Grow with Angie and April: A Podcast for Teacherpreneurs

In this episode, Angie and April speak with Katie and Chynell from Routine Your Reels to help teacher sellers navigate how to use Instagram Reels in their marketing. Join in on the conversation in the mastermind group at www.growwithusmastermind.com. We’re excited to have a couple guests on the podcast with us to dive into another […]

In this episode, Angie and April speak with Katie and Chynell from Routine Your Reels to help teacher sellers navigate how to use Instagram Reels in their marketing. Join in on the conversation in the mastermind group at www.growwithusmastermind.com. We're excited to have a couple guests on the podcast with us to dive into another one of those topics that push us out of our comfort zones—Instagram Reels. Chynell and Katie built the Routine Your Reels membership program. I was part of the beta group and am excited to share this resource with other TpTers. Katie Brockmeyer is a photographer and videographer for teacher sellers. Chynelle Moore is a marketing strategist and business coach for “teachers turned accidental entrepreneurs” at Routine Your Dream. The two met on Instagram and eventually created the membership program Routine Your Reels. As they were learning Reels, they knew they wanted to help make it easier for teacher sellers. The Basics of Instagram Reels Reels is the new kid on the Instagram block. Regular posts are the OG of Instagram and still work for engaging those in your audience that don't enjoy video content. Stories are great for engaging and nurturing your existing followers. Reels have quickly become the new way of reaching new people on the platform and growing your audience. Unlike Instagram Video (formerly known as IGTV), Reels are designed to be super quick videos. The ideal length of a Reel is just 7-15 seconds. While they can be as long as 60 seconds, knowing the shorter ones perform bests is a great reason to remove some of the pressure from yourself by keeping it short. Katie and Chynell love them because you don't have to dive into full production mode the way you do for YouTube videos. Instead, it's short-form video marketing that is easy to produce. What Content Performs Best on Reels? You're probably familiar with the dancing, finger-pointing type of Reel. While many of the Reels we see on the platform have more of an entertainment feel, they don't have to be just for entertainment. You can also use them for marketing your products and building trust with your followers. Your Reels can be used to share your expertise on something. Or you can use it to share a quick tip or two on a problem your niche market faces. You can bust common misconceptions your niche audience has. It's important to remember what information is helpful to your market. It doesn't have to be dancing and pointing. You can also just turn on your camera and start talking. While you can use your Reels to showcase your products, Katie and Chynell have found the ones that perform best are the ones that show your face. Consumers don't always want to see you marketing your products. Instead, they want to know who the person is behind the products. Showing your face on your Reels allows people to connect with you, so they'll want to connect with your products. It helps build that trust factor. As a TpT seller, the goal is to reach the target market. Your goal isn't to go viral and get two million views. So, it's OK if you're not going to do something crazy. Focus on who you're trying to attract instead of worrying too much about what it takes to go viral. Can I Repurpose My TikTok or YouTube Videos? Yes and no. When Reels first came out, there were a lot of videos that even had the TikTok watermark on them, but things are changing. When it comes to your return on investment, you're going to be better off creating videos specifically for Reels. The people who

In this episode, Angie and April are speaking with Chrissie Rissmiller from Undercover Classroom. She recently transitioned to become a full-time TpTer. Together, they're answering the commonly asked questions TpTers have about the transition to going full time. Join in on the conversation in the mastermind group at www.growwithusmastermind.com. We have been hearing from a […]

In this episode, Angie and April are speaking with Chrissie Rissmiller from Undercover Classroom. She recently transitioned to become a full-time TpTer. Together, they're answering the commonly asked questions TpTers have about the transition to going full time. Join in on the conversation in the mastermind group at www.growwithusmastermind.com. We have been hearing from a lot of TpTers with questions about going full time. With the difficulty of the past two years and how teachers have been treated, it's easy to see why. Previously we did a podcast episode for people thinking of making the transition, however, we were still new to being full time TpTers ourselves and were still figuring things out. We decided to do a new episode answering the commonly asked questions. Here to join us on the episode is Chrissie Rissmiller from Undercover Classroom. She has been full time in her TpT business for just over a year now. Between the three of us, we're able to cover a wide range of experiences and are happy to share our experiences. We're going to jump right into your questions. What made you decide to leave teaching and go full time with TpT? The answer is a little different for each of us: Chrissie hit a point where she was burned out between running a business and teaching. It wasn't sustainable long-term. Her goal was to teach for 30 years, and she had become comfortable living on her teaching income and the additional income from her TpT store. In 2020, she created a digital resource and had an increase in her TpT income, but she was still teaching. Her blood pressure was high, and she began getting migraines. During remote learning, she and her husband (who is also a teacher) were teaching out of separate spaces at home while their own children were struggling on their own with virtual school in their rooms. She felt like a terrible mom and terrible person Over the summer of 2020, she learned about an opportunity that would allow her to take a leave from teaching while earning half her salary since she had children at home doing online learning. She took it from August to December and did some soul searching. In December, she retired at the age of 45 with almost 24 years in teaching. You can hear more of my and Angie's stories in our previous podcast episode. But the quick recap is that Angie began having health issues. She was overwhelmed and struggled with feeling like she wasn't good enough as a mom, wife, or teacher. Her migraines were out of control. All of this led to her making the transition to full-time TpT. I had gotten used to having the TpT income on top of my teaching salary and enjoyed it, but I found out I was pregnant with twins. The cost of daycare was basically my salary from teaching. In addition, we had a new principal who wasn't supportive and ¾ of the staff ended up leaving. In January of that year, I let them know I wasn't going to be coming back and ended up being able to go on maternity leave early. When the summer ended, I never went back. How many hours do you work on your TpT store? While we thought we would work more on our TpT stores that first year, we didn't. We all found that during the first year, we didn't work a crazy number of hours. I had my twins, which took up more of my time, and Angie and Chrissie both needed some time to recover from the overwhelm and physical toll teaching had taken on them. Now that Chrissie is into her second year, she works around 30-35 hours a week on her business. On average, she works about 5 hours a day. In 2021, she still experienced a 12% growth in sales, but it was the smallest she had experienced in her business. Angie and I have found that it usually takes 6 – 12 months of working on so

In this episode, Angie and April are speaking with guest Susan Jones about how to leverage YouTube for your TpT business. Join in on the conversation in the mastermind group at www.growwithusmastermind.com. We’re excited to dive into talking about YouTube because we’ve been committed to using it but coming up with excuses for years. We’ve […]

In this episode, Angie and April are speaking with guest Susan Jones about how to leverage YouTube for your TpT business. Join in on the conversation in the mastermind group at www.growwithusmastermind.com. We're excited to dive into talking about YouTube because we've been committed to using it but coming up with excuses for years. We've always seen YouTuber teachers who were in the classroom during their videos. That was kind of discouraging to us since we're no longer in the classroom. So, we're excited to have Susan Jones as a podcast guest to help get us motivated and moving! Susan Jones started her YouTube channel, Susan Jones Teaching, in 2019 when she decided to start working on brand awareness. Social media wasn't something that she enjoyed doing, and she wasn't great at putting her face out there even though she had a successful TpT store. Much like us, she had kind of written off YouTube because most of the TpTers on the platform were in the classroom and she wanted to create videos where she could just sit down and talk about a topic. She started with one video a week called “Susan's Sunday Spotlight”. Most of the videos were less than5 minutes and she shared a game that teachers could use in their classrooms. She is now posting twice a week, and her channel has grown to over 81,000 subscribers. The process of creating YouTube videos Before we jump into all of Susan's tips, we want to share what her process looks like for video creation along with the time it takes her to complete. Her final edited videos are usually between 10-15 minutes. For each of the videos, she records between 30-45 minutes of herself talking. Since her videos are mainly her sitting and talking, she also records at least an hour or two of B roll footage. Examples of B roll might be a video of her taking a video or a resource being used that she can share on the YouTube video while she talks over it. This helps make her videos more exciting instead of her being a “talking head”. Susan likes to have an outline created for each video before she gets started. On average, she estimates it takes her about and 90 minutes to film a video and around five hours to edit each one. Susan's YouTube Tips for TpTers Here are the tips Susan shares with TpTers interested in starting or growing a YouTube channel. 1. Batch your work Susan uses her YouTube videos to focus on her main revenue streams. She focuses on one each week during the month and at the start of the month creates the 8-9 videos that will go out that month. She's found it's the only way to really get things done consistently when you have so many moving pieces to your business. Trying to find time to film and edit one new video every week would be a lot more time-consuming and stressful than dedicated time to it all at once. 2. Hire someone to help Susan's sister has worked in her business for years and now dedicates most of her time to editing her YouTube videos. She takes the video and does everything to get it ready to publish. Then, she schedules them ahead of time so she's able to work at her own pace. They are almost always scheduled beforehand instead of waiting until the day they are supposed to go live. Her sister is the one who adds in the B roll film or extras to make the videos more engaging like a cha

