Ok, you have a website. And you have some digital products you want to sell (..software, e-books, graphics etc..). Unless you have a solid business and a budget to set up an online store, you will probably go look for a suitable service that will enable creditcard payments on your website. This post focus on two major players – ClickBank and Click2Sell.
What you are looking for
A service to provide the following:
- Enable creditcard payments at your website
- Allow the customer to download your product after successful creditcard payment (and only then)
- Let you monitor statistics and payments
- Let you withdraw funds from your account. To your PayPal account, MoneyBookers account, by check, by banktransfer etc.
- An affiliate program, allowing others to sell your products for a commission rate at your choice
ClickBank and Click2Sell do all that, so this post will focus on those major players.
Back in the days..
I started out in the 90's, selling software and website content. It wasn't any huge business, but it worked. I produced digital products, sold them online, got a few bucks, and the customers were happy. At the time, Amazon.com were skyrocketing. People had wild ideas about making money from advertising, and left the content aside. Advertising still works, but we have learned that ads saying "buy this well known product at a 25% discount" works far better than "Click here to win $1.000.000!".
Credit card fraud was already invented on the Internet of course. And a lot of service providers came…and disappeared. It was a time when trust were "under construction", and one player that seem to have won the battle is ClickBank. I used it back then, and I was a little surprised to see that they still are one of the top players, more than 10 years later. Or maybe not. Their business idea is waterproof and bulletproof – provide a service that everyone wants, and push the fees to the limit. After a withdrawal at ClickBank, I got to keep around 30% of my profits. Not only their fault, since a lot of money went MIA due to the insane fees when cashing checks in Swedish banks..
ClickBank .vs Click2Sell
ClickBank have made some changes since the last time I used their services, and those changes have opened up the market for some competition. I wont waste your time with more Internet history – here's todays comparison between the two top players.
| ClickBank |
Click2Sell |
|
| Start up cost |
$49.95 | $0 |
| Enabled markets |
Limited | Most of the world |
| Your profit on a $20 sale, after fees |
$17.50 | $19.00 |
| Allows selling of physical products |
No | Yes |
| Affiliate program |
Yes | Yes |
| Tools and management | Medium | Easy |
Conclusion
Either ClickBank or Click2Sell will get the job done. However, ClickBank is'nt the only player anymore. As you can see from the comparison, Click2Sell are now taking a big piece of the market and we dont have to wonder why. I'm a member of both ClickBank and Click2Sell, but for my next project I know which partner I will use for online shopping services – Click2Sell.
If you are about to launch an online merchandising project, big or small, you'll be up and running in minutes with Click2Sell. Sign Up for a free account and try yourself.