In May, Spring announced our partnership with Bondly, allowing creators to explore the possibilities of creating, minting and selling NFT’s. The question is: are NFTs harmful to the environment?
Short answer: Sometimes. There are blockchain companies finding solutions for excessive energy consumption and offsetting kgC02 emissions associated with the minting of NFT’s. Taking steps towards significantly reducing damage to the environment, Bondly has teamed up with a company who mint NFT’s responsibly. Meet Polygon: a blockchain using just 0.002% of the energy that other blockchains use.
First, let’s start with the basics:
What is an NFT?
Just like digital products, NFTs can be anything. However, there are some differences. NFT stands for non-fungible token. With NFTs, digital products can be “tokenized” to create a digital certificate of ownership that can be bought and sold.
Non-fungible token: a unit of data stored on a digital ledger, called a blockchain, that certifies a digital asset to be unique and therefore not interchangeable.
What are the benefits of launching NFTs for creators?
NFTs allow you to make sure that you get paid a percentage (or royalty) every time your NFT is sold or changes hands. That means, if your work increases in value, you’ll see some of that benefit.
No one can copy an NFT. This gives you absolute ownership of your work. For example, anyone can buy a Banksy print, but only one person can own the original. The artist can still retain the copyright and reproduction rights of an NFT, just like with physical artwork.
Fans can financially support creators like you. Buying an NFT gives fans basic usage rights, like being able to post the image online.
The environmental picture: Polygon VS other blockchains
Since most NFTs use the same blockchain technology as some energy-siphoning cryptocurrencies, they also end up using a lot of electricity as a result. Bondly has recently teamed up with Polygon to integrate eco-friendly NFT minting and are setting up a fund to offset their carbon footprint. One NFT with Polygon uses x3 less energy than streaming a video online for 1 hour.
Granted, they’re new and the conversation around NFT’s can get complicated. NFT’s not your thing? There’s always a digital product. There are pros and cons to launching both digital products and NFTs.
We want to offer creators the opportunity to select their creative medium from a wide range of products, both physical and digital—including eco-friendly options.
Digital products are growing in popularity, and fast. Check out the most effective ways to promote and share yours using these tried and true promo hacks.
So you’ve added a digital product to your store, now it’s time to create promotional content and share it with your community. Follow these steps to start unlocking more sales now:
Feature digital products in your day to day social content.
Demonstrate how fans can utilize your digital products with mockups and videos.
Create incentives for fans to purchase your digital products.
Your digital product promo checklist
1) Take advantage of Spring’s social integrations
Using platform integrations means fans can discover your digital products easily on your socials. You have access to the new Linktree Integration right now—it enables you to embed your Spring store directly within your Linktree. If you’re eligible, you can use our YouTube Integration to display your digital product below your video content. Spring has tons of integrations available. See which ones you have access to below.
2) Create social content featuring your digital product
Prepare imagery or video content to showcase what your digital product can do. Nutritional Sarah created a recipe e-book and used imagery demonstrating the book can be read on an iPad. Wednesday Holmes created a printable coloring book, effectively featuring the printed sheets in an eye catching Instagram post.
3) Use mock-up templates and video content to demo your product
To get going, you may need a few templates handy. Placeit has tons of mock-ups ready for you to insert your book covers, coloring sheets, planners, and more. We’ve collected some free ones for you below.
Include digital products in video content on platforms like YouTube, TikTok, or IGTV. Not only does Sadie Aldis announce her iOS icon pack using YouTube content, she explains how fans can start applying her designs to their devices after download. If you’re using the YouTube integration, don’t forget to include your digital products in the merch shelf below your video too 😉
4) Incentives on social media go a long way
Share discount codes, run a giveaway to kick off the launch, or include a bonus gift when someone buys your digital product (such as a digital wallpaper). See examples from Wednesday Holmes and Nutritional Sarah below. Run your incentives for a limited time to create a sense of urgency. Create an attention grabbing post on Canva to make it unmissable.
Ready to launch your own digital product? Get tips for creating your first one and be sure to check out the mock-up vault. Start uploading your product below.
Looking to introduce digital products to your fans? It’s likely you already have everything you need. Pull your best-selling designs from the archives and keep scrolling to find out how to repurpose them into digital products.
It’s an easy win. Your community will be obsessed, and we’ve got just the tools you’ll need. We’ve collected the best examples from our talented creators so you can see just how effective the ‘reusing designs hack’ is. Not only will a digital/physical design collection look great on your store and compliment your brand, it will save you time.
If you already have your design handy, we’d argue digital artwork is the easiest digital product to prepare and upload within minutes. Ashley Acevedo carries her design style consistently across all of her products, digital and physical. In the example below, the Not Afraid Of Dying t-shirt design works brilliantly as a piece of printable digital art too. Although Ashley is a digital artist, you don’t need to be a pro—if you fans love a design you’ve already launched, go for it.
All you’ll need to do is format your artwork or design file. The resolution needs to be at least 300dpi to allow for different print size options. It’s a great idea to provide several sizes (A5, A4, A3) in a zipped folder. Create the perfect listing image by using templates on Canva or VOUN.
