Not to be dramatic, but creating and selling digital products can be a totally life-changing experience. So if you’re wondering how to turn your life (and wallet) around, you’re in the right place.
Even digital product creators with just a modest audience can bring in a lot of passive income potential for a very minimal amount of labor.
But what exactly is a digital product?
A digital product is anything you can sell online that doesn’t require manufacturing, shipping costs, or inventory space. Compared to tangible merchandise, digital products are way easier to produce, have a farther audience reach, and are generally less of a headache for both you (the creator) and your customer (your audience).
Read on to learn more about the best tools to create digital products, what types of digital products you can create, and the best tools to sell digital products online.
Click here to start creating and selling digital products with The Leap. It’s free!
Click here to start creating and selling digital products with The Leap. It’s free!15 Best tools to create and sell digital products overview
| Platform | Description |
| The Leap | Best for: Creating, marketing, and selling digital products Pricing: Free! |
| Mailchimp | Best for: Drip email campaigns Pricing: $13 – $350/month |
| Hubspot | Best for: CRM Pricing: Free – $20/month |
| Linktree | Best for: Simple link-in-bio tool Pricing: Free – $24/month |
| Linkin.bio | Best for: Link-in-bio tool for Instagram Pricing: Free |
| Thinkific | Best overall for: Creating online courses Pricing: $36 – $149/month |
| Squarespace | Best for: E-commerce and online courses Pricing: $23-$27/month + transaction fees |
| Canva | Best for: Design-based content Pricing: Free – $14.99/month |
| Fontself | Best for: Creating fonts Pricing: One time payment of $39 |
| Adobe Lightroom | Best for: Creating photo editing presets Pricing: $10 – $20/month |
| Google Workspace | Best for: Creating templates, worksheets, ebooks, and online course content Pricing: Free – $18/month |
| Buffer | Best for: Social media scheduling Pricing: Free – $100/month |
| Notion | Best for: Creating templates Pricing: Free – $15/month |
| Surfer | Best for: AI-driven on-page SEO insights Pricing: $99 – $219/month |
| SEMrush | Best for: SEO analysis and digital marketing strategies Pricing: Free – $129.95 |
15 tools to create and sell digital products by category
- The Leap
- Mailchimp
- Hubspot
- Linktree
- Linkin.bio
- Thinkific
- Squarespace
- Canva
- Fontself
- Adobe Lightroom
- Google Workspace
- Buffer
- Notion
- Surfer
- SEMrush
Best overall tool to create and sell digital products
1. The Leap
🏆 Best AI-powered all-in-one digital product solution
Want to be able to create digital products quickly and easily? Look no further than The Leap.
The Leap is a totally free, all-in-one platform that functions as a customizable link-in-bio storefront, an AI-powered digital product builder, a lead generation tool, and an email marketing suite. Essentially, The Leap allows digital product creators to create, market, and sell (aka monetize) their particular brand of genius into income-generating digital products.
Designed with lead generation and sales in mind, The Leap helps creators transform their knowledge into digital products and their followers into paying customers quickly and easily.
The Leap’s AI-powered digital product builder enables creators to create a range of bingeable bite-sized learning products, including mini-courses, tutorials, guides, and challenges. Everything is mobile-optimized for maximum engagement.
Plus, The Leap’s product builder is powered by generative AI, meaning it creates products for you, saving you time and effort (which = money, right?). It also empowers creators to turn their products into lead magnets, which helps them grow their email list.
If you’re a creator who focuses on coaching or consultation services, then The Leap is here for you. The platform’s Book My Time feature is a native calendar booking tool that simplifies scheduling and hosting multiple types of events.
What’s more, The Leap offers users email collection and built-in email marketing features, audience analytics, and several flexible payment options to simplify the payment process.
The best part about The Leap (lest we forget to mention one last time)? It’s free to use!
