Is anyone making any money on Zazzle

[Deb1]

Is anyone making any money on Zazzle? I'm don't know I was selling some then all this crazy fee things stole most of my profit. Just cannot not see how to earn any money doing this. The fees, other people can steal my profit not to mention at the end of the year I will have to claim this income on my Income taxes. If anyone is making any real money, please let me know how too. So disappointed. Thank you.

[PenguinPower]

? No, you won’t have to claim any money you haven’t actually collected…. What Zazzle reports as your earnings will still, as it always has been, only be the money you are paid.

[Sara_H]

@Deb1 

Being on this platform is 100% your choice. It is also Zazzle's choice to change the rules at any time. It is their site and their business model.

They can charge us whatever fees and it's our choice to either continue accepting their terms by using the site or go and make our empire elsewhere.

That is our choice.

Sales are not guaranteed by just having a store on Zazzle and hope that you're being found in the marketplace.

There are thousands of sellers (probably more) and millions of products for buyers to choose from.

Know your buyer, make products for that buyer, promote those products to those buyers and if they like them - they will buy it.

That's their choice.

If you're disappointed you're not earning the money you want using Zazzle, maybe look at other options or re-frame your disappointment to an action plan on how you can make more money using this platform and accepting their new terms and fees.

Your choice.

[YesItsRoy]

I’ve been debating whether or not to respond to this – and I’m aware it’s my choice to do so now. 😊 

A point, if I may:  Humans have been entering binding agreements since Mesopotamia… Ancient Egypt… the Roman Empire – written in stone, literally.  And until eBay and Amazon tried on unilateral changes in (if I recall correctly) the early-mid 2000s, contracts required the consent of all parties in order to be modified.  I’ll do this, if you do that; scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours (for a fee, of course); tit for tat; “consideration,” in legalese. 

eBay and Amazon were successful because they were giants.  That doesn’t make it an ethical business practice.  eBay, Amazon, RedBubble, and, yes, Zazzle know we’ve dedicated years of our time – time we can’t get back – and we are hard pressed to take our business elsewhere.  The contract is no longer written in stone (if it were, there would be a lot fewer changes!!), but we’re stuck between a rock and a hard place, and they know it.

There isn’t one Zazzle employee would just sit back if Zazzle said “we’re going to reduce your pay, effective in 2 weeks, by 35-50 percent each week, depending on which department you’re working in to help defray the cost of paying someone else’s salary.”  US employees are At Will, and if Zazzle will do this to us, they could well do that to their employees – same concept; not written in stone.

So, with respect, a “take it or leave it attitude” is bad business all around.  It erodes the trust, and that trust will likely never return.

Your point of creating a new business plan is a good one -- everyone should take it and diversify.  We should've always, but we definitely should now.

[Mariholly]

It seems to be a bad time — between the new rules and the global economic situation, this platform no longer feels like the designer-friendly place it used to be a few years ago.

As others have said, it's your choice whether to stay or not, but yes, it used to be a place where you could earn good money by working long hours. Being friendly didn’t mean anything was handed to you, but it was a good place.

If you’ve taken a look at the various posts, you’ll see how disappointed — even angry — many of us are. Some have been here for over a decade, dedicating countless hours of their lives

.

[MadjackGG]

I'm guessing what's happened is that Zazzle's balance sheet is not looking good.

As a result they've cut back on the marketing budget and are now promoting a smaller number of sellers at the level Zazzle had been applying to a much wider number until recently. Like Redbubble's Premium/Pro account tiers, these preferred sellers likely fit a profile that the rest of us can only guess at, although being highly effective at self promotion has to a component. This is why sales have cratered for many (including myself), since the new TOS came into effect, regardless of a high z-rank, use of cover photos or having a good sales record.

At the same time, sellers are now evidently subsidizing Zazzle's marketing through the introduction of a heavy 'marketing fee' on each sale - which is frankly a little cynical if they're instead reducing the marketing for most sellers.

The cost of keeping prices competitive has been offloaded onto sellers by encouraging the default royalty rate be reduced to 10%. Which in reality, after all the extra fees Zazzle applies, results in a payout of pennies on the dollar.

These measures are effectively squeezing sellers out of the equation.

There's also the shenanigans with how referrals work. I'll leave that to those who have a better understanding of the ins and outs of it. All I know is I used to get a referral sale about once a month and they were always good payouts. I don't expect I'll be seeing those again, though I hope I'm wrong.

At the end of the day, I've got to congratulate whoever designed this new regime. Completing that BA in business studies was evidently time well spent because this has been a masterclass in using near legalese levels of opaque complexity to confuse, befuddle and blunt the inevitable backlash by the Zazzle community at being bent over a barrel.

Bravo.

[YesItsRoy]

Couldn't agree more.  

