According to Straits Research, the print-on-demand market size is expected to grow significantly over the next decade. In 2022, the global print-on-demand market was valued at $5.397 billion; it’s projected to reach $39.035 billion by 2031. In this article, let’s explore a complete list of the best print-on-demand apps to help you start earning profit today.
Stages of a Print-On-Demand (POD) business
There are several steps to grow POD business, from product research to marketing and shipping, from design to customer support. Here is an overview of each stage:
- Product research: Determine the market niche you want to target (e.g., custom t-shirts, home decor, stationary, etc); then research popular products within that niche.
- Choose a POD platform: Evaluate different POD platforms (e.g., Printful, Printify, etc) based on product range, integration capabilities, pricing, and fulfillment times, then choose whichever suit your business best.
- Design and customize your products: Create original and appealing designs that resonate with your target customers.
- Marketing: You can reach your target audience through paid ads, SEO, influencer collaborations, email marketing, etc
- Order fulfillment: Integrate with your POD platform to ship out orders precisely and quickly
- Customer support: Set up customer support channels to handle inquiries and complaints
- Reviews and ratings: Encourage customers to leave reviews and provide feedback to gain social proof for your POD business.
A shortlist of the best apps for POD business
This is a shortlist of the best apps to help you start, manage, and grow your POD business without any hassle.
| POD STAGES | APP | OUTSTANDING FOR | PRICE |
| Product and supplier selection | Printful | High-quality printing | Free Plan Available |
| Printify | Competitive pricing | Free Plan Available | |
| Design and custom | Canva | User-friendly design tools | Free Plan Available |
| Teeinblue Product Personalizer | Easily customizable products | Free Plan Available | |
| Marketing | Klaviyo | Advanced email marketing automation | Free Plan Available |
| BixGrow | Affiliate and referral program management | Free Plan Available | |
| SEO Manager | Search engine optimization tools | $9/month | |
| Shipping | AfterShip | Real-time shipment tracking | Free Plan Available |
| Customer Support | Chatty: Livechat Helpdesk, FAQ | Multi-channel communication | Free Plan Available |
| Reviews and Ratings | Loox ‑ Product Reviews App | Visual Reviews (photos, video,..) | $9.99/month |
1. Product and supplier selection
Choosing the right product and trust-worthy supplier is the first stage in building your print-on-demand store.
Printful
Whether you’re just getting started or are already running a successful brand, Printful is one of the most popular and trusted partners to help you launch and grow your business.
User Feedback on Printful: 4.6 stars from 6494 reviews
Key Features:
- High-quality products and printings with good quality control
- Custom branding with packaging, pack-ins, packing slips
- Easy to set up
Pricing
- Free: Free to install, Printful only charges users for order fulfillment and shipping when a product is sold in their stores
- Growth: $24.99/month. Up to 30% off all products with 7% off product branding, unlimited stores, and FREE once you reach $12K in yearly sales
Trusted by countless famous brands such as Coca-Cola, MTV, CBS, and Dunkin’; 85+ million items shipped since 2013 – Printful is undoubtly one of the best POD platforms. Set up shop quickly and seamlessly with its easy-to-use interface, and get your products in front of thousands of customers in a heartbeat.
99% of all shipped orders meet customers’ quality standards because Printful has the best quality control team, to ensure buyer’s satisfaction.
Printify
Printify offers some of the lowest prices in the industry because print providers continuously compete to win your business.
User Feedback on Printful: 4.8 stars from 6120 reviews
Key Features:
- Wide selection of custom products with great prices
- Free design tools
- No stock upfront
Pricing
- Free to install. Product and shipping costs are billed only when a sale is made in your store.
- Premium: $29/month. ALL Free plan features; 10 online stores; Self-serve help desk; Up to 20% DISCOUNT on all products and an additional 14% off with a yearly plan
Printify has 900+ products and top-quality brands, you can choose the best products for your business. You can easily add custom designs to t-shirts, mugs, phone cases, and hundreds of other products.
Trusted by over 8 million sellers around the world, Printify fulfills orders quickly and precisely to increase your store’s reputation.
2. Design & custom
To develop unique and appealing designs that have the potential to sell, you need to utilize all design and custom tools available.
Canva
While Canva is not a Shopify app, it’s a popular online graphic design tool that is known for its newbie-friendly and easy-to-use interface.
Key Features:
- A huge variety of pre-designed templates
- Drag-and-drop interface
- No installation needed, easy to use
Pricing
- Free: Free
- Canva Pro: $9.99/month
- Canva Team: $14.99 per month for the first five users
Canva offers a vast library of pre-designed templates and design elements for various types of projects. Canva also provides various tutorials, courses, and resources to help POD business improve their design skills and make the most out of the platform.
Teeinblue Product Personalizer
Let your creative mind fly high with Teeinblue Product Personalizer’s intuitive artwork editor, where you can add images, texts & PSD files to create a complete design for your print-on-demand store.
User Feedback on Teeinblue: 4.8 stars from 263 reviews
Key Features:
- Many personalization options: custom text, photo, star map, street map, clipart, etc
- Live review
- Easily set add-on charge
Pricing
- Development Stores: Free
- Starter: $19/month
Teeinblue lets you combine your designs with products in different campaigns and launch them in your store with just a few clicks. It also enhances the shopping experience of customers with a product live preview feature.
Style your product page to match your site’s branding with conversion-optimized features to gain massive revenue.
