Redbubble is a free-to-join marketplace of thousands of shops, all operated by independent artists from around the world. Here’s our guide to getting started.

How Does Redbubble Work?

When you upload your art to Redbubble, you can customize it on over 80 different products. You choose which products you sell and set your own artist margin so you have control over your pricing.

When a customer purchases one of your products, Redbubble handles production, shipping and customer support for you, so you can focus more time on important stuff like creating amazing art! It’s completely free to open a shop and sell your art, and you can keep track of what you’ve earned on your Dashboard.

The 3 most important tips we have for you in getting started on Redbubble are:

1. Upload a full catalog right away – aim for at least 25 designs in your first month.
2. Tag your work well! For a full breakdown of how to tag, click here.
3. Promote your store. Sharing your shop link on social media, regardless of your audience size, can help bring your followers to your store and improve your sales.

Keep reading for a detailed walkthrough on setting up your shop, choosing your products & pricing, and how to use customer insights to make more sales.

Mat Miller’s Redbubble Shop | Designed and sold by Mat Miller

Step 1: Set up shop

A journey of thousand miles begins with one step. After creating your Redbubble Artist Account, your first step to setting up shop is split into 3 parts:

Confirm Your Email

Before you can make your artwork available for sale, you’ll need to confirm your email address. Head to your Account Details page, enter your email and click on ‘Confirm Your E-mail Address’. You should receive a confirmation email within a few minutes. If you get stuck, our Artist Support team can help you out.

Add Your Name And Address

This one’s pretty straightforward. As with your email, these details need to be filled out so your account is set up and you’re ready to sell.

Add Payment Details

You can be paid via Paypal, or bank transfer if you have an Australian, US or UK bank account. You’ll find your payment details under Account Settings. Make sure you choose the correct currency as we’re unable to change this once you’ve confirmed your payment details. For more detailed info on getting paid, see our article on the artist payment process.

Step 2: Customize Your Profile

Customize the appearance of your shop in your Account Settings. You can find these settings by clicking on your avatar in the top right corner of any page. They’re also in the menu on your Dashboard.

Add a Bio

Customers are keen to support independent artists so this is your chance to connect. A great bio should encourage them to explore your shop, favorite your work, and follow you. Your bio should serve as a high level introduction to you, the kind of work you create, subjects or themes you’re passionate about, and tools and techniques you use. For more tips, see our guide to writing a great bio for your Redbubble shop.

Vlad Stanovic’s bio and social links

Add an Avatar and Cover Image

Your shop’s appearance tells customers a lot about what they will find inside. Your avatar and cover images are your chance to wow customers and encourage them to browse and ultimately buy from you. It’s often helpful to create consistency between the artworks they will find in your shop and the profile and cover images.

Cover image dimensions are 2400 px wide by 600 px high. For your avatar, we recommend 100 x 100 px. Both should be either JPG or PNG. Learn more about how to design eye-catching cover photos.

Add Social Links

Make it as easy as possible for them to find and follow you elsewhere by adding your social links. It’s a great way to build an audience, and it will help you when it comes to promoting your art. Filling out your bio and adding social links can increase your chances of being featured on Redbubble’s homepage, social media profiles, or in our marketing emails. Read more about how to get featured on Redbubble.

Step 3: Get creative!

Now that your shop is set up, it’s time to create some art. Here is everything you need to know to create products to sell on Redbubble.

Upload Designs

There’s a whole section on uploading in our Help Center, so we’ll just cover the basics here to get you started. To create your first products, click on your avatar (top right of any page) and choose ‘Add New Work’. Select ‘Upload new work’ and choose a JPEG, GIF or PNG file. From here you can choose your title, add a description, add your artwork to multiple products, adjust the placement, disable or enable products, choose a background color, manage tags, and choose the default product you want to appear in your shop. Once you’re done, scroll to the bottom of the page and save your work. Easy peasy!

Add Tags

To increase your chances of being discovered, we recommend increasing the relevance of your tags. Relevant tags are words that clearly describe what can be seen in your artwork (ex. “cat” + “skateboard” for a picture of a cat riding a skateboard). They can also refer to the context or meaning of the design “home” + “cozy” + “comfort”  for a design of a fireplace inside of a snowy cabin).

