Maximizing Your TPT Potential: Tips and Reminders for Your TPT Store

Kirsten 0:01

You're listening to the creative teacher podcast, a show for busy teachers looking for ways to engage, inspire and make an impact in their teacher businesses. I'm Kiersten, a teacher business owner who is all about simple and actionable tips, strategies and resources that result in wins, big or small. If you're looking for that extra spark of creativity, you've come to the right place. Let's dive in together.

Hey, everybody, welcome to season three of the creative teacher podcast. We're added again, I'm excited to bring you some really great stuff for this upcoming season. I wanted to kind of catch up with you guys today about all things TPT. I know a lot is going on in the last few months since the last episode aired in May. And I just wanted to share my thoughts about you know, some conference takeaways over the summer. Some helpful reminders, as we're coming to a very, very tough time, I know for a lot of sellers in the TPT space. And then we're going to end off with something that I feel is kind of on the more fun side. Six things that I feel are overrated in the TPT world. So stick around for that little list. It's based off of a Instagram posts that I saw, it was like six teacher items that are like overrated, basically. And so I kind of wanted to take a spin on that for TPT sellers.

released and where it is for: 2020

started my store up again in: 2020

Another really, really great takeaway I had from the TPT forward conference, had to do with a keynote speaker, Gillian star talked about her story about when she was a little girl, as you know, little Julian. That's kind of who she was creating her resources for making sure they were accessible, easy to read, you know, something that won't get students super frustrated just of how its formatted. I think that was a super powerful story. And it made me think of the little Kiersten wins. As a person of color. I'm African American, not being represented in stories in history as a kid, a lot of the stories that I heard about African Americans were, you know, very sad, and it always made me sad as a kid, like hone down another one, you know, it's great to hear their bravery. You know, Harriet Tubman, all of those classic African American heroes that we have in history. But you know, not being able to know more about the positive accomplishments of other African Americans like me, was something that I was kind of sad as a little girl or, you know, not really getting to have that opportunity to learn more about I didn't hear about madam CJ Walker, who is recorded as the first female self made millionaire in the United States, like that's in the Guinness Book of World Records. I didn't hear about that until I was an adult. And I also didn't hear about the Tulsa race riots and how there was it's rising, African American, predominantly African and Asian American neighborhood in Tulsa, where I grew up. I did not hear about that until years later. So I that's kind of why I create the rates, some of the resources that I do, I want little Kiersten like me to see themselves, not just in negative ways, or just something that's always like, we're always pushed down but rather, hearing uplifting stories, the good that they contributed to society. I'm thinking people like Oprah Winfrey, Madam Madam CJ Walker, Wallace Amos, the creator of Famous Amos cookies. People like that. That's why I create some of the resources. I do like the black history posters. And it's incorporated into a lot of my social studies resources and in my membership as well. So that's something that kind of really stuck with me Gillian Starr's story, I think it was very powerful. It was a tear jerker, that is for sure.

The teacher cellar summit was also kind of taking place around the same time as the TPT. Forward conference. And that was something that was amazing, so many great presentations there, like I don't even know where to begin. But a couple that stand out to me is the marketing funnel. From Alyssa McDonald, I've always loved her teacher hustle podcast that she had. And her marketing funnel like blew my mind. I don't know why. But just thinking about how, you know, social media isn't really like your main avenue to going directly into sales, it's really part of the top of the funnel, or even before you get into the funnel, it's more of like brand awareness. And that kind of gives me a little bit peace, because my social media game is just not under par, I do not have over 10k followers. And, you know, it's something that just not something that I'm that great at, and it's okay, and just kind of like using social media to get people into my email list, which does more like I feel like, I can get more people or get more leads into my email list or reading my blog post, more so than getting actual conversions. So that's something that's, you know, kind of like really great reassurance of how I have been doing this, you know, like, Alright, so we got the social media going into our email having a really great opt in. And so that presentation was just really great. That presentation also helps me realize that I have a really big gap in, you know, having a variety of services and offers at a variety of price points. And so that's something that I'm going to be changing in the next few months. So I'm really excited about that. It also helps me kind of think about really who I want to serve and what I really want to be known for. And that is mainly graphic design and branding, something that if you were back in the early days of you know, the TPT branding and design made easy my very first Facebook group that I hosted. That was something that I wanted to focus on. And then I kind of got a little bit more general, you know, there was a plan I had, and that strategy didn't work. So I went digging deep into branding and graphic design, which is what I'm excited to be sharing with you more of in this upcoming season of the podcast. But yeah, there was like, there was so many really great presentations, and I'm so you know, proud of all my colleagues, sharing their knowledge, their expertise, I thought it was a really great learning experience. And I hope you feel the same way whether you attended the teacher seller Summit, or the TPT forward conference, or a little bit of both.

