How Does Hotmart Work? Everything You Need to Know!

Hotmart is an all-in-one platform for digital creators and entrepreneurs to build and sell digital products such as online courses, membership sites, subscriptions, communities, events and ebooks. Learn how Hotmart works for creators all around the globe. 

Hotmart was founded in 2011 with the mission of helping people live their passions through online education.  Our team has developed a complete, safe and easy-to-use toolkit for anyone who wants to build their business online with a robust members area for buyers to learn new skills.

We connect the three essential roles for a business to thrive online: creator, affiliate, and buyer!

If you are interested in working online or taking an online course to open up new doors, keep reading to learn how Hotmart works and how you can enter our universe!

What is Hotmart: learn how Hotmart works!

Hotmart is a global tech and education company. We are a leader in the digital product market and headquartered in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, with offices in Brazil, Spain, Colombia, Mexico, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Mexico.

We offer a complete ecosystem for creators, affiliates, and online course buyers, and have more than 370 thousand registered products, 26 million users, and sales made in more than 185 countries. 

Our mission is to help people live their passions by sharing knowledge and helping others in their professional and personal growth because we believe that learning changes everything.

Hotmart also offers tools and solutions that help build, market, and sell digital products. This way, anyone can find new opportunities by creating or taking their business online.

In a nutshell, this is how Hotmart works:

1. A person with knowledge in a certain area creates a product (like an online course or an ebook) to share that knowledge with the world.
2. People who have an online audience or are good at making sales, help promote and sell this product to consumers in exchange for commissions on each sale made.
3. A buyer who is looking for new knowledge can purchase the product on our platform by using our search page or clicking on a link provided by an affiliate or creator.

In other words, Hotmart is a platform that hosts online courses and processes payments all in one place, as well as offering solutions that help scale online businesses.

Empowering creators: how Hotmart fuels the creator economy

The creator economy is a thriving ecosystem where creators of all kinds are able to monetize their content and build successful digital businesses. And this is how Hotmart works: providing a leading platform for creators with the tools and resources they need to succeed in the creator economy.

Here are just a few of the ways of how Hotmart works for creators:

• Building a product: Hotmart is easy to use and to build their first product, creators can get started in just a few clicks with our AI tool;
• Monetization: Hotmart offers a variety of monetization options for creators, including digital product sales, affiliate marketing, and subscriptions;
• Distribution: Hotmart makes it easy for creators to distribute their content and reach a global audience;
• Analytics: Hotmart provides creators with detailed analytics, so they can track their progress and make informed decisions about their businesses;

We have an amazing ebook about the creator economy if you want to learn more about the opportunities in this thriving industry!

What are digital products?

Before learning what creators and affiliates are and which suits you best, you need to know what digital products are.

Digital products are mostly educational materials that are produced in a digital format and distributed online.

Online courses, subscriptions, and ebooks are some examples of digital products, but there are many other options.

They have become very popular among consumers as they offer the chance to learn about various subjects without having to leave home. In other words, they are an accessible, practical content format that is increasingly gaining traction in the market.

Digital products are a great opportunity for entrepreneurs because of their geographical reach and, mainly, because in this business model it’s easier to scale profits.

But how does that work, exactly? And how does Hotmart work in this scenario?

A person who lives in Japan can buy a creator’s course online now (built on Hotmart and sold on our Marketplace) and have access to it without either of them having to travel anywhere or ship anything. While the buyer is accessing the digital product, another shopper may be doing so in another part of the world.

In short, it’s a scalable business model with the ability to increase revenue exponentially, without having to increase costs in the same proportion.

Since a creator’s product is 100% digital, they don’t have to produce a new course from scratch every time a new person buys from them. With just a single product, they can make thousands of sales!

Understand more about this topic in our post that explains what digital products are and how to make money with them.

Who are creators?  

Now that you understand what a digital product is, it’s time to find out where you fit in this market.

There are basically two major roles, creators and affiliates.

Creators are people who make digital content.

A digital creator at Hotmart could be an influencer, blogger, or anyone who has mastered a certain subject and has decided to create a product, to teach and share their knowledge with the world

Who can become a Hotmart creator?

It may sound cliché, but the truth is that anyone can become a Hotmart creator, that’s the essence of how Hotmart works. You just need to be able to create content and know how to use the internet.

What will really make you stand out is your persistence as an entrepreneur and your willingness to learn with your own business.

Types of digital products

Currently, at Hotmart, it is possible to sell different types of digital content:

• Ebooks in PDF or EPUB formats;
• Documents (.doc, .rtf), audiobooks and music (mp3, wma);
• Video classes;
• Talks and screencasts (MPEG, FLV, MOV, WMV);
• Software (.exe,.msi);
• Images;
• Podcasts;
• Scripts and any other file formats that can be downloaded.

