaw-dropping,elegant,marvelous designs of lots of products but,unfortunately very few viewers visiting on my products,almost none .no selling and earning at all.  what should i do now ? ... View more

The timing of the the jump in my linkovers coincides with my 'back at it' activity this past week. But I'm wondering if it's just a coincidence? Are others experiencing a jump in linkovers? For those who don't already know how to access linkovers you go to your 'account' then to 'earnings' and select the 'abassador' tab to view your linkovers. Linkovers relate to traffic coming to Zazzle via your links ( or bots ... and by bots that might be other sites doing a mass crawl of your products. I don't understand it properly but I think this accounts for surges when we all see the same pattern). ... View more

The way I see it, Zazzle’s new fee structure is about protecting their bottom line. 1. They run big discounts (sometimes as high as 40% ), and to ensure those sales are impactful prices must appear significantly lower. High royalties might cancel out the impact of sales. Hence discouraging higher royalties? 2. Google made massive changes to what they show via images so the promotional pins took a hit, they don't appear in results like they once did. Sales overall might be significantly down. We have Amazon and Temu offering personalized goods at significantly lower prices. That has got to have made a dent. The way to overcome that is to focus on personalized goods that neither of those providers is capable of producing! 3. Part of it is also about royalties/referrals. With a high royalty rate and 35% self-referral fee Zazzle could actually end up barely covering their own costs once sales and discounts were applied. So now with the carve-outs and caps, they’ve made sure that doesn’t happen anymore. I can see the logic there.  4. I also think Zazzle wants us to market ourselves more. By making royalties alone less reliable, they’re nudging us to use referral links, which saves Zazzle the cost of advertising. Hence cover images and videos and reward systems/features for those sharing media and so on. I expect to see more reward systems in the future for those doing particularly well on social media.  5. And then there’s the category thing — higher carve-outs in areas like home décor and digital products just mean Zazzle makes sure they always get their cut, no matter what we set as a royalty. So yeah, it’s built to make sure Zazzle stays profitable. Our job is just figuring out how to work with the system instead of fighting against it. I'm working on that now. I as you know haven't been active on Zazzle a while so it will take some time to work out new strategies. But I am on it!  ... View more