The Course Creators Circle Podcast

The Role of Collaboration in Course Creation Success

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Fri, 20 Dec 2024 06:30:00 GMT

Collaboration is about opening the door to fresh ideas, diverse skills, and unique perspectives. It enhances the learning experience for your students and makes the course creation journey more enriching for you as an educator. By working with others, you can elevate the quality of your course and tap into expertise you may not have yourself. Whether it’s subject matter experts, instructional designers, or community managers, collaboration has the potential to create courses that are engaging, comprehensive, and impactful.

How to Ensure Your Course Delivers Real Results

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 28 Nov 2024 22:30:00 GMT

Creating courses is an art and a science, especially when it comes to crafting experiences that truly transform the lives of our students. As educators, coaches, and mentors, our ultimate goal is to guide students on a journey that leaves them empowered, skilled, and changed by the end of our course.

So, how do we design a course that isn’t just a collection of lessons but a transformative experience? Here’s how to create courses that deliver real results and lasting impact.

What Does “Designing for Transformation” Really Mean?

When we design courses for transformation, we aim to deliver more than just information. Our focus shifts from merely teaching concepts to creating an experience that brings about meaningful change. A transformation-focused course doesn’t just tell students “what” or “how” – it takes them from where they are to where they want to be.

This journey is carefully mapped out with a clear beginning, middle, and end, each step building on the last, so students feel guided and supported every step of the way.

Define Success: Set Clear, Actionable Goals

The first step in designing a transformational course is defining what success looks like. Ask yourself, “What should my student be able to accomplish by the end of this course?” Whether it’s learning a skill, completing a project, or reaching a personal milestone, be crystal clear about the desired outcomes. When we have a defined destination, we can structure each module and lesson to support students in reaching it.

To ensure these goals are achievable, break down larger objectives into smaller, actionable steps. Using the SMART goal framework – Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound – keeps students on track and focused. This approach not only makes the course more engaging but encourages students to continue returning, eager to meet each new challenge.

Structure for Progress: Build Incrementally

Transformation doesn’t happen overnight, so structure your course in a way that allows for gradual progress. Start with foundational concepts and then progress to more advanced topics, giving students time to practice and build their skills as they go.

Incremental learning is powerful because it lets students absorb, apply, and retain knowledge over time. If your course includes challenges or prep weeks, these can be excellent ways to help students build momentum and create lasting habits.

Real-World Application: Bring Learning to Life

A transformational course includes real-world applications, allowing students to practice what they’ve learned. Include projects, case studies, or role-playing scenarios so students can actively build skills, not just passively absorb information.

For instance, in my courses, I often use interactive workbooks that help guide students through exercises and give them a place to track their progress. These types of hands-on components reinforce learning and make it more meaningful.

Encourage Reflection and Self-Awareness

Building in checkpoints and moments of reflection is key to fostering self-awareness, which is crucial for transformation. Include surveys, quizzes, or prompts for students to assess their progress. Encourage them to reflect on what they’ve learned and celebrate their small wins. If you have a community component, such as a Facebook Group or forum, ask students to share their weekly wins or learning highlights. Reflection helps students see how far they’ve come and keeps them motivated on the path to growth.

Provide Support and Create a Community

Transformation thrives in a supportive environment. Offer your students feedback through quizzes or assignments, or give them the option to upgrade to a membership for more personalised guidance.

A strong community can also be a powerful motivator. In some of my courses, I run live challenges periodically to create a sense of camaraderie and support among students. Q&A sessions, office hours, or even opportunities for one-on-one coaching can make a world of difference, helping students stay engaged and committed.

Guiding Students from “Here” to “There”

Ultimately, creating a transformational course means taking students from where they are now to where they want to be. It’s about identifying the skills or knowledge they need, breaking these down into manageable steps, and guiding them along the way. This is the privilege and responsibility we have as course creators.

So as you set out on your course creation journey, keep the focus on transformation. Where do you want your students to go? What skills do you want them to master? Design your course to deliver real, lasting results that students will value long after they’ve completed the course. And remember – transformational learning isn’t just about information; it’s about inspiring change and leaving a lasting impact.

Until next time, keep creating courses that matter and bring transformation to every student you reach.

Some of the links shared in this content may be affiliate links. This means the Enever Group may earn a small commission if you purchase through them at no additional cost to you. We only recommend products and services we trust and believe will benefit you. For complete information, see our terms of use.

The Course Creators Circle Podcast is Merging with the Talk Podcast in 2025!

In 2025, we’re excited to announce that the Course Creators Circle Podcast will be merging with the Talk Podcast to bring you all the tips, tools, and support you need in both course creation and marketing – now all in one place.