3. Marketing
Marketing a Print on Demand (POD) business effectively involves a mix of smart strategies and essential apps to reach your target audience, build a brand, and drive sales
Klaviyo
According to AVOUP, there are over 4.258 billion active email users worldwide as of 2022, it’s predicted that the number of email users will expand to nearly 4.4 billion by 2023. Klaviyo is one of the most popular email marketing apps.
User Feedback on Klaviyo: 4.5 stars from 2439 reviews
Key Features:
- Email and SMS marketing
- Real-time revenue data per automation, campaign, segment, and channel
- Omnichannel templates
Pricing
- Free: Free
- SMS: $15/month
- Email: $20/month
You can create personalized customer experiences across email, SMS, mobile push, and more with real-time data and AI-driven insights to promote your business. You can grow your audience, customer lifetime value, and total sales with Klaviyo.
BixGrow
BixGrow is the essential app to help you advertise your POD products with its amazing affiliate and referral program.
User Feedback on BixGrow: 5.0 stars from 1081 reviews
Key Features:
- Create and manage referral programs automatically based on your customizations.
- Recruit affiliates & influencers with MLM
- Flexible commission plans
Pricing
- Starter: Free
- Scale: $9/month
- Pro: $15/month
You can easily install BixGrow directly from the Shopify App Store without adding extra code to your theme. Moreover, you can activate both Affiliate and Referral programs at the same time, doubling your referral sales potential.
SEO Manager
SEO stands for search engine optimization, and it is the practice of optimizing your web pages to rank higher on search engine result pages. SEO Manager helps boost your store ranking on Google.
User Feedback on SEO Manager: 4.7 stars from 1729 reviews
Key Features:
- Automate title, description, and image alt text with templates
- Real-time performance scan
- AI-powered keyword discovery
Pricing
- Starter: $9/month
- Essential: $29/month
- Professional: $59/month
SEO Manager makes it easy for you to understand and implement SEO measures that will help your store rank better in search engines. The app allows merchants to take control of how search engines see their store, and gives them real-time feedback about the success (or failure) of their search engine optimization efforts
5. Shipping
In the POD business, your suppliers will handle production, packaging, and shipping on your behalf – you just need to manage and track the process.
AfterShip Order Tracking
AfterShip supports POD sellers to build a branded order tracking page and automated notifications from 1100+ carriers to offer shipment updates
User Feedback on AfterShip: 4.8 stars from 4623 reviews
Key Features:
- Branded tracking pages
- Automated email and SMS notifications
- AI-powered estimated delivery dates
Pricing
- Free: Free to install
- Essential: $11/month
- Pro: $119/month
- Premium: $239/month
Trusted by the world’s leading POD businesses, AfterShip enables proactive and automated delivery updates that forefront your brand. Resolve exceptions before customers notice and get shipping performance insights to optimize your long-term carrier strategy as your retention rate grows on autopilot
6. Customer support
Excellent customer support plays a key part in increasing sales, generating leads and improving your store’s reputation.
Chatty: Livechat Helpdesk, FAQ
Providing stellar customer support with the help of Chatty Livechat Helpdesk and FAQ to increase customer engagement and satisfaction.
User Feedback on Chaty: 4.9 stars from 290 reviews
Key Features:
- Integrates smoothly with WhatsApp chat, Facebook Messenger, Line, Telegram, Viber, TikTok, etc
- Customize chat widgets
- Show WhatsApp icon & chat buttons on mobile & desktop
Pricing
- Free: Free
- Basic: $15/month
- Pro: $39/ month
- Growth: $79/month
Make yourself available to customers on all platforms: WhatsApp, Facebook, Instagram, Telegram, Viber, or any custom links with Chatty. You can create widgets for various devices, languages, and pages; and even target specific countries or certain pages.
7. Customer reviews
According to BrightLocal reports, 49% of consumers trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations from friends and family. Collecting reviews and ratings can boost social trust and encourage visitors to buy from your POD stores.
Loox ‑ Product Reviews App
Serving more than 100,000 merchants from over 180 countries, Loox is the most popular product review app.
User Feedback on Loox: 4.9 stars from 19,607 reviews
Key Features:
- Automatically collecting reviews
- One-click referral program.
- Diverse widgets and layouts
Pricing
- Beginner: $9.99/month
- Scale: $34.99/month
- Unlimited: $299.99/month
Loox is an official Google reviews partner, the app collects and displays beautiful visual reviews (videos and photos), so you can build trust instantly and turn more visitors into loyal customers. You can create and customize review pages to display all the reviews in an aesthetically pleasing way.
Checkout related apps list?
- Top 9 Best Dropshipping Apps For Shopif
- 5+ Shopify Product Customizer Apps That You Need
- 07 Best Product Sourcing Apps for Shopify (for dropshipping)
- 10+ Best Shopify Affiliate Apps
- 10+ Best Shopify apps to increase sales
- 15+ Free Apps on Shopify
- 10+ Best Shopify Marketing Apps To Expand Brand Reach
Wrap it up
The print-on-demand (POD) business model offers a unique and flexible opportunity for small businesses to enter the e-commerce space with minimal upfront investment and risk. Utilize the best apps to aid you in each stage of growing your POD business.
Dan Muller
I have been working in marketing for four years, passionate about creative writing and copy writing. Love to be alone at watersides, sip coffee, play games or read anything that is thought provoking.