In this episode, Angie and April are speaking with guest Chloe Tascoff about how to create and use preview videos for your TpT resources. Join in on the conversation in the mastermind group at www.growwithusmastermind.com. We’re excited to have Chloe Tascoff on the podcast to talk about all things video previews. Along with creating her own […]

In this episode, Angie and April are speaking with guest Chloe Tascoff about how to create and use preview videos for your TpT resources. Join in on the conversation in the mastermind group at www.growwithusmastermind.com. We're excited to have Chloe Tascoff on the podcast to talk about all things video previews. Along with creating her own TpT resources, she specializes in creating preview videos for her clients. She's going to share some of her tips and tricks about how to make video creation faster and easier along with the best way to use the videos. Chloe got started creating video previews when a friend asked her to try filming a product for her. She played around with it and found she really enjoyed the process. Word started spreading and people started reaching out to her for help on their videos and things grew from there. What is the purpose of a preview video? PDF previews and photographs are helpful at showcasing your resources, but video previews help bring them to life. Chloe shared that consumers are 80% more likely to purchase a product when there is a video attached to it. When teachers are able to see your resources in action it gives them a better idea of what they're actually receiving. A lot of our video previews end up being flipping through the pages of the resource or sharing pretty much the same information that's already in the PDF preview. These types of videos can still be helpful, but there are so many additional ways to create a video preview. Chloe recommends if you're creating a video preview for Pinterest that you keep it to 5-16 seconds long. On social media platforms, your main goal is to stop the scroll so you can get people to click through to your resource. However, for the videos you use on TpT, you have two minutes to use. It's helpful to create longer videos for this purpose because the people looking at your resource are already there because they are interested in it. That means you can go more in-depth with what you explain and show. What to include in a preview video? Chloe recommends starting your video with overlay text asking a question that appeals to the problem they're having. She shared the following example: Imagine you've created an organizational system to help small groups or centers run smoother. Your audience might be teachers struggling with spending too much time trying to put out fires while doing small group math. You could start with a question like: “Are you struggling with other students interrupting while you're helping small groups?” Then in your video, you will show how the resource solves that problem for them. Show them the resource in action. This will look differently depending on the type of resource it is. You could flip through blank pages, fill out some of the pages beforehand, or complete the pages on video. If you are creating a video preview for an existing product with reviews make sure to include testimonials for social proof as well. At the end of the video include a call-to-action like “Invest in our bundle today to save your sanity!” What if you have a resource that isn't exciting? If you have test prep resources or other resources that are heavy question and answer format, Chloe recommends keeping the video preview short. You can show how to fill out the worksheet by only doing one or two pages. She also recommends showing the answer key so teachers know it's included, but you can keep the video short. What about talking over screen recordings? Screen recordings are a great way to show how your digital resources work, however, Chloe recommends using text overlays i

In this episode, Angie and April are reflecting on 2021 and setting goals for 2022. They’re going to dive into the things they want to do more and what surprising thing they’re letting go of in the new year. Join in on the conversation in the mastermind group at www.growwithusmastermind.com. This year was a blur! […]

In this episode, Angie and April are reflecting on 2021 and setting goals for 2022. They're going to dive into the things they want to do more and what surprising thing they're letting go of in the new year. Join in on the conversation in the mastermind group at www.growwithusmastermind.com. This year was a blur! It flew by. We felt like last year was one of the longest years of our lives and we're thankful that this year was different. However, that also meant things were different in our TpT store and businesses as well. We're sharing what business looked like in 2021 and what we're planning for 2022. Reflecting on 2021 in our TpT business I don't usually set specific monetary goals for my TpT store. I typically see a 20-30% increase in sales from year to year but because of how unique 2020 was, I really just wanted to hit the same earnings from last year. Both April and I created a lot of new resources when everything went digital in March 2020. Teachers needed those resources. That ended up really helping with sales so we were worried that we wouldn't be able to beat those numbers this year. It made it really difficult to compare product to product from last year to this year, but overall, April had a 35% increase and I had a 50% increase from last year. There are a few things we attribute this to. Hiring help April and I have both hired people that are helping us in our TpT stores. From 2019 to this year, I experienced an 80% increase. I was doing everything on my own in 2019. April had a similar experience. From the same time period, she had a 70% increase in her business. She has added over 200 products to her store since the beginning of the pandemic and was able to do so because she has people working in her business with her. Having help in my business allows me to focus on the things that are in my zone. I'm slow at creating new products. When I was still teaching and running my TpT store, I had to make time to do it but now that I can hire someone else to, it makes the process easier and faster. It allows me to focus on other areas and planning while hiring someone else to help implement my ideas and strategy. This isn't something we were able to do right away but this also allowed us to gain experience and knowledge on what sells in our stores. If we were just started out from scratch and hired help, we wouldn't be as successful because we wouldn't know the strategy or have the templates we've created over the years. There's only so much you're able to do yourself and having people on your team helps. Including more with products We have learned over the years that sales increase when you include additional pieces with resources. When I first started my store, I would create a resource and that would be all the teachers would get when they bought it. Since then, we've learned that it helps to include things like teacher manuals, printables, and suggestions on how they can use the resource in their classroom. This makes life easier for them which increases our sales. If you're just starting out or not already doing this in your TpT store, this is a great place to start in growing your business. Consistent marketing I largely credit my increase in sales with my effort to market my products consistently. I started having weekly blog posts, regular social media posts and engaging my email list regularly. Years ago I thought I was doing good without blogging so didn't think it was important, but I started to wonder if I was doing good without blogging, what could I do in sales if I was blogging. If you can identify what products are popular and use that information in your m

In this episode, Angie and April are talking about the secret weapon for sales – promotions. They like to shake things up with their promos so they’re covering a lot of different options in this episode. Join in on the conversation in the mastermind group at www.growwithusmastermind.com. It’s always nice to chat with others about […]

In this episode, Angie and April are talking about the secret weapon for sales – promotions. They like to shake things up with their promos so they're covering a lot of different options in this episode. Join in on the conversation in the mastermind group at www.growwithusmastermind.com. It's always nice to chat with others about what they're doing in the TpT world, so we have a special guest today, Ciera Harris of Ciera Harris Teaching (formerly known as Adventures of Room 129). She has been on TpT for 10 years and specializes in creating reading comprehension resources for grades 2-4. Together, we're going to answer some of the commonly asked questions about running promotions. How often should you run sales and promotions? The more you have a promotion, the more people will start to expect it and wait for you to have it. Ciera tries to do one huge promotion each quarter outside of TpT sales. In addition to those, she'll do little promotions and sales but they aren't planned out the way the larger ones are that happen each quarter. I don't run big promotions in my store, but we try to have some kind of promotion going each week. This could be a free resource or a 24-hour quick sale on a resource for a related bundle. We've also found that presales work well. We give people a ridiculous sale price if they buy the resource before we create it. We like to do those once a quarter because they are really successful and pay for the creation of the resource. Running promotions and sales on your website store vs TpT Ciera also offers a higher discount on her website store compared to the price on TpT. This gives customers the options to save more (and she earns more because she doesn't lose the 20% as a premium seller) by purchasing directly through her site. This doesn't go against TpT restrictions because the resources are priced the same, it's just the coupon code that's different. It's important to know your audience. Some people are only comfortable buying resources on TpT, whereas there are others who don't care where they buy it from. Encouraging them to buy from your website store has the added benefit of being able to access your money right away in addition to avoiding the commission. Your followers and customers who have already supported your business and buy into your philosophy will likely know that you're able to do a little better from the sales on your website so they won't mind buying there. And if you give them a larger discount there as opposed to TpT, it's even more incentive. People usually like this option and are happy about having it. How do you decide which resources to promote? For Ciera, this is a cross between looking at yearly data and what resources are coming out. At the end of the year she does a big planning session where she tries to plan out all the big promotions. When looking at the upcoming year and the data of the biggest sellers and when they sell along with the new resource completion dates, she can create a mix of old and new resource promotions. It can be easy when you're focused on new resources to forget about promoting the old resources, but looking at the data is important. Look at what sells well at certain times of the year, what resources are coming out, and how you can best present it to your customers in a way that makes them want to buy it at that time. It all comes down to planning. You can't throw together a big promotion in two days. If you know months ahead of time, then you can build a stronger promotion for new products. Products you already have are a little easier to plan promotions for. However, from my