rity of people experienced in: 2020

nes back in the early days in: 2013

you're you know, ending this: 2023

Another couple of tips I have for you. bundles, bundling things you never thought of I decided to create a grade level specific bundle for my daily passages resource. I had initially published them by the unit, so by domain geography, and history and all of that. And then I decided on a whim, I was like, Well, what if I combined like made a third grade packet for you know, Texas, third grade teachers, then one for fourth grade and one for fifth grade. And it's like not, I guess it's not a bundle in the sense of I'm combining resources that are already listed. But I decided to kind of repackage it and sell it as like a year long, specifically for third grade. And that resulted in sales. And then I also there was a couple of other resources where I never thought to bundle but I looked at it and I was like, this could be some type of like, warm up resource for maybe social studies and ELA teachers. So I bundled those together. And I created you know, I created a bundle cover for it. And I had a preview and I added those in my little bundle listing and that that was also pretty successful there too. So just kind of think about, you know, what you can bundle together, see, if you can maybe think year round, like have some type of year long bundle resource. You'll know you'd be surprised people like if anything that seems like it's robust. People will gravitate toward it in this time. I think less people are, you know, buying those cutesy resources like craft activities and task cards, I'm not seeing a lot of my task card selling as much as they used to. So I think people are looking for something more robust when they go on TPT that they can use throughout the year. So that's one tip to grow your TPT store is just to add more bundles, you can use what you're already what you already have in your store. Another is to niche down even more so than you might already. So if you are selling primarily, let's say upper elementary math resources, rather than get really general with upper elementary math, maybe focus a little bit more, maybe with a specific state or a specific topic in math, like, maybe you can be the go to on fractions like just doubling down on fractions in upper elementary math, whatever's working for your store, seeing what's selling in that and just kind of rather than, you know, try to replicate that just find a way to hone it down even more niche down even more in that subset and create resources that people can utilize for maybe a month long unit or something that is really jam packed with value rather than just one off activities in a resource.

Another thing is consider increasing prices. I'm going to tell you, your data playbook did it again, with their price change tracker. That was a really helpful resource. It's something that's included in all tiers. If you're in your data playbook. The price change tracker has been really, really helpful. I'll increase something by a couple dollars and then I'll check on I believe Mondays when I can to see if that change Ain't was successful. Or if there's still, you know, it could be that it's still learning or it's unsuccessful, and it'll have the original price and the price you change it to. So you can always change your back or you can always increase the price. So that's always a helpful way to know, if you're on the right check as far as pricing things correctly, or, you know, in the right ballpark of pricing it. So that's something that I've been doing in the last couple of months.

All right, we're ending this very long episode, I didn't really make for it to be so long, but here we go. It's the first it's the first episode I'm gonna let it slide, we're gonna have a nice, juicy first episode of season three.

So we're gonna end this off with a really quick list of things I feel are overrated in the TPT world. Maybe you'll agree with me, maybe you won't. That's okay. We can agree to disagree if we need to.

The first one is too many fonts and clip art. Yes, I think it's overrated. I really, I mean, now thinking back, I would always stock up on clipart. And like, fonts, and all of these things like, Oh, I'm gonna use this and this and this, and this and this. And now I just use the same two or three fonts. And I only use one source for specific clipart. So what I did back then, you know, I've kind of learned from that. And it's all part of your branding, and how you want to kind of stay consistent, and it's just easier in general. A

second thing is scheduling apps outside of native platform. So something like tailwind. Like I am not a big scheduler, I used to have what was I think Smarter Queue, I had that for a while. That was pretty cool how you could recycle posts, but for the most part of just use the meta business suite and scheduled posts there or directly on the app. I love how you can schedule reels now. Oh, my gosh, I'm so glad that's I would always be afraid that it would be you know, I have it in my drafts, and then it would go away, I would always be afraid that I was going to lose it. But scheduling reels has been a godsend. And yeah, I just think it's just kind of overrated. Another is posting on Instagram, every day, I have learned that I really want to focus on quality on my Instagram rather than quantity. Because I am not getting as much engagement as it used to anyway. So I feel like I want to spend my energy on other things. So yeah, I think I think more people are doing this, I've noticed, I think, you know, more people are providing quality posts and are not seeing the need to post every single day. And I give them kudos because like, it's a lot, it's a lot to do and manage.

n the realm of the, you know,: 2015

All right, a fifth one is buying every course or membership available to TPT sellers. Man I like I am not a course junkie. I'm not one to buy every single course that everybody advertises. But I know the FOMO is real like you see like doors are closing in two hours and you're like, Oh, well I might miss out on something. When I'm just here to tell you like if if you're buying every single course or membership If that's available for TPT sellers, chances are like, are you really implementing those courses? I think a rule of thumb is if you're still in the middle of a course, and haven't finished it, or really actually implemented what you're doing in your business, like, like, let's say you're learning about creating products covers, but you don't have any resources in your store, you have to put the brakes on, you have to, you know, you've got to create things for your store, add things, implement things, that you're actually learning from the courses before you go and buy another course or bundle. Because really, like, it's kind of it's a cycle, you don't want to, you want to learn all the things. But there is a boundary that you have to select for yourself. And you know, financially, it's not feasible. And realistically, if you're buying all of these things, but not implementing them, it's a waste of your time, and it doesn't get you very far just kind of have to stay in the same place. Kind of spinning around in circles.

The last thing I feel that are overrated is buying borders off TPT Yes, I know, call me like, I mean, I, I'm all about simple borders, I'll sometimes do a rounded border on my resource. But for the most part, it's a square border. And that's it, I make it in PowerPoint, or Canva. And that is the extent of my borders. There was a time and place for that. But right now, that's simplicity is best. I you know, I'm a big fan of clean eat resources, clean, neat branding, that's something that is, you know, is appealing to a lot of people as well. All right. So ending on that note, I hope you got a lot of value in this episode. It's kind of like a big rambling of what I've been up to and what I've been thinking and what I've been wanting to share with you all these past few months. So I hope you enjoyed this episode, and I can't wait to talk to you again next week.

Thanks for listening to the creative teacher podcast. If you enjoyed listening to today's episode, feel free to subscribe and leave a review. I'd love to hear your feedback. You can also follow me on Instagram at the southern teach dot designs. Have an amazing day.