Remember that customers don’t click randomly; they only engage with content that is relevant to what they searched for. Choose around 15 relevant tags. Don’t be tempted to tag spam. You may think adding as many tags as possible will increase your visibility, but it can have the opposite effect on your search ranking. See Redbubble Tagging 101 for more tips.

We recommend adding at least five artworks when you’re setting up your shop, and adding 25 artworks within your first month! Adding all of your art and making those designs available on a wide range of products instantly makes your shop feel established and gives customers a range of products and designs to browse. To ensure your products look great, pay close attention to the way your artwork is positioned on each product. Try and avoid white edges or badly cropped designs. You may need to go back and edit your work to adjust the positioning.

Select a Product Range

You can sell your art on over 80 products – and we’re adding new products all the time! To keep up to date with new product news, check your Dashboard, make sure you’re signed up for emails, and follow us on our artist Instagram @redbubbleartists.

Designed and sold by Sabrina Brugmann

Understand Dimensions and Formats

We’ve compiled a list of dimensions and formats for all products in our Help Center. It’s a super useful resource and one of our most visited pages so you’ll to want to bookmark it for later! While we’re talking useful resources, check our guide to designing with products in mind.

Review Your Pricing

Each product has a base price that covers Redbubble’s service fee and the cost of manufacturing. Artists can set a percentage markup or ‘artist margin’. The margin is set to 20% as a default, but you can adjust this for each product, choosing any percentage you like. Head to your Dashboard and click on product pricing to adjust the artist margins for each of your products. This article covers pricing in more detail.

Remember this: The most successful artists on Redbubble add new artwork regularly. Keep things fresh by releasing new artworks each week. Let your followers know about your latest designs and new products on social.

Step 4: Promote Your Redbubble Shop

There are two simple, yet extremely important things you can do to get on the right track:

Add a link to your shop on your social profiles and website

The link on your dashboard has tracking so you can see the traffic you’ve sent to your shop in Artist Traffic Sources.

Kelly Gilleran on Instagram

Promote your designs on social when you add new work.

Once you’ve uploaded a new design, you’ll be taken to the promote page where you can download product images or share them directly to social. The Shop Talk section on the blog features lots of selling tips and advice including:

• Personalized Shop Links and Direct Sharing Product Images to Social
• Share Your Work Like a Pro With Our Promotional Tools
• Hashtags, Captions and Tracking Links: How to Share Your Work and Measure Results
• The Ultimate Guide to Promoting Your Art on Instagram
• 10 Ideas for More Engaging Social Media Posts
• A Guide to TikTok for Visual Artists
  

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Use Trends and Customer Insights

When you’re creating new work and thinking about marketing your Redbubble shop, tapping into trending themes can be a great way to find inspiration and reach new audiences. Before you dive into the creation process, it’s a good idea to ask yourself a few questions.

• Who am I designing this for?
• What products are they most likely to be interested in?
• What are the file sizes and dimensions for those products?
• Is there an audience I can share this with on social?
• Are there any popular hashtags I can use to market my work and reach new people?

We’re big advocates of finding trends that compliment your own style and passions. Successfully combining business and creativity means creating with an audience in mind, and some idea of how you’re going to reach them. Here are some useful resources for research:

• Browse sites like Pinterest and Instagram to see what’s popular
• Use Google Trends to compare traffic volumes for different search terms
• Visit retail stores to see what colors, patterns and themes are big this season

Google Trends

It’s also a good idea to have a poke around Redbubble. Put yourself in the customer’s shoes. Go looking for something that speaks to you. See what other artists are creating. What styles pop up. You’ll start to see how you can create artwork unique to you that customers will love. For more inspiration, see our articles on identifying trends and how events and holidays can help you connect with fans.

Helpful Resources

We hope you’ve found some useful tips in our guide to getting started on Redbubble. Here are a few more important places where you can follow updates and find further information:

• Dashboard: Track your earnings, see customer traffic sources, trends, tips, and more
• Artist Social Channels: Follow us on Instagram and Facebook for inspiration and updates
• Email: Make sure you are signed up for our artist newsletters! Click this link, check the box for Artist Newsletter, and then scroll down to save changes.
• Redbubble Artist Blog: Find the latest artist news, selling tips, advice, and inspiration here on the blog
• The Help Center: Got a question? Our Artist Success team can help.

Header Image: A Dreamy Night In | Designed and sold by Singajelly