Selling art online can take different forms. You may consider selling canvas art on Etsy or doing custom artwork on Fiverr, but have you ever seriously considered print-on-demand platforms like Society6? On Society6 you can sell your artwork on different, everyday, household items, like stickers, wall art, shower curtains, or phone cases. This Society6 Review details everything you need to know as an artist about Society6.

Is Society6 for You?

Let’s preface this review by saying: Society6 isn’t for every artist. Society6 has a specific seller demographic. We’ll be reviewing it with this in mind. Because the purpose of this Society6 review is to ascertain if sellers who are in their target demographic will have the best experience on Society6 and whether it will be beneficial for them.

Society6 is not everyone’s cup of tea. For artists who prefer working on commissions, there are niche sites like My Art Brief and Artfinder, where you can sell one-of-a-kind paintings to clients all over the world. 

But, if you’re an artist that wants to create a few good pieces and earn a recurring residual income from those pieces, then you’re Society6’s target demographic. This review will help you choose if joining the platform is the right move for you.

Artists aren’t the only creators that can make use of Society6. Illustrators, vector artists, photographers, even graphic designers use the platform. If you’re selling original, high-quality artwork, you can sell it on Society6.

How To Make The Most of Society6?

Society6 is a good blend of entrepreneurship and creative expression. Therefore, artists using the platform should focus as much on the business as they do on the art. We have an excellent piece about how to do product research for creative products so you can sell more and not stifle your creative expression.

SOCIETY6 REVIEW:
ARTIST’S DREAM OR ARTIST’S NIGHTMARE?

Fees

There’s contention around how much artists should earn from their artwork. Platforms like Redbubble and Printful give you greater control over how much you’d like to earn from your designs as they give you a base rate for the blank and you add your markup. 

However, Society gives artists a 10% flat fee of the sale price of the item. This works out to $0.40 for the cheapest item and $64 for the most expensive item for sale on the site.

The only products that enable you to earn more than the 10% flat fee are art prints, canvas prints, and framed prints. On these products, you can include an artist markup.

Getting Paid

All your earnings from Society6 are paid via Paypal. But, that’s as far as the simplicity of the process ends, because Society6 has a complicated payment process. 

Firstly, sellers are paid between the first business day and the third business day of the month. However, before sellers are paid, the product needs to complete a 30 day clearance period. Therefore, you’ll only get paid the following month after your products have undergone the clearance period. This works out to be between a one-month and a two-month delay on earnings.

The Selling Process

Selling on Society6 is fairly easy and doesn’t require any specialized skill. All you need is a quality scanner and a photoshopping app to ensure your designs meet the standard. Unless you’ve created your designs digitally, in which case you need to ensure they meet Society6’s minimum requirements. 

Another benefit to Society6 is that they’re known for their premium blanks, which is why customers of the site recommend them to friends and why you’ll find exceptionally talented artists on the platform.

Besides, as an artist, your only job is to create. 

Society6 takes care of shipping, customer support, queries, and all the other “backend” processes.

Getting Noticed

This is one aspect where Society6 is lacking. Platforms like Etsy, or even Amazon handmade, enable you to advertise and promote your products. But Society6 doesn’t have a built-in feature to advertise on the platform or outside of the platform. 

You can argue that this is better for sellers because it levels the playing field. But, it can be stifling for newer artists who aren’t making enough sales to make their products show up first in search and also don’t have a large presence on social media. Essentially, Society6’s only advice, to get noticed on the platform, is to market your designs on social media, which is what many artists already do. 

But there is another way to get more sales, and that’s to research the most popular tags in each category you plan on selling art in, then using a combination of your top ten picks.

Another tip is to include your designs on items that are frequently purchased together. That way, when people are checking out they’re more likely to purchase other products in the same range.

Alternatives

A Society6 review wouldn’t be complete without mentioning it’s biggest competitors. The most popular alternative to Society6 is Redbubble because Redbubble offers the same service as Society6. 

However, Redbubble has been marred by the publics’ and artists’ perception of the platform, due to an increasing amount of plagiarism and copyright infringement on the site. However, Society6 is known to sell original artwork and designs on their homeware, clothing, and other blanks.

Another alternative, Printful, which is also a print-on-demand service, requires artists to be far more hands-on. To sell on Printful you’ll need to set up an eCommerce store and choose which designs to include in your site. 

This means Society6 is the only service like itself at the moment. For artists who don’t want to be too hands-on with customer service or setting up a store, Society6 is an excellent plug-and-play solution.

Blanks

When you choose to upload your work to a print-on-demand service like Society6, you need to be certain that your products are being printed on superior blanks. Blanks are the items without the design on it. Society6’s blanks are comparable – in quality – to products you’d find at Urban Outfitters or Wayfair. 

Community

The greatest benefit of selling on Society6 is the Society6 community. Many well-known artists sell their artwork on Society6. You could think of these artists as “competitors” or become overwhelmed by the sheer amount of talent on the platform because you’re concerned that your art will be overshadowed by more established artists. 

However, you’ll find having a community of established artists has the opposite effect. 

Having a strong and growing community of artists, who are loyal to the platform and enjoy selling their creations there, means more customers will be on the website. The more customers on the website the more you’re able to sell. 

Final Thoughts

Society6’s blanks are of high quality, their printing service is superb, and so is their customer service. Artists who sell on the platform know that their designs won’t be diminished by poorly constructed items. That said, their pricing structure isn’t as flexible as similar platforms – RedBubble is one example. However, once you know how to maximize your earnings on the platform, this can be overlooked.

Recommendations

If you’re an artist, certainly try Society6. Their products are highly rated by customers and artists on the platform enjoy publishing their content there. The process of getting started and getting paid is straightforward, and the artists who you share the platform with have an array of talent and skill.