In this episode, Angie and April are talking about how they use Canva to save time while working with the design aspect of their TpT stores. Join in on the conversation in our mastermind group at www.growwithusmastermind.com. In the last podcast episode, we talked all about hiring for your TpT store. It was a pretty serious […]

In this episode, Angie and April are talking about how they use Canva to save time while working with the design aspect of their TpT stores. Join in on the conversation in our mastermind group at www.growwithusmastermind.com. In the last podcast episode, we talked all about hiring for your TpT store. It was a pretty serious topic and covered a lot of information. This time, we're jumping into a fun topic—playing around in Canva! We're going to share with you the ways that we use Canva for our TpT stores, but we'd love for you to get in the Mastermind group and share how you're using it. We're always looking for new ideas. All about Canva If you've never heard of Canva, it's a graphic design platform you can use to create pretty much any type of image you need. In the past, we used Photoshop or PowerPoint to create all our images, but it could be complicated and took a lot of work to make it look just right. Canva makes it simple and easy. I tried Canva when it first came out and didn't like it. They had some templates but it was very limited and you had to pay to use their images. I quit using it, but they made updates to it over time and people started talking about it a lot. The platform had advanced a lot and when I came back to it, it was so easy to figure out. Is the paid Canva plan worth the investment? This is a question we get asked a lot from TpTers. There is a lot that comes with the free plan. You have access to some of the templates and images on the platform. There are also some options for collaborating with teams. But the paid account is so awesome and we think everyone should be using it. There are a lot of things we pay for and this is one of the things that we use almost every single day. It's so cheap. The current pricing is around $120/year and that allows you to include five people on your account. April has her whole team in Canva which makes it really easy to work together on projects. What we love about Canva Folders We love the way the Canva paid account allows us to store images and graphics in folders. You can create folders for product launches that include all your templates for social media, slide decks for webinars and mini-trainings. Then, when you launch again next year, you have everything you need in one place. It's all there and organized. Templates Templates help make the entire graphic design fast and easy. I love that you can make a template, put a placeholder in it and then easily drop an image in it when you're ready. It saves a lot of time not having to recreate the template over and over again. All you need to do is switch the images. I can switch whole product lines in less than an hour with templates for social images, previews, thumbnails, pins, and the teacher manuals in my resources. You can create your own templates to save and share with the paid plan, but there are also tons of pre-designed templates you can use. Canva also has templates that make it easy to create mockups of your resources. They have templates with tablets and computer screens you can drop your resource photos into. You can even search “mockups” in the templates to see the templates they already have created. You can also search templates by your brand color codes. This makes it really easy to find pre-created templates that are already using your colors. You'll probably still need to do some tweaking, but it can speed the process up. To search by color, you just use hit the filter image by the search box. Branding With the paid Canva account, you can store all of your brand

In this episode, Angie and April are answering frequently asked questions about hiring for your TpT store. They cover everything from VAs to full-time employees. You can join in on the conversation in our mastermind group at www.growwithusmastermind.com. A couple of years ago we did an episode on how to hire help to grow your […]

In this episode, Angie and April are answering frequently asked questions about hiring for your TpT store. They cover everything from VAs to full-time employees. You can join in on the conversation in our mastermind group at www.growwithusmastermind.com. A couple of years ago we did an episode on how to hire help to grow your TpT store, but a lot has changed in our businesses over time. So, we're excited to have Caitlin Mitchell from EB Academics join us on the podcast to talk about all things hiring. Disclaimer: We are not accountants. We are sharing our personal experiences. We encourage you to talk to your accountant or a tax professional before hiring employees or contractors for your TpT business. The rules and restrictions vary from state to state. Please make sure you cover your bases. With that disclaimer out of the way, we get a lot of questions in our group about hiring help. Caitlin, Angie, and I all have employees working in our businesses but it looks a little different for each of us. Caitlin has two full-time employees, 8 part-time employees, as well as an overseas virtual assistant and editor through Upwork. Angie currently has eight people working with her. She hires as she sees a need in her business or something she doesn't want to do on her own anymore. I currently have 3 full-time employees along with part-time employees. Q: Should I hire employees or freelance contractors We're not going to get into the legal/tax side of the difference between contractors vs employees. However, we do want to touch on the experience of working with contractors vs employees. All three of us have worked with both options. Contractors can be nice to work with when you have a project that you need to be completed. This is often an easier way to begin having people help you complete different tasks within your company. The difference that we notice with employees is you're able to grow and direct them for your company where you're not really able to do the same with contractors. When you hire someone as an employee, we've found that you get more buy-in from them. They are part of your team and share your mission and goals with you. When you work with a contractor, you may be one of many of their clients. This may be OK with you for certain tasks, but as we've handed over more and more tasks, we've all enjoyed the experience of hiring employees. Yes, it is expensive, but we've found once you get to the point of needing to hire, the resources are there. Q: Where to find people to hire? There are several different places that we've found work for hiring employees for our TpT businesses. Here are a few to consider: Upwork: If this works with your tax situation and rules, it can be easier because the platform issues the 1099s for you. Network of teachers: This is a great way to find help in the summer. You may also find teachers who are looking to earn some extra money for vacations, paying off student loans, or putting their kids in extra curriculars. People you know: Angie's sister-in-law works for her and I have a close friend working for me. This won't always be a great fit, but if you have people you trust that fit with your business it's a possibility. Recommendations: You may be able to get a good recommendation from another TpTer. However, keep in mind that just because someone works well with an individual doesn't mean it will automatically be a great fit for you. Email list or followers: Don&#

No show notes for this episode, but we're excited to be back with a full episode in two weeks!

No show notes for this episode, but we’re excited to be back with a full episode in two weeks!

Digital learning is on everyone's minds these days. So, today we're talking about what you can do to make digital learning interactive and tips for converting your existing resources. And, we're continuing the conversation in our Mastermind group. Head over there to share what works for you and hear what others are saying: www.growwithusmastermind.com. Now that teachers everywhere are dabbling in digital learning, it doesn't look like this is something that's just going to go away once everyone is back in the classroom. So, digital products will be something we can continue to focus on more than just converting our existing print resources. It's something April and I have been wanting to talk about, but it just wasn't that popular. Obviously, things have changed. So, we are excited to have Erin Flanagan from Erintegration as our guest on the Grow With Us Podcast.  Erin is an expert in interactive digital training. Most of her store has a technology focus and she's familiar with making resources that can be used on various platforms. It's the identity of her brand and blog. So, we hit her up with our interactive digital learning questions. What resources are selling well right now? Erin has found that fully contained resources seem to be selling the best right now. These are the resources that include all directions, don't need any other resources, and the students can complete the entire thing within the platform they're using.  Right now, most teachers are focused on trying to do short lessons with the students and then assign them work they can do independently. So, any products geared towards that are most likely going to be more popular.  For example, Erin has a multiplication fact practice activity that is self-checking, and students can do completely on Google Sheets. The teacher doesn't even need to be involved in giving directions. Things like this are getting a lot more attention right now.  Teachers are looking for simple resources that don't need a lot of guidance. What can we expect next year from digital resources if the classrooms are open? I think the fact that most of Erin's store is geared entirely toward digital learning, it shows her answer to this question. Even before the pandemic hit, there has been a shift in general to teachers using more digital tools. Now, schools are realizing that it's important for them to have a game plan for distance learning in place whether it's for a pandemic or a snow day. Schools don't want to be left in the position of scrambling to figure it out after the fact in the future.  Erin believes that as teachers transition back to the classroom they're going to want to keep some of the things that are great about digital learning. There are some things you can do on a device that you just can't do without it. She thinks teachers are finding those positives and will be considering them as they buy resources for the fall.  I agree with her. Teachers that were afraid to try digital products in the past are building up confidence in using them right now. They may feel better using some of the more complex digital resources when they're back in the classroom.  Right now parents are the ones having to troubleshoot the login process and getting their kids set up. When everyone's back in the classroom, teachers may be thankful to be able to handle these tech issues.  What's the difference between clip art and moveable clip art?  Erin shared that sometimes teachers are confused that both clip art and moveable pieces are both PNG image files. To Erin, the biggest difference is that moveable pieces are designed to only be used on a screen. They aren't m

Digital learning is on everyone’s minds these days. So, today we’re talking about what you can do to make digital learning interactive and tips for converting your existing resources. And, we’re continuing the conversation in our Mastermind group. Head over there to share what works for you and hear what others are saying: www.growwithusmastermind.com. Now […]

