Hey, what’s up?

Today, I wanted to share why I stopped using print-on-demand upload automation.

This is for you if you’re new into print-on-demand considering such a tool or if you’re already using them, then you might be wondering if you still want to use them.

Regardless of who you are, my goal is to simply share my personal experience by using them. Then it’s up to you to make your own decisions.

That being said, I’m not saying that I will never use them again. I think automation tools are really great, but there are a few problems that can make them dangerous. If tech gets better, I might get back using them.

Let’s go right in!

1- TIME EFFICIENCY GONE WRONG

Time efficiency can be good. You’ll save a lot of time using automation tools. But both quality and quantity are important. Print-on-demand is a very competitive environment.
But if you over rely on quantity over quality, you end up having tons of cheap, low quality designs. When using automation tools, I fell into the mindset of creating lots of scalable, low quality designs because I wanted to upload as much as possible.

2- SECURITY RELATED TO PASSWORD

Most of my incomes comes from Print-on-Demand marketplaces. I feel a little concerned knowing that I have to give away my password to software that could end up having security breaches. Of course, they say that it secure, and I believe them. Banks are supposed to be secure and sometimes, they get security breaches.

Allowing automated tools access to user accounts could pose security risks. Print-on-demand platforms are likely to prioritize the security of user accounts and sensitive information.

Yes, you can avoid putting your passwords. But then, what’s the point of using automations if you’re not automating the login.

3- THESE TOOLS ARE EXPENSIVE

Money isn’t really an issue but every year flying research increasing their prices. Which is kinda of a normal thing.

But it reached a point that I feel a bit concerned paying so much money on tools that I don’t really use.

I recently switched from Flying Research to Podly with a cheaper LIFETIME SUB that gives me all the tools that I actually need.

4- BAD PRODUCTS

When you use automation, you have to use a design template which you use over and over again. It doesn’t take into consideration the different size of the designs. It leads to bad and unoptimized products. Why would any customers buy from you? You basically trade speed for quality. Manually uploading everything allows you to review and confirm the accuracy of the products, titles and descriptions

5- MOST MARKETPLACES TOLERATE IT

Print-on-demand platforms may have specific rules and guidelines regarding intellectual property, copyright, and content policies. Manual uploads give creators an opportunity to ensure their content complies with these rules.

Print-on-demand platforms often want to maintain a certain level of quality for the products listed on their site. Manual uploads allow for more oversight, ensuring that each product meets the platform’s standards.

Zazzle for example, enforced their Google Captcha to be impenetrable by automation tools. I used to use Flying Reseach to upload on Zazzle but since then they stopped providing that service for Zazzle. They don’t want you to use them at all.

6- BUGS AND MISTAKES

Automations are not perfect. Sometimes, they mess up, they get stuck, they can’t upload, they create duplicates.

You might leave while letting the automation tool do its thing. And you come back to realize that it is stuck or created duplicates.

I also used automation to create Printful products to upload them on my Amazon Seller Central account, but I uploaded so much that Printful had synchronization issues with Amazon. Most of the Amazon orders that I got, I ended up doing everything manually.

7- TRADEMARKS AND COPYRIGHTS ARE AMPLIFIED

An issue that can occur is that you upload automatically many products at once (for example with scalable designs) that infringe trademarks and copyrights, then you’re going to get many rejections at once. Terrible for your account.

I am talking with experience, I think I lost my KDP, Redbubble and TeePublic account because of this.

8. KEEP UP WITH THE UPDATES

In order to keep using these tools, you have to learn how to use the automation tools, and you also have to keep up with the updates and technology in order to remain the most efficient.

If you keep putting so much time into learning and keeping up with the updates, you spend less time on other things like designing and creating designs.

9. MOST MARKETPLACES HAVE EASY UPLOAD TOOLS

Amazon merch, you can use the Productor template feature to select all the right colors and pricing. Use Podly to generate the data.

Redbubble have the copy settings which allows you to literally copy a listing. The only thing is a bit time-consuming is reviewing all the products to make sure they’re all good and well-placed.

Teepublic takes literally seconds to upload manually.

By creating one Zazzle products, you create all the other products in the same time.

Spreadshirt and Displate are ok to use.

I do not recommend Society6 manual upload. If you wish to upload on Society6, I highly recommend an automation tool, it is long and painful. I simply don’t bother with it.

10. SHARING WITH FRIENDS AND FAMILY

I want to share my print-on-demand stores with my friends, family and friends. If my stores are messed up and contains lots of bad products, that would make me feel uncomfortable. What does that say about me?

I want to be proud to share my print-on-demand stores.

CONCLUSION

In conclusion, automation tools are really useful. You’ll save lots of time using them. If you decide to use them, you have to be aware of these potential pitfalls. Regardless of your decisions, I think you should always prioritize the security of your account.

So that’s pretty much it, I hope this was helpful to you. If this blog was valuable to you, you could consider following me on social media and if you have any thoughts or comments, you can leave them below.

I hope this helps, peace!