The Rebranded Teacher
The Rebranded Teacher
4 TpT Seller Tips from Selling on Teachers Pay Teachers for 8 Years
Have you ever wondered what it takes to transform your Teachers Pay Teachers (TPT) business into a thriving, sustainable enterprise? Join me, Lauren Fulton, as I reveal the key strategies that successful seller entrepreneurs have used to achieve remarkable growth. With over eight years of experience in the TPT marketplace, I share insights into creating high-quality resources that captivate and retain buyers. From investing in professional clip art to crafting clear instructions, learn how these elements elevate your products and make them indispensable in teachers' daily routines. Discover practical techniques, such as projectable daily slides, that seamlessly embed your offerings into educational workflows, ensuring repeat purchases and increased customer loyalty.
Navigating the complexities of trademark and copyright laws is crucial for expanding your business beyond TPT, and I provide essential guidance to help you avoid costly legal pitfalls. As market dynamics shift and seller interactions become more regulated, staying compliant is more important than ever. I explore the value of venturing outside the TPT community to gain fresh perspectives from other industries, which can spark innovative strategies and prevent stagnation. This episode equips you with actionable steps and fresh ideas to propel your TPT business towards sustained, long-term growth. Don't miss this opportunity to learn from my journey and apply these insights to your own entrepreneurial path.
Welcome to the Rebranded Teacher Podcast. My name is Lauren Fulton. I'm a full-time teacher, author and seller on Teachers Pay Teachers, and I help other teacher entrepreneurs grow their TPT businesses in a way that's purposeful and sustainable. So if you're looking for actionable, step-by-step ways to grow your business, you're in the right place. Let's get started. I'm going to be sharing some tips for selling on Teachers Pay Teachers. This is coming from someone who has eight years worth of selling experience, two stores and multiple successful online businesses, including those two TPT stores.
Speaker 1:Here are some things that I think every TPT seller should know when it comes to successfully growing your TPT or Teachers Pay Teachers business. Number one we're going to start off really basic, but make sure that you stay to the end, because I'm going to be giving you a tip that I don't think I've ever talked about on this channel, but I think is really important, especially as I'm growing in my TPT business journey and I'm learning more and more about the industry. But let's start with the basics. First of all, you want to make sure you're creating high quality resources, and if you've been a seller for a while, you've heard that before you know. The thing is true, but I feel like it needs to be said, especially for those of you who are just getting started make sure you are not skimping on the quality of your resources. You don't want to be skimping on your clip art. You don't want to be skimping on making your pages look professional, creating high quality directions and, overall, just presenting a very polished and professional resource to your buyer. These are going to be the things that, while your buyer isn't necessarily thinking about it consciously, these are going to be kind of subconscious signals to your buyer about the quality of your resource before they even use the resource. So if they open up your product and they immediately kind of see something that is jumbled or created in Microsoft Word and it doesn't look very nice, neat, polished, professional, while they might have a good experience with the resource itself, there's a good chance that immediately, whether they realize it or not, they're already assessing the quality of the product they purchased, just based on some of those extra things that most buyers don't really think about, like the terms of use pages or maybe even your credits page, or whether or not you're offering them a free resource Whenever they open a product that is very high quality, has really clear, beautiful directions for them and makes everything so much easier for them to use. Whether that is doing something as simple as creating a table of contents page within your larger resource so that they can click and they can get to the specific content page that they want to get to. Whether it's something as simple as that, or just making sure that your pages look beautiful and aesthetically pleasing and are easy to navigate, those are things that are subconsciously signaling to your buyer that your work is high quality and, over time, those are going to be things that are going to help increase your ratings, improve your repeat customer base and all of those phenomenal things that you need for your store to be successful.
Speaker 1:So don't skimp on polishing those products up. Don't just stick up the things that you have made for your classroom. Make sure, pretty them up, put your copyright on it, create your terms of use page, create very clear directions, even for an activity that you think might be simple, or provide additional resources and support for someone who might need it. So I gave you the example earlier of putting in like a table of contents page if you have a longer resource, but there are also things that you can do that you can provide that are just extras. So if I am creating task cards, most teachers are going to know how to use task cards. So you might not think to provide tutorials or instructions for that. But you never know that you might have a brand new teacher who knows how to pass out task cards and have students work on them, but doesn't know how to make those task cards engaging. So you can provide resources, materials, ideas for them and how they can make your product more engaging or have a more seamless experience with your resource.
Speaker 1:Okay, the next thing that you want to do is you want to create strategically. Now, hear me out on this, because some of you guys here create strategically and you think I'm about to tell you something that you've heard 5 million times and I am, but then I'm also going to tell you something that you might not have heard before. So listen carefully. Creating strategically is creating resources that you know buyers can only purchase from you, so that you're increasing the chances that they're going to come back and they're going to purchase products from your store. Yes, that is creating strategically. Creating resources that are going to stand out in an oversaturated market yes. Conducting market research to make sure a resource can sell before you purchase it. Yes, absolutely.
