Selling things for bitcoin online doesn’t have to be hard. In fact, it shouldn’t be, given the decentralized nature and low fees of peer-to-peer electronic cash. For beginners and DIYers new to the world of creating an online bitcoin or crypto marketplace, this article seeks to provide some basic pointers and new resources to get you making deals and selling your wares or content for bitcoin in no time.
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Getting Started
The first thing to do before setting up a website to sell content or goods for bitcoin is to have a product. Maybe it’s exclusive content, an old baseball card collection, or commissioned artworks. New paywall services, easy payment gateways, and highly accessible online marketplaces make offering these easy and quick, without long and tedious sign-up processes or the need to share too much personal information.
The second thing to consider is the type of crypto to accept. For the purposes of this article we’ll be looking at mostly bitcoin cash avenues, owing to the BCH network’s low fees, fast speeds, and innovative development culture. For the reader unfamiliar with the difference between Bitcoin Cash (BCH) and Bitcoin Core (BTC), more information can be found here. Readers who don’t yet have any BCH to experiment with, or a wallet to store it can get these for free as well, using this resource.
Pick an Avenue and Set up Shop
How a website sells for crypto depends largely on what a website sells for crypto. A blogger or content creator might want to put up a crypto paywall for access to exclusive content. A computer parts store could use a payment gateway to make processing crypto payments easy and compatible with existing channels and traditional currencies. Someone looking to sell various odds and ends might link to a crypto marketplace account or sell directly using a business wallet and an address pasted to their site. Whatever the approach, the following are some sites, services, and ideas that can help get you started.
Satoshiwall.cash
For those looking to set up a crypto paywall on their site, Satoshiwall is a quick and non-custodial solution. Even without an account at Satoshiwall.cash, anyone can paste in their BCH wallet address, upload content, choose a price denominated in one of multiple traditional currencies, and then share the link with fans and followers. Those wishing to view the content then pay the appropriate amount in BCH, Satoshiwall takes a non-custodial (thanks to BIP70) fee of 10%, and the post is revealed.
Each registered user also has their own RSS feed which enables interesting options like automatic sharing of paywalled content to your website or social media. A recent development summary posted to read.cash gives the full breakdown.
Openbazaar
The free online marketplace at Openbazaar allows users to create their own store page and “Sell whatever you’d like. Reach a new audience. Get paid in cryptocurrency.” The site takes no fees and is a decentralized, peer-to-peer network built on open source code. Online merchants can choose to be paid in cryptos like bitcoin cash, bitcoin core, litecoin and zcash, and prices can be denominated in multiple fiat currencies.
BCH-Friendly Payment Gateways
As Bitcoin.com elaborates regarding payment gateways: “A Bitcoin Cash payment gateway lets your customers pay with cryptocurrency on your website. The gateway is integrated into your site and you can use it to accept e-commerce sales, charity donations, invoice payments, and more.” Some payment gateways like Bitpay allow those still inexperienced with crypto to accept payments that are automatically converted to traditional currency on the merchant side. There are also non-custodial and privacy-focused options like Atomicpay and Blockonomics, where users keep complete control of their private keys.
A good payment gateway will provide you plenty of customizable options and embeddable buttons to make selling stuff for crypto on your website a smooth and fun process.
KISS
The KISS principle, standing for “keep it simple, stupid,” or “keep it stupid simple,” is always important to remember. It’s a big part of the reason this whole crypto thing came about in the first place. In the face of unnecessarily complex and privacy-invasive legacy financial protocols, a new money was born. There is something very clean, refreshing, and direct about a peer-to-peer electronic cash transaction with no meddling company or middleman standing in the way.
For the DIY enthusiast perhaps not interested in any of the above solutions, all that is truly needed to sell stuff for bitcoin on a website is a BCH address and a wallet. And that is the beauty of crypto. Just copy/paste an address and request the funds. Additionally, a brand new marketplace has just emerged for BCH payments for goods on the local.bitcoin.com peer-to-peer trading platform, so if you wish to direct your web traffic to your listings there, that’s also an option.
Whatever your choice, economic freedom is what bitcoin is all about, and the door is now opened for anyone — no longer just big corporations or exclusive groups — to trade value for value freely and easily online.
What do you think is the best way to accept crypto payments online? Let us know in the comments section below.
Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only. Readers should do their own due diligence before taking any actions related to the subject matter written above. Neither the company nor the author is responsible, directly or indirectly, for any damage or loss caused or alleged to be caused by or in connection with the use of or reliance on any ideas, software, concepts, content, goods or services mentioned in this article.
Image credits: Shutterstock, fair use.
Verify and track bitcoin cash transactions on our BCH Block Explorer, the best of its kind anywhere in the world. Also, keep up with your holdings, BCH, and other coins, on our market charts at Bitcoin.com Markets, another original and free service from Bitcoin.com.
