Let’s Make a Logo and Personalize Your TPT Store Together

Making your TPT store attractive with a branded theme can help you gain a following of repeat customers who know what to expect when they shop in your store. But nobody is going to pay you for a store that looks good. Designing logos and store banners can steal a lot of your time from the real work – creating products. Let’s get your TPT store looking great without wasting hours of your time that could be spent adding new resources.

 

I’ll walk you through each step of designing the images you’ll need and then at the end, how to upload them all to your store.

 

Disclaimer: I have NO formal training in graphic design. I have watched a kajillion YouTube videos, read a bajillion articles, and spent time working through ideas trial-and-error-style. This is my best advice, but I’m sure it’s not perfect.

 

Step 1: Choose Your Program

Canva is a great tool for making your own logo and matching banners, product thumbnails, etc. You can use it for free and it’s very user-friendly. Canva is available on every device and has free graphics, fonts, animations, and more for you to customize your work in every way. Sign up on canva.com for a free teacher account. 

If you’re not interested in using Canva, you can also use Powerpoint or Google Slides. You will not be able to save GIF files, so you won’t have moving images in your store.

 

 

 

Step 2: Design a Logo for your TPT Store

Let’s get started by customizing the size of the picture we’ll be creating. In Canva, click Custom Size and set it to 500 x 500 pixels (px).

 

In PowerPoint or Google Slides, go to Page Setup and adjust the size to 500×500 pixels.

Pick two to three colours. One for your background, one for text (if any), and possibly one for images. Don’t get stuck spending too much time choosing colours yet. You can change them later and you might find that you’ll want to choose them based on the graphics you find. Look up the colour codes so you can use the same colours in future graphics.

Go to elements and search for circle. Insert a plain circle and make it your chosen background colour. Stretch it so it fills the square.

 

Pick two easy-to-read fonts. It helps to double-check your fonts with others – sometimes you stare at something for so long it’s hard to tell. 

 

Choose your graphics. You can import images you have found on pixabay.com or other free image sites or you can choose from Canva’s selection of free images.

 

 

 

 

Play around with it. Duplicate the page and try changing the colours. Click Styles to try Canva’s automatic colour and font combinations. Make a few duplications and as you start to narrow down your favourite elements, write down the colour codes and fonts you use. Knowing the colour codes will help you match the exact same colours in the rest of your branded content.

 

 

 

 

Download your logo! You’ll want to download a copy as a PNG file with a transparent background. This will let you layer your logo on top of other pictures without the square background. 

 

 

 

Organization Tip: I recommend making a folder for TPT and a subfolder for Brand Images, Product Thumbnails, Published Products, and Future Products.

 

 

Step 3: Make an animated leaderboard

 

This part is the header of your store. It sits just above your featured items. It is a picture that has a link attached so customers can click on it. You could link to a particular resource or a category of your resources, such as Math. This is one part of my store that I don’t want to have to change, so I have mine set to my most recent resources and I leave it that way. You’ll add the link later. For now, let’s design the banner.

 

Set your design size to 718 x 90 pixels.

 

Choose one of your brand colours for the background. Type in the colour code for an exact match.

 

Add a call to action such as “Click here to see my latest resources”. Add graphics if you wish.

 

Animate the text in Canva. People’s eyes are drawn to movement. Having moving graphics in your store will draw attention.

 

 

 

Download your leaderboard as a .gif file.

 

 

Step 4: Make a TPT Store Page Column Banner

 

I use this one to advertise my Instagram handle but you can choose to link it to your most recent products or one of your custom categories. It’s a great place to feature your logo again because the one at the top is not visible once you’ve scrolled down this far.

 

Repeat Step 3 but the size will be 160 x 200 pixels.

 

Choose a background colour, add your logo (the PNG file with the transparent background so you have just the circle and not the square around it). Add a call to action. Save as a PNG or a GIF if you animate it.

 

 

Step 5: Make a Scrolling GIF for Your Quote Box

 

This is great for quickly advertising some of your bestselling products, introducing yourself, or inviting customers to your blog/website. If you don’t have many products yet, I would suggest skipping this step for now, or creating one image to upload as a PNG file. Remember – spending a lot of time here is not the most valuable use of your time. 

 

Set the size of your canvas to 452 x 157 pixels.

 

Design your first slide and then add another page. You can duplicate your first page or add a blank one. 

 

Only one link is able to be added when you upload the file. Again – try to make this scrolling banner so you will not have to change it. If you have custom categories assigned to your products, you could link to one of them. You could also change the “sort by” feature to show your most recent products and use that link.

 

 

 

Add animations and preview your file. Make sure the slides are shown long enough to read any important text. (Low text is more effective!) 

 

Save your file as a GIF.

 

Step 6: Upload all of your images to Teachers Pay Teachers.

 

On your dashboard, click “Edit My Profile” to upload your logo. 

 

 

 

If you’ve finished Step 5, change “Personal Quote” from text to Image/Link. Make the text say “Click here” or something similar. Upload your GIF. Add the link you’ve chosen.

 

Go back to your dashboard. Go to the Marketing tab. Click Customize.

 

 

 

Upload your PNG files and insert links. If you don’t have a specific link in mind, linking to your Most Recent products is a good bet. (See Step 5.)

 

 

 

Step 7: Make a Growing Document of Product Thumbnails

 

Square files work best for product thumbnails, so you can start with a 500 x 500 pixel canvas.

 

To give your products a uniform look, make one basic background. Upload and add your logo to one corner or as a stripe on one side. Duplicate that page and add pictures and text for each individual product. Keep text to a minimum but make your title big. It will be much harder to see as a small square and you want it to be clear and eye-catching.

 

Use screenshots or a screen clipping tool to take pictures of parts of your product and add them. People like to see what they’re getting. 

 

 

Now you’re all set! Your TPT store looks professional. You’ve got a base thumbnail ready to customize for any future products. Your brand files are organized. Now you can put your time into the most valuable place – creating new, quality products to add to your store.