This merge reflects our commitment to simplifying your experience and delivering even more value, from course creation tips to practical advice on marketing and business growth. By uniting these podcasts, you’ll gain access to a broader range of topics and expert tips that empower you to design impactful courses and market them effectively.

Make sure to subscribe to the Talk Podcast on Apple and Spotify to stay tuned for everything you need to thrive in 2025!

Highlights

00:13 Designing Courses for Transformation
01:39 Defining Success and Setting Goals
02:29 Structuring the Course for Progress
02:57 Incorporating Real-World Interactions
04:08 Support and Engagement

Resources

Talk Podcast on Apple https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/talk-with-linda-reed-enever/id1473569942
Talk Podcast on Spotify https://open.spotify.com/show/29Qpk48pAQanFqh09HRkXh
The Course Creator’s Guidebook https://www.enevergroup.com.au/product/the-course-creators-circle-course-creation-guidebook-create-that-course/
The Course Creators Circle Hub https://enevergroup.thinkific.com/courses/coursecreatorscircle
The Course Creators Circle Facebook Group https://www.facebook.com/groups/coursecreatorscircle
What Is Your Learning Style Quiz https://www.enevergroup.com.au/what-is-your-learning-style-quiz/

Customer Centric Course Creation: Content and Delivery

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 14 Nov 2024 22:30:00 GMT

Course creation has become one of the most effective ways to share knowledge, build expertise, and truly make a difference in your students' lives.

But to keep learners engaged and coming back, it's essential to approach course creation with a customer first mindset.

A Customer-Centric Approach to Course Creation

Being customer centric means listening closely to what your students need and value. This isn't about packing in content just because we can – it's about delivering what will best support their growth best.

Understanding Your Learner's Journey

Creating a customer centric course begins with a clear understanding of who your audience is and what they need. Consider their goals, challenges, and pain points so you can design content that speaks directly to these issues. It's easy to get wrapped up in what we want to teach, but our real focus should be on bridging the gap between where students are now and where they aspire to be.

A customer centric course is relevant, accessible, and engaging. It should be easy to follow and, most importantly, valuable.

So, let’s dive into some actionable tips on how to make this happen.

Designing with Intention

Start with what your students need, then make it actionable. Sometimes, less is more. Instead of overloading a course with videos, quizzes, and examples, focus on providing content that’s clear, practical, and straight to the point. Think about the impact each lesson will have on their journey.

Break down complex topics into smaller, digestible sections, and use real-life examples or exercises to reinforce the learning. This helps students engage with the material, grab those small "wins," and immediately apply what they’ve learned.

The result? A more meaningful experience that keeps them motivated.

Incorporate Different Learning Styles

Not everyone learns the same way. Some are visual learners, others prefer audio, and some learn best through hands-on activities. Here at the Enever Group, we’ve got resources to help you teach across different learning styles, and you can even discover your own learning style on our website. Knowing this will enhance your course creation journey.

Consider breaking your course into modules or sections, allowing students to learn at their own pace. Modular learning helps with student retention, as students focus on one topic at a time without feeling overwhelmed. Adding interactive elements like quizzes, workbooks, or live Q&A sessions will also make your course more engaging.

Providing Support and Feedback

Creating opportunities for interaction is key. Isolation can lead to disengagement, so consider building a community, whether through a Facebook Group or a community on your course platform. By staying connected, you can get regular feedback, see what questions are coming up, and refine your course content accordingly.

Tracking student progress and completion rates can also be insightful. If completion rates are low, it doesn’t necessarily mean students didn’t value the course – they may have learned what they needed in the first few lessons. This might be a cue to streamline future courses.

Avoiding Common Pitfalls

Course creation has its pitfalls, but they’re easy to avoid with the right approach. One big misstep is overloading students with content; remember, quality beats quantity every time. Another is the lack of interaction, which can make students feel isolated. Building in regular engagement through community spaces or live Q&As goes a long way in keeping everyone connected and invested.

A Final Note on Customer-Centricity

Designing a course with your learners at the forefront of every decision is what truly makes an impact. What we want to teach, it means little if our learners don’t engage. Let’s keep them at the heart of our courses so we can help them achieve their goals.

The Course Creators Circle Podcast is Merging with the Talk Podcast in 2025!

Make sure to subscribe to the Talk Podcast on Apple and Spotify to stay tuned for everything you need to thrive in 2025!