It is also possible to create subscriptions for membership programs, private sites, coaching, or any type of product where buyers pay a recurring fee.

In this case, if the creator wants, they can integrate the registration system on their own website with the Hotmart ecosystem, and host their members area with Hotmart.

That’s a lot of information, right? But don’t worry. You’re learning step-by-step how Hotmart works and we’ll talk about the Hotmart Members Area later in this post.

Who are affiliates?

Unlike creators, affiliates are people who help market and sell third-party products and they’re essential for how Hotmart works.

By becoming an affiliate at Hotmart, you can choose from hundreds of products to promote on our platform and get paid commissions for each sale made.

Being an affiliate with Hotmart has a lot of advantages, such as:

• You don’t need to have your own product to start selling;
• If you don’t have your own product, you don’t need to deal directly with buyers (this will be done by the creator responsible for the product);
• You don’t have to have a website (although it’s highly recommended), and you can promote the product on other sites such as social media platforms;
• Commissions are processed automatically by Hotmart at the time of sale. So, as long as everything is in compliance with what’s in our Terms of Use, there’s no risk of not getting paid commission on a sale;
• Hotmart affiliates can choose from hundreds of products from different niches to affiliate with. Depending on the product, they could earn more than US$ 100 per sale made.

If you don’t have a product, working as an affiliate is the fastest way to start making money with your website or social media accounts.

It is important to remember that Hotmart prohibits certain affiliate practices, such as sending spam and overstating product benefits. These practices can even lead to the affiliate’s Hotmart account being blocked. If you want to learn more, check out our best practices manual for creators and affiliates.

If you believe a user is violating our Terms of Use, you can report them. Hotmart has a service channel where it’s possible to report violations of rights and other irregularities, including violations of our Terms of Use. You can access our service channel by clicking here.

Interested in this subject? You can learn more about the Affiliate Program as well as the different types of Affiliates.

How to buy an online course at Hotmart

If you want to purchase one of the many courses made by Hotmart creators, just click here!

In our Marketplace, you’ll find a curated selection of online courses from a wide range of segments, such as personal development, business & career, cooking & gastronomy, languages, health & fitness and much more.

Advantages of choosing Hotmart

Hotmart is a market leader because we strive to offer the best experience for everyone involved in the process, from product creation to consumption.

With tools created to automate leads, product access, and payments, our creators are able to focus on what really matters: developing a quality product and fostering a closer relationship with their audience.

Plus, with Hotmart’s help, creators don’t need to hire experts to develop or configure complex systems.

We simplify everything so creators can focus on the quality of their content and strategies used to promote their products.

Things that make our ecosystem different are that we:

• Offer a safe hosting infrastructure;
• Have an exclusive solution for online payments — including international payments;
• Carry out automated delivery of content to buyers;
• Automatically distribute commissions for promoting partners (affiliates);
• Provide a variety of tools and reports to manage product sales;
• Offer advanced options to set up your sales page according to your buyer’s interests.

For buyers, the focus is on a complete learning experience and top quality, with a variety of resources for their engagement. Things like:

• Hotmart Player, our proprietary video service with optimized resolution according to the user’s connection speed;
• Notes directly in the videos to improve the learning process;
• Access to additional materials (videos, PDFs), provided by the creator;
• Creator notes to help guide students;
• Exclusive communities on the Hotmart app;
• A space where you can ask questions and get answers from the creator;
• Subtitles in a variety of languages;
• Access to the product on your phone or TV;
• Watching classes offline or online using the Hotmart app;
• Course certificates, if the course creator chooses;
• Course notifications via the Hotmart Sparkle app.

Main Hotmart features

Payments

We said we were going to talk a little more about our payment system, didn’t we?

With high security and millions of transactions carried out all over the world, Hotmart’s proprietary payment system helps increase conversions for our creators.

One of the great advantages of the tool is that it allows creators to sell all over the world: in nearly every country and in multiple currencies. Creators just choose the price of their product and Hotmart Checkout automatically converts the amount to the currency of their buyer’s country.

And there are a ton of advantages (really!). It provides the autonomy and security for creators to sell their digital product worldwide, focusing on business internationalization and getting paid in their local currency, without needing other plug-ins or third parties getting involved from the beginning to the end of the transaction.

Using Hotmart payments, buyers can purchase creators’ products using several payment methods:

Credit card

On Hotmart, buyers can make one-time payments or pay in installments using 2 cards. If they choose to pay in installments, there is a 2.49% fee for each installment.