For Marketplace consistency, the right move was to increase Base Prices.  Instead, they encourage us to not only not retain 14.9%, but reduce to 10.0%, take more from wherever we land on our rate (and of course, when we increase rate, Zazzle gets more from each of our sales), and then punish us with less promotion because our prices are higher when we increase our rates to retain our levels of Earnings.

And market it to us as "opportunities ahead" and tout how we can earn 35-50% on the 1 referral a month we *might* be lucky enough to get past Zazzle's RF IDs out there in the world.

Definitely strategic and well played, Zazzle.  But a lot of loyalty and trust has been lost, and that was an immeasurable benefit. 

I'm sure the cost of the lawyers and coding engineers were worth it. Though the coders... math isn't mathing. 

[Andrea]

Also, this may be an unpopular opinion but in this instance A.I. went some way for those able to write the promps...  to help us unravel the confusing material/updates/terms/changes we were given.... however at every turn those results and clarifications were blocked when we tried to post them for everyone to see.

[Jadendreamer13]

I took a look at your store. A few items have simple patterns applied to your products. However, nearly all of the rest of your products have no designs and no personalization options applied to them. They just have a solid color applied to them, and that’s it. Any customer can change the color of each product, so why would they buy a product for a price that also includes a designer fee when they could save the money and do that themselves?

Zazzle customers are looking for one-of-a-kind products and gifts with unique designs that they can’t buy elsewhere. To make sales on Zazzle you have to create the type of designs that Zazzle customers want to buy.

Customers are willing to pay a premium for POD designs that meet their needs. You have to add value to Zazzle’s products in the form on high-quality, unique designs that customers can easily modify, personalize, and purchase.

[Deb1]

I would like to see Zazzle a fantastic place to be as an artist and designer. Best site for artist to use and the best for Zazzle. I believe they need to take a better look at what they are doing so they are around for a long time. I sold over 1000.00 dollars in one order of beach towels and made $79.00. Also, other sales. Now things have changed not for the better. My time, effort now has become marketing. I just want to design and make money and Zazzle promote my work. In my view after hours of design, posting and promoting my work it's not much profit at all. After all my work and time not only low profit but it can be reduced even more, and I have no say in it. I think Zazzle is just not looking at this from our view as artist and designers who fight Everday for our work to be ours and not ripped off by someone else getting paid for it or paid nothing in profit for it. I really hope Zazzle realizes they can do better by us and makes changes. Yes, this is a choice I made to be on a wonderful site like Zazzle. I hope they make this site fantastic again for artist and designers to post on and can actually make a decent profit.  Zazzle I respectfully request you take a good look at what you are doing profit wise and in the Ambassador program to make this a better site for not only Zazzle but Artist and designers. I'm sure your intention is to be a great place for artist and designers to give you their best work and loyalty. I know artist and designers would gratefully appreciate being compensated for their work. Please reconsider. My suggestion are as follows - a decent percent profit not all the bells and whistles of the Ambassador program which is just plain confusing and loss of income for artist and designers. I am not happy that someone else can profit from my work and cut my profit it makes a cutthroat workplace. Just a decent profit and not creating a not so fun place to be that makes you sick to your stomach to see someone else taking your profit. Again, I do love Zazzle, and it has wonderful products just wish it was a little better.  

[orientcourt]

Unfortunately Deb1 , Welcome to the real world especially 2024/ 2025, Our world is changing quickly and for a large proportion of people artwork is the last thing on their mind ! Zazzle has to navigate this change as well to keep their business afloat ,which is resulting in loss revenue for designers ! Just saying!

[Deb1]

Sad thing for Artist and Designers. I see so many beautiful and awesome art and designs sad day. 

[orientcourt]

Yes it is very deflating for designers  Deb1 . Never fear with your marketing efforts, more sales could just be around the corner 

[Deb1]

I'm just posting on all my sites and hope it drives up sales. I was not planning on marketing myself was hoping that was Zazzle job. Maybe Zazzle takes a good look and changes things. Just to high of fees not very fair to us. 

[Deb1]

I believe smart people always find a way to make things work and profit. Zazzle has the excellent platform to thrive by not the ability hopefully they will stop and think about this and how to make a profit and make the sellers and buyers happy. Just takes thinking. Wish them the best because this can be an awesome site if they just like us put the work into it.

[Deirdre]

I know its not directed at me, but I find this helpful

[Andrea]

A great reminder to us all! Stick to the script guys!

[Deb1]

Everyone has a right to their own opinion. I did not know art and design had boundaries tell Picasso his art stinks...LOL all in the eye of the beholder dear...... have a blessed day.

[Deb1]

I didn't say I was not making money. I was saying most of the money i did make was ate up by fees. Have a blessed day. 

[PenguinPower]

I don't begrudge 3rd party sales.... it means someone else has done the hard work of getting what I've done seen (yes, even if it's Zazzle...). Had they not been there, it's unlikely I would have even made the sale at all. 

