Long gone are the days when people would only go for physical courses alone. Today, several people are looking online as one of the best places to get courses. And if you are offering an online course, you need to provide value for the students.
If not, the course won’t be as successful as you may want it to be. So, how do you ensure that your online system will be successful? This is a plan that you need to have before you even sit down to create the course. And there are tips that you can follow to ensure you create value for the clients.
People are no longer looking at you simply stating that you offer a valuable course; they want the value to show. You need to demonstrate your worth to those who will buy your course. Here, you will get a breakdown of how you can create an online course that will be successful.
- Pick the Right Topic
- The Course Needs to Have High Demand
- Create A Compelling Learning Outcome
- Gather Content for the Course
- Produce the Course
- Set up the School
- Get the Right Pricing Models
Pick the Right Topic
When you are choosing the right course to present, it should be something that you love. It should be a passion you love, not only something you want to make money out of. This is the only way you can be sure to deliver the message in a way that will get to the audience.
You are not teaching a higher education course; it should be something that anyone can easily understand. If you have the skills to deal with it, the better off you’ll be as you have the experience to deliver in the simplest way possible.
For example, you can opt for a cooking class if you have a passion for doing it. When you don’t have the power, this can rub off your clients the wrong way. And you have several other options that you can go for, like interior design, writing, overcoming death, and so on.
The Course Needs to Have High Demand
You can’t sell something that isn’t marketable regardless of your passion for the course you are selling. You can’t waste your time investing in a course that no one will buy. This is one aspect of creating a course that you need to look at carefully. You need first to know some of the online courses to sell before you can get down to creating your course. You need to thoroughly research some of the online course topics that are sellable – on demand. Please don’t assume that because a course has several competitors, it won’t sell; it can and probably will.
When you are in that position, you need to create your own so that it won’t be ignored. It should be something stellar that appeals to the broader public. When you find a course with a lot more competition, it shows demand for it.
It will be easier for you to sell a course that people want than trying to sell something no one wants. It would be best if you looked at some ideas before settling on a course on-demand.
Here is what you need to look at;
- Are people asking about the course topic you want to pick
- Are people even talking about
- Is there a gap that you can fill? Something that the competition isn’t offering.
These questions need to have one clear answer, and the answer needs to be “yes.” But also need to be offering something different from what the competition is offering. Don’t be too quick to engage if you have nothing different from what’s out there already.
If you offer something different and you are sure it isn’t a downgrade from what’s in the market, you need to put it out there.
Create A Compelling Learning Outcome
There needs to be an outcome for the course to be considered a success. No one will want to invest in a course that they don’t know what they will get from. It would be best to tell people exactly what they’ll get after they are done with the course.
For example, if it’s a cooking class, you need to assure them they will get the whole recipe for a particular dish. And they will be able to prepare the dish attractively. This is what your reputation will hinge upon in the long run.
Students want to know what the course will do for them or find it easy to enroll in it. However, you need to measure your verbs as much as you try to assure them they’ll get value for their money. This should be something that the learner will feel at the end of the course.
Another thing about having clear outcomes is that only sure students – the right students-will enroll in the course. This means that there will be fewer refund requests as everyone will know what they are signing up for.
You will also need to be careful when creating the outcome as you don’t want to give away much info.
Gather Content for the Course
This is where you are likely to hit a stumbling block on your ways to create a great course. You have likely consumed too much info, and you need to take a step back and see what works – or will work. This information will probably be in your hard drives, books, and everywhere you can store it.
What you need to be looking at is the information you will be leaving out. You read that right – it isn’t about what you will include in the course, but what you will be leaving out. You need to figure this out when you are conducting market research.
While you are perusing the info you have gathered, you need to be concentrating more on what won’t make a difference. If it isn’t directly involved in the success of the course, you need to throw it away.
You already know the pressure points for an audience looking to sign in to the course; ensure you answer these questions. While you answer these burning questions, ensure that you also fill the gaps left out by the competitors.
Produce the Course
This will involve recording, filming, and editing the course. This should affect the idea of how you will deliver each part of the course. You have all the info from what you have gathered – you know what works for each piece.
For example, you have sections of the course that are better delivered through a video class, and other text will do. Know what works for each and how you can give on either one of them.
When you deliver a video class, you need to get your camera and start recording. You will, in the end, have hours of footage that you need to edit. This should be done meticulously. This part is the whole production section, and it needs to stand out.
You will need to learn how to edit your videos to make the course great. This process also applies if you are going to put out a text course. You will also need to edit the course to ensure that it resonates with the audience.
Set up the School
The school is basically where you will sell the course once it is ready. You can’t simply place a course randomly online and expect it to market. Here are some of the significant ways you can use to sell your course online:
- Learning management systems
- Online course marketplaces
- Software or plugins on your website
When you have your website, you can use a learning management system. This is a system where you have an academy that you can link to the website, and you can then fully brand the platform. This will make it all the easier to sell the course than having it anywhere else.
It would be best to look at some of the Learning Management systems to find out which ones will work best for your site. It would be best if you also looked at the things that make an LMS attractive.
Get the Right Pricing Models
You need to look at the course and see how it fits in the overall business plan. Some of the things you need to look at are:
- Is the course going to be a free lead magnet into the primary service and product?
- Will the course be your primary source of income?
- If the course will be an income stream on its own
The course needs to be designed to fit the section that it has been assigned – different volume values for each. Each of the above aspects will also come into play when it comes to the pricing of the course.
There is no clear way to decide on the price you will set for your online course. This will be dependent majorly on what you will be delivered to the audience. You can use the competing courses as a benchmark of what you will be charging for the course.
When you want to create an online course, there are several things that you have to consider. Above are some tips that you can use to ensure that the course you create will be a successful one. You don’t want to put up a course that will end up not making any impact as you had initially anticipated.