Yearly software and mobile app sales revenue is expected to exceed 44 billion dollars by 2021. This means more and more online entrepreneurs enter into the booming, competitive market of digital products every day. The challenge is how to make money in this new industry? It’s important to look for best ecommerce platforms to sell software online because numerous ecommerce stores enable you to launch and run your own shop with little more than a blank web page.
In the 21st century, ecommerce has been the most convenient way to sell online. As a result, it has become so popular nowadays since many online companies are using this platform when they want to sell their products and services. If you are also looking for the best ecommerce to sell your software or app products then this write-up will be helpful to you.
If you are seeking a platform where you can sell software products, you should look for the best ecommerce platforms specifically designed for this purpose. There are multiple ecommerce software platforms designed specifically to facilitate the selling of digital products. In addition, there are specialty sites and marketplaces that sell only software and digital content.
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Choosing the best platform to sell digital products
There’s no better time to start selling digital products. The latest stats show that the ecommerce is exploding right now, and that growth is set to continue.
But what is the best platform to sell digital products?
There are plenty of great tools that you can use. The key to choosing the right software, is making sure that you know what you need from your platform.
Podia is a great option for those looking to sell digital downloads, courses and membership offerings. It includes the ability to run an affiliate program and will handle email marketing for you. Better yet – they won’t take a cut of your profits.
Then there are tools that operate for free by taking a cut of transaction fees – these can work well if you’re just getting started.
Thinkific
Thinkific is another ecommerce platform that focuses heavily on the benefits of online teaching for making money. With Thinkific, you can create a powerful empire for online education using your own branding and discover the benefits that sharing your knowledge can bring.
Already, more than 40,000 course creators use Thinkific to share their expertise online, and 30 million courses have been taken. If you’re looking for a service that will allow you to sell eBooks online, there are much more basic services out there. However, if you need one of the most powerful course-creation systems that there is, Thinkific is your number one choice.
Features include:
- A custom domain and URL
- SSL certificate for security and peace of mind
- Font, text, and language control
- White labelling for complete branding
- Audio, PDF, survey, video and download support
- Exam-based lessons with certifications
- Assignments for individual students
Although Thinkific is far from the cheapest platform for selling online courses in the industry today, it is one of the most comprehensive solutions on the market. If you need access to a completely brandable teaching experience that can help you to promote your courses, as well as sell them, then Thinkific could be just the thing that you need.
We’re particularly impressed by the drag-and-drop editor that allows you to change every aspect of your course, from the quizzes you use to teach customers, to the text style. You can even implement your own Google Docs into the mix.
Pricing: Free plan for your first course, and there’s a 30-day money-back guarantee. For advanced features, you’ll need at least the Basic package for $49 per month, or the Pro package for $99 per month. No transaction fees.
What can you sell with Thinkific? Thinkific is specifically suited to selling online courses, rather than other digital downloads.
PayHip
PayHip is an e-commerce platform with over 130,000 sellers worldwide. The platform allows you to sell a range of digital products from ebooks and memberships, to software and music.
Although customer store pages may be limited in terms of customization, it bears a similarity to the layout of Pinterest.
However, if you run your own blog, website or plan to sell directly on social media, PayHip makes it incredibly easy to embed the checkout and shopping cart. Even better, you can customize these features to match your branding.
The checkout is also responsive, so customers can easily make purchases regardless of which device they’re using.
Other useful features:
- Can create your own affiliate program
- Add discounts or coupons to your products
- Run promotional campaigns
- Limited downloads (each customer can download their purchase a max. of 3 times)
- Offer license keys for software
- PDF stamping onto buyers purchases to prevent illegal sharing
- Sell memberships with multiple plans and a variety of recurring intervals
- Sync your customers to your mailing lists
If you plan to sell membership or subscription services, each of your members can manage themselves with an account. You can also set up free trials for your services.
Sales are deposited immediately after each sale, and buyers can choose a variety of payments methods, from PayPal or Stripe to their own card (Visa/MasterCard/American Express etc.). You can also accept payments from a wide array of currencies.
The best thing about PayHip is that all the features are available on each plan, and they have a free plan.
What can you sell with PayHip? Digital downloads, subscriptions, software, courses and memberships.
Pricing: Each plan comes with all features and unlimited products; the only difference is the transaction fee. The Free Forever plan has a 5% transaction, this is reduced to 2% in the Plus plan. There is no transaction fee in the Pro plan. PayPal/Stripe fees still apply.
DPD (Digital Product Delivery)
DPD is a great solution for those that want to sell digital products like ebooks, graphic novels, and other related materials.
Selling multiple products is not a problem for DPD. All you need to do is upload all of your files on the platform. Then you can copy-paste DPD’s cart buttons. When customers buy your products, all of the payments get processed by DPD’s payment partners. And you keep all of the sales.
Because DPD hosts all of your files, you don’t have to worry about backups and product delivery. Your job ends after you upload the digital products.