Highlights

00:44 Understanding Customer Centricity in Course Creation
00:56 Merging Podcasts: What You Need to Know
01:44 Key Elements of Customer-Centric Course Design
02:38 Effective Content Delivery Strategies
03:41 Incorporating Different Learning Styles
04:04 Interactive and Modular Learning Approaches
04:51 Tracking Progress and Gathering Feedback
05:28 Avoiding Common Pitfalls in Course Creation

Resources

Talk Podcast on Apple https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/talk-with-linda-reed-enever/id1473569942
Talk Podcast on Spotify https://open.spotify.com/show/29Qpk48pAQanFqh09HRkXh
The Course Creator’s Guidebook https://www.enevergroup.com.au/product/the-course-creators-circle-course-creation-guidebook-create-that-course/
The Course Creators Circle Hub https://enevergroup.thinkific.com/courses/coursecreatorscircle
The Course Creators Circle Facebook Group https://www.facebook.com/groups/coursecreatorscircle What Is Your Learning Style Quiz https://www.enevergroup.com.au/what-is-your-learning-style-quiz/

Planning Your Course Offerings

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 31 Oct 2024 22:30:00 GMT

Whether you’re a seasoned course creator or just starting, how you structure and plan your courses directly impacts how well you attract students and deliver real value. It even influences your marketing success.

So let’s walk through a roadmap that will help you plan and structure your course to set it up for success!

Know Your Audience

Before you start planning your course, you need to know exactly who you’re creating it for. Understanding your audience is the foundation of any successful course offering. What are their pain points? What are they struggling with? And most importantly, what do they want to achieve by taking your course?

You want to listen to your audience. This could mean conducting surveys, checking the comments on your social media, or paying attention to the questions people ask in your day-to-day life. The better you understand your audience, the better you can tailor your course to solve their problems.

Craft a Learning Journey

The next step is to craft a learning journey for your students. You don’t want to just offer random lessons here and there; instead, create a structured pathway. Start with a foundational course that introduces key concepts, and then build on it with intermediate or advanced content. You could even foster a specialised series of workshops or webinars that dive deeper into the material.

This approach doesn’t just help your students grow their skills – it keeps them coming back for more. When they see how much progress they’ve made, they’re excited to move on to the next step in their learning journey.

Choose the Right Format

When it comes to course format, there isn’t a one-size-fits-all answer. The best format is the one that you can create and deliver confidently. Whether it's live courses, self-paced, or cohort-based, the key is to choose what works for both you and your audience.

For example, in my Marketing Circle, I run a hybrid model where I offer live courses alongside self-paced content. The live sessions give students the chance to interact with me in real time, while the self-paced materials let them learn at their own pace.

And don’t forget about the community! Learning together as a group is becoming more important in course creation. Building a sense of community adds value and enhances the learning experience.

Pricing Your Course

Pricing your course can be tricky because you want to provide value while also making it accessible. I recommend tiered pricing.

Offer a basic course that covers the essentials, then a premium tier that includes extras like one-on-one coaching or webinars. You could also add a guided version where students work through the material with you, step by step. Bundling related courses together can also offer a discount and make the learning path clearer for your students.

Planning the Launch

Once your course is ready to go, it’s time to plan your launch! If you haven’t started building an audience yet, now’s the time. You want to be tapping into other people’s audiences, talking about your course on podcasts, and building buzz well ahead of your launch date.

Teasers, early bird offers, and even a waitlist can be powerful tools to get people excited about your course. When people join your waitlist, you not only build anticipation but also get their email so you can continue marketing to them.

Measure & Improve

Finally, once your course is live, keep an eye on how things are going. Measure what’s working and what isn’t – both marketing and student engagement. Are students dropping off at a certain point? Are reviews coming in? Use that data to make improvements for next time. Course creation is always an evolving process.

Let’s Get Planning!

Planning is at the heart of any successful course. It gives you a clear message and roadmap to guide your students to success.

For a step-by-step guide to help you kickstart your course creation journey, check out The Course Creation Guidebook and The Course Creators Circle Hub.

Some of the links shared in this content may be affiliate links. This means the Enever Group may earn a small commission if you purchase through them, at no additional cost to you. We only recommend products and services we trust and believe will benefit you.

Highlights

00:00 Introduction to Course Planning
01:09 Understanding Your Audience
02:10 Crafting a Learning Journey
03:01 Choosing the Right Course Format
04:02 Pricing Your Course
05:07 Planning Your Course Launch
05:53 Measuring Success and Gathering Feedback

Resources Mentioned in the Podcast

The Course Creator’s Guidebook https://www.enevergroup.com.au/product/the-course-creators-circle-course-creation-guidebook-create-that-course/
The Course Creators Circle Hub https://enevergroup.thinkific.com/courses/coursecreatorscircle
The Course Creators Circle Facebook Group https://www.facebook.com/groups/coursecreatorscircle

Trends to Take Your Courses to the Next Level in 2025

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 17 Oct 2024 22:30:00 GMT

As we head into 2025, it's the perfect time to start planning for the emerging trends and innovations shaping the way courses are built, delivered, and experienced.

Whether you're a seasoned course creator or about to launch your first course, there are some key developments and course creation trends you should pay attention to.

