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Earning cash through avid reading habits: A guide

In essence, it's reasonable to assume that one might benefit from an additional financial boost, be it for personal spending like buying books and savoring coffee.

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Contemplating that your financial situation could use a boost, be it for additional spending money...
Contemplating that your financial situation could use a boost, be it for additional spending money on items like books and coffee.

Earning cash through avid reading habits: A guide

Get ready to turn your love of books into cold, hard cash with these clever digital products. But this ain't no pyramid scheme or get-rich-quick tactic. Buckle up, because I'm going to share my journey of selling digital goods and give you a handful of ideas to turn your hobbies into extra cash with educational digital products. Heck, I'm doing it for your own good.

What are digital products and how do you make money with them?

Think of a digital product as anything you can download or access online after making a purchase. Ebooks, Google Docs templates, video workshops, printable worksheets, digital planners – you name it. The sky's the limit when it comes to dreaming up useful goodies for your customers.

I sell my digital wares on Etsy, but I've also got a PayHip store and use ThriveCart. I thought ThriveCart would replace PayHip for me, so I wouldn't have to pay their fees, but people still find my PayHip store, and I don't want to leave any moolah on the table. You can also use SendOwl or Shopify if you've got your own website.

Most of my income comes from Etsy, but it's not just because Etsy's a marketplace and draws in loads of people. They also trust Etsy more than a random website, but if you've got a huge social media following, you could funnel all that traffic to your own site without losing your biz to some other Etsy shop or having to pay their fees.

How I make money with digital products

I've got my Etsy shop called Writer Lifestyle, but Etsy only attracts about half of my traffic. I talk about my products a lot in my blog, and they're relevant to my content, so I create Pinterest pins for my blog posts. Seems like people don't respond as well to my direct product pins, but I've noticed that getting people to my blog first does the trick.

I also have digital courses and a few other digital products on ThriveCart because it gives me more autonomy than selling on Etsy. Plus, you can't collect peoples' emails when selling on Etsy, but I like being able to email updates and other important stuff to my customers.

I sell products at different price points: from small, inexpensive items to more complex, costly ones. I want to appeal to different experience levels, from newbie writers to advanced ones. Almost all of my products are about writing fiction, but I have some products for readers and book clubs and a couple of business ones that, honestly, don't really fit in. I create new products regularly and update or retire older ones.

August is a slow month for me, but I'm expecting things to pick up soon. Last February was my best month, and I made almost as much as I would've made in a crappy nursing job, which was a huge win since I have no intention of going back, thanks.

Don't be a hater, hater!

Some folks argue that if I were genuinely making money from digital products, I wouldn't be teaching them and would just keep all the profits myself. I get it – there are scammers out there, especially those peddling AI-generated quick-buck schemes for selling cheap POD products. But don't trust anyone without a successful, current Etsy shop. And let's face it – you can't create high-quality products that people genuinely love using shortcuts. You need to get repeat buyers for the most money, and you can't do that by selling trash and cheating your customers. They won't be coming back to you.

If you're good at something, why wouldn't you want to make money by teaching others how to be good at it too? That just means more cash, but also, some of us just enjoy teaching. Being stuck in a low-paying gig sucked the life out of me, and if I can help even one person out of that situation, I'm pleased.

I'm not afraid of competition because:

  • I already have it.
  • Nobody else is me.
  • Most people won't do what it takes to genuinely compete. This ain't about jumping on trends, so I'm not worried about sharing my "secrets" at all.

Note: If you want to sell earrings or digital art, don't come to me for advice. I've tried, and I wasn't good at it, so you shouldn't ask me how to do it. Stick with what you know, and make sure the person you go to has the results you want.

Ideas for bookworm digital products

Alright, time to dig into the juicy bits: how you can use your love of books and reading to create digital products that make some spondoolies. Let's first talk about the types of educational digital products you can make.

types of educational digital products

Your "educational digital products" should help people in one of these four ways:

  • learn
  • improve
  • remember
  • organize

You need to figure out who you're marketing your product to and what they need.

When you know what you want to help people with, you need to decide the format for your product. Or formats, actually, because you can use the same idea for different products for different people and different price points! Here are some options:

  • ebooks
  • Google Docs/Sheets templates
  • Notion templates
  • video workshops
  • PDFs with linked pages for Goodnotes and other PDF annotation apps
  • printable or digital worksheets, trackers, and logs
  • printable or digital workbooks

Let's say you want to teach someone who wants to learn something, like grammar or specific writing techniques. You could create a "how-to" type of product, like an ebook or perhaps a video tutorial. If you wanted to help someone improve a skill they already have, like writing a book review, you could create a printable worksheet or a digital workbook. For helping someone remember information, like character names in a classic novel, you could create printable reference sheets or checklists on Google Sheets. And if you want to help someone organize their reading list or keep track of their book purchases, you could create a database for Notion.

I*deas for bookworm digital products

So what kind of digital goodies can you come up with about books and reading?

Let's say you're a literary expert and have a deep understanding of different classic novels. You could create a template for collating notes about the novel, and that template could be a printable worksheet or a Notion template. You could also create a reference sheet for various character traits in Jane Austen's novels, for instance.

What if you're just a bookworm who loves to read? You could create different reading trackers, book review templates, or reading log pages for digital planners. Think about different aesthetics and genres when creating your products. Think about what you would find helpful.

Here are some product ideas off the cuff:

  • Notion template for keeping track of your "To Be Read" list with links to the Kindle Store
  • Academia aesthetic habit tracker for reading goals
  • Google Docs lecture note template for a course on American literature
  • Reference sheet for different literary devices
  • Printable book review template with prompts
  • Social media content ideas for a Bookstagram or Booktok account
  • Reading challenge checklist for Excel

If you want more digital product ideas in different niches, check out this post on my other blog, Educational Etsy Products.

What about non-educational products?

Of course, you can make other types of digital products if you'd like! But since this is my gig, this is what I teach.

That said, I do also have a few entertainment-type products in my shop, like printable games. There are numerous ways you can use your bookish interests to create these types of products, so here are some ideas for that as well:

  • Book-themed bingo sheets
  • Printable Murakami word search pages
  • Library treasure hunt sheets
  • Fill-in-the-blank quotes for popular book series like ACOTAR
  • Customizable book-themed board games for a bookish family night
  • Printable certificates for finishing a long series

If you have artistic skills, you can make these products even better and more unique than what we mere mortals can create with Canva graphics, so that's something to consider.

  1. Delve into the world of digital products for creative writing enthusiasts by creating ebooks, Google Docs templates, video workshops, printable worksheets, digital planners, or PDFs with linked pages for Goodnotes and other PDF annotation apps.
  2. Establish a personal-growth focus by offering digital workbooks that help readers hone their writing skills, such as learning proper grammar, developing specific writing techniques, or practicing effective book review writing.
  3. Cater to lifestyles centered around books with entertaining digital products like printable game sheets, book-themed bingo, word search pages, or customizable board games for a family night of literary fun.
  4. In the realm of bookish education-and-self-development, design digital tools that help readers organize their reading schedules, track their reading progress, or create social media content for Bookstagram or Booktok accounts.
  5. Explore the market of fashion-and-beauty and lifestyle with digital products centering around aesthetic habit trackers or printable reference sheets for various literary devices, as well as Bookstagram or Booktok content ideas.

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