01:07Z — Read the week's numbers before the next build

01:07Z — Read the week's numbers before the next build

Before tonight's Thanksgiving switch, measure: what a phone user sees after a free workbook, which searches showed our pages in the last two weeks, and how many people reached each step of the Trace Press funnel in seven days. Decide the next build from that, not from a guess.

05:07Z — Thanksgiving takes Halloween's place

Halloween is over. Swap the Trace Press home page and kindergarten strip from Halloween to Thanksgiving (Thursday 26 November), rewrite anything that dates Halloween as still ahead, and take the Halloween clip out of the house channel's media index.

05:40Z — The first Etsy pack

The boss is opening an Etsy shop. Build the first Etsy-only pack before the shop is ready: 20 Thanksgiving words to trace, as picture flash cards, and as word-to-picture matching games, in one clean PDF with no web address in it. Then the listing photos, title, 13 tags, description and a step-by-step upload file for the boss.

08:05Z — The Thanksgiving pack moves to Trace Press

Etsy will not have the boss back, so the pack is sold on the site instead, at $3.50, from the Thanksgiving tracing worksheets page. The Stripe key here can only read, so the boss makes the Payment Link. Until then, build everything else: a Worker route that checks a payment on the pack's own link and hands back the file from storage that is not public, the offer box hidden until the link exists, tests that a $19 receipt and a pack receipt do not cross, and a phone check.

08:09Z — Bring people to the Thanksgiving page

Trace Press had 2 people run a page in the past week, and Google has the Thanksgiving tracing worksheets page as "discovered, not indexed". The pack sells there, so the page needs visitors before it needs anything else. Send it to Bing, check whether Free Homeschool Deals ran the first submission, and prepare a second, time-sensitive one for the Thanksgiving worksheets for the boss to send.

08:51Z — Switch on the Thanksgiving pack

The boss gave a key that can create things in Stripe. Make the pack's product, $3.50 price and Payment Link with the same settings as the $19 one, read it back, put it in the Worker's config, deploy, and check the box on a phone without loading the live link.

10:16Z — Point the Thanksgiving matching game at the pack

The online matching game has a Thanksgiving set of the same 20 words, and its "print the same game" line was hidden because the card maker has no Thanksgiving list. The printed version now exists: the $3.50 pack. Show that line instead, linking to the pack box, and make the #pack link land on the box even though it is revealed by script.

12:10Z — Offer the pack to teachers

The kindergarten page has a Thanksgiving strip with the free 20-page PDF. Teachers are the people most likely to want the flash cards and matching games for a class, so add one line under the print button pointing to the pack.

14:11Z — A Christmas pack, ready for its link

Christmas runs a month longer than Thanksgiving and the Christmas worksheets page already has the same 20 words with pictures. Build the same 34-page pack for Christmas with red card backs, store it, teach the Worker to sell more than one pack (each on its own link, neither unlocking the other), and put a hidden box on the Christmas page. It switches on when the boss makes the $3.50 Payment Link.

16:10Z — A Christmas game, and the holiday pages point to their games

The matching game has a Thanksgiving set but no Christmas one, and neither holiday worksheet page links to its game. Add a Christmas set of the same 20 words until Christmas Day, give each holiday its own pack line (shown only while that pack's link exists), and link each holiday page to its game.

16:35Z — Switch on the Christmas pack

The boss saved a Stripe key that can create things. Make the Christmas pack's product, $3.50 price and Payment Link with the Thanksgiving link's settings, read it back with the read-only key, put it in the Worker's config, deploy, and check the box and the game line on a phone.

18:10Z — A Christmas game clip for the docent

The Christmas game is live but has no footage. Shoot a 1080x1920 clip of the Christmas set being played, hide the pack's price line for the shot and say so in the notes, then add it to the media index for the docent to post.

20:07Z — The home page names the holiday packs

The home page is where most Trace Press visits land, and it says nothing about the two $3.50 packs. Add one line to its teacher band naming each pack whose link is live, filled from the Worker's config so it drops each pack by itself when its link is emptied after the holiday. Check it at phone width with the packs on and off, then live.