[Deb1]

Zazzle is a site that makes money already from us prompting should be free. It's like ticket scalping when someone does this it seems innocence but is not. I could go over everyone's listed products and make a living never posting my own. Who is to say what would have been don't cheat yourself.  You have nice stuff best of luck to you. 

[PenguinPower]

I'm not cheating myself - I'm realistic. I have neither the time nor the expertise, nor the budget ($0) to properly market myself entirely independently. I also prefer to spend my limited free time creating rather than endlessly posting to social media,  attempting to attract attention and pouring over website analytics. If the only way I were ever to be seen were my own feeble marketing efforts or being discovered via a marketplace search, I doubt I'd ever sell much... I welcome anyone who wants to post my products. If you do the work, you deserve a cut. 

[Deb1]

I hate doing Pinterest or wasting my time on posting to social media myself. I was looking for Zazzle to do it for me. 

[Deb1]

I was expecting them to market for me not farming it out and collecting a fee for it that takes most of my profit. Just really disappointed.

[Mariholly]

I don’t mind others promoting my products either — that was never a problem, not even with Z. There are Zazzlers who have blogs, websites, etc., and they help drive sales while also promoting their own products. That’s great, and I’m thankful to be chosen.
What I do find completely excessive — and I believe many of us agree — is the huge marketing commission applied after the recent changes.
Right here, there are posts requesting products to promote, and I don’t think anyone believes there’s bad intent.
But of course, if it turns out that all third-party referrals now belong to Z, due to that suspicious cookie system we suspect they’re using, and Z is the only one benefiting, then our feelings about the situation are indeed very different.

[Andrea]

Sorry, but could you explain more about the zazzle associate/promoter/and self promotion links... thank you. I'm finding it confusing. All the best.

[MadjackGG]

I was until quite recently. Not any more though.

[Deb1]

I think you are right it is definitely a waste of time prompting unless you profit elsewhere such as just posting everyone else work it has a way to make quick profit found my niche. Quick money and no work love it. Thank you. Posting here I come.

[Deb1]

Closing out this discussion. Getting busy posting since it is okay to do so. I can post others work all day it is easy to do hope I make you some sales. Please create love to help you out good deal for me. Have a blessed day and thank you I am so excited to do this. 

[Deirdre]

Only 7 bucks so far. I plan to celebrate once I reach my $10 milestone.

[Deb1]

I'm taking everything off I posted on Pinterest for Zazzle and removing the Ambassador program I did better before Pinterest and the Ambassador program. I noticed when they go to Pinterest yes, I have high counts but fewer views on Zazzle I'm thinking when they go to Zazzle, they see just me but when they go to Pinterest, they get distracted. I'm just adding my other sites to my Zazzle cover page that seems to work the best for me. I am disappointed in Zazzle for not thinking this over better and not watching out for us better.

[dbvisualarts]

I haven't had a sale in 3 weeks, the longest I have ever gone without one. I lowered my royalty, sales dropped. I raised it again and they stopped completely.  🤔

[Barbara]

Some years ago, I sold handmade items on consignment when the standard was 15-20%. So, when I saw Zazzle's desire for all of us to lower our take to 10%, I was shocked and still am. That, combined with the marketing fee has made me wonder if Zazzle's ultimate goal is to change their business model, perhaps getting rid of those of us who don't fit well into their vision.

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[igiftcenter]

I can't answer for how may designers are making money on this platform... and I don't think anyone can really answer from a first hand knowledge point of view. But I can tell you that this platform is a business and it wants to survive and thrive in a profitable way as all businesses strive to do.  If the company sees the need to make changes to offset new / additional expenses being driven by marketplace changes and changes to the digital content business that is in their best interest... they have every right to do so. If these changes have a negative affect on the profits of a designer in a free platform (they don't charge for use of the platform) then designers have the option to make changes to the way they are conducting business on this platform or find that it is not the best place for their work to be promoted.  My income has been affected by changes several times over in the years I've been part of this platform (and still love doing it).  I find a way forward that allows me to continue working with this platform through these changes... and I do it by choice. 

As a business partially reliant on the content of those who create the content I would seriously doubt if the platform would knowingly do anything that would drive away content creators or discourage them knowing that they are reliant on the content being supplied. I believe whatever changes were made were done so reluctantly but deemed to be necessary.  Just remember: if the platform does not make a profit... there is no platform and everybody loses.

I wish you all continued success and hope many of you find a way a way forward through all these changes.

[Deb1]

I agree it is in their best interest and as usually we pay for it.  I just think they are not looking at the best opinions for them or us there are better ways. I do wish them the best and yes this is a choice, but it is also their choice on how to do business even if it ruins their business. Again, wish them the best and hope they are around for a very long time I do love Zazzle. I just hope we don't have to accept 1% profit.