Speaker 1:All of those things are important, but let me tell you something that you might not have thought about before when it comes to creating resources strategically, and that is, if you want to improve your repeat customer base, you want to create resources that buyers can only get from you and they can incorporate as part of their everyday routine. For example, instead of just creating a set of printable warmups, I can make them projectable daily slides so that every single day, the teacher has a habit of turning on that slide projecting the morning work on the board and students know to look for it there. In my particular market, it's not unheard of to have warm-up slides or to have them available, but for those to be an option that are standards-based for every single day of the year. Yeah, I'm not saying it doesn't exist, but I've never seen them. So those are the kind of things that, once you get a buyer to incorporate your product in their everyday routine, they are going to continue to purchase that product from you because they need it.
Speaker 1:In order for it to be a part of their routine, it doesn't have to necessarily be something like warmups or exit tickets or homework. It could also be something like classroom decor. It could be something as simple as creating a system or an outline for classroom decor that makes it really easy for teachers to change out seasonal items while the main components all stay the same. So, for example, like maybe you have the same exact theme for the entire year, but when November rolls around, they change out the month and they add in some seasonal pumpkins or things like that in order to make it more seasonal. But without having to redo all of their decor, without having to redo their entire bulletin board, they can still make things more festive during seasonal parts of the year while sticking with the routine that they've created or the system that you've created for them. This is going to keep them coming back to you because you have found a way to make their life easier. It would be more difficult for them to switch to something else than it would be for them to just go ahead and continue purchasing from you. I've given the example of classroom decor. Would be for them to just go ahead and continue purchasing from you. I've given the example of classroom decor warmups, exit tickets, homework, things like that.
Speaker 1:It can also be as simple as talking to your audience about creating strategies to incentivize students, so you can share with them strategies for utilizing your products to incentivize reluctant learners. So in my world this might look like hey, one of the things that I did was, at the end of every single unit, we did a mini mystery. And my students loved these mini mysteries and they knew that when we got to the end of the unit they were going to get to do a mystery. And if we got to the end of the unit, we didn't do a mystery. They were upset and disappointed, and that's why I created all of these so it becomes part of the routine, it becomes part of the structure of their teaching and of their learning environment, and so there are different ways that you can strategize that. But you really want to think strategically about how can I take this ordinary product that, yes, will make this teacher's life easier, but how can I tweak it, or even just tweak my marketing around it, in such a way that this resource becomes a part of their daily, weekly or monthly routine, so that it doesn't make sense for them to go anywhere else to get another product? Okay, so that is something really simple but extremely powerful when it comes to creating a repeat customer base that can skyrocket your business.
Speaker 1:Let's go on to number three and let's talk about doing your own research. Even within a niche, there are some things that might sell really well for someone who has a very similar audience base. It might sell really well for them, but it doesn't sell well for me, and maybe that's just because of a way that they've prefaced this, maybe it's because of the way they've rolled something out. Maybe it's because they have the exact same group of teachers, but those teachers are looking for something very specific and have come to learn to look for something very specific from that seller, and so it could be a variety of reasons. But just understand that just because something is doing really well for someone else does not mean it's going to do well for you. You need to conduct your own research about what your audience wants, what teachers want, what buyers are looking for but can't find. This is going to save you a lot of time on creating resources that your buyers never wanted to begin with, but it was just something that you wanted to make, or you saw somebody else have success with it and you wanted to give it a try. This could also potentially cut down on a lot of stress and anxiety.
Speaker 1:There are a lot of sellers who see somebody else doing something and they're like, oh, I want to try that or I want to do this, and they don't realize that maybe that seller has a specific license to utilize a trademark or a brand or something like that for example, like Bitmoji and they don't realize like, oh, this person has a license to use this inside of their products and I don't right, right. And then you create the resource, thinking everything is good because they're doing it and they're doing it successfully and they're not getting in trouble for it. But then you start to create it and all of a sudden, this resource that you've sold and made hundreds or thousands of dollars on, not only is it taken down and you lose the income from that, but you potentially oftentimes have to pay that money back to the buyers, and so that can create kind of a financial crisis, right, and I've talked to many sellers who have done this over the years where once upon a time I would say, you know, when I started back, like eight years ago other sellers who owned trademarks or had a license to use a trademark they were a little bit more patient and maybe more gracious than they needed to be and they might reach out to you directly and just be like, hey, can you take this down? And you would take it down, and it wasn't the end of the world. But nowadays the market is so saturated, there are so many sellers on TPT and there are so many people who are, whether unknowingly or knowingly, trying to like cheat and break the rules right. Most of the time I think they don't realize that what they're doing is problematic or that they're infringing on a trademark. But it's so widespread that the people who have a license to use the trademark or who own the trademark they don't have the time to just reach out, so they just report it to TPT and they go through the system and you can get in a lot of trouble for infringing on a trademark or copyright.