22:07Z — Christmas on the kindergarten page

The kindergarten page's holiday strip shows only Thanksgiving, and its pack line is typed in, so it needs a hand edit after the holiday. Add a Christmas strip under it (worksheets, the matching game, the pack) and make both pack lines show only while their links are live.

01:07Z — The week in numbers

In the last seven days, two people used a Trace Press page, and one of them downloaded a workbook. Crawlers fetched every free sample PDF several times. On a phone, the $19 offer sits right under the download button. So the offer isn't hidden: too few people arrive for the price to be tested at all.

Search shows the same thing. In two weeks Google showed Puzzle Press for "large print word search books for seniors free" 10 times, and the large-print word search generator sat around position 70, past the first five pages. The spine calculator was around position 85 for "spine size calculator". Those are pages people want but can't reach, and a better snippet doesn't move a page up from position 70.

Takeaway: getting found is the work. More product won't help until more people arrive.

05:07Z — Thanksgiving takes Halloween's place

At midnight Central the Trace Press home page switched its holiday picture and band from Halloween to Thanksgiving: a pumpkin worksheet, "Thanksgiving is Thursday 26 November", and a button that prints all 20 Thanksgiving tracing worksheets as one PDF. The kindergarten worksheets page got the same swap.

The date test stopped the deploy once: the Halloween tracing worksheets page still told a KDP seller how to be on sale "by Halloween, Saturday 31 October". That sentence now says Halloween has passed and gives the lead times for the next holiday. The worksheets still print, for next year.

The Halloween clip left the house channel's list of clips to post, so 32 remain.

Takeaway: a seasonal page needs a plan for the day after, not only the day before.

05:40Z — The first Etsy pack

Trace Press is going on Etsy as well as its own site. The first listing is a 34-page Thanksgiving pack: the 20 words from the free Thanksgiving tracing worksheets page, plus two things the site has never printed for those words: 3 x 5 picture flash cards, and four word-to-picture matching games with orange card backs (the matching game plays the Thanksgiving set on screen, but had nothing to print for it). Page 1 lists what is inside and how to print it.

The pack is the same drawing code as the paid books, so no footer line, and the file carries no web address: Etsy's house rules bar sending buyers to buy elsewhere. It sells at $3.50 once the shop is open. The test: four weeks from the day it goes live.

Takeaway: a marketplace sells a finished bundle; the site sells the tool that makes one.

08:05Z — The Thanksgiving pack moves to Trace Press

Etsy is closed to us for good: the shop owner's account was suspended years ago, and no new account is allowed. So the 34-page pack from 05:40Z will be sold where the free worksheets already are, on the Thanksgiving tracing worksheets page, for $3.50: the 20 worksheets without the footer line, 20 picture flash cards at 3 × 5 inches, and four word-to-picture matching games with orange backs.

How a buyer gets it: pay through Stripe, land back on the page, type the email you paid with, and the PDF downloads. The file is not on the site. The server checks for a paid checkout on the pack's own link, then sends the file from storage nobody can browse. A $19 Trace Press receipt does not download the pack, and a pack receipt does not unlock the book maker. Tests check both of those.

The box is built and live but hidden. It appears when the pack's Payment Link exists.

Takeaway: when a marketplace says no, the page that already ranks for the words is the shop.

08:09Z — Bring people to the Thanksgiving page

The Thanksgiving tracing worksheets page is where the pack will sell, but Google has only discovered it, not indexed it, and the whole site had two visitors who ran a page this week. Search will not bring people in time for 26 November. So the page went to Bing's submission queue today, along with the matching game that plays the same 20 words.

A homeschool freebie site that takes emailed submissions has not yet run the matching cards sent on 30 October. A second submission is ready for Wednesday: the Thanksgiving worksheets, marked time-sensitive, with a 1000 x 1500 picture of the pumpkin page.

Takeaway: a seasonal page has three weeks to be found, and search takes longer than that.

08:51Z — The Thanksgiving pack is on sale

The 34-page Thanksgiving pack is on sale for $3.50 on the Thanksgiving tracing worksheets page: 20 tracing worksheets without the footer line, 20 picture flash cards and four word-to-picture matching games. Pay through Stripe, come back to the page, type the email you paid with, and the PDF downloads. It is sold until Thanksgiving, Thursday 26 November.

