The Paperless Movement - Should you be selling digital planners?
Could you imagine organizing everything in your personal and professional life on one, sleek iPad? That might sound too good to be true, but with a digital planner, it's totally possible!
Digital planning is a simple way to organize your thoughts, goals, documents, routines, and lists without using a single piece of paper. While digital planning has been around for a bit, it's recently increased in popularity as the paperless movement has been gaining traction.
Many brands have added digital planners to their shops to diversify income and appeal to a whole new niche. Let's dive into what these brands are doing and why going paperless is such a great idea – for both customers and aspiring business owners!
What is the paperless movement?
The Paperless Movement is a term created by Tom Solid as he wanted to increase productivity in the corporate world by creating a completely digital workflow. You can learn more about his work here!
While the paperless movement is mostly an improved corporate workflow, it can also be applied to our lives outside of work or a little cubicle. With so much of our lives already taking place in the digital world, a pivot away from paper planning can be super easy!
But is it really possible to digitize everything that's going on in your brain? The Pink Ink started digital planning back in 2018 and fell in love right away since we bring our electronics with us pretty much everywhere, which means they can fit easily into backpacks, diaper bags, and most purses. You can also sync your digital planner so that you have the same information on your phone, iPad, and laptop. This means that when you have an idea in the middle of the night or on your commute to work, you can take out your phone and jot down your thoughts.
Is going paperless good?
The simple answer is yes, it totally is! Going paperless can actually increase productivity, allow for personalized planning, and do so while helping the environment. Let's break each of these down a bit further and see why this is the case:
Increased productivity - a digital planner makes organizing and planning easy because everything is at your fingertips. You can search your planner's content and jump from one section to another, which cuts down on the time and stress caused by trying to find something in your planner that you can't place. They eliminate clutter, which means you don't have to focus so much energy on keeping things in their place but instead on what actually goes into your planner.
Personalized planning - digital planners often come with tons of different page set-ups for every kind of mind. You can duplicate pages, add in blank ones for new ideas, and purchase planners for different niches and stages of life. You can increase your productivity in any way that makes sense for you since each planner is customizable.
Environmentally friendly - a shift away from paper planners means less paper is being used to produce physical planners. It also means that you don't have to keep buying planners year after year because you can reuse the one planner you've purchased! Not only are digital planners environmentally friendly, but they're wallet-friendly too!
Brands that are breaking the mold
With digital planners continuing to sell like hotcakes, some brands have added digital planners to their shops. Businesses that have received tons of recognition for their unique paper planners are now creating a digital version of that same planner, and they're huge hits!
Out of many reasons, there are two in particular that we want to talk about when it comes to these big brands selling digital planners – they're expanding their business to serve a new audience and it increases revenue.
There are some people that are obsessed with paper planners while others can't get enough of digital planners. Instead of limiting yourself to just one-half of people interested in purchasing a planner, you can now take advantage of the entire niche!
This brings us to the second reason why adding digital planners to your shop is a great idea – it will make you more money! With increased attention in your business, your shop traffic is going to increase, which will likely mean your sales will, too! Not to mention, businesses typically sell their digital planners for less than paper planners since there's no physical product that needs to be created. Because of this, people will see a high-quality product available at a lower price and be more likely to invest if the price point of your physical products was holding them back!
There are four brands that have done just this. We've listed and linked them below so you can take a look at what they've done, their products, and how they've developed a signature method to turn into a best-selling product.
View-Halloo - specializes in digital planners for equestrians and horse lovers. They help equestrians plan their schedules to plan their 9-5s alongside their riding schedules and other important areas of life.
Passion Planner - Angelia Trinidad created the passion planner to take back control of her life and focus on what really matters. Now her products, both physical and digital, help thousands of people of all ages while giving back to the community.
Thyme is Honey (The Digital Page Shop) - Dani is both a course creator and digital planner shop owner that helps others create systems in their business to maximize productivity. Their best-selling planner is designed with a science-backed strategy.
Hustle Sanely - Jess Massey created her Peacefully Productive Planners to help women prioritize their mental health and relationships by building healthy habits and a schedule that supports the priorities you’ve set in life.
Ideas to Beak through the paperless movements
How can you join the digital stationery movement as a business owner? Here are some ideas to turn an existing offer into a digital product!
Take your most popular physical planner and turn it into a digital planner
Create a unique notebook or notepad that highlights your signature method
Create one-of-a-kind sticker collections that bring joy to your customers and help you to move away from generic sticker packs
How can you bring these offerings to life? You need three different tools to get started:
A design program - you can read about four digital planner design programs we recommend in this blog post
A signature method - monetize a system you’ve created in your business and learn how to do this in our free challenge
An iPad and a note-taking app - take the first steps and jump into the world of digital planning by gathering all the essentials. Learn what you need here!
Joining the paperless movement
Are you thinking about selling digital planners? There are two different ways you can do so, depending on how familiar you are with running a business. First, you can add a new stream of income to your existing business by launching a digital planner collection. Why might this be a good idea for you?
You have a signature method that clients and customers are raving about
You've already developed a paper planner and want to reach a new audience
You have an amazing digital product already available and want to create a complimentary, low-ticket offer
We highly encourage coaches and service providers to take the leap and design a digital planner! But wait a second, you have to design the entire thing?
That sounds like a lot of work, and you might not have time to add such a big task to your to-do list. If that's the case, we'd love to take that weight off your shoulders and collaborate on the design process!
Here’s how we can help your business with joining the paperless movement:
The design process - in just a week, you can have a digital version of the perfect planner that replicates your signature methods so you can reach your latest business goals. If you'd like to talk more about how we can work together, you can read and inquire here.
Digital Planner Academy - we've created our signature program, Digital Planner Academy, to help women find their footing in the online space so you can design a life you love while selling digital planners you're truly passionate about. If you'd like to learn more about how DPA has changed lives and can help you, click here!
Digital Planner Kits - DIY your very first planner with a customizable template that will allow you to bring your ideas to life in just one weekend instead of months of design trial and error. We’ve created 8 different Digital Planner Kits so that once you've chosen your niche, you can create a planner your audience will love. You can shop the selection here.