Speaker 1:So you really need to make sure you're doing your own research and not just looking and seeing like, well, this person's using a Disney character, so I can use a Disney character. Or this clip artist made this clip art, so it must be fine to use Any kind of a doubt. Or you're creating something based on someone else's work or you're using someone else's characters or someone else's content. Just be extra careful and do your research ahead of time, because it can save you a lot of headache, a lot of stress, a lot of money. But in the long run, this is also going to just help you build a better business, because if I'm creating resources based off my own research, then I know that I'm creating something that my audience is going to love. It's not going to get taken down, so I'm not wasting my time and it's just going to have a much more positive long-term impact on my business. Number four and this is the one that I don't think I've talked about a lot, but it can be a really big game changer once you get to a certain point in your business. Number four and this is the one that I don't think I've talked about a lot, but it can be a really big game changer once you get to a certain point in your business, and that is branch outside of your immediate industry.
Speaker 1:When you first start selling on Teachers Pay Teachers, it is really in your best interest to consume a lot of content that is specific to TPT sellers and selling on Teachers Pay Teachers. Right, I'm not gonna go and pay thousands of dollars to learn from a marketing guru about how to market on TikTok in the very beginning, because I really want to just learn how to create resources, how to navigate the TPT website, optimize my keywords and SEO and all of that good stuff specifically for TPT. So in the beginning, it's in my best interest to really stick to TPT-related content and content created by TPT business owners. After a while, though, once you get to a certain point in your business, it is really really beneficial to start to look outside of this space. Yes, still stay abreast of current best practices. Yes, still talk to people inside the industry, because we're walking through the same thing that you're walking through and we can grow and learn from each other and there's space for all of us to be successful.
Speaker 1:But the longer I've been in the online business space, the more I'm learning that there is a lot to learn from people outside of this business space. It doesn't mean that they're smarter or brighter. It just means a lot of times they're doing things a little bit differently and we can kind of get stuck in this wheelhouse of like we're all listening to the same podcasts, we're all watching the same YouTube videos, we're all reading the same books, and so we're all working the same strategies. So kind of branching outside of that and collaborating or having conversations with other business owners who are maybe in the online marketing space or selling digital products just not to teachers for your business because you're going to start to learn new strategies or have new, fresh ideas that are not currently being utilized by everyone in this space and that can be super beneficial, you guys, because past a certain point, you kind of get inside of like this little echo chamber in the TPT world and this happens in every industry but you kind of get inside this little echo chamber.
Speaker 1:Everybody has the same complaints, everyone has the same frustrations and most people have the same perceived limitations for their business. So when you kind of branch outside of that, your world kind of opens up to a lot more strategies, possibilities and you start to have some really great eye-opening conversations with people in other businesses. Those people are also not afraid to share their secrets with you because you're not a direct competitor and so there might be something that someone in the TPT space is doing that they don't want to share and so they're telling you kind of like that grandma's recipe sort of thing. They're telling you the basic recipe, but they're not telling you that they're sprinkling flake salt on top of their cookies, right? Or they're not telling you that there's nutmeg inside of that fried chicken or whatever it is that unexpected ingredient. They're kind of leaving it out, holding it back, giving you all the main things but kind of holding the rest back for themselves because, honestly, they're smart business owners and they don't want to share all of their secrets with people who are going to be competing with them. But when you kind of step outside of that space, those walls sort of drop a little bit because you're talking to people who are not your direct competition, and so you start to share some of your better ideas and some of the things that you've kind of been holding a little bit more closely to your chest, and you can gain a lot of fabulous insights and ideas for your business that way.
Speaker 1:Okay, so let's recap real quick. Number one focus on creating those quality resources and making sure that your resource, start to finish, looks polished and professional, so that you are both consciously and subconsciously demonstrating the quality of your work to your buyer. Number two you want to make sure you're creating strategically. Think not only about like can somebody buy this from anyone else on the market? And if so like if they can get it anywhere why would they want to get it from me? So, thinking about how ways to make your resource stand out in a saturated market, but also thinking about ways to make your product a part of your buyer's life so that they continue to come back. Number three making sure that you do your own research. You're not relying on the research and experience of others to conduct your business, but you are searching the matter out and you're doing your own research when it comes to copyrights, trademarks or even just what types of products to create. And then finally, number four when you get to a point where you are feeling pretty confident in what you've learned on TPT, start branching out and mingling online or in person with other business owners in the online space that are not a part of the TPT industry, because it can make a huge difference in your business. So there are four things that I've learned in the last eight years of selling on.
Speaker 1:Teachers Pay Teachers. Thanks so much for being here. You guys, if you enjoyed the podcast, be sure to share it. Share it with your teacherpreneur friends. No-transcript. You right back here next week.