Welcome to October's edition of Publisher Showcase, where each month we spotlight standout publishers in the Nitro network building valuable tools and resources for gaming communities around the world.

This edition features TFT Academy, co-founded by Amer “Kite”, whose years of experience in gaming media and close collaboration with pro players laid the foundation for the site. Created alongside TFT legends Frodan and Dishsoap, TFT Academy has quickly become a go-to destination for strategy-driven, educational content that helps players truly level up.

Keep reading to see how a bold idea turned into a go-to resource for TFT players everywhere 👇

First up, can you tell us a bit about your career/life background that led you to start TFT Academy?

Hi, I’m Amer, but online, people know me as Kite. I’m the “vision guy” behind TFT Academy.com I’ve been in the gaming and content space for years, running a media agency that creates content for top gaming creators, mainly in TFT.

Working closely with pro players and streamers gave me a deep understanding of the community, what kind of content players actually find useful, and where the gaps are. That experience naturally led to the creation of TFT Academy as a way to take high-quality, educational TFT content from video format to a wider audience through a web experience.

What drove you to create TFT Academy? Did you see a specific gap in the market? Was there a particular insight that motivated you to launch it?

The educational content just wasn’t there for TFT. Most sites focused on raw stats with no explanation or context, and that led to a lot of “noob traps.” For example, you’d see an item like Zephyr showing a high win rate, but that’s only because it performs well when built late in the game.

If you built it early, it could actually hurt your chances, but the stats alone didn’t tell you that. We wanted to fix that by creating a site that explains why things work, not just what the numbers say.

How long have you been running your website and how long did it take from development until it was live?

I asked Frodan on September 4th, 2023, to start a website with me. Within a few weeks, we had Dishsoap on board and immediately started looking for developers. It took around five months for the first version to go live in March, and honestly, it sucked.

Like, looking back, it’s insane to me that people actually liked it. But it just goes to show that if the core idea is good and solves a real problem, people will use it regardless of how rough the first version looks. So just work on getting it out and fix it up after.

How did you decide on the specific features and tools available onTFT Academy?

We wanted content that was easy to understand, regardless of your skill level. The tier list format worked perfectly as our core feature, it’s simple, familiar, and instantly useful.

Everything else we built on top of that was designed to make the information around it more helpful and touched on everything a player might need in-game.

How were you able to build a strong online presence for the website? (e.g. SEO, forums, PPC, influencers etc)

Two of our three founders are well-known creators in the TFT community, so getting that initial boost in visibility wasn’t too difficult. The real challenge was turning those first-time visitors into regular users.

TFT is a social game, almost everyone who plays has friends who play too, so once we brought people in through creator exposure, we focused on making the product good enough that they’d naturally share it. Word of mouth became our strongest growth engine because the site genuinely helped players enjoy the game more.

What have been some of the most effective tactics to drive traffic to your website so far?

Dishsoap winning Worlds twice definitely helped put a spotlight on us, but I’d say the biggest factor has been the consistent, high-quality content curated by our two TFT experts, Frodan and Dishsoap.

Their insights keep players coming back. On top of that, our clean and intuitive website design makes it easy for players to share TFT Academy with their friends, which has really helped our organic growth.

What are you most proud of regarding the success of TFT Academy so far? Any major highlights?

I’m most proud of how quickly TFT Academy became trusted in the community. Seeing people reference our guides on streams or Reddit, or hearing players say they improved because of the site, that’s the best part.

We even have a Discord channel for testimonials, and while I might not check my DMs for a week, I check that channel every day. The growth of our team has also been a big highlight for me. Hitting big traffic numbers is cool, but it’s way more meaningful when there are people around you to celebrate those moments with.

What advice do you have for new and existing website owners that you wish you knew before you started?

I wish someone told me earlier that you can’t do it all yourself, and trying to is just dumb. The real magic happens when you start trusting other people and sharing the load.

You’ll never be an expert at everything, but you can be great at bringing the right people together and passing your vision on to them. If you can do that and surround yourself with talented, like-minded people, you’re already halfway to building something awesome.

What do you like best about being a part of Nitro’s network of premium gaming/entertainment websites?

I really like how hands-on and responsive the Nitro team is. If I notice an issue, I can drop a message in the group chat and it’s usually handled fast. Since joining, we’ve actually tripled our revenue, which has been huge.

Being able to make data-driven changes for better visibility, get live feedback, and adjust in real time instead of guessing has made a massive difference. Having Nitro handle that side of the business lets us focus fully on creating quality content, and that’s what keeps the growth going.

What’s next for TFT Academy?

We’re working on our in-game overlay right now, which is going to be an awesome product to release and get feedback on. We’re also building a mobile app for TFT’s huge mobile player base.

Seeing how well our formula has worked, and with the amazing team we’ve built, we definitely want to expand into other games and bring the same quality and approach there too.

A big thank you to Amer from TFT Academy. Keep your eyes peeled for more insightful interviews like this in next month's edition of our Publisher Showcase, where we’ll continue to spotlight one of the 500+ stand out websites on Nitro, diving deep into their unique success!

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