Shifting Course Structures: Beyond Video and PDFs

In 2025, we're going to see a major shift in how courses are structured. The days of offering purely video-based or PDF-only courses are changing. While videos will still play an important role, today’s learners are seeking more interactive and engaging experiences.

This is where tools like interactive workbooks on Wobo and hybrid learning models come into play. We're also seeing the rise of AI-driven sessions, personalised learning paths, and self-paced modules, all of which are set to be at the forefront of course planning for 2025.

It's All About the Experience

More than ever, planning a course means crafting an entire learning experience, not just throwing together a few lessons and hoping for the best. To truly captivate learners, you need to think through their entire journey, from onboarding to post-course support, and even your marketing efforts. Every touchpoint matters.

AI's Role in Course Creation

Artificial intelligence has changed the game, and its influence is only set to grow in 2025. We’ve already seen AI used in marketing and data analytics, but now it’s becoming an essential tool in course design and delivery. AI offers a level of personalisation that makes learners feel deeply engaged in their learning experience. This is the kind of forward-thinking that will set your courses apart.

The Rise of Microlearning

COVID and the fast-paced world we live in have given rise to microlearning – small, bite-sized lessons that deliver big value. With attention spans shorter than ever, learners want content they can consume quickly, especially as they juggle busy schedules.

As you plan for your courses in 2025, consider breaking lessons into smaller, actionable pieces that students can digest and implement easily. The secret to microlearning is delivering powerful lessons in a way that feels manageable and allows learners to win – and keep winning.

Community Based and Peer Learning Is Back

We’ve noticed a growing trend toward community based and peer learning, and this is expected to continue into 2025. Learners are increasingly looking for ways to connect and learn from each other, not just from the instructor.

As a course creator, it’s essential to build spaces where students can interact, collaborate, and support each other. Whether through discussion forums, live Q&A sessions, group projects, or accountability buddies, creating these opportunities for connection will enhance the learning experience and keep students engaged long after the course ends.

Key Focus Areas for 2025 Course Creation

When planning your 2025 courses, there are a few key areas to focus on:

Technology and Integration: The platforms and tools you use should allow you to build interactive and engaging experiences. AI is a big part of this, with tools like Thinkific and Interact Quiz Maker offering features that bring AI-based quizzes and personalised learning paths to life.

Content Delivery: Implementing microlearning will make your lessons more flexible and easier to consume. Thinkific, for example, has introduced a mobile app that makes courses more accessible to learners on the go. Ensuring your content is mobile-friendly is a must for the future of course creation.

Community Building: Don’t overlook the power of community. By offering a membership or group component alongside your course, you provide a space for ongoing learning and interaction. This not only enhances the learning experience but also encourages students to stick around – and continue purchasing from you in the future.

Looking Ahead: 2025 and Beyond

So, what’s the big takeaway for 2025 course creation?

It’s all about embracing new technologies, focusing on student engagement, and designing courses with the learner’s journey in mind. By doing so, you’ll not only create a course that stands out but also one that delivers real, meaningful results for your students.

As we move into 2025, it’s time to start planning for the trends and innovations that will shape the future of online learning. So, take some time to think about how you can integrate AI, personalise learning experiences, implement microlearning strategies, and foster community engagement in your courses.

For a step-by-step guide to help you kickstart your course creation journey, check out The Course Creation Guidebook and The Course Creators Circle Hub.

Highlights

01:05 Emerging Trends for 2025
01:56 The Role of AI in Course Design
02:44 Microlearning and Its Benefits
03:30 Community and Peer Learning
04:20 Key Considerations for 2025 Course Planning
05:57 Conclusion and Final Thoughts

Resources Mentioned in the Podcast

The Course Creator’s Guidebook https://www.enevergroup.com.au/product/the-course-creators-circle-course-creation-guidebook-create-that-course/
The Course Creators Circle Hub https://enevergroup.thinkific.com/courses/coursecreatorscircle
The Course Creators Circle Facebook Group https://www.facebook.com/groups/coursecreatorscircle
Thinkific https://snip.ly/thinkificeg
Wobo https://snip.ly/woboeg
Interact Quiz Maker https://snip.ly/interactquizmaker

Course Creation for Growth: Content, Delivery, and Engagement

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 03 Oct 2024 22:30:00 GMT

Creating a course isn't just about sharing knowledge, it's about delivering real transformation for your students while positioning your business for long-term growth success.

In this episode of The Course Creators Circle Podcast, we will cover a topic close to my heart; course creation for growth. Whether you’re just starting out or are a seasoned course creator, understanding how your course fits into your overall business strategy is key to driving success.

Let's dive into how you can make your courses work harder for you and your audience!

