Greetings all Zazzle sellers!
As you’ve all probably already seen, Zazzle launched Embroidery yesterday – making a splash on the pages of TechCrunch, Frobes, TechNews, Business Week and more. The word is out: Zazzle’s embroidery offering is setting a new standard.
So what’s next? How can you cash in on embroidery?
This is a prime opportunity for you to extend your product offering by creating new embroidery-specific galleries. Make it easy for buyers to find quality embroidered products, all in one place.
‘Tis the season for unique gift-hunting, so give all those holiday shoppers something worth buying: the best embroidery on the P.O.D. block! Be sure to tag your products with embroidery and recipient-friendly keywords.
Wanna get busy on your embroidery empire, but don’t want to pay those digitization fees just yet? Create a custom text template!
Step 1: Choose your embroidery product from http://www.zazzle.com/custom/embroidery
Step 2: Add your image(s) & text
Step 3: Click the “Advanced options” link at the bottom of the image or text box.
Step 4: Check the box “Make this a template object”. Checking that box will display all the options available for defining this template image placeholder.
When you select “Make this a template object”, you have access to four options:
- Product page label – This is the label that the customer will see on the product page. Use something descriptive here, like “Your picture” or “Your logo”.
- URL parameter name – If you are using the Zazzle API to pass data to this product from an external source, this is the parameter name the API will use. Avoid spaces or special characters. You can safely ignore this field if you are not working with the API (see the Zazzle API documentation for more information).
- Inner fit/fill mode – For images. If your template allows the buyer to replace your placeholder image with one of her own, this setting determines how the buyer’s image replaces yours. The options are none, fit, or fill.
None – If you set Inner fit/fill mode to none, the buyer’s image simply replaces your placeholder image, and may be larger or smaller than the placeholder.
Fit – Selecting fit will resize the buyer’s image to fit inside of your placeholder image object’s dimensions. This will ensure that their image is not cropped.
Fill – Selecting fill will resize their image to fill the entire dimensions of your placeholder image. If the buyer’s image is wider or taller than your placeholder, this may result in zooming and cropping of the customer’s image.
- Allow editing on product page – Keep this checked if you want to enable EZ Templates on your product page. Unchecking this option is usually only done when working with the Zazzle API.
Once you have filled out all the options, click Post for Sale. You are then presented with the normal Post it for Sale page. Notice the checkbox labeled “This product is a template”. This tells you that the product contains template objects, and that it will be posted for sale as a template. Only uncheck it if you decide at this point to not allow customer personalization of this product; otherwise keep it checked.
Stoked! You’ve just created a template product!
Lock it up!
Sometimes, you may want to create a template product but have items that are not changeable by a customer. Now you can simply check the box labeled “Lock this image” or “Lock this text object”. This will essentially lock the item and not allow any editing of it whatsoever (can’t delete it, move it, re-size it, etc.)
And that’s the good word on text templates in embroidery!
As you brainstorm additional ways you can make embroidery work for you, be sure to explore all the groups of people who may be interested in these kinds of products:
· Sport Teams
· Clubs
· Employment
· Universities
· High Schools
· Family Reunions
Have fun!