It offers multiple payment methods including Stripe, PayPal, Moolah, Sage Pay, and Authorize.net.
There are also third-party integrations available like MailChimp, AWeber, Sendy, GetResponse, Google Analytics, Campaign Monitor, Zapier, ConvertKit, and Commission Junction.
It even gets better since DPD allows you to manage multiple online stores from one account. This lets you manage different accounts or businesses from one central location. How convenient, right?
This platform also offers digital stamping, product updates, and key codes for digital products.
Pricing: How much you pay depends on how much storage space you need. The more storage you need, the higher the price. You can configure the storage space needed to get custom pricing. The base plan is $10/month which gives you 1GB of storage space.
Gumroad
Gumroad isn’t unlike the other ecommerce platforms on this list. It too can be a platform to sell digital products and services online. But what makes it stand out from the most popular ecommerce platforms is that it targets online creators.
In a way, it’s more of a platform for other creators to discover your works.
If you’d like to share your animations, tutorials, apps, music, stories, comics, and other related digital assets (and get paid in the process), then Gumroad is the platform for you.
When you sign up for Gumroad, you’ll have an ecommerce platform where you can start selling online courses or other digital products. You can personalize it using CSS.
There’s a built-in analytics tool so you can keep track of your views and sales. If you’re unsure how, Gumroad has different resources available to you.
As with other ecommerce platforms, you can offer codes and generate license keys. You can offer multiple versions of a product at Gumroad though. For example, a customer has the option of downloading a PDF, ePub, or the Mobi version of an ebook.
And you can set which currency to sell your products in. This is a good way of increasing conversions. Gumroad also lets users rent your product. For example, customers have 72 hours to watch a video within 30 days of purchase.
Pricing: Getting Started (no fee but has a 5% commission + charge fee), Creator ($10/month for less than 1,000 customers)
PayLoadz
Best for Selling Artistic Products
PayLoadz has been around for quite some time (18 years in total) and you could easily make the case that it has pioneered similar ecommerce platforms. Just like Gumroad, PayLoadz seems to be extremely popular among visual artists, authors, and designers. The features that come with PayLoadz include several payment options in multiple currencies, a turn-key affiliate system, no waiting time for deposits/transfers, secure storage, eBay auction support, easy file upload, and conversion tracking.
You can get all of that for the price of $19.95 for the plus plan. Otherwise, you have the option of creating a free account that comes with some awesome features on its own. If you change your mind in the meantime, you can always upgrade your account. There’s also a 14-day free trial option.
Pros of PayLoadz
- Fast money transfer;
- Mailing list integrations;
- The option to sample and preview files;
- Easy way to share your art with the world;
- Several payment options;
- Multiple currencies.
Cons of PayLoadz
- Some of the layouts can seem a bit outdated.
Fetch App
Best Ecommerce Platform for Versatility and Flexibility
Fetch App is another ecommerce platform that allows its users to sell digital downloads easily and seamlessly. It’s been around since 2007 and it prides on enabling its users to enjoy a secure way to share their creations with the world. There are plenty of options as to what kind of digital downloads you can sell – you can sell PDFs, eBooks, photos, and software. While shopping, your customers can choose between plenty of payment options. One of the best things that come with FetchApp is the ability to sell various goods without worrying about any transaction fees.
If you want a limited amount of space only, you can go for the free version that allows for 25 orders a day and 5 MB of storage. Other plans cost from $5 to $500 a month, depending on the amount of storage space and bandwidth you prefer. For instance, the $10 a month plan comes with 2 GB of storage space and unmetered bandwidth, while the $100 a month plan comes with 35 GB of storage space. On top of all that, you also have the option of integrating Fetchapp with Shopify and other ecommerce platforms.
Pros of Fetch App
- No transaction fees;
- You have the option of creating a free account and testing out the platform;
- Many payment options available;
- They emphasize security while shopping;
- Various payment plans to choose from that are flexible for any budget.
Cons of Fetch App
- Downtime can occur from sometimes.
What digital products can you sell online?
Here are a few product ideas that you’ll have little trouble selling online:
- Ebooks (fiction/non-fiction)
- Recipes
- Email templates
- Magazines
- Podcast episodes
- Songs
- Beats
- Sound effects
- Stock photos
- Sheet music
- Tracks
- Movies (that you have rights to)
- Stock video
- Documentaries
- Wallpapers
- Fonts
- Logo designs
- Infographics
- Animations
- Lightroom presets
- Photoshop brushes
- LUTs (Lookup Tables)
- Apps
- Games
- Browser extensions
- WordPress themes
- Guides
- Online courses
- Tutorials
- Certifications
Conclusion
The digital products market is demonstrating excellent results among all sales channels. Products like downloadable software, membership sites and software services are dynamic and versatile. They met the needs of many customers who want information that’s current and accessible at the time they need it.
Nowadays, software or digital product is a great way to run your business. It’s not like old days when there were no technologies and people used to rely on physical products. Now, people prefer buying the products online because they want to save their time and money.