E-learning and online learning courses are experiencing remarkable growth today. In 2021, the e-learning market surpassed USD 250 billion and is expected to continue to grow. With the Covid-19 pandemic and incredible technological developments in recent years, online courses have become a valuable component of education today. But you need to know how to sell online courses.
With the current state of education, selling online courses can definitely be profitable with the right know-how. You may not see profits instantly, but you can establish a potentially lucrative passive income by selling online courses. But learning how to sell online courses takes time and you need to learn the basics before you will see any success.
This post has been updated in September 2021.
Why Should You Sell Your Courses Online?
Selling your courses online is a great way to earn some extra bucks. It also serves as a marketing tool that strengthens connections with your customers. It is a way to show what your brand and company are all about.
The good news is anyone can create online courses, make some money, and promote their brand. All you need is the ability to speak passionately on a particular subject and the know-how of marketing and selling them.
Tips on How to Sell Online Courses
There are many valuable tips that can help you successfully sell your online courses.
Don’t Skimp on Your Online Courses
If you have the dedicated budget available, you can hire a professional to make your online courses for you. Course creation services aren’t as expensive as you may think and represent excellent value for your project. But, when you are just starting, it might be more affordable if you create the courses yourself.
If you wish to make the courses yourself, you can start by thinking about some of the great presentations, textbooks, or eLearning courses that you have encountered in the past. Get inspiration and learn from these experiences to create your own course that will wow your audience.
Choose Where to Sell Your Online Courses
Once your materials are done, it needs to be live somewhere online. There are several platforms where you can sell your courses.
Standalone platforms
An excellent option for selling your online course may be to submit all your course materials to an established site. Standalone platforms are best for small business owners and solo entrepreneurs. They provide marketing functionality, but usually, they pose restrictions on what you are able to do with your course and the course topics you can choose from.
WordPress plugins
You can also make use of WordPress plugin platforms to host your online courses. There are many inexpensive plugins available that allow you to create and sell your courses using your existing WordPress site. This option may be best for WordPress users who already get a lot of traffic to their sites.
All-In-One platforms
There are also all-in-one platforms available that include website builders, course hosting, and marketing automation. These are best for people who want to sell their courses online regardless of their experience level.
Pricing Your Online Course
One of the most common questions you encounter when figuring out how to sell online courses is how much to charge your clients for your course. This step can be a bit of a guessing game. It would be best to use some trial and error first to figure out the right price for your course. Only when you begin to sell your courses regularly will you know the long-term value that it provides to your customers.
Part of determining how much to charge for your online course is your target audience’s income level and competitor’s pricing. It’s also great to consider the structure of payment when you sell your online courses.
Enhance the Value of Your Online Course
Over time, you should increase the value of your online course so that you can also increase its price. You can add value to your materials by offering various bonuses and extra valuable content. Building a solid offering of bonuses can build relationships with your clients. You can do this by creating your own supplements such as extra resources, reports, or templates. You can also build a referral program for businesses and offer referral bonuses to those who invite other people to take your course.
Another way to increase value to your material is using upsells. It is one of the best ways to earn extra money. Upselling means offering additional products during each purchase. It creates another purchase opportunity just before the first transaction is over. Some easy upsells that you can offer with our online course include coaching and live group training. Coaching, including phone coaching, email coaching, and monthly webinar, is often an effective way to increase your revenue. On the other hand, live group training provides a more in-depth discussion of various course topics.
Choose a Business Model
It is often best to start by creating or picking a business model for your online courses. Generally, there are two categories that best serve selling online courses, the one-time or membership (recurring) models.
One-time model
For a one-time business model, the client pays you upfront to access your online courses. You can also set up an installment plan for payment. Typically, once payment is delivered, the student can have unlimited access to your course for a set period of time.
Membership Model
For the membership or recurring model, the client pays you regularly. It could be monthly, quarterly, or annually. This model is great if you consistently offer new materials of value to your customers. They can have access to your courses as long as they continue paying. Canceling the subscription means losing access to your online course materials.
If you are unsure which model works best for you, the simplest way to choose is to ask yourself if you plan on producing new content regularly. From there, you know whether to use the one-time model or the membership model.
Market and Sell Your Online Course
It doesn’t matter if your online course is the greatest in the world. It will be a failure if it doesn’t appeal to a wide audience. After all, it won’t matter how great the product is if nobody buys it. That is why you must know your target audience for your online course. This means identifying the right people who are most likely to want and buy your digital product.
Having the largest market possible is always a tempting choice. For example, if your market is 200 million people, you only need less than 1% of this number to achieve success, right? The sad reality is large markets are highly competitive and often overcrowded. That is why if you are starting out, you must begin with a core target audience. It doesn’t matter if it’s small as long as you serve it well. If you succeed with the small market, you can always create more courses and expand your market reach over time.
As you continue to grow your brand, you may realize that your digital products may resonate with other markets. Thus, you must be flexible enough to adjust and respond when your market continues to evolve.
Focus on the Buyer’s Journey
Creating a buyer’s journey is another effective way to solve the problem of how to sell online courses. With a buyer’s journey, you provide your customers with a series of choices that they can make while researching a purchase. It is good practice to include some guidance for potential customers in your marketing efforts for their buying journey.
Crafting your buyer’s journey also depends on your target market and preferred marketing channels. When it comes to creating content types, do not be afraid to experiment. You never know you might stumble across a marketing strategy that is extremely effective for selling your digital products.
Create an Effective Call-to-Action
A call-to-action, or CTA, is a marketing term that prompts users to perform a specific action. Effective use of a CTA is a crucial component to making sales. Thus, it deserves your attention. It’s also important to remember that when using CTAs, it’s crucial to identify the target audience and their wants and needs.
Using CTAs is all about getting your message across in a way that encourages action from your customers. Creating an innovative CTA and mastering various techniques can be the difference between you experiencing huge success or total failure in selling your online sources.
Social Media Marketing
Since many people spend most of their time on social media, it may be best to use this platform for marketing your online courses. Social media marketing is a huge part of digital marketing. Many social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and Instagram can be used to promote your digital products. You should start thinking about where your target audience is frequenting and how you can reach them more effectively.
Pre-Launch Your Course
Part of how to sell online courses is doing pre-launching efforts. You can warm up your target audience by providing free resources, posting on social media, posting on blogs, or sending emails. Pre-launching is one of the most effective ways on how to sell online courses before its initial launch. The sooner you tell people about your courses, the more they are aware and anticipate what your courses could offer. You can also use this time to get feedback from your audience on which features are promising and which aren’t.
Sell, Sell, Sell!
Now that you’ve learned how to sell online courses, it’s time for you to go out and earn some extra bucks. Just remember that the most important part to selling online courses is the overall quality and value of your course. However, not taking the time to prepare and produce a good plan often leads to costly delays and unfulfilled expectations.
Hire an e-learning creator today to ensure your online courses provide incredible value to your customers.
