TpT Seller Tips

Want to know how to market your TpT products? I’ve got you covered!

Creating teaching resources on TeachersPayTeachers is an amazing creative outlet that I think many of us have craved for so long but it’s one thing to make fun teaching resources and another thing to actually get them out there in front of people to find! I hope this list can help you be successful in your TpT journey! Some of these links are affiliate links which means I get a commission for purchases made through them. I only recommend things I love! 🙂

So how do you market your TpT resources??

1) Marketing on Pinterest

Mastering pinterest is a must! Pin your products regularly. I personally recommend 5-10 a day to get started and work your way up to 20-30 pins a day. You want to try to spread them out throughout the day. How do you pin all day without being on the computer all day?

Tailwind!

Try it out free and see if you like it. I personally think Tailwind is AWESOME. It allows you to schedule your pins all in one sitting and then pins them for you at whatever days and times you choose. I can’t believe I ever tried to market without it. I used to get on my computer to pin a couple pins at a time 10-15 times a day… for years. What?! Now I use Tailwind and do it all in one sitting. I’m currently scheduled over FOUR MONTHS in advance and it’s so nice to know that it’s working for me while I focus on what I truly love doing… creating and writing.

Tailwind also has a feature called Tribes that can be super helpful. You can join different tribes of other TpT sellers who share their best pins with each other. It’s a great way to get others to pin for you and find great pins from others to share! A lot of collaborative boards have rules where you have to follow ratios (example: you have to post 3 ideas for every product you post) so tribes are a great way to find teaching ideas pins from others to be able to maintain your ratios.

My favorite part of Tailwind is actually the analytics it provides too! I love being able to see if my pins on collaborative boards are actually getting repinned. Tailwind has a “Pin Inspector” feature that makes that really easy for me to do. I also use the “Pin Inspector” feature to analyze pins on my own boards. I really love that tool!

If you feel lost with Pinterest, you are not alone. There is so much to learn and conflicting information everywhere. Try things, play around with your strategy, and see what works for you!

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Update: I still use Tailwind, but I do the majority of my pinning using SmarterQueue now and I ABSOLUTELY LOVE SmarterQueue because it loops! IT. LOOPS. What that means is that I only fill in the content once and it continuously loops! 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 Love that so much! All of my pinning is automated now and I absolutely love it. If you haven’t tried SmarterQueue for pinning, I recommend doing their free trial to see how you like it!

2. Email Newsletter

You may be thinking you don’t have time to write any sort of newsletter or you don’t have people to follow you yet… perfect!

Start your newsletter now. I started collecting emails with a little sign up on the side of my other blog for well over a year before I ever sent an email. When I finally felt ready to send something out and like I had something to say, I had an audience built to actually send something to. You don’t want to have something to say and no one to say it to, so start your list now!

If you’re in Facebook groups of other TpT sellers, you probably keep hearing people talk about how much they love ConvertKit for their newsletter.

I am constantly hearing of people who had other email list providers and switched to ConvertKit, especially recently as word has spread about how much people love ConvertKit, so it’s definitely worth checking out now so you don’t pick another newsletter provider just to do all the work of switching later.

There are other options out there too though so check them all out and see which one best fits you and your needs! If you find one you like, search ConvertKit vs. (whatever it is) to compare it and make sure you read several articles from the first page to get a good idea, not just one person’s opinion. Do that with any 2 mail services you’re considering to read about how others with experience with them feel.

3. A Blog

Start a blog! If you’re creative enough to create teaching resources, you probably have a lot of other great ideas to share with the world! Even if you only write once every month or two, start one now. Two very popular places to host a blog is either Blogger or WordPress. I plan on writing a post on how to start a blog soon so keep a look out for that!

4. Facebook

Start a business Facebook page. Even if you don’t plan on using it much, make sure you claim your business name on all the social media channels before someone else does and so they can slowly grow until you’re ready to start utilizing them. It can be hard to get great reach on Facebook but SO many people in the world use Facebook every single day so it’s worth having for those random posts that explode. I don’t personally but a lot of people also do Facebook ads to expedite the growth of their page and get their posts seen. 🙂

If you have a Facebook page already and are just having trouble keeping up with it, consider scheduling your posts. Facebook has a built-in scheduler that you can do all the work manually or you can get one of the amazing scheduling services like SmarterQueue that allows you to save evergreen content for easy recycling to save you time. I love that I can write a post ONCE and they set it to loop indefinitely (in other words, literally never have to do it again). You can write ALL your posts for the entire year and set it to post for you. Then, when it goes through them all, it will loop them all again next year. Aaaamazing!