Course Creation for Two-Way Growth

When we talk about course creation for growth, we’re really speaking about two things: growing your business and helping your students grow. To achieve both, your courses need to be impactful, scalable, and aligned with your business goals.

But where do we start?

Step 1: Know Your Audience & Their Desired Transformation

To create a course that drives real growth, start by asking yourself: Who are my students? What are their pain points? Most importantly, what transformation are they seeking? You’re not just teaching for the sake of teaching. You’re taking your students from where they are now to where they want to be.

For example, someone might only need to know how to write a social media post, while you might want to dive into the broader world of marketing. However, if the transformation they’re seeking is writing a post, that’s where you should focus. Start with small, focused outcomes to guide them step-by-step toward that transformation.

Step 2: Structure Your Course for Maximum Impact

A well-structured course doesn’t just help your students—it makes the creation process easier for you as well. Start by breaking down your content into modules and lessons, each building on the last. This step-by-step approach keeps students engaged and helps them build the necessary skills to reach their goals.

In the Course Creator Circle Hub, we have planning tools that guide you through this process. Each module tackles a key skill, and each lesson within those modules dives deeper, helping students master that skill one step at a time.

Mixing up content types such as videos, quizzes, worksheets, and discussion forums also keeps learners engaged. Don’t be afraid to incorporate practical exercises and real-world applications. When students can apply what they’ve learned right away, they see tangible results—and that’s where the magic happens.

Step 3: Make It Scalable

If your goal is growth, your course needs to be scalable. Good Learning Management Systems (LMS) like Thinkific can help you accommodate growing numbers of students. You can also repurpose content to save time. For example, if you have a video tutorial that applies to multiple courses, use it across the board instead of recording it multiple times.

Scalability also means planning for the long term. Think about how you can update and improve your course over time. Can you add new modules or bonus content? Can you create an evergreen course that keeps delivering value year after year? Or, consider adding your course to a membership program for ongoing support.

Step 4: Marketing & Selling Your Course

Many course creators hit a roadblock with marketing. As I often say, 20% of the work is creating the course, and 80% is marketing it. You might spend more time promoting your course than you did building it, and that’s perfectly okay.

You need to think about how you’re going to attract students. What channels will you use to promote your course? Consider offering lead magnets like free webinars or downloadable guides to give potential students a taste of your teaching style. This not only draws people in but also helps build your email list—an essential tool for long-term growth.

Step 5: Pricing for Profit & Growth

Next, let's talk pricing. How do you price your course in a way that drives sales without undervaluing your content? The price of your course should reflect the time and effort you’ve put into creating it, as well as the transformation it provides for your students.

Consider offering different pricing tiers. For example, a self-paced course might have one price, while adding live support or coaching can be offered at a higher price point. This flexibility can help you reach a broader audience while maximising your revenue.

Step 6: Grow with Your Students

Finally, let’s not forget about the growth of your students. Happy, successful students are your biggest advocates. They’ll recommend your course to others, leave glowing reviews, and even tag you in social media posts. By staying engaged with your students through emails, updates, and progress check-ins, you ensure they stay on track and see the results they signed up for.

Automation tools, such as email nurture sequences, are a great way to keep your students engaged even after the course ends. These little reminders ensure they stay motivated and continue applying what they’ve learned.

Final Thoughts: A Growth-Driven Approach to Course Creation

In the end, the success of your course and the growth of your business depends on your ability to focus on your students’ needs. Structure your course to provide maximum value, plan for scalability, and market it effectively.

The result? You’ll create not just a course but a learning experience that delivers transformation.

For a step-by-step guide to help you kickstart your course creation journey, check out The Course Creation Guidebook and The Course Creators Circle Hub.

Highlights

00:00 Introduction to Course Creation for Growth
01:12 Understanding Your Target Audience
02:11 Structuring Your Course for Maximum Impact
03:00 Engaging Students with Varied Content
03:58 Scaling Your Course for Long-Term Success
05:22 Marketing Strategies for Your Course
06:24 Pricing Your Course for Business Growth
06:58 Ensuring Student Growth and Satisfaction
08:37 Final Tips and Community Engagement

Resources Mentioned in the Podcast

The Course Creator’s Guidebook https://www.enevergroup.com.au/product/the-course-creators-circle-course-creation-guidebook-create-that-course/
The Course Creators Circle Hub https://enevergroup.thinkific.com/courses/coursecreatorscircle
The Course Creators Circle Facebook Group https://www.facebook.com/groups/coursecreatorscircle
Thinkific https://snip.ly/thinkificeg

Some of the links shared in this content may be affiliate links. This means the Enever Group may earn a small commission if you choose to purchase through them, at no additional cost to you. We only recommend products and services we trust and believe will benefit you.