Key features
- Mobile-optimized link-in-bio creator store
- Digital product-hosting services
- AI-powered digital product builder for mini-courses, tutorials, guides, and challenges
- Email list builder
- Pre-made email templates for setting up email flows and sending email broadcasts easily
- Book My Time native calendar booking feature for coaching and consulting services
- Audience analytics
- No listing fee or platform transaction fees
- Flexible payment options like buy now / pay later, discount/coupon codes, and one-click payments
- 200 combinations of themes, layouts, and colorways for customized storefronts
- AI assistant to generate mobile-optimized products, sales page descriptions, and more
Pricing
The Leap is totally free to use!Ready to make bank selling digital products? Try The Leap for free today.
Best tools for email marketing
2. Mailchimp
🏆 Best for drip email campaigns
If you’ve done any reading on email marketing, then you’ve probably already heard of Mailchimp. Popular for a reason, Mailchimp is a top choice for content creators looking to sell digital products thanks to its user-friendly interface, powerful automation features, generative AI, and integrations with e-commerce platforms.
This platform allows creators to easily build email campaigns that target their audience and drive sales, whether it’s for ebooks, online courses, or digital downloads. Mailchimp’s all-in-one marketing platform helps creators manage everything from email lists to analytics, making it easier to nurture leads and convert them into paying customers.
Key Features
- Drag-and-drop email builder
- Automated email sequences
- Generative AI
- Integration with e-commerce tools like Shopify
- Audience segmentation for targeted campaigns
- Detailed analytics and reporting
Pricing
The free version of Mailchimp comes with up to 500 contacts, although analytics and customer support features are limited. Paid plans start at $13 per month. For more advanced features — like generative AI and automated customer journeys — you’ll need to upgrade to its Standard plan for $20 per month. Mailchimp’s Premium plan jumps to $350 per month and can host up to 10,000 contacts.
3. Hubspot
🏆 Best for CRM (customer relationship management)
Want the best CRM in the email marketing automation game? Then it’s got to be HubSpot. This popular all-in-one marketing platform combines powerful email automation with robust CRM capabilities.
So, how does it work? Your Hubspot is made up of a number of different “hubs” which are all connected to a central Smart CRM, which hosts and tracks data on leads and customers.
The platform’s Marketing Hub provides you with a powerful, all-in-one marketing automation software that helps you engage, nurture, and convert leads effortlessly. This HubSpot arm is kitted out with features like an opt-in form builder and an AI-powered email builder, along with a marketing automation tool that scores your leads, segments them, and sends automated, personalized email flows based on CRM data.
While HubSpot does offer some free tools, its email allowance and automation features are limited. This is great for creators who are just starting but can prove expensive for scaling long term.
Features
- Email automation (limited on free version)
- AI-powered email writer
- Audience segmentation
- Powerful CRM
- Opt-in forms
- Lead scoring
Pricing
HubSpot offers a Free plan for up to two users. If you want to take advantage of advanced automations, you’ll need to shell out for a paid plan. Its Starter plan costs $20/month and includes 1,000 marketing contacts.
Best link-in-bio tools
4. Linktree
🏆 Best simple link-in-bio tool
Linktree was the first-ever link-in-bio tool on the market. And with over 40 million users worldwide, it’s also one of the most popular today. The platform also has a number of monetization features and flexible payment options.
Linktree users are able to sell digital products through Linktree by way of SendOwl, or by directly uploading PDFs and placing them under a Payment Lock. In terms of customization, Linktree offers users a host of pre-made themes, which can be customized using the platform’s simple drag-and-drop page builder. With this tool, you can update your landing page with your brand colors and fonts, as well as add animations to links.
The platform also offers a handy email collection feature and integrations with popular third-party software, like Zapier, Amazon, Google Analytics, and Mailchimp.
Key features
- Unlimited links
- Link scheduling
- Email collection
- Customize colors, fonts, and buttons
- Detailed analytics and reporting (including link tracking)
- Monetization features (including selling digital products and tip jar)
Pricing
Free plan available. Paid plans are $5/month (Starter), $9/month (Pro), and $24/month (Premium).