I absolutely love SmarterQueue. It’s so easy to use and, as I said, it loops your posts over and over so you only ever have to set up your posts ONE time. Then it is on an infinite loop! Amazing! It also allows you to put posts into categories and pick the days/times you want each category to post so you get an awesome, perfect mix of the things you share and not a random mix. It and Tailwind are my 2 favorite things for making marketing easy!

If you are brave enough to hop in front of the camera, do Facebook Lives from your business page! It’s a great way to share teaching tips and other fun teaching ideas through video. They seem to get a lot of engagement. I find it too scary right now but a lot of people have fun with it!

5. Instagram

So many teachers love Instagram and use it daily. It’s such a fun place to share teaching ideas and connect with teachers all over the world. One great thing about IG is that, even if you have very few followers, you can use popular teaching hashtags to reach a lot of teachers. It’s also nice you can use specific ones for your grade level or specific niche if you have one to reach teachers just like you.

For example, if you teach kindergarten, look through the #iteachk hashtag. That’s an easy way to find other kindergarten teachers to follow. Once you follow and look at their pages, it’s easy to find other people with similar interests through them as well by interacting in their comments section. 🙂 Same goes for #iteachfirst #iteachsecond #iteachthird etc.! Other really popular hashtags are #teachersfollowteachers and #teachersofinstagram among many others. Just click on the ones other people use to find others… and, of course, tag your own photos with relevant hashtags so they get seen!

You can also schedule your Instagram posts (can you tell I love to automate things?? It makes me feel so organized & on top of my social media when I know things are already scheduled for me) using Tailwind!! Check out Instagram for Tailwind – it’s pretty cool!

There are other ways to market your TpT resources that I didn’t cover like Twitter. I don’t know enough about them to speak about them so I’ll leave that to others to do.

I hope this list has been helpful for you!! I’d love to hear from you in the comments what social media platform you find best for marketing your teaching resources. When we all learn together, we grow together so I am excited to have shared these tips! Let me know if you have any questions!

You may also like this post:

Best Blogging Tools for Teacher Entrepreneurs

If you want to pin this post for later, here is an image for you to pin 🙂

Here is a list of the best blogging tools for teacher entrepreneurs, or really any person working from home to build their business!

These past few years have seen a huge rise in the teacher entrepreneur! So many people in the education field are starting their own businesses: blogging fun and creative teaching ideas, creating educational materials for TeachersPayTeachers, and all sorts of things. If you were born to be a teacher, you were probably also born to be an entrepreneur. You probably have great management and organizational skills, you’re creative and positive, you’re self-directed… you possess all of the skills necessary to be a successful business owner… so now you need some tools!

I compiled this list of what I think are the best blogging tools or must have items for your home based business that I personally love. This list could really apply to anyone who works from home so if you’re a photographer, blogger in another niche, or any sort of entrepreneur – I think you’ll still find this list helpful! I provided the links for you to see the tools I recommend directly on Amazon – some links are affiliate links which means I get commission if you buy from the links, it’s no extra cost for you but I just wanted to let you know! 🙂

My absolute favorite thing I’ve purchased is my vertical mouse. I didn’t even know these existed until I was getting a lot of pain in my wrist and lower arm and was researching solutions. I tried carpal tunnel exercises and resting but nothing really worked… until I found this mouse! The first couple times I tried it, I didn’t like it and thought it was too big for my hand. Now I don’t think I’d use the computer without it. It glides really easily, is super easy to use, and I have no wrist pain anymore! When I tried my old mouse or try to use my laptop’s pad, my wrist pain comes back immediately so I know this mouse was worth every penny.

Another thing I can’t recommend enough is a quality office chair. Do not, I repeat do not, sit on your couch hunched over for hours. You don’t have to work in an office – roll your chair into the living room in front of the T.V. so you can still watch your favorites. This is the chair I have and love but I highly recommend you go in person to an office store and try them out to find the one that fits you perfectly. Make sure it gives you lumbar support, is adjustable to fit you perfectly, and has you sitting straight up and down. I used to always work on the couch with my laptop and my back/neck hurt all the time.

Another creative option is this Gaiam Balance Ball Chair. They’re supposed to be great for your back! I don’t personally have one but I have friends who love theirs. All the secretaries at my doctor’s office also rave about theirs. I am really thinking of getting one soon! They have fun colors to choose from in the adult sizes and kids love them for flexible seating (I have a huge post of flexible seating options and ideas for the classroom) so why not us too? 🙂

Edit: I do own one now and I love it! It really makes me feel like I am sitting up straight!