We'll be completely honest with you. We spent the first few weeks of this pandemic in a bit of panic mode which has the tendency to paralyze people from taking action. But we're coming out of that now and we want to share what we're doing to have some movement in our TpT business during this time. Don't worry, we're not going to tell you to shift everything to digital products. And, we're not going to just focus on the coronavirus. The 3 things that we're going to share are things that can benefit your business right now in the midst of the pandemic but also at any other time. 1. Survey your audience This is a tool that we've talked about before. This is a great time to be surveying your audience. A month ago, teachers felt like they needed everything. There was no plan at that time. Everyone was in panic mode. Now, they have a better understanding of what's expected of them and what they need. So, it's a great time to survey your audience. Here are some questions you could ask your audience: How are you teaching right now? Are you using Google Classroom? Are you sending home packets? What resources are you using? What digital options are you interested in? Is there training you would like to have? What can I do to support you? Think about what's been on the back burner One of the first things that Angie did when this happened is thought about what resources teachers have asked for in the past that she hadn't worked on yet. While something might not have been the right thing for you to create for your store in the past, it might be a better time now. If there is something your audience has asked for in the past, rethink if this is the right time to focus on it now. Engage with your email list Angie and I have both become more consistent with our email lists. I've been sending emails a few times a week. Teachers are overwhelmed right now and I don't think they're reading every email. But I'm being more active with my list and I'm getting more feedback. In my emails I'm asking what teachers need, offering support, or making them aware of a resource that I have on sale. Teachers are responding with valuable feedback to let me know what they need. Why this is so important A lot of times, TpTers look to other TpTers to see what people want. But that's not necessarily what your audience wants. You need to find out what your specific audience is looking for. For example, a lot of TpTers quickly started turning all their resources into digital resources, but that's not what all audiences want. You could be wasting your time doing this if your audience doesn't care about digital resources. Think about the long-term As you get feedback from your audience, think about how it fits into your long-term plans. You don't want to just focus on a short-term bandaid right now. You want your efforts to be something that can be good for your business for the long-haul. As we move forward, more teachers will be more fluent with digital resources. But that doesn't mean they'll want to use them once they can get back in the classroom. That's why you need to carefully weigh what is beneficial for right now that will also be beneficial in the future. Consider offering training sessions I've been getting a lot of feedback by offering training sessions for teachers. I was getting a lot of questions about how to assign one of my writing assignments online. So, I ran a Facebook ad and held a one-hour training. I got so many questions during that training that I've been able to use to create quick videos for teachers. I know a lot of people hate doing video, but it's a great way to connect with yo

As we come out of the initial shock of the coronavirus pandemic, we need to create a plan to move our business forward. These 3 tips can help you with short-term and long-term movement in your TpT store.

We've been hearing from a lot of Tpters lately reporting that their traffic and views are dropping in Pinterest. So, today we're talking about what you can do to combat that and increase your Pinterest activity. And, we're continuing the conversation in our Mastermind group. Head over there to share what works for you and hear what others are saying: www.growwithusmastermind.com. On this episode of the Grow With Us Podcast, we have Sara from the Stellar Teacher Company joining our conversation on Pinterest. When we saw the concerns around the current struggle with Pinterest, we put out a call in our group for new Pinterest strategies and someone recommended Sara. Her account has 4.4 million monthly viewers. Sara creates and sells resources for upper elementary and launched her website earlier this year. We had a long list of questions and discussed the following Pinterest strategies: The use of video pins Sara shared with us that she noticed a big increase in her Pinterest views when she started using video pins. She only uses them to share and link to her products and isn't using them to share blog posts or opt-in offers for her email lists. A recent video pin had 149k views with 2.4k saves on these pins. It's her highest percentage of engagement on Pinterest which really surprised her because they are pretty simple and straightforward. However, the videos are able to provide a more comprehensive view of what's included in the resource which is what teachers are looking for. It allows them to get a good feel for the entire product. How to create video pins for Pinterest Sara reassured all of us that it really isn't that difficult to create video pins. She likes to batch her work so she can create multiple pins at once. She uses her iPhone for all of the videos and photos that she takes for her marketing and really likes the time-lapse feature to help speed things up. This allows her to flip through an entire 50-page resource in a 7-second video. Apps for video editing When it comes to editing her videos, Sara likes to use PicPlayPost. She uses the paid version because it's not that expensive but there is a free version as well. This app allows you to edit things like brightness and timing, which is helpful because your video needs to be at least six seconds long. The app also allows you to add text and combine multiple videos into one. Sara shared that it's easy to use and within an hour of playing around you can be pretty set on how to use it. Importance of consistency While video pins have contributed to Sara's recent growth you can't overlook the importance of consistency. She experienced what she calls the "Pinterest Crisis" last fall just like many others. In order to combat the dip she experienced, she began to post consistently. While Tailwind was helpful, Sara didn't enjoy using it so she eventually hired a VA to handle it for her and it's made a huge difference. It helps here to keep the queue full of new pins or high performing ones that she wants to keep circulating. This is the first year that she's been consistently pinning the same number of pins every day. She keeps it to 25-30 pins a day and personally doesn't use SmartLoop because her VA is helping do the work for her. The consistency has had a good impact on her growth since last fall. When it comes to creating new resources, she tries to upload 20-30 new pins a month for it. And, while she does do repins of both video and regular pins, she makes a point to get the new pins out there too. Batching work to save time As mentioned before, Sara prefers to batch her work. For example, a few weekends before we recorded our episode with her, she created all of her video pins for the month. This is how it worked: Two hours spent on printing, cutting, and preparing Two hours spent on making

We’ve been hearing from a lot of Tpters lately reporting that their traffic and views are dropping in Pinterest. So, today we’re talking about what you can do to combat that and increase your Pinterest activity. And, we’re continuing the conversation in our Mastermind group. Head over there to share what works for you and […]

Last month we stepped out of our comfort zone to talk about selling on our websites. Today we invited someone who knows way more about the topic than we do to share more information. And, we're continuing the conversation in our Mastermind group. Head over there to share what works for you and hear what others are saying: www.growwithusmastermind.com. A few podcast episodes ago, Angie and I shared our own experiences with selling directly from our websites. And, now we are really excited to bring Melissa Tallman from Teacher Thrive onto the podcast. She has been running her own store for about eight months and can speak to some of the things that we can't, like WooCommerce. What made Melissa decide to sell on her website Like Angie and I, Melissa is grateful for TpT. It's a great way for teacher sellers to really get started. But, Melissa is no longer teaching in the classroom and has turned her business into her full-time income. Because of that, she doesn't want to keep all of her eggs in one basket. Just in case anything were ever to happen with TpT, she can't afford to lose all her income. So, she decided to set up her website store and use her own platform. Deciding on WooCommerce and setting up her store Melissa gave the DIY path a try when she first started to set up her store but realized it wasn't for her. So, she hired a developer. She knew from the start that she wanted to use WooCommerce because she prefers how it's customizable and knew that it offered the look that she wanted. Some things, like writing a blog post or resource descriptions were really simple. But, when she started to try to customize the storefront to be easy for the customer to use, it wasn't as simple. Melissa didn't want to spend her own time trying to figure out how to set it up from scratch, so she hired a developer. It can be easy to spend a lot of time trying to make all those little tweaks to get things looking just right and still not end up with what you're looking for. That's why sometimes it's just easier and faster to hire someone that knows what they're doing. Melissa's advice for teacher sellers When we asked Melissa what advice she had for teacher sellers when setting up a store, it all came back to hiring help. It's not that she's against people setting it up on their own. But, she highly recommends finding someone that knows what they are doing. She found a person on Upwork. Her recommendation is that you find examples of stores that you like the look and functionality, find a developer that you'd like to work with, and ask them for a quote on how much it would cost. There are a lot of talented freelancers on Upwork. Another area that you might want to consider hiring help in is moving your products over from TpT to your own store. You can go the simple route and just copy them over, but eventually, you'll want to update all the links so you are keeping your bundles together on your own website store. Either route is time-consuming, but copying them over is a lot less intensive. You can hire a virtual assistant to help you out if needed. Melissa bit the bullet and did the work all at once from the start with the help of her husband. WooComerce plugins Melissa uses a bundle plugin called YITH that works with WooComerce. While she suggested that there might be newer ones, she liked the look of it and that it was similar to setting up bundles on TpT. It also provides pagination where teachers can see all the items within the bundle. It allows them to click on it to see the exact product page that's included. Another plugin that she recommends is called Discount Rules by Flycart Technologies. This allows you to offer a "build your own bundle" option on your website. Melissa used the example of the grammar units that she sells. She of

Last month we stepped out of our comfort zone to talk about selling on our websites. Today we invited someone who knows way more about the topic than we do to share more information. And, we’re continuing the conversation in our Mastermind group. Head over there to share what works for you and hear what […]