5. Linkin.bio by Later
🏆 Best free link-in-bio tool for Instagram
Linkin.bio was created by the popular social media management platform, Later. This tool allows you to create a mini webpage to host all your content, and then generate a single link that you can add to your social media bio.
Linkin.bio enables you to add unlimited links to your page, so your audience never misses out on a single piece of content — and you never miss out on a single click. To help increase your traffic, the tool also allows you to add featured media to your landing page, as well as linked versions of your Instagram and TikTok feeds.
Key features
- Unlimited links
- Customize colors, fonts, and buttons
- Linked Instagram and TikTok posts
- Embed featured media
- Mailchimp integration
- Advanced analytics and link tracking
Pricing
Linkin.bio is free to use.
Best tools for online course creation
6. Thinkific
🏆 Best overall for creating online courses
Looking to sell your knowledge or expertise through online courses? Check out Thinkific.
Thinkific is an all-inclusive tool for creating, marketing and selling online courses. The platform is super easy to use and allows creators to either create courses with multi-media content or upload existing courses onto the platform.
Thinkific offers creators the ability to produce courses with video, audio, text, images, and interactive features (like quizzes or assignments), among a bunch of other features. What’s more, creators can even use Thinkific to produce their websites and landing pages to promote their digital products.
Key features
- Custom web themes and domains
- Drag-and-drop course builder
- Drip scheduling
- Mobile app
- Membership monetization
Pricing
Thinkific offers a free plan that allows creators to test drive the platform with one course a month. From there, the platform offers affordable, scalable pricing tiers with a range of advanced features like unlimited courses, broader community features, multiple administrators, and more. Priced plans range from $36/month to $149/month. Sign up here.
7. Squarespace
🏆 Best for e-commerce and online courses
Known for being user-friendly and customizable, Squarespace boasts an easy-to-use e-commerce website builder that helps creators sell their digital products directly to their audience. However, in terms of digital product creation specifically, Squarespace has recently rolled out an online course builder for those looking to monetize their knowledge and expertise.
Not just a website or online course builder though, Squarespace offers several marketing tools that can be useful for your brand, like email marketing, SEO tools to help increase your visibility online, a logo maker, and more.
Squarespace offers a range of beautiful website templates that require no coding experience at all, making it a great option for beginners looking to scale their business over time.
Key features
- Website templates
- SEO tools
- Free custom domain
- Advanced website analytics
- Integrated e-commerce
Pricing
If you want to sell online courses using Squarespace, you must have a Business or Commerce plan ($23/month or $27/month respectively), or add a Digital Products subscription to any of its website plans. Squarespace charges a 9% transaction fee on digital product sales with Business or Commerce plans, but you can lower this fee by purchasing a Digital Products Add-On.
Best tools for content creation
8. Canva
🏆 Best for creating design-based content
Have great design ideas for your digital products but you’re not a formally trained graphic designer? Don’t even worry about it! Canva helps content creators level up their content game with its user-friendly design features. From built-in templates to photo editing tools, this graphic design tool has it all.
Basically, Canva helps non-designers produce aesthetically pleasing content. Whether you’re looking for help creating a layout for your ebook, or producing Instagram Stories templates or downloadable prints to sell, Canva has got you covered.
Key features
- Templates for various platforms
- AI-powered design tools
- Text and typography tools
- Collaboration and sharing
- Mobile app
Pricing
Canva has a completely free program that offers over 250,000 templates, customizable options, and collaboration tools, among many other features.
Its free tier only offers 5GB of space, but for $14.99/month, creators can upgrade to cloud storage as well as unlimited access to all available templates and stock photos, among many other features.
9. Fontself
🏆 Best for creating fonts
If your digital product is to produce fonts, then Fontself might be the best tool for you. It’s unique from other font makers because it’s not an app itself. Instead, it’s an extension for Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop CC. So if you’re already familiar with the Adobe platform, Fontself should come pretty intuitively for you.