Sellers, as creators or affiliates, must make the credit card option available as a payment method, where, in the installment plan, the seller will receive the full amount of the purchase, and the interest will be passed on to the credit card company.

Hotmart also makes it possible to pay by credit card via PayPal.

Direct debit 

Creators can also offer online debit as an option for their customers.

Buyers make a purchase and the online debit works as an online transfer. In this case, this purchase cannot be paid in installments.

Local payments

Depending on the country the buyer is in, they might prefer paying with PayPal, bank payment slips, Oxxo, Balotos, Google Pay, among many other payment methods. Hotmart wants every buyer to feel confident and comfortable with how they choose to make their purchase. 

When registering their products with Hotmart, creators can select the types of local payment options they’ll accept.      

Checkout Builder 

Creators no longer have to spend money on hiring programmers or designers to incorporate their branding on their checkout page.

With our Customizable Checkout option, creators have the ideal tool to transform their payment pages with their product’s visual identity, building their brand just like they want it. They can create a custom checkout page and increase their conversions.

The tool allows creators to have greater chances of breaking down their customers’ objections, assert their visual identity, and help their affiliates.

With the customizable checkout, creators can insert their product’s logo, videos, images, text, and widgets, as well as customize the page’s colors and structure. Another advantage is that creators can choose from several template options, which are ready to be used.

And this isn’t all. Creators can also:

• Create different checkout pages with distinct elements for mobile and desktop versions;
• Use images and videos that reinforce their buyer’s security and confidence;
• Speed up their conversions by testing different versions of their checkout page.

That’s right. Creators can turn their checkout page into an amazing sales tool, without paying anything at all. It’s free and unlimited!

You’re one step further into understanding how Hotmart works. Watch the following video to learn more:

At this point, you might be wondering, “Do I have to pay for all of these services Hotmart offers?”

And the answer is… No!

Hotmart is a free platform! We charge our users 9.9% of each sale they make. That means that if you don’t make a sale, you’ll never have to pay anything to use our services.

But, of course, that’s not the ideal situation for you, nor for us, is it?

That’s why we encourage all of our creators and affiliates to sell by delivering features and content that will help them make sales and earn an income by doing something they really enjoy.

And when we talk about delivery, it’s because we do everything we can to make our user experience easier and uncomplicated. If you haven’t checked out our app yet, make sure to download it so you can always carry your future online business with you. 

The Hotmart App

The Hotmart App allows creators and affiliates to see how their business is doing – and even how many affiliate requests they have – from wherever they are, whenever they want or need to. And allow buyers to view all the content they’ve purchased in one place.

It also provides creators:

• Easy visualization of their buyers’ information, revenues, and sales growth.
• Greater autonomy to manage their business, using their smartphone to make important decisions, such as approving affiliates.

Oh, and it’s also completely free, okay?

Just download it from the App Store or Play Store and enjoy all its features to speed up your daily routine.

Members’ Area

Hotmart Club is a free and unlimited membership area set up to increase sales and deliver content automatically, and like all services Hotmart offers, there’s no membership fee, no monthly fee, and no complicated integrations.

With a username and password, students who buy online courses have access to a space where they can find all the course materials, such as video classes, quizzes, and other types of materials.

Hotmart Club has its own player, which was developed to prevent the content from being replicated for people who haven’t purchased the course.

There are additional advantages, such as:

• Content divided by modules;
• Space for comments;
• Accreditation for students;
• Buyer support;
• Design customization, and much more.

Hotmart Club also contributes to building customer loyalty, guaranteed recurring earnings, and improves the operational routine. 

If you’re a creator, discover a new way to deliver your digital products, check out Hotmart Club and find out why Hotmart Club is the easiest way to create a members’ area and sell a lot more.

But, the Club isn’t merely for delivering creator content. It can multiply sales and ensure the best learning experience for students with three amazing tools only provided by the Club. Plus, they’re also 100% free. Let’s check them out:

Boost sales in the Members Area

You’ve probably heard the saying that you have to “be in the right place at the right time”, right?

This is what Club Ads provides creators and their students. Creators can create special offers for students by inserting ad pages in the members area itself while students are watching classes, without them having to leave their members area or look elsewhere on the internet.

In other words, relevant content that enriches the experience of those who watch creator materials, when they need it most.

In addition, creators also have a group of people who have already bought their digital product and trust it – thus, significantly increasing their chances of selling more.

Do you have any doubt that creators have a great chance of increasing their conversions?

Customers can buy with just 1 click

The second tool that boosts conversions in the Club is known to many as One-Click Buy. One-Click Buy makes it easy for customers to pay, reducing the time it takes them to enter their information and therefore, increasing the chances of them completing their purchase.