As a teacherpreneuer there are so many things to focus on while growing your TpT business. It's easy to become overwhelmed and lose focus. Today we're talking about how to stay productive, and we're continuing the conversation in our Mastermind group. Head over there to share what works for you and hear what others are saying: www.growwithusmastermind.com. April and I were excited to bring Shelly Rees back as a guest on the Grow With Us Podcast. She was a guest way back in episode 10 when we were live at the 2018 TpT conference. She's a teacher seller and a productivity guru. On this episode, she shared some incredibly valuable tips on how to stay productive and beat that feeling of overwhelm that we all experience at times. If you have been trying to figure out how to stay focused, this is the episode for you! There's always going to be a little overwhelm I describe my overwhelm as a sliding scale. Sometimes it's more and other times it's not as bad, but there's always a bit of it there. Remember, you may always feel a little bit of that overwhelm. It's not that you need to eliminate it all the way, but you do need to learn how to manage it and stay focused. What you don't want is to get so overwhelmed that it causes you to freeze and not do anything. Shelly is experienced at this. She has two facets to  her business. The first is her TpT store. The second side is helping other teacher authors. She admits that it can be overwhelming, but she has found the right strategies to help her stay productive through it.  Here is what she recommends you do to stay focused: 1. Do a brain dump Shelly suggests that you get a big piece of paper and just start writing everything down that's rolling around in your head. This includes the big and little things. Write down all the projects you're working on and tasks that you need to do. It doesn't have to be business related. It could be something like "clean the kitchen counter". Just get it all out. 2. Prioritize it Once you have it all out of your head and down on paper, it's time to prioritize it. List them as most important to least important. Or, if you're really feeling overwhelmed, Shelly recommends that you list them from the smallest task to the biggest task. This allows you to get some easy wins by completing and crossing off the small tasks first. This helps to build momentum and allows you to be more productive. 3. Keep a list of tiny tasks These are tasks that will only take you 15 minutes or less to complete. It could be something like creating a new pin. Shelly keeps this list on hand at all times. Then, when she finds that she has a small chunk of time to use, she can do something productive instead of scroll through Instagram or Facebook. We're all guilty of wasting those little chunks of time. One of the biggest excuses that Shelly hears from TpTers that are still working in the classroom is that they don't have enough time. But if you work on focusing during those small chunks of time then you'll see that you actually have more time than you realized. Or, if you need a little motivation to help see this, look at the breakdown on your phone of your screen time. You'll most likely see that you are wasting more time than you realize on things like social media. How to stay productive by organizing your time While the three steps above can go a long way in helping you stay productive, it's also helpful to keep the big picture in mind when organizing your time. Here's how Shelly does it: Choose a word of the year. For 2019, her word was "intentional". She wanted to be intentional about creating products and how she was using her time. She will choose a new word for 2020. Plan 3 big goals. Once she has he

As a teacherpreneuer there are so many things to focus on while growing your TpT business. It’s easy to become overwhelmed and lose focus. Today we’re talking about how to stay productive, and we’re continuing the conversation in our Mastermind group. Head over there to share what works for you and hear what others are […]

While we aren't experts on the topic, today we're sharing our experiences with setting up a website store to sell products from our own websites. And, we're continuing the conversation in our Mastermind group. Head over there to share any tips or ask any of your hiring questions: www.growwithusmastermind.com. Some links are affiliate links. We pay for the podcast costs using revenue generated when people checkout using our links. This is a bit of a taboo topic that we are going to jump into today—selling on your website. Angie and I are in no way claiming to be experts on this topic, but we've received a lot of questions about it lately. Our stores are pretty new and we are still in the beginning phases, but we wanted to share our experiences, what we've experimented with and do our best to answer your questions. Please know that we are in no way encouraging everyone to start a store or to take resources off of TpT. It's a great platform that drives a lot of traffic to our resources and has been a huge blessing for us both. We are simply exploring options to grow our business which has led us to open website stores in addition to our TpT stores. This is not something for everyone. We are going to answer your questions as honestly as we can to give you a good indication of if this is a good option for you or not. So, here we go: When or why should you start a website store? As mentioned above, it's not for everyone. If you're already overwhelmed with creating resources, building an email list, and growing your social media following, it might not be the right time for you. It's not as simple as just throwing up your resources on one more site and calling it a day. We don't recommend for beginners This is not something for beginners. If you only have a few resources up at TpT, focus on growing your store there first. They drive traffic to the website and teachers naturally come to it to look for resources. This is the best place to start growing your sales. If you're just starting out, stick with product creation for now. When you have your own store, you're the only person driving traffic to it. It's not going to just start flowing in without you working on it. We don't recommend if you aren't looking for additional features If you don't want to use more features than what TpT already has—if you don't want to pixel customers to retarget them with ads, give coupons to your email list, and things like that—just stick with TpT. Having your own store allows you to have a lot more analytics about your customers which allows you to target them further. If that's not important to you right now, it's probably not worth your time to start a store on your website. We don't recommend if you don't have the money and time It cost money to set up your shop, get traffic to your store, etc. I know a lot of sellers were interested in starting their own stores when TpT increased their commission from 15% to 20%. However, when they made that jump they realized they weren't selling as much on their own stores. TpT gets a lot of organic traffic that you just aren't going to get on your own store. You have to create all of that momentum yourself. You are going back to square one when you start your own store. If you're on the fence and can't think of any other reason to start a store than wanting to make more commission, it might not be for you. What sales platforms should you use? As we mentioned, Angie and I aren't experts on website stores, so we are only able to share our own experiences here. Woocomerce Woocomerce is a really popular Wordpress plugin. A lot of people use it. However, I can easily get carried away with tweaking things in Wordpress which

While we aren’t experts on the topic, today we’re sharing our experiences with setting up a website store to sell products from our own websites. And, we’re continuing the conversation in our Mastermind group. Head over there to share any tips or ask any of your hiring questions: www.growwithusmastermind.com. Some links are affiliate links. We […]

Whether you're back-to-school and short on time or simply have too much on your plate as a full-time TpTer, hiring help can be exactly what you need to grow your store. Today we're talking everything you need to know as you get ready to make your first hire. And, we're continuing the conversation in our Mastermind group. Head over there to share any tips or ask any of your hiring questions: www.growwithusmastermind.com. This is a topic that people are excited about! There have been tons of questions and inside the group regarding how to hire help. So, we are going to do our best to answer them all. Let's dive in. What you need to know before you make your first hire Here's a word of warning—it's hard to hire people. You have spent time and energy building your TpT business and it's hard to hand over tasks to others. Essentially, you have to trust them to be able to continue the work you have started. It can be tough. Not every person you hire is going to be the right fit. But before you even start looking for your first hire, you have to do a little more work yourself. You need to figure out what you want to hire for. Think about what tasks you are doing that you don't want to do. It might be that you struggle with getting them done or that you just don't like them. Then, you need to get crystal clear on what tasks you're going to hire someone to do and what your expectations are. It's your job to choose the right person and give them proper training. If you try to rush the process, you'll most likely end up disappointed. I'll share with you my exact hiring process to show you exactly what I mean shortly. But, just remember that before you jump into the process you have to have a purpose for your hire. What are they going to help you accomplish? If you don't know, they aren't going to know either. What is a VA? This is a popular question in the group because it's the common advice that you're probably hearing all over the place. If you are overwhelmed in your business, people will tell you to "hire a VA". VA stands for Virtual Assistant. These are people that can essentially help you do a lot of those smaller and more time-consuming tasks. A good VA is someone that you can work with to teach them how to do a task and then turn it over to them and they take it from there. This is a person that doesn't necessarily need a lot of specialized skills in one certain area. For example, a VA may help you reply to a few emails, create some Pins, and respond to a question for you on Facebook Messenger. Angie recently hired someone to work as a VA. She is in her local area but is going to work remotely. They met and Angie showed her several tasks that she was looking for someone to complete. They include things like creating pins and copying and pasting resource descriptions from her TpT store to her website. They are not necessarily difficult tasks, but they are time-consuming. Angie can do them, but she'd rather not have to. What a VA is not A VA is not a mini-me. This can be a sticking point for a lot of TpTers and it was for us at first too. When I first started trying to find someone, I didn't really know what I wanted help with. I just wanted someone that could step in and handle what I do on a daily basis while still being affordable. That was unrealistic. However, there are definitely people out there that can take some things off your plate. You just have to know what to look for. What can I hire help for? Instead of hiring a VA, you can also hire for specific tasks. Look for the tasks that you don't enjoy doing, or that you aren't great at, and hire someone to handle that exact thing. Customer service For example, I recently decided to hire for customer service. It wasn't something that I needed when I first started out and was only getting an email a day. But now I get

