Tools for Teaching.

Over the last decade, I have been a “demo junkie.” If a company offered a free demo, I took it. If they offered a free introductory call… sign me up! I’ve tried a lot of programs and tools available to online course creators. In the last year, I’ve shifted from trying programs to simplifying and dialing in my process, shedding my subscriptions to only what I genuinely use and love. The list below is my daily drivers. Some of these contain affiliate links.

Hosting:

Kajabi - Free 30 Day Trial (normally 15 days)

Teachable - Although I no longer host my current courses through Teachable, there are many things that I miss about it. I’ll highlight those soon!

Squarespace - Squarespace is the tried-and-true friend who's always got your back. I tried a different platform for a while because I thought I was taking my site “to the next level,” and I regretted it each day until I switched back. I needed a web designer and developer to help me navigate plugins and maintenance, and I felt a total loss of control. Now that I’m back at Squarespace, you can probably hear my sigh of relief from where you are sitting. I’m back in the driver’s seat and can make changes as I wish.

Recording and Editing:

Descript - My list of software for recording and editing used to be a lot longer. I’d record in one program, extract the audio to fix it in another, create captions in another… you get it. Putting together one lesson felt like scaling a mountain. Now…I record, edit, and create subtitles, all in Descript. It’s a fairly new software that is evolving, like including overdub voice generation to correct a word or two when I say something wrong.

Content and Emails:

Grammarly - The more I'm glued to my desk, the more typos I unleash. I used to embrace my typos and even dubbed myself the "Typo Queen," but to be honest, it's not a great look for professionalism. Grammarly has happily dethroned me. Now, we the advances in AI, I use Grammarly’s “Grammarly Go” to help me rethink my sentence structure or change the tone of my paragraph. This is especially helpful if I’m having difficulty being diplomatic when dealing with a tough customer.

ConvertKit + Kajabi - I’ve used ConvertKit for years (and loved it), but now I use Kajabi exclusively for my online course emails.

Visuals:

Canva - No surprise here! Canva has been my go-to for creating Instagram images, YouTube thumbnails, and PDF lead magnets.

Gear:

Elgato Stream Deck - I use my Elgato Stream Deck every hour of my workday. I’ve preprogrammed sites and programs that I visit often to correspond with each button. When I sit down at my desk in the morning, I press the top four buttons to open four pages and programs that I start my daily routine with (sales spreadsheet, Stripe page, email, and Meta (to answer Instagram messages).

Apple iPhone 15 Pro Max, MacBook Pro, and iPad Pro - I’m sure I’m not using these to their full potential, but they surely make my work life easier and more fun. I love the ability to switch between them seamlessly, depending on how mobile I am.

Some of these are affiliate links that cost you nothing extra but may provide a small commission to me if you choose to purchase using them. It’s part of what keeps TammyTeaches.Online is up and running; thanks for your support!