How To Make a Text Template at Zazzle

People love to have the ability to personalize something. From monograms, to names and messages, giving a personalized gift is special.

Zazzle offers customers the opportunity to personalize almost every product they sell. But the creator of that product should make it easy for the customer to do so. That is where templates come into play.

Templates are simply place holders that can hold example text which the buyer will change.  Designers can also create photo templates, but this page is dedicated to making text templates only. 

Now that Zazzle is ranking our stores, one of the requirements is to make more template products for sale.

This picture tutorial page will show you how easy it is to make products customizable by turning text into an easy-to-use template.

As of the beginning of 2017 Zazzle has given us a new and improved design tool.  As of this writing, it is still an option, with the old tool still available to use.

(To switch between the two, go to Account, then Settings.  Click on "Zazzle Labs" in the left hand sidebar and you will see where to "turn on or off the new product page experience".)

Like many people, I have a hard time dealing with big changes.   Especially when it comes to earning income.  Zazzle tends to make a lot of changes very often, but this one is indeed good.

At first, I switched back and forth between the two, mainly because the new tool has a curved text option, and a kerning tool (which allows for spaces between letters).   But after a while, as I became more familiar with the new design experience, I embraced it.  BUT... there are still kinks to work out and Zazzle asks for feedback which means they are still perfecting the tool.

Below I have included a screenshot of the new tool which I used to design this poppy "save the date" sticker.

In the new tool, first click "add text" - blue button at the top of the page.

Next, find the template area under the "more" button at the bottom of the page.  Click "make this a template" and add your preferred product page label.  

All other text editing options are at the bottom of the page.  Change the font style and size.  Next to the size is the kerning option to space the letters, if you wish.

To the right of the kerning numbers is the curved text option, with numbers to change the amount of curve.  

My best advice is to play around with this entire design tool and soon you will feel comfortable with it.

Once my text templates are set, the product is ready to be posted for sale in my Zazzle store.

When it shows up for sale there will be a line (or lines) of text showing for the customer to easily change.  If the product was not a template, the customer would have to go into the "customize" area and then change the text.  If the customer could figure that out.

My sticker allows the customer to quickly print the names and date of wedding.  Templates allow the purchaser to see exactly what they are getting before they buy.

You can find cards and gifts anywhere online, but not every place offers the option to add your own text yourself, before purchasing.  Zazzle's customers love this and come to Zazzle looking for unique gifts and paper that can be personalized.  

I recently sold 50 separate note cards all in one design.  I have a line of template text on the front of the card and a custom, sample message inside.

The customer apparently wanted to create a separate message or text for each individual card (except for a grouping of 15 that were bought together) as the cards were sold one at a time.  This tells me that each card was individually personalized.

He or she liked the card design and really liked the idea that each one could be changed easily to what was needed. 

Templates give the customer options.  Make text templates on every item you can and the sale opportunities for those items are better than blanks.

I just wanted to mention this cool new option Zazzle has added within the new design tool.  An uploaded image can be changed to a new color, or black and white, by using the "filters" module.

Click on the image you want to change, then find filters under the "more" button.   As you can see in my design here, the original blue floral pattern was changed to pretty yellow, pink and purple by the click of a button!