Whether you’re back-to-school and short on time or simply have too much on your plate as a full-time TpTer, hiring help can be exactly what you need to grow your store. Today we’re talking everything you need to know as you get ready to make your first hire. And, we’re continuing the conversation in our […]

The back-to-school rush has come and gone! Now it's time to figure out how to promote our resources for the rest of the year. Today we're talking about leveraging promotions. And, we're continuing the conversation in our Mastermind group. Head over there to share what works for you and hear what others are saying: www.growwithusmastermind.com. Happy back to school! It's that busy time of year where everyone's adjusting to new schedules. But, the back-to-school sales rush is over which leaves us TpTers asking "What now?" The back-to-school time is great for sales as teachers prepare for their classes, but it's also a time when it's easy to get lost in the crowd. There are tons of sales, giveaways, and promotions going on. This is one of the reasons why it's great to continue doing promotions throughout the year. Angie and I are working on creating our promotion schedule for the year. Teachers are really appreciative of fun giveaways and promotions throughout the year, so don't think you have to wait until the next big holiday or TpT sale to promote your products. We're going to give you insights on both group promotions and individual promotions and share what's worked well for us. Group promotions To be honest, I have a love-hate relationship with group promotions. I love how great they are at getting me in front of new people. And, it's a really affordable way to do that because you can pitch in some money instead of having to do all the advertising on your own. But, they can be a lot of work, especially if the organizer isn't really organized. Over the past five years, I've really learned a lot from the different group promotions that I've been a part of. I've also learned that I like to be the one organizing them because I'm a bit of a control freak. The simpler they are, the easier they are to be a part of. But, in all honesty, they can be fun to participate in and when run well, they can give you great results. Tip: Find sellers with similar grade levels as you Angie and I have both found that it's really helpful to work with other sellers that focus on the same grade levels as you. This gives you similar audiences which is exactly what you want when doing a group promotion. The more targeted you are, the more likely you are to get in front of an audience that will join your lists and buy your products and resources. I know some TpT sellers also like to pay attention to what specialties the other sellers in a group has as well. If you all focus on a different area there is less competition among the group. You don't really want competing resources within a promotion. Tip: Look at past performance Before joining a group, you want to make sure that the other sellers in the group participate and follow through on the things they're supposed to do for the promotion. You don't want to join with other sellers that aren't going to share the posts with their group. And, you'd be surprised how many people this really is. Check to see how they performed in other group promotions they were a part of. Did they post the images to their platforms? Did they comment on the others? There are some people that participate 110% and then there are others that have great followings but don't really participate. Tip: Don't do ALL promotions with the same group If you only work with the same group over and over again you're going to limit your reach. You'll only be getting in front of the same people over and over again. The last promotion that Angie and I did, we worked with some new people from the group and it turned out great. If you do a few a year with the same group and spread it out over the course of the year then you'll most likely be fine. Both you and the other sellers will have grown your audience in between the promotions, so there will still be new eyes seeing your stuff.

The back-to-school rush has come and gone! Now it’s time to figure out how to promote our resources for the rest of the year. Today we’re talking about leveraging promotions. And, we’re continuing the conversation in our Mastermind group. Head over there to share what works for you and hear what others are saying: www.growwithusmastermind.com. […]

You've heard about the importance of building an email list, but what are you supposed to do with it once you have it? We're discussing how to consistently use your list and the importance of growing it today on the podcast. And, we're continuing the conversation in our Mastermind group. Head over there to share what works for you and hear what others are saying: www.growwithusmastermind.com. Building an email list. It seems to be one of those things that's on every TpTers to-do list, but it's often not something that we focus on. April and I both admit that we haven't been real consistent with sending out emails to our lists over the summer either. That's why we brought Nicki from The Sprinkle Topped Teacher on the podcast to share how she grew her TpT store by focusing on building and using an email list. A little about Nicki Nicki started her store, The Sprinkle Topped Teacher, back in September of 2015. Her original focus was on K-3 products, but she has moved into creating resources for a broader audience. This is her first schoolyear that she is going full time as a TpTer. She recently moved across the country and is using this as her opportunity to try stepping away from the classroom. If you're thinking about taking the same step, check out our episode So You're Thinking of Going Full Time TpT? It's an exciting step but can feel a little scary too. Nicki started focusing on building an email list after listening to plenty of business podcasts that talked about the importance of it. And, it really stood out to her when she heard Jenna Kutcher from Goal Digger say that if people subscribe to your email list they are your people. She spent the entire 2018 year creating products releasing three a month! After that, she felt it was time to start building her list. So, she signed up for Amy Porterfield's Email List Building course and hit the ground running. During the 2019 schoolyear, she only created one resource and spent the rest of her time focusing on growing her email list and the results have been huge! Don't be afraid to invest in yourself Nicki mentioned that because she invested in herself and spent the money on the course she was more likely to follow through on completing it. The investment became a type of accountability for her. April and I have found the same thing to be true. So, don't be afraid to invest in yourself. with courses and software. It might be just the thing that you need as motivation to really get your TpT business growing. What do you send out to your email list? Nicki believes in the 90/10 strategy. This means that 90% of what she sends out is focused on serving her customer. The last 10% is leftover for sales. Every Sunday she sends out the Sunday Sunshine to her email list. The goal is to help her audience fight the Sunday scary. She reminds them of their purpose and value and gives them a freebie or notifies them of a promotion or podcast that shew was on. On occasion, (that 10%) she sends out a sales email. When she does this it's usually an email the day before the sale and then one on the day of the sale. Here's the best part—people reply to her emails. They are thankful for them and she gets feedback and reassurance that her emails are a hit with her audience. What type of format should you use? Nicki sticks with a simple format for her weekly emails. They begin with an introduction and then include a tip or challenge for the week. After that, she has a closing message and a P.S. that includes something that she's promoting. You may hear from other sources that you should keep your emails short. But, Nicki mentioned that her emails are long

You’ve heard about the importance of building an email list, but what are you supposed to do with it once you have it? We’re discussing how to consistently use your list and the importance of growing it today on the podcast. And, we’re continuing the conversation in our Mastermind group. Head over there to share […]

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This is the final week of our four-week blogging challenge and we are focusing on marketing blog posts. We took the information we covered in our workshop at the TpT Conference and turned it into a challenge. The goal is to help you set up a blogging plan that you can stick to. No big deal if you missed the conference workshop! This challenge will work for any TpTer. Join our mastermind group for blogging accountability as we work through the challenge: www.growwithusmastermind.com. In Week 4 we are going to focus on putting together everything we learned in the first week and start marketing our blog posts. In order to complete the tasks this week, you're going to need to work through the first 3 weeks. So, if you're just joining us, go back and check out what you missed: Plan Your Year: Week 1 - Learn how to set up a blogging plan for the year that's easy to follow. Blog Optimization & Prep: Week 2 - Focus on optimizing your website so you'll be ready when you start getting blog readers. Craft an Intentional Post: Week 3 - Learn why you need to be intentional with the posts that you write and what steps to follow. Let's talk about marketing blog posts So, you have a beautifully crafted and intentional blog post completed and published. Now what? Do you just wait for the readers to come? No way! Now is the time to focus on marketing. You want to make it easy for your audience to find your blog post. Resources to help with marketing blog posts The first thing I want you to do, if you haven't already, is go download the Challenge Organizer on our Resources page here. In this guide is a checklist that you can use when marketing your blog post. This is something that you can refer back to with every blog post that you write. Creating images for marketing Here's the thing you need to keep in mind when creating images for your blog posts and marketing—keep it easy. There are a few tips that can help you do this. Canva There are many different ways you can create images for your blog and marketing. Angie and I both use Canva so that's what we will be discussing here. There is a free version that is still incredibly useful, but we both use the paid version. It allows you to have access to a huge image library and has another incredible tool that I'll share in a minute. Use templates Angie and I both use templates for creating our social media and blog post images. You don't need to reinvent the wheel every time you need a new image. Simply create a design that you like. It should have your branding on it. Then, with every new blog post, all you need to do is create a copy, update the title, and swap out images. The layout is already there and waiting for you, so you can save a lot of time. If you struggle with design, you can buy templates to use the same way. Create multiple images at once Angie is great at this. When she writes a blog post she has five different templates that she uses. This makes it easy for her to create images for Pinterest, Instagram, and anywhere else that she wants to share an image. If you are doing a shoot with a new resource that you have, take TONS of pictures. Make sure to get them from different angles and sizes so you have options to work with later. Having many photos to choose from and different image templates will allow you to market and share your blog post over and over without having to use the same image. This allows it not to appear so repetitive. In the paid version of Canva, you can