All you have to do is open the extension and drag panels from the extension panel to edit and install your font. The platform’s Smart tools make it easy to adjust alignment and format, which allows you to kern without going through the glyphs one by one.
For creators who are just starting to create fonts to sell as digital products, Fontself is a great beginner option as long as you’re already comfortable with Adobe Illustrator or Photoshop.
Key features
- Intuitive draw, drag-and-drop features
- Auto spacing and kerning
- Standard and color vector fonts
- Customer support
- Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop integration
Pricing
Fontself Maker for Illustrator CC is priced at an affordable one-time payment fee of $39. You can also purchase the Fontself Illustrator and Photoshop bundle for a one-time fee of $59.
10. Adobe Lightroom
🏆Best for creating photo editing presets (e.g. for Instagram, e-commerce, etc.)
Part of the Adobe Creative Cloud subscription family, Adobe Lightroom helps professional photographers, creators, and photo enthusiasts make stunning photographs through photo editing and organizing.
We all know that part of being a creator is building a visually stunning profile, which is one reason why selling photo editing presets is increasing in popularity.
Creators can use Lightroom to produce presets to improve lighting, contrast, shade, color, brightness, and more. Unlike Instagram filters, Lightroom presets offer a more sophisticated level of editing that allows users to make individual changes without losing image quality.
If you’re a photo content creator, chances are your audience is already familiar with your particular style of work and would be eager to purchase a preset to apply to their own work. Let’s say you’re an exposure queen or maybe you’re a color corrector pro. Whatever your specialty is, you can absolutely turn it into a Lightroom preset that can generate some big bucks.
Key features
- Advanced preset options
- Organizational tools
- Photoshop integration
- Cloud storage
- Mobile app
Pricing
Creators can purchase the Lightroom plan for $9.99/month which comes with 1 TB of cloud storage space. For advanced photo preset options, Adobe offers a Lightroom and Photoshop plan for $19.99/month.
11. Google Workspace
🏆 Best for creating templates, worksheets, ebooks, and online course content
Ah, the good ’ol Google Workspace. You really can’t go wrong with this completely free cloud software. All you need is a Google account, and you’ll have unlimited access to Google Docs, Google Sheets, and Google Slides.
Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides are web-based counterparts to traditional word processing, spreadsheet, and presentation software. They allow creators to produce and share written content easily. Not only are these tools useful for planning or drafting content for your digital products, but they’re also great for creating digital products that you can sell. Think an editable résumé template created with Google Docs, or a budget tracker spreadsheet created using Google Sheets.
Thanks to Google Workspace’s intuitive autosave, there’s no need to worry about saving your draft every 10 seconds either. Not to mention how useful the real-time collaboration tools and seamless integration with Google Drive are.
Key features
- Real-time collaboration
- Editing history
- Commenting and suggesting
- Offline access
- Mobile app
Pricing
The Google Workspace is completely free for individual users. If you’re a content creator who is looking to scale your digital product business, you might be interested in checking out one of Google’s business plans which go from $6 to $18/month, depending on what type of features you’re looking for.
Best tools for social media scheduling and management
12. Buffer
🏆 Best for social media scheduling
Buffer is one of the best social media management tools for content creators selling digital products because it simplifies scheduling, posting, and analyzing content across multiple platforms.
Its intuitive interface saves creators time managing their social media presence, allowing them to focus more on selling digital products. Buffer also provides detailed analytics, enabling creators to refine social strategies based on what resonates with their audience.
Key Features
- Easy scheduling for social media posts across multiple social platforms
- Detailed audience and performance analytics
- Link shortening and tracking for product promotion
- Collaboration tools for managing multiple accounts with a team
- Instagram Stories and Shop Grid management for product visibility
Pricing
Buffer offers a Free plan with basic scheduling, a landing page builder, and an AI Assistant for up to 3 channels. Its Essentials plan starts at $5/month per channel, its Team plan is $10/month per channel, and its Agency plan is $100/month per 10 channels.
13. Notion
🏆 Best for creating templates (e.g. checklists, calendars, all-in-one dashboards, etc.)