Scaling Your Courses: Balancing Content Quality and Delivery

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 19 Sep 2024 22:30:00 GMT

As course creators, we all dream of reaching a wider audience, expanding our offerings, and ultimately increasing our revenue. However, as we scale, we often find ourselves juggling the delicate balance between growing our reach and maintaining the high standards our students expect.

The good news is—it’s not impossible! In today’s session, I’ll be sharing strategies to help you scale effectively while keeping your content engaging, up-to-date, and relevant.

What Does It Mean to Scale a Course?

At its core, scaling means expanding your course's reach to a larger audience, which often involves creating more content and increasing revenue streams. However, this expansion comes with challenges, especially around maintaining the quality of content while managing an increased workload.

As you grow, it’s easy for certain things to slip through the cracks—like slower delivery processes due to a higher student count or overlooking updates to landing pages and marketing materials. However successful scaling is all about finding the balance between growth and quality.

Consistency is Key

First and foremost, consistency is key in every aspect of course creation. To maintain the quality of your content, you need to regularly review and update it. Keeping up with the latest industry trends and student needs is essential to ensuring your courses remain relevant and valuable. Trust me, as someone in marketing, I know how important it is to stay current!

Engaging and interactive content is another critical element when scaling. You don’t just want to deliver information—you want to captivate your audience. Including multimedia elements like quizzes, discussion forums, and live lessons is an excellent way to enhance the learning experience. For example, one of the ways I scaled my own business was by turning my courses into a membership that offers live Q&As and targeted help.

The Power of Feedback

Another vital part of scaling is having a feedback loop. Regularly gathering feedback from your students helps you make informed decisions about course updates and future offerings. Your students will tell you what’s working, what needs clarification, and what they want to learn next. In fact, in my membership, those live Q&As have been invaluable for highlighting areas I hadn’t considered.

Efficient Delivery Methods

When it comes to delivery, having the right systems in place is essential. A solid Learning Management System (LMS) will help you handle more students without losing that personal touch. I’m a Thinkific expert, so I use their platform to ensure smooth delivery, but there are many great tools out there to explore.

Automated systems like email drip sequences (think MailerLite) also help maintain that personal connection with your students, even as you scale. By reminding them to come back and continue learning, you maintain engagement and drive completion rates.

Offering Different Levels of Support

As your student base grows, offering different levels of support becomes crucial. I often recommend offering your courses in three ways:

Self-paced: Let students take the course at their own pace.
Membership: Offer added support and opportunities to ask questions.
Live sessions: Engage with students in real time, allowing them to interact with you directly.

This tiered approach not only adds value to your students but also allows you to scale efficiently without being overwhelmed by one-on-one interactions.

Time Management and Technology

Let’s talk about time management, a key factor in scaling effectively. Most of us get into this business to monetise our knowledge, and reaching a wider audience means managing our time wisely. Utilise tools like time-blocking sheets and content checklists both available in The Course Creator Circle Hub to keep your workflow efficient.

Leveraging the right technology is a game-changer. Tools like Descript have revolutionised video and podcast editing, making it simpler and faster than ever before. AI-powered tools can assist with writing lesson introductions, creating timestamps, and even generating transcripts, saving you hours of work.

Anticipating Challenges

Scaling does come with its challenges. Increased student inquiries, potential glitches from new technologies, and additional administrative work are just a few. But with strategies in place, like using reports from your LMS to track student progress, you can anticipate and tackle these issues before they impact your course quality.

Focus on Retention

Finally, let’s not forget about student retention. It’s much easier to re-engage a current student for your next course than to attract a new one. So, keep your students motivated to complete your courses and engage with your future content. Using tools like Thinkific’s power-ups helps enhance the learning experience and keeps students coming back for more.

Start Small and Scale Gradually

Scaling doesn’t have to happen overnight. Start small—with one core offering—and expand gradually. If you’re considering a subscription-based model, you don’t need all 12 months of content ready to go. Focus on the first few months, and expand as you receive feedback and grow.

Gather feedback from your current students about what they want to learn next, and build from there. You’ll find that scaling is much easier when you’re meeting the evolving needs of your audience.

Leveraging Automation and Support Systems

Make sure you have the right automation and support systems in place. Email systems that integrate with your LMS, like MailerLite, allow you to maintain personalised communication with students. And don’t forget about the potential of AI chatbots to help with support.

Final Thoughts

Scaling your courses while balancing content quality and delivery is all about finding the right strategy and leveraging technology to stay focused on what matters most—providing value to your students. By taking a measured approach and continually refining your process, you can scale successfully without sacrificing quality or your personal touch.

For a step-by-step guide to help you kickstart your course creation journey, check out The Course Creation Guidebook and The Course Creators Circle Hub.

Highlights

01:12 Understanding Course Scaling
02:12 Maintaining Quality While Scaling
02:52 Engaging Content Creation
04:03 Leveraging Technology for Efficiency
04:47 Strategies for Student Support
05:49 Time Management and Efficiency Tips
07:07 Overcoming Challenges in Scaling
08:01 Final Tips and Conclusion

Resources Mentioned in the Podcast

The Course Creator’s Guidebook https://www.enevergroup.com.au/product/the-course-creators-circle-course-creation-guidebook-create-that-course/
The Course Creators Circle Hub https://enevergroup.thinkific.com/courses/coursecreatorscircle

Successful Course Marketing Strategies with Lucas Marino

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 05 Sep 2024 22:30:00 GMT

In the realm of online education, creating a course is just the beginning. Ensuring its success involves an often-overlooked yet crucial element—marketing.

In this episode of The Course Creators Circle Podcast, I spoke with fellow Thinkific expert Lucas Marino about effective course marketing strategies, drawing on his extensive experience in the field.

Here are the key takeaways from our conversation.

The Journey from Author to Course Creator

Transitioning from author to course creator involves more than just repurposing your written content. It’s about transforming your expertise into a structured learning experience that delivers clear outcomes for your students.

As an author, you have the knowledge, but turning that into a course requires understanding how to teach, engage, and lead learners through a journey that adds value to their lives. This shift requires careful course planning, the right tools, and a focus on the learning outcomes, ensuring that your course is not just informative but also transformative.

The Importance of Identifying Your Market

Identifying whether your course is best suited for a B2B (business-to-business) or B2C (business-to-consumer) market is crucial to your marketing strategy. B2B markets often require a focus on professional development, efficiency, and ROI, while B2C markets may prioritise personal growth, skill acquisition, and entertainment.

Understanding the differences between these markets helps in crafting targeted messaging, choosing the right platforms, and ultimately attracting the right audience. Tailoring your approach to the specific needs and motivations of your market can make the difference between a successful course launch and one that struggles to find its audience.

The Power of Free Content

Both Lucas and I agree and advocate for the strategic use of free content as a marketing tool. While some course creators may fear giving away too much, Lucas argues that offering valuable resources for free can help screen your audience and attract the right customers.

Offering free content is a powerful strategy for building trust and establishing authority in your niche. By providing valuable resources at no cost, you demonstrate your expertise and give potential customers a taste of what you have to offer.

Free content acts as a gateway, attracting an audience who may eventually become paying customers. It’s an effective way to build relationships, drive engagement, and grow your email list, laying the foundation for future sales. Whether it’s through blog posts, videos, or downloadable guides, free content can be the catalyst that turns interest into loyalty.

Building an Audience Takes Time

Building an audience is a process that requires patience, consistency, and persistence. It does not happen overnight but through the steady effort of delivering value and engaging with your community.

Not everyone who engages with your content will be a good fit for your course, and that's okay. The goal is to build a community of people who resonate with your message and are ready to invest in what you have to offer.

Whether you’re growing a blog, a social media following, or a subscriber list, it’s important to focus on quality over quantity. Authentic connections, valuable content, and a clear understanding of your audience’s needs are the keys to gradual but sustainable growth. Over time, these efforts compound, leading to a loyal audience that supports your brand and spreads your message.

Final Thoughts

Effective course marketing requires a deep understanding of your audience and a willingness to adapt your strategies. Whether you're targeting businesses or individual consumers, the key is to provide value, build trust, and be patient.

To get in touch with Lucas, contact him at Lucas Marino Training.

For more insights and practical tips on using these methods, explore Thinkific's resources.

For a step-by-step guide to help you kickstart your course creation journey, check out The Course Creation Guidebook and The Course Creators Circle Hub.

Highlights

00:56 Meet Lucas: Course Creation Expert
01:17 From Books to Courses: The Conversion Process
02:13 B2B vs B2C Marketing Strategies
03:28 The Importance of Targeting the Right Audience
05:53 Leveraging Free Content for Marketing
07:05 Building and Engaging Your Audience
12:44 Final Thoughts and Contact Information

Resources Mentioned in the Podcast

The Course Creator’s Guidebook https://www.enevergroup.com.au/product/the-course-creators-circle-course-creation-guidebook-create-that-course/
Thinkific https://snip.ly/thinkificeg

Effective Online Course Delivery Methods with Aaron Morin

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 22 Aug 2024 22:30:00 GMT

Online education continues to evolve, offering new opportunities and challenges for course creators. As more entrepreneurs and educators enter the online learning space, the need for effective course delivery methods has never been greater.

Aaron, a seasoned Learning Development Manager at Thinkific, shares valuable insights on the top three course delivery strategies that are gaining momentum in the world of course creation.

Based on his experience working with thousands of course creators, these methods not only enhance learner engagement but also help course creators stand out in a crowded market.

