The Final Stretch

Wednesday, February 08, 2012

While I am making a final sprint to finish the Income Guide, I wanted to try a beta test to see how difficult it would be to print copies of my data graphics and sell my work though my website. In the past I have tried Cafepress for printing and selling the large posters that I created for my Master Thesis but with very little success. These were large 2' x 3' posters and the digital print-on-demand was not a high quality. This time I will be selling a popular graph on Tax Rates that I recently updated for 2011. This tax graph is topical and has been reposted by many blogs and has been requested by financial advisors. It will be a small tabloid-sized poster on high quality paper but with digital printing so I can do short runs (i.e. 50 copies at a time).

I am working with a print broker to experiment with different paper options and help me find the best printer in my budget. My hope is to create a high quality print piece since there is little incentive to buy and hang a cheaply made poster in your office if it is freely available online. I have also found an online shopping cart (Cart66) that can be set up on my Wordpress blog to start selling the poster. I am researching the best way to printing mailing labels and postage myself and the cost of different mailing options. Finally, I have set-up a form and an email list with Mailchimp to gather the emails of potential customers though me website. With this project, I can work out the kinks in the printing/online sales process before I publish my Illustrated Guide to Income.