Notion is a go-to tool among many digital product creators thanks to its superior planning and organizing functionality. This productivity and note-taking app excels at flexibility, making it highly adaptable to any content creator’s needs.
Creators might use Notion for product roadmapping or to organize content plans or reference notes while producing video content. If your digital product needs a knowledge base (let’s say your online course requires a single source for course resources), Notion is great for creating these spaces.
While Notion might not be created specifically for digital product creation, many creators actually use it to produce templates or other resources to sell online. For example, a social media coach may sell a content calendar template created using Notion, while a career advice influencer may sell a job search tracker that lives on Notion.
Key features
- Great for note-taking, scriptwriting, and producing content outlines
- Collaboration and sharing
- Customizable templates
- Integrations with other apps like Dropbox, Asana, etc.
- Mobile app
Pricing
Notion boasts affordable pricing plans (another reason why it’s so popular among creators) with a free plan, a basic plan for $8/month, and a business plan for $15/month.
Best tools for SEO (search engine optimization)
14. Surfer
🏆 Best for AI-driven on-page SEO insights
Surfer is a top AI lead generation tool known for its content optimization and SEO strategies, which help to drive organic traffic and high-quality leads. By leveraging AI, Surfer analyzes vast amounts of data to provide actionable insights for creating content that ranks well on search engines. This results in improved visibility and increased lead generation.
The platform’s user-friendly interface and comprehensive analytics make it easy for marketers to optimize their content and track performance, ensuring that efforts are focused on strategies that yield the best results. Surfer also offers a ton of actionable data that aids in delivering precise recommendations for content improvement.
Key features
- AI-driven insights for creating high-ranking content
- SEO enhancement
- User-friendly interface
- Comprehensive analytics
Pricing
Surfer’s Essential plan starts at $99/per month, its Scale plan is $219/per month. Surfer users can also purchase add-ons and AI packages.
15. SEMrush
🏆 Best for overall SEO analysis and digital marketing strategies
If you’ve dabbled in SEO, you’ve probably heard of SEMrush. The SEO tool is popular among content creators thanks to its comprehensive insights into keyword research, competitor analysis, and website optimization.
With SEMrush, creators can identify high-traffic keywords and trends to optimize their content and product listings, improving visibility and driving organic traffic to their sales pages. The tool also offers detailed reporting and content suggestions to help creators stay ahead of the competition.
Key Features
- In-depth keyword research and tracking
- Competitor analysis to uncover successful strategies
- SEO content templates for better optimization
- Site audit tools to identify and fix SEO issues
- Backlink analysis for improving domain authority
Pricing
SEMrush offers a Free limited plan with a cap of 10 Analytics requests per day. For more advanced features you’ll have to upgrade to a paid plan, which starts at $129.95/month.
What types of digital products can you create?
Read on to learn more about what types of digital products you can create.
Ebooks
An ebook — aka an electronic book — is one of the most popular digital products out there. Particularly favored by creator educators, the purpose of an ebook is to communicate valuable information to the reader with the added bonus of a low-cost and low-hassle effort.
Many creators who already manage blogs or newsletters might gravitate towards producing ebooks since the end goal is the same, except an ebook doesn’t have to be maintained. Once you write, design, and publish an ebook, it just lives out there on the internet with the potential to rake in the cash every minute of every day.
Related: How to make money selling ebooks online
Templates
Another popular digital product among creators is the template. And when we say template, we mean it can be anything from a freelance contract agreement template, to a sample résumé or cover letter, to a media kit template.
If you specialize in a particular area of expertise and have knowledge to share, chances are you can put that knowledge to good use by creating a template. This type of digital product can be effortless for the creator to make, while also bringing immense value to their audience. It’s truly a win-win digital product.
Related: How to create and sell Notion templates and Canva templates
Online courses
If you really want to make some bank, you might want to consider producing and selling an online course. Whether it’s a one-time thing or a series of courses, the online course offers your audience a flexible learning experience where they can advance at their own pace.
