So like anyone desperate for a change, I went searching for "digital products," "passive income," anything that didn't require shipping packages.
That's when I stumbled on a random video about creating designs for sublimation tumblers.
I'd never heard of sublimation. Had no idea what a PNG file even was. But something made me pause.
I checked Etsy to see if people were actually buying these. What I found shocked me: Sellers with over 100,000 sales. Just from digital files. No inventory. No shipping. Just upload once, sell forever.
Professional, polished shops that looked like they had years of design training.
Meanwhile, I literally hated Photoshop and had zero graphic design experience.
These sellers weren't trading time for money anymore. While I was up at midnight packaging orders, their designs were selling automatically.
That was enough to make me try.
Let me be clear: It was brutal at first.
This was early 2022, before I was using any AI design tools. I did everything the slow way with Canva and commercial graphics. Writing every title, description, and tag by hand. Taking hours to create what now takes minutes.
My learning curve wasn't just steep. It was vertical.
😏 My next 10 designs? Complete crickets.
Success wasn't about one lucky viral moment. It was about having a boring, systematic approach that compounds over time.
So I stopped chasing viral wins and started following a simple weekly routine:
1.
Research what's actually selling (not what I think looks good)
2.
Create multiple variations to test
3.
List consistently, even when nothing's working
4.
Learn from the data, not my emotions
5.
Repeat.
Boring. Systematic. Effective.
$65-75K per month across 5 businesses. 3 hours per week on my Etsy shop. Freedom to travel while the business runs.
I'm actually present with my kids instead of packaging orders during bedtime stories.
Here's the kicker ↓
You can do this 100X faster than I did.
Because now you have AI. 🎨 Midjourney, ✏️ Kittl, 💬 ChatGPT.
I built my seven-figure shop the hard way. You don't have to.
Even today, with $1M+ in sales, I still have listings that completely flop. The difference? I don't make it mean anything. It's just data. Learn and move on.
A lot of Etsy sellers quit after a few weeks because they expect instant success.
The ones who win? They expect it to take years and are pleasantly surprised when the boring system starts working in months.
Just imagine waking up 6 months from now...
...as the owner of a strategic Etsy business that:
✓ Generates sales while you sleep
✓ Doesn't require inventory or shipping
✓ Gives you actual time freedom
✓ Grows and compounds over time
↓