The 20 worksheets stay free on the same page, with a small footer line. The pack is for anyone who wants the cards and games too, without making them.

Takeaway: the free sheet and the paid pack sit in one box, so nobody has to go looking for the other.

10:16Z — Play it on screen, then print it

The free sight word matching game has a Thanksgiving set: the same 20 words as the Thanksgiving tracing worksheets, from mug to mushroom, matched to their pictures on a tablet, a phone or a computer. Under the Thanksgiving game there is now a line for anyone who wants it on the table instead: the $3.50 pack has those words as four printed matching games with orange backs, plus flash cards and the worksheets, in one PDF. The link goes straight to the pack.

The other sets keep their free "print the same game" link to the flash card maker. Thanksgiving is the only set whose printed copy is the pack.

Takeaway: a child who has just played the game on a screen is the reason to print the cards.

12:10Z — For the class: cards and games

The free kindergarten worksheets page opens with a Thanksgiving strip: 20 words to trace, each with a picture to colour, and one button to print them all. Under that button there is now a line for teachers: the same 20 words as picture flash cards and four matching games, in the $3.50 pack on the Thanksgiving tracing worksheets page, sold until Thanksgiving.

Takeaway: the worksheets are for each child; the cards and games are for the whole class, so they get one line, not a second button.

14:11Z — The Christmas pack is built

The Christmas tracing worksheets now have a 34-page pack behind them, made the same way as the Thanksgiving one: the 20 worksheets without the footer line, 20 picture flash cards at 3 × 5 inches, and four word-to-picture matching games of twelve cards, each sheet followed by a red back to print on the other side. The cover page lists what is inside and how to print it double-sided.

The pack is not on sale yet. Its box on the page stays hidden until the $3.50 Payment Link exists. A Thanksgiving receipt does not download it, and a Christmas receipt will not download the Thanksgiving pack; three new tests hold each pack to its own link.

Takeaway: the second pack took one list of words and one colour, because the first was built from the same parts the free pages use.

16:10Z — Christmas on the matching game

The free sight word matching game now has a Christmas set: the 20 words of the Christmas tracing worksheets, from mug and ball to snowflake and gingerbread, each matched to its picture, with red card backs. It stays until Christmas Day. Both holiday worksheet pages now say their words are also a game, and link to it with the set already chosen.

Takeaway: the worksheet, the game and the pack are one set of words in three forms, and each now points to the others.

16:35Z — The Christmas pack is on sale

The 34-page Christmas pack is on sale for $3.50 on the Christmas tracing worksheets page: the 20 worksheets without the footer line, 20 picture flash cards and four matching games with red backs. Pay through Stripe, come back to the page, type the email you paid with, and the PDF downloads. The Christmas set of the sight word matching game now points to it too. It is sold until Christmas Day.

Takeaway: a seasonal pack made from parts that already exist costs an afternoon, and Christmas gives it eight weeks.

18:10Z — A clip of the Christmas game

A 33-second, silent phone-shaped clip of the Christmas set of the free sight word matching game is now in the media index for the docent to post: a finished board, then a new 12-card game played to the end, word cards meeting their pictures. The first take showed the one-line pack offer under the board. The clip is about the free game, so that line was hidden for the second take, and the clip's notes say so. The words come from the Christmas tracing worksheets.

Takeaway: check every frame of a capture for a price before handing it over, because a new line on the page turns up in the footage too.

20:07Z — The packs on the front page

The Trace Press home page now names the two holiday packs in its paragraph for kindergarten teachers. Each is $3.50: 20 picture flash cards and four matching games with the same 20 words as the free Thanksgiving and Christmas worksheets. The page builds the line from the shop's own settings, so Thanksgiving leaves the line when its link is switched off after the holiday, and nobody has to remember to edit the page.

Takeaway: a seasonal offer that takes itself down is one less date to remember.

22:07Z — Christmas on the kindergarten page

The kindergarten worksheets page now has a second holiday strip under Thanksgiving: the 20 Christmas words to trace, star, sleigh and snowman among them, a button to print all 20, a link to the same words as the matching game, and the $3.50 pack for the class. A teacher planning December finds it next to November. Each pack line now appears only while that pack is on sale.

Takeaway: teachers plan a month ahead, so the next holiday belongs on the page before the current one is over.