Take your design, remove the color using free online tools (Pixlr or Gravit) or Adobe programmes such as Illustrator and Photoshop, and export your pages as PDFs. Fans can print out and customize IRL, or import your files into coloring apps such as Procreate, Pigment, or Colofy to color them digitally.
Device customization
Last but not least, Atomic Mari has the right idea when re-purposing her designs. Every successful physical product launch should mean a digital product collection to keep the hype going. We’re talking bundles—digital wallpapers for all devices, iOS icons, and widgets.
Not only do these in-device design aesthetics look super cool, they mean fans will think of you and your content whenever they look down to send a text 🥺. If you’re uploading device customization products, be sure to bundle them together in a zipped folder and include instructions your community can follow after download.
Want more ideas? Find your perfect digital product, as well as guidelines for formatting, pricing, and more via the Spring Digital Catalog.
Or, start utilizing your designs right away and upload your products via the launcher.
We’re no stranger to the fact there’s dozens of ways to fund your stream or channel already. Take Twitch for example—fans can subscribe and gift them too, move tiers, and more—but selling digital products with Spring is a goldmine.
Read on for digital product ideas to enhance the connection with your community.
Turn stream moments into audio, artwork, coloring pages, and more
There’s one thing sets streamers and video-based creators apart from others—they are their content. Whether you’re playing COD, discussing art, or chatting about your weekly food menu, there’s always a moment that can be transformed into a sellable digital product.
Take for instance Chris Pearson, aka Pop Cross Studios. Weekly, he shares video content about his character designs and stories he writes. Anyone who subscribes to his channel can not only enjoy his “nerdy art nonsense” and follow his drawing process, but continue the fun by customizing his characters through purchasing digital coloring sheets.
This blog is a great place to start, or find some extra ideas below.
Turn favorite streaming moments and inside jokes with fans into colorless line drawings using free color removing tools, or Photoshop. If you’re a creative, also consider selling digital artwork and posters too.
Create wallpaper backgrounds using images your community will recognize. Find tons of free customizable designs on Placeit and Canva.
Sell snippets of your favorite taglines from your stream and sell them as audio files. Fans can download onto their devices and use them as ringtones and notification sounds.
Emotes, stream overlays, and panel designs
As a streamer, you’ll know how important elements like overlays and emotes are for communicating your brand. With the live streaming industry growing rapidly, many of your viewers are likely aspiring streamers. Why not offer your skills too in the form of purchasable stream elements? This way, you can give back to your community, while fans support you in the process.
Hind Ema is an artist and creator selling streaming packs that include overlay screens, panels and emotes all inspired by Japanese anime and cats. By offering this type of digital product, Hind’s followers can stand out when they stream. Check out some ideas as well as free online tools below to speed up the process by using templates and customizable designs.
Audio files for fans to use as custom alerts (when someone subscribes to your channel, they’re called out in-stream)
Use Canva or Placeit to customize your own sellable profile banners and panels, or provide Adobe Photoshop or Illustrator files for fans to customize. (Recommended size for profile banners is 1200x480px, Twitch panel images should be 320px wide)
Create emotes for fans to offer on their stream. Images should be .png format. You will either need a single square image between 112 x 112px – 4096 x 4096px, or three image sizes: 28 x 28px, 56 x 56px and 112 x 112px.
Guides and tutorials
Share your knowledge with your fans. One of the best ways to extend the value of your content is to sell guides and tutorials. Identify the high engagement, frequently requested or content topics, and turn it into a resource for fans to learn more.
Alan, aka The Dungeon Coach, connects with fans by inviting them to join him in absorbing themselves in the world of Dungeons and Dragons via his YouTube channel. His goal is to enhance the experience of the game by encouraging his 21.5K (and rapidly growing) subscribers to think outside the box. He provides tips on combat, travel, character creation, and more via his YouTube channel.
Then came the opportunity to create The Dungeon Locker, a Spring store full of PDF e-books offering inspo and guides, such as Homebrew Monsters: a guide to adding new and exciting abilities to monsters in the game to challenge players.
Lay out your writing and imagery using the simple and easy-to-use Canva e-book building tool and export your design as a PDF
You’re not limited to the ideas above. Digital products are ideal for gamers too. They’re a great, low-cost way to run giveaways. Run contests on your live streams and reward your subs easily. How about these ideas too:
Playstation or Xbox backgrounds. Sell designs that can be uploaded and used as to customize your fans’ gaming devices. Be sure to provide instructions.
Coaching sessions, exclusive meet-ups, and 1:1 play-throughs. Create a PDF acting as a ticket for your fans to download and gain access. In your document, display your exclusive video call link, or any contact details (create a specific email).
Gaming mods. Provide add-ons for games you create content playing. I.e. cosmetic items, equipment, game enhancements, etc.
Sell your game design knowledge and skill. The ultimate gaming digital product inspo—Tacko Gamma. Isaack sells digital products designed to help game developers and designers level-up their projects. Check it out.
Now you’ve got the inspiration and tools to create your first digital product, what are you waiting for? Prepare your files and head to the Digital Launcher.