Not only are online courses great for your audience, but they also greatly benefit the content creator as they offer the opportunity to transform knowledge and expertise into something you can sell over and over again.
Related: How Miss Excel built her $2 million online course business
Website themes
Turns out, websites are not so easy to create… which is why the internet has such a vast need for website themes and templates. That means, website themes are super high in demand and can be a very lucrative form of passive income for content creators.
If you’re a creator who builds websites, uploading and promoting your themes to your storefront or on a website builder platform can be an easy and quick way to make passive income.
Fonts
When we think about digital products, we often think about written or video content. But don’t forget about all the design opportunities! Similar to website themes, font creators have a great opportunity to earn passive income by creating and selling their fonts online for a fee.
Photo editing presets
An increasingly popular digital product of the influencer era, photo editing presets are a group of photo editing settings that are designed to quickly transform images with a particular aesthetic in mind.
Photo editing presets can be created and sold for a variety of social media platforms or Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom.
Keep in mind that the digital product world is vast and these are just some examples of the digital products that you can create. Read on to learn more about how to create digital products to sell, and the tools that will help you succeed.
If you’re looking for even more digital product ideas — or how to maximize your passive income potential — check out The Leap’s free resources!
Create and sell digital products in minutes using The Leap!
Feeling pumped to start designing your very own digital products? Want to learn even more about how to sell digital products online so you can start making some bank? The Leap is a great place to start!
The Leap‘s AI-powered digital product builder helps you create the digital products of your dreams quickly and easily. The best part about The Leap? Once you’re finished creating your digital products, you can start selling and marketing your products all on the same platform, using The Leap’s mobile-optimized link-in-bio online store builder, lead generation tools, and built-in email marketing automation.
The Leap is 100% free to use so you have nothing to lose!
Want to get started creating and selling your own digital products? Try The Leap for free now.
Create and sell digital products in minutes using The Leap!
Hot tip: Download The Leap’s free 6-Step Digital Product Launch Checklist to learn how to successfully sell your first digital product.
FAQ
What digital products can I create and sell?
When it comes to digital product ideas, the digital world is your oyster, and there are plenty of opportunities to create and sell your digital products. Some examples of digital products you can sell include an ebook, online course, template, tutorial, stock photos, or even a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet.
How do you create digital products to sell?
So you want to start an online business selling digital products? Get ready to embark on a wild journey (in a good way!).
First things first, you want to start by identifying your expertise or passion. It could be writing, graphic design, coding, career or relationship advice — you name it and your expertise can be translated into a digital product.
Next, you want to brainstorm digital product ideas and plan your product meticulously, ensuring it fulfills a need or offers value to your target audience. Once you’ve established these important starting points, you can dive into the creative process.
Write that guide, sell those stock photos, or build that template! Quality is key. There are plenty of tools out there to help you keep the quality of your digital product up to the status quo. Consider using platforms like The Leap to help you create and sell your digital product, all in one place.
Don’t forget that promotion is a key component of selling digital products. Use your social media accounts, engage with your audience, and don’t forget to gather feedback for improvement.
How do I make my first digital product?
Creating your first digital product can seem like a daunting journey to embark on. Our best advice is to begin by identifying a problem that you’re passionate about solving, or a skill that you’re eager to share.
For example, let’s say you’re a freelance graphic designer — you could consider crafting brand design templates or even freelance contract templates.
Once you’ve honed in on your idea, gather the necessary tools and software to help you produce it. Then, dedicate the necessary time to perfecting your product. Lastly, find a platform (or build your own website) to sell your product and start promoting it.
Follow The Leap on TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube for more creator tool and platform reviews. We also make a newsletter.
Further reading
- How To Make Passive Income Selling Digital Products
- 15 Profitable Digital Products To Sell Online (+Real Examples)
- How To Sell Digital Products Online: A 6-Step Launch Checklist
- How To Create and Sell Notion Templates: A Beginner’s Guide
This article was originally published in September 2023, and updated in March 2025 with additional information.
