Ever dream of turning your design skills into a profitable side hustle? It’s easier than ever to create and sell resources online, and one “format” that’s been growing in popularity is selling templates created in Canva. 

This guide will walk you through everything you need to know about making and selling profitable Canva templates, plus I'll give you a free resource to jumpstart your creative process!

Why Sell Canva Templates?

The beauty of digital products like Canva templates lies in their low overhead costs and scalability. Once you create a template, you can sell it countless times without additional production work. Plus, Canva templates are particularly attractive because:

• They're easy to create: Even design beginners can create stunning templates with Canva's intuitive drag-and-drop interface.

• They're in high demand: Businesses and individuals crave high-quality, ready-made designs to elevate their online presence.

One thing I want to underscore about Canva templates based on some untrue online narratives: it is not passive income. While you can “make sales in your sleep,” there are still a lot of maintenance tasks required with running a digital business, particularly marketing. This isn’t to dissuade you, but more to dispel some untrue claims that float around! 

How to Make Profitable Canva Templates

How to Make & Sell Canva Templates

The key to success lies in understanding who needs your templates and what their design problems are. Focus on a specific niche, like social media graphics, presentations, or marketing materials. This will help you tailor your templates to their exact needs. In addition, you need to make sure there’s demand for your products.

There are different types of demand: seasonal demand and search/trend demand. 

The first one is considering when your products are going to be popular and convert to sales. For example: a Christmas card template will encourage buyers a few months out of the year, but you probably won’t see much traction in June! Evergreen templates, like a social media template, are something that is in demand year-round, not based on seasonality.

The other type of demand is based on search data. What are people looking for in terms of keywords? This is where you’ll hear a lot about SEO. Use tools like eRank, Google Keywords, or even Pinterest to research what’s in demand. The words you use must match what people are searching for when they go to Google or Pinterest.

To help you brainstorm profitable niches, I've created a free downloadable resource: 60 Profitable Canva Template Ideas! This cheat sheet is packed with inspiration to get the ideas flowing.

Designing High-Quality Templates

When you design a Canva template, keep in mind that it needs to be both aesthetically pleasing AND user-friendly. Depending on who your ideal customer is, they might not have used Canva before! Make sure your design is well organized, you provide clear instructions, and cover all the little details like printing.

For the design itself, focus on creating visually appealing templates that are easy to customize with brand colors and fonts, especially if you’re creating templates for other business owners. 

My biggest advice for the design is to remember that Canva has a vast template library that grows each day, so to make the case for a sale, you need to focus on creating ownable elements or more advanced ways of solving problems. For example, maybe Canva has a lot of social media templates, but they aren’t catered towards specific niches. If you can create the dream template for your niche, it will be a no-brainer. 

Showcase your products intentionally

When it comes to selling Canva templates, designing the template itself is only half of the design needs! The other important element is carefully considering how you can elevate the perception of your product through mockups, visuals, and a well-written product description.

Any time you spend on mocking up your product is time well spent. I often do my mockups right in Canva (click the image > Edit > Apps > Mockups to view all of the Canva mockups), but you can also purchase them from sites like Etsy or Creative Market. 

Conclusion: How to Make & Sell Canva Templates

Creating and selling Canva templates is an accessible way to turn your creativity into a revenue stream. With the right approach and valuable resources, you can be well on your way to designpreneur success! So, what are you waiting for? Don’t forget to download 60 Profitable Canva Template Ideas to get started.