This is the final week of our four-week blogging challenge and we are focusing on marketing blog posts. We took the information we covered in our workshop at the TpT Conference and turned it into a challenge. The goal is to help you set up a blogging plan that you can stick to. No big […]

This is the 3rd week of our four-week blogging challenge. We are continuing to build off of our Intentional Blogging workshop from the TpT Conference. This challenge was designed to help you learn to write an intentional post and optimize your blog. It's OK if you missed the conference workshop, this challenge will work for any TpTer. Join our mastermind group for blogging accountability as we work through the challenge: www.growwithusmastermind.com. Week 3 of the challenge is here and we're going to dive into writing an intentional blog post. If you're just joining us for the challenge I encourage you to go back and work through the first two weeks: Week 1: Plan Your Year - We walked you through how to plan out and choose topics to write about for the entire year (which isn't as many as it sounds like). Week 2: Blog Optimization & Prep - We discussed areas of your blog that you should optimize before you turn your focus on directing traffic to your site. Crafting an intentional post This week we are all going to work through brainstorming and writing one blog post. Here's what we're going to focus on when writing: Make it SEO friendly Clearly state what the post is about in the title Keep goals front and center The entire purpose of writing intentional posts is to meet the goals of your TpT business. In order to do that, you need to ask yourself a few questions before you start writing: What are the goals for your post? How will it benefit your business? What are you hoping to achieve by writing the post? What do you want readers to do? How to write an intentional post In Grow With Us episode 33, we talked all about intentional blogging. So, instead of restating the same information again, I'll highlight a few things we discussed. Then, if you missed the episode the first time, head over to listen to it or read the show notes. What blogging intentionally is How to create a 3 part blog post The importance of answering questions from your audience Focusing on quality and not quantity Plugins that can help you Blog organizer and checklist If you haven't downloaded our free resource from the TpT conference yet, you can get that on the Resources page here. The Challenge Organizer document has a place to help you brainstorm your blog post ideas. There's a spot for you to write the post title, post goals, and the main ideas you want to discuss. Keeping the goals front and center is important because you need to know what action you want readers to take when they finish reading. Your post should be based around leading them in that direction. The organizer and checklist are designed to make it easier for you when you get to the point of sitting down to write the blog post. This week our focus is on brainstorming the post, writing it, creating the images, adding the email opt-in, editing it for SEO, and adding in links. Importance of including links You want to include links throughout your post for two reasons: It's good for SEO It allows you to provide more valuable information for your readers After you write your blog post go back and look for areas that you can place links. You can link to other blog posts that you have on the topic, your email opt-in, or your TpT store. Remember to keep your blog goals in mind so you know what links to include. Your links don't always need to be i

This is the 3rd week of our four-week blogging challenge. We are continuing to build off of our Intentional Blogging workshop from the TpT Conference. This challenge was designed to help you learn to write an intentional post and optimize your blog. It’s OK if you missed the conference workshop, this challenge will work for […]

This is the 2nd week of our four-week blogging challenge. This is building off of our Intentional Blogging workshop from the TpT Conference.  Over the next several weeks, we will focus on helping you with blog optimization and writing intentional blog posts. It's OK if you missed the conference workshop, this challenge will work for any TpTer. If you are just joining us, make sure to check out Week 1 here and join our mastermind group for blogging accountability as we work through the challenge: www.growwithusmastermind.com. Week two of the blogging challenge is all about prepping and optimizing your blog for success. Having quality blogs is important, but you want to make sure your site is set up and ready for when people show up. You want your audience to easily find out about you, see your posts, and find your resources. Let's get started... Blog Optimization with SEO Yes, you want to include your SEO keywords within your blog posts, but blog optimization requires to go even further. You need to think about things like your link structure. This should be SEO friendly as well. What you're looking for is a link that looks like this: YourBlogName.com/keyword-phrase Keep your links short, simple, and use your SEO keywords. I just recently got all of my links redirected and switched over. All of my old structured links now redirect to new SEO friendly links. I actually paid someone to help me with this (learn more about outsourcing in episode 14). If you can redirect your existing blog posts, that's great. But, if that's not something you have time to worry about right now just use this strategy moving forward. Blog SEO resources We are going to dive further into SEO keywords next week, but SEO is an important part of prepping and blog optimization. So, here are a few resources: Past Grow With Us Podcast Episodes Episode 19: Tips & Tools for Optimizing Your Blog Traffic Episode 17: SEO Tips with Guest Noelle Pickering SEO keyword finder tool Uber Suggest is a great, and FREE, resource! You can enter in a topic that you're interested in and it provides you with a list of ranked keywords. Challenge resources Angie and I compiled a list of SEO resources and included them in our Blogging Challenge resource list. You can find them on the main resource page for the challenge here or at the link below. There is one list with SEO for Blogger and one that's SEO for Wordpress. www.growwithuspodcast.com/challenge/ Prepping your homepage You want your homepage to me more than just a list of your existing blog posts. When your audience arrives at your homepage, they should be able to find out who you are, what you do, and what you stand for. There should also be a call-to-action (CTA). You want people to easily be able to sign up for your email list, training course, or anything else that you have as an option for people to opt in for. You need to include a way for people to interact with and engage with you. If you're just starting out with your blog and haven't created an opt-in yet then encourage them to follow you on social media. The main goal is to make sure that you have a way to continue interacting with them once they click off your blog. You don't want to lose them forever. Optimizing your contact page Your "Contact" page is a way for people to easily reach ou

This is the 2nd week of our four-week blogging challenge. This is building off of our Intentional Blogging workshop from the TpT Conference.  Over the next several weeks, we will focus on helping you with blog optimization and writing intentional blog posts. It’s OK if you missed the conference workshop, this challenge will work for […]

We are super excited to be continuing our TpT Conference workshop on "intentional blogging" in this new blogging challenge. Over the next four weeks, we will focus on helping you with blog planning to be more intentional with your posts. It doesn't matter if you attended the conference or not, we want you to participate! Make sure you head over to our mastermind group for accountability as we work through the challenge together: www.growwithusmastermind.com. Are you feeling motivated and inspired after attending the TpT conference? We hope so! We were honored to present a workshop this year on intentional blogging. The conference is always a great time for gaining new insight and focus to grow your TpT store. But, if you didn't attend the conference, don't worry—we've got you covered! Over the next four weeks, we are embarking on a blogging challenge. If you attended the workshop, you know all about it. If not, that's OK. We are going to provide short podcasts once a week over the next month to walk you through the process of learning to blog intentionally for your TpT business. What this challenge is and what it's not This challenge is not blogging every day for 30 days. We'd never ask you to commit to that. We wouldn't do it ourselves! It's not even about blogging once a week. Last summer we ran a blogging challenge to blog once a week for six weeks. It was rough! So, this year, we are going to focus more on prepping your blog for the entire year. Yes, it's an entire year of blog planning, but it's going to be simplified and goal oriented. We want to help you succeed! This challenge is all about quality over quantity. It's better for you to blog less and create content that you're proud of then to pump out new content that's subpar each week. We don't want you to feel stressed about blogging. Week 1 focus: plan your year Let's be real, half the hassle of blogging is sitting down and trying to figure out what to post about. That's why intentional blogging is so helpful. We talked about it a lot in our conference workshop, but you can also learn more about it in our podcast episode 33. You need to know why you're blogging. What are your goals? Of course, you want to sell everything in your store. But, it's hard to blog about all the resources you have. So, it helps to look at the following things when choosing your focus and finding your sweet spot. Which products in your store are selling really well Areas where a lot of others aren't already selling resources and you are What other teachers consider you an expert on Here's what this looks like on my blog. I have decided to focus on two areas. My first focus is creating blog posts on the products that are selling well that I don't have a lot of blog posts for just yet. I'm going to focus on explaining why teachers should be trying the activities in their classrooms and how to succeed with them. My second area of focus is on creating blog posts around the questions that I'm hearing teachers ask a lot in Facebook groups. Creating an intentional blogging plan Most successful blogs have one particular theme for their blog. It could be a grade level or a certain type of learning style. Something along those lines. Before you start mapping out a year of random blog posts, it's important to choose what you're going to focus on. Decide what area you want people to see you as an expert on. Do not move on from week one until you know what those topics are for you. And, when it comes to planning a schedule, do what works for you. April and I recommend that you shoot for at least one blog post a month, or two if you can do it. Choose what will work the best for your schedule while allowing you to create qua