I actually try not to sit that often when I am working on my computer. I often put my laptop on a plastic storage bin on a dresser (I’m super fancy) to create a makeshift standing desk. I also have a treadmill desk and bike desk that I LOVE. I vary my position all the time so I stay active. Sitting isn’t healthy so I try to do as little of it as possible despite how much time I spend on the computer.

I am OBSESSED with my treadmill desk. I have had the LifeSpan TR1200-DT5 for several years now and I love it just as much as the day I got it. I am not that coordinated so I was hesitant but I got used to it immediately. I usually walk at a low speed and check emails, do my pinning, check social media, write blog posts, or whatever else I need to do! I love the huge desk it has – there is plenty of room for my computer, mouse, and a lot of room to spread out all the papers I’m using doing whatever I’m doing. The treadmill desk does take up a bit of room but it’s so worth it to me. I have mine in the corner of the family room so I can walk, work on the computer, and watch T.V. at the same time.

I also have a bike desk! Not going to lie, sometimes I just feel like sitting. When I just want to sit, I sit on the bike desk. Sometimes I barely move my legs so it’s just a little movement and other times I super-peddle while working – I like that I can choose the intensity by just peddling or not. It’s really nice to have options! I actually find myself peddling really fast sometimes not thinking about it and being winded! So I like that it provides exercise too!

Another must have is a quality color printer. I have had my Brother wireless printer for a few years now and I love it. It prints beautiful color so I really love it for printing centers and color activities!

Something I just recently got that I’m obsessed with right now is my electric hole punch! True story: I hate 3 hole punching things and was in an office store the other day and saw one of these. I didn’t know they existed! So naturally I went to Amazon to find it cheaper 🙂 and read reviews. This is the one I ended up with and I love it so far. I have already made so many binders worth of things with it because hole punching is so quick and easy now.

If you’re working on your computer all day, you need a good one! The most important thing to me was speed and battery life so I did a lot of research and tried a lot in store. I couldn’t find my exact one because I think it’s an older model but this Lenovo ThinkPad is really close to it! I absolutely LOVE the touch screen. I didn’t think I’d use it but I find myself using it all the time. I don’t use the folding up option much because I’m not a tablet person but I’m sure other people do. I just love the battery life on it because I used to be a Mac user and it was really hard to find a PC that compared in battery life! This is my 2nd Lenovo though and I really like this brand. I also really like the keyboard on this particular computer – it’s nice to type on and, well I blog, so I do a lot of typing! 🙂 It’s also SUPER portable. It’s so small and lightweight compared to my laptop before it. It’s been great to take on trips – I can use it in the car, in hotels, and also easily on airplane tray tables.  What type of computer do you use?

If you take pictures of your products or pictures for your blog, you also need a digital camera! It’s okay if you can only afford a point and shoot for right now – they can still take amazing pictures and are easy to use. When you’re ready to get a DSLR, I recommend Canon. I have a Canon Rebel T5i and it takes really, really beautiful pictures.

Okay so this one is a little embarrassing but if your eyes ever hurt or feel strained from working on the computer, Gunnar Optiks glasses are great! My eye doctor actually recommended them because I was getting eye pain from working on the computer all night (anyone relate?!) so I wear them when I am working on the computer at night to filter out the glare. My husband may or may not make fun of me for looking a little goofy. 🙂

Last but not least, BACK UP YOUR STUFF. Definitely get some sort of back up to back up all of your files. You work so hard on all your creations, blog posts, whatever… make sure you back them up. I use a Seagate External Hard Drive but also back up by putting my things on more than 1 computer and on flash drives. I back up the back ups of my back ups. 🙂

I hope this post was helpful for you! These are some of my favorite tools that I use for blogging and building my business. I’d love to hear in the comments if you use any of these too or what other things I should know about!

As you may have guessed by the name of this site, I LOVE making lists. Check out some of my other fun lists:

How to Market Your TpT Products

Classroom Must Haves

Reading Must Haves

Math Must Haves

Best Back to School Read Alouds

Back to School Books Specifically for Kindergarten

Best Books by Behavior (great for teaching specific behaviors like tattling, sharing, etc.!)

Huge List of Classroom Jobs

How to Organize Classroom Jobs

Teaching Interview Questions

8 Reasons Why Kids Need Recess

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