When students purchase a course, they enter their information and use a payment method, with credit card information, for example.

After that first purchase, they can buy new content with just one click, without having to enter their information again. 

This has two big advantages:

• Creators build student loyalty with other products by using this option;
• A very high level of security in the storage and use of student data;

The purchase information is already stored with total security in the Hotmart Club. Buyers can reuse it for new purchases, without having to enter their information again or worry about having their card nearby.

Student groups can be quickly organized

The third tool is a step forward when it comes to the student experience. Organizing students is a no-brainer since it allows creators to create and segment their students’ experience by managing students by groups.

This allows students who are at the same level to evolve together.

Another plus is that creators can also make offers focused on their students’ needs – with full flexibility to change the course content and target the best ad for each student profile. Cool, isn’t it?

HotLeads

HotLeads is a tool that allows creators to track leads and safely link them to affiliates, ensuring that they receive their commissions correctly.

In addition, it allows creators to extract strategic information about potential customers, such as country of origin, device and browser used. This makes it possible to target campaigns considering their leads’ characteristics.

This tool also features real-time lead and affiliate reporting, which allows digital creators to create strategies based on valuable data.

HotLeads can be integrated into major email marketing tools, such as Aweber, Mailchimp, and Mautic.

Automated lead management

Automatic Lead Management (ListBoss) is the perfect tool for creators to segment their email lists according to the actions of their customers or potential buyers at the time of purchase.

Some of the main segmentations to improve sales are the recovery of canceled purchases and abandoned shopping carts. In addition, creators can also organize their contacts considering other types of actions, such as their product’s reviews.

According to a 2017 study, digital creators who use Automatic Lead Management (ListBoss) make up to 8 times more online sales than those who don’t, by structuring the funnel in an organized manner and by using relevant content.

Automatic Lead Management (ListBoss) can be integrated with different email providers, such as Klicksend, Mailchimp, ActiveCampaign, GetResponse, and Infusionsoft.

Sales Funnel

Hotmart’s sales funnel allows creators to track their customers through every step of the sales process, from discovering their product to the decision to buy.

The tool allows creators to have a clearer sales process and develop efficient strategies to increase their conversions.

To better understand how it works, you can read our article on the Hotmart sales funnel.

Hotmart Pages and Hotmart Send

Hotmart Pages and Hotmart Send are additional solutions designed to help boost online businesses.

In addition to everything that the Hotmart platform already offers, with Extensions, creators can:

• Build and edit sales pages from scratch, with just a few clicks;
• Create and blast email marketing campaigns within minutes;
• Make sales during livestreams to potential Buyers.

And, best of all: everything in one place and fully integrated with Hotmart!

How to sign up with Hotmart

Now that you’re familiar with how Hotmart works, you’re probably wondering how to go about signing up on our platform.

To help you, we have provided step-by-step instructions below in text format, and another one in a video.

Sign up with Hotmart (creator)

• Go to the platform and complete your registration by filling out the Payment Information and your contact details;
• Register your product: at this stage, you will enter the name, description, price, and decide whether you will allow other people to promote your product for you (Affiliate Program);
• Complete your sales page;
• Publish the product;
• After completing the product’s configuration, you need to finish your registration. You can only finalize your registration after confirming your personal and financial info on the platform. To do so, click the My Account option on the top menu, and then click the Personal and Financial Info tab.

By completing the registration, you confirm that you have read our Terms of Use. The registration process can take up to 3 business days. You can only start selling after this period.

Sign up with Hotmart (affiliate)

Do you feel that being an affiliate suits you better?

Check out the step-by-step process below to sign up on our platform:

• Sign up with Hotmart;
• Go to the platform and complete your registration by entering your Payment Information and your contact details;
• Go to the Marketplace and search for products that are the most compatible with you and your audience. For example, if you have a travel blog, look for travel-related products to promote;
• When you find a product that you’d like to promote, click Promote to receive your affiliate link for that product;
• That’s it! You can start promoting.

You can view affiliate link click reports at any time, as well as track their referrals and commission earnings on the Hotmart dashboard.

If you have additional questions please contact our Customer Support team.

Start your transformation with Hotmart!

We’re glad that you’ve made the decision to learn more about the courses available in the Hotmart universe, or to become a creator or affiliate and finally work with something that you truly enjoy.

If you want to be an entrepreneur, you should know that having a success-oriented mindset is just as important as success itself.

We hope this content helps you start your entrepreneurial journey! And, to help you on your way, we invite you to sign up for free and let us help you set up with our complete Hotmart Guide!