We are super excited to be continuing our TpT Conference workshop on “intentional blogging” in this new blogging challenge. Over the next four weeks, we will focus on helping you with blog planning to be more intentional with your posts. It doesn’t matter if you attended the conference or not, we want you to participate! […]

We get a lot of blogging questions from TpT sellers. And, since blogging is a great way to grow your audience and sell more products we are going to address one of the most popular questions we get. We are continuing the conversation in our mastermind group so head over to share your blogging tips and ask any related questions: www.growwithusmastermind.com. One of the questions that we hear the most about blogging from TpT sellers is, "What do I blog about?" And, we totally get it. Choosing a blogging topic can be overwhelming because there are so many things that you can blog about. So, today is all about blogging with intention. What is intentional blogging? Intentional blogging is when you really focus on your main niche when writing your blog post. You blog about the things that you are an expert on and stick to it. You think about a call to action for each post and intentionally think about how you craft the post to encourage people to act on that call to action. The purpose of writing a blog post can be to highlight a product, give away a free resource, make a push to get email addresses, or just giving valuable content for your target audience. Both Angie and I used to just blog about whatever we were thinking about. We didn't give it a lot of thought and there wasn't a real strategy. But, if we are going to take the time to write a post and people are taking their time to come and read it, then we want to be purposeful about what we want to accomplish. Blogging intentionally helps you make the best use of your time I have plenty of old blog posts that I'm working through and trying to move towards having a purpose and a call to action. Blog posts can be good for getting traffic to your blog, but when you have little time to work with, you have to be really intentional about what the blog post is geared towards. You want to have a goal for your blogs so you don't just go on a random tangent. Angie shares that blogging doesn't come naturally for her. So, when she is going to blog she wants it to be well worth her time and I couldn't agree more. How to blog intentionally The first step to blogging intentionally that both Angie and I use, is to think of what we wanted to accomplish from our blog post. Ask yourself what action you want people to take after they read your post. Then, work backward. For example, if you have a resource that has lost traction and sales have really dropped off, write a blog post about it. You could give teachers ideas on how to use it in their classroom and even create a freebie from it. This can help to boost sales again. When we create new products, we spend a lot of time promoting them. But, then after a year or two, they start to lose their traction. I like to track my biggest sellers and then when I notice a big drop, I know it's time to make some changes. This could be updating the covers and preview images and writing a really useful blog post that highlights the product. When you look at the data and you're freaking out because something isn't selling, it's nice to know that you can go and write a blog post about it and it will help it gain traction. This doesn't mean it's a quick process. Blogging is more of a long game, but it's nice to feel like you have some control over it. So, instead of sitting and staring at a blank screen trying to decide what to write, start by thinking about what you want to accomplish and work backward. Create a 3 part blog post Sometimes I split my blog post into three parts. The first post is about the topic. It might be a how-to type post or something like that. The second post is something like tips on how teachers are using the resource in the classroom or a "here's what you can do with the resource" type post. The third post is a roundup of quick tips and social m

We get a lot of blogging questions from TpT sellers. And, since blogging is a great way to grow your audience and sell more products we are going to address one of the most popular questions we get. We are continuing the conversation in our mastermind group so head over to share your blogging tips […]

The TpT Conference is coming up and we are discussing everything you need to know. But, if you still have questions about it, join us in the MasterMind discussion too. You can find it at www.growwithusmastermind.com. It's time to get ready for the TpT conference! We'll be there attending and presenting this year and we're super excited. This is our favorite time of year as TpTers. We get to see friends and meet new people. What we love about the conference April and I have the same two things that we love the most about the TpT conference—the people and the renewed energy. The people At home, most people don't really "get" what we do. But, when we arrive at the conference, we are surrounded by people that "get it". They understand exactly what we do and what we deal with, both the good and the bad. Your significant other or family and friends don't really understand how frustrating it is to get a question through the Q&A. They don't know the feeling you get when you hear that notification. The renewed energy When you head home from the conference you take with you so much renewed energy. You'll feel ready to take on the tasks that you need to in order to grow your business again. April attended the first conference but I didn't. I had such FOMO (fear of missing out) after that first year that I haven't missed one since. If the conference is still open for registration when you read this, head over to the site and get signed up! There have been a lot of questions bouncing around in the group, so we are going to answer the most common questions that we're seeing. But, first a little about our workshop This year, April and I are going to be presenting a workshop at the conference. It's called The 30 Day Blogging Challenge. We are going to blog like we're supposed to over this summer and want to invite you to join along with us. During the workshop, we're going to outline everything you need to do in order to blog intentionally and then set up accountability for you when the conference is done. When you leave the conference, you will have a plan in place and know what blog posts you're going to create. During the workshop, we'll be there to help you one-on-one. That's why we love workshops! Once you leave the conference we are going to have three weeks of accountability for you and follow up podcasts. Not able to attend the conference? You can still join in afterward with the podcast episodes and accountability. TpT Conference Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) Q - What should I bring to the conference? Laptop - YES I always bring a laptop to the conference with me, but I don't usually take it to sessions. However, if you're coming to our workshop, it will be helpful for you to bring your laptop to it. It's nice to go back to the room at night and be able to start trying out the things that you're learning. It's also not uncommon to see a group of TpTers sitting around with their laptops out working side-by-side. And, you might meet new people that you want to show something from your store or blog or check out on theirs. Handouts - You decide I used to print out all the handouts beforehand and bring them with me to take notes on. But, now I find that it's more beneficial for me to bring one notebook that I call my "[Year] TpT Conference Notebook". I put all my notes from sessions and workshops in here so I can go over them once I get home. April likes to save all the handouts digitally. She often switches up what workshop she's going to or jumps in on one that has room when she's there. The digital downloads are helpful when they include links. Our workshop is going to have a blog post template organizer. However, we made it a fillable form so y

The TpT Conference is coming up and we are discussing everything you need to know. But, if you still have questions about it, join us in the MasterMind discussion too. You can find it at www.growwithusmastermind.com. It’s time to get ready for the TpT conference! We’ll be there attending and presenting this year and we’re super […]

There is a lot to wrap your head around when building a TpT business. Today we are taking a break from business strategy and honoring TpT spouses. But, if you are looking for answers and tips for your business, head over to our MasterMind group: www.growwithusmastermind.com. If you're building a TpT store, you realize how much work really goes into it. It's not a get-rich-quick type of business (not that those really exist anyway). It takes a lot of time and effort whether you are still teaching in the classroom or not. And, then you add all of your regular life to-do's into the mix and it can feel like something's got to give. Enter, the TpT spouse. TpT spouses are amazing! They do a lot and don't usually get a lot of credit. They support us in our business goals, listen to us stress about things they might not understand, help free up our time so we can work on our business, and some even start to work in the business with us. So, April and I decided that it was time to honor these spouses. We brought on 3 of the TpT husbands that we know so they could share their perspective. Scott: The husband behind the Not So Wimpy Teacher First up on our podcast was Scott the husband behind Jamie at the Not So Wimpy Teacher. When Jamie first started the business, Scott thought of it as a hobby. He that she could use it to maybe earn enough money to cover her TpT expenses. Jamie was a teacher and Scott was working full-time at night as a nurse. At that time they also had four young children at home. He first started helping Jamie out by taking over more of the household chores. Since he worked at night he had a chance to get groceries and clean the house before the kids were home from school. This allowed his wife time to work on her TpT store while she was home in the evening. But, after downloading the app on his phone he started to hear all the cha-chings and realized the potential of the business. He started helping her with pinning so she had more time for creation. Then, he started listening to podcasts and watching tutorials to learn more about it. As the business continued to grow he was able to cut back on his nursing shifts to take on more of the tasks for the business, eventually quitting his job altogether. Scott now handles Facebook and Pinterest advertising for the store as well as the finances and technical issues. Favorite things about the TpT business Scott admitted it's the best career he's ever had. He enjoys having more time at home and no longer misses his kids' concerts or games. And, he gets to spend more time with his wife. He also loves that there is always something new to learn. Advice for others When working with your spouse, make sure you know what your roles are so you aren't always second-guessing each other. Scott and Jamie use the Wunderlist app to keep track of their business to-dos. This helps to keep their business life and personal life separate. Instead of talking about business all day long this allows them to add things they think of to the app to address once they are working again. Peter: The husband behind Performing in Education Peter is April's husband and also a high school government teacher. He admitted that he was not

If you're building a TpT store, you realize how much work really goes into it. It's not a get-rich-quick type of business (not that those really exist anyway). It takes a lot of time and effort whether you are still teaching in the classroom or not. And, then you add all of your regular life to-do's into the mix and it can feel like something's got to give. Enter, the TpT spouse.