Whether you're a seasoned creator or just starting out, staying informed about the latest trends can help you enhance your offerings and ensure your courses stand out in a crowded market.

Free Online Courses as Lead Magnets

One of the standout trends is the resurgence of free online courses. These courses are not just a tool for sharing knowledge but are also powerful lead magnets. By offering free courses, creators can grow their email lists, build their brands, and earn trust among potential students.

Key Benefits of Free Online Courses

Audience Growth: Free courses attract a wide audience, helping you build a substantial email list and increase your following.

Trust Building: They serve as an entry point into your sales funnel, allowing potential customers to experience the value you provide before committing to paid products.

Differentiation: In a market flooded with eBooks and worksheets, interactive and short-form video content within free courses helps you stand out.

Cohort-Based Programs

Cohort-based courses have been gaining popularity over the past year, and for good reason. Unlike traditional self-serve masterclasses, which allow students to learn at their own pace, cohort-based programs are structured with scheduled content drops and fixed timelines.

Why Cohorts Work

Increased Engagement: Students progress together, fostering a sense of community and accountability.

Higher Completion Rates: The structured nature and support mechanisms, such as group coaching calls or private community spaces, lead to better course completion rates.

Content Repurposing: Course creators can repurpose evergreen content by running cohorts, providing live sessions initially, and later using recorded sessions for future cohorts.

This method is particularly beneficial for solopreneurs or small teams, allowing them to maximise the use of their content without constantly creating new materials.

Membership Subscription Offers

The implementation of membership subscription models helps creators avoid the boom-and-bust cycle of course launches by providing a steady, recurring revenue stream.

Community-First Memberships: A significant trend is the shift towards community-driven membership models. Instead of just offering course content, creators are focusing on building and monetising communities.

Subscription Flexibility: Thinkific has made it easier for creators to set up subscription payments for community access, allowing for one-time, monthly, or recurring payment plans.

Content Drops: Regular content drops, similar to platforms like Patreon, keep members engaged and subscribed.

Using the right tools to support these delivery methods is important. Thinkific offers a 30-day free trial, allowing creators to explore features like cohort-based courses, subscription models, and community building.

Final Takeaway

As the online education space continues to grow, adapting to new delivery methods is essential for success. By leveraging free courses as lead magnets, structuring cohort-based programs, and implementing membership subscriptions, course creators can enhance their offerings, increase student engagement, and build sustainable businesses.

For more insights and practical tips on using these methods, explore Thinkific's resources.

For a step-by-step guide to help you kickstart your course creation journey, check out The Course Creation Guidebook and The Course Creators Circle Hub.

Highlights

00:33 Meet Aaron: Community Manager at Thinkific
01:35 Top Trends in Online Course Delivery
01:41 The Rise of Free Online Courses
03:24 Cohort-Based Programs: A New Approach
06:11 Membership and Subscription Models
07:23 Thinkific Tools and Features
08:18 Additional Course Creation Resources

Resources Mentioned in the Podcast

The Course Creator’s Toolkit https://www.enevergroup.com.au/the-course-creators-toolkit/
Thinkific https://snip.ly/thinkificeg

Launching Your First Course: Essential Steps and Tips

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 25 Jul 2024 22:30:00 GMT

Creating your first online course is an exciting and rewarding journey, but knowing where to start can be overwhelming. Whether you're an experienced professional or a passionate hobbyist, your knowledge holds incredible value.

In this guide, I will walk you through the essential steps and provide practical advice to help you turn your expertise into a valuable online course. From debunking common myths to identifying your ideal students, these steps will set you on the path to success.

Let’s dive in and explore how to make your course creation journey a successful and enjoyable experience.

Debunking Common Myths About Course Creation

Several misconceptions can hold you back, but I’m here to set the record straight:

Perfection Isn’t Necessary: Your first course doesn’t have to be perfect. Every course evolves, and those initial imperfections are part of the journey. Continuous improvement is key.

You Are Good Enough: Doubts about your ability to teach are natural, but your unique style and approach are what attract students. People seek your perspective and way of explaining things.

Tools and Resources: High-end equipment and a large following are not prerequisites for creating a course. Start with what you have and focus on building an engaged audience rather than a large one.

Understanding the Value of Your Expertise

I can’t stress enough how important it is to recognise and value your expertise, no matter where it comes from. Whether your knowledge is from a hobby or professional experience, it’s incredibly valuable. People are always searching online for guidance, often looking for the exact skills and know-how you possess. Never underestimate the worth of your knowledge.

Teaching What You Know

Teach subjects you are passionate about and can discuss extensively. These areas often provide the most value and engage students effectively. Share your knowledge, shortcuts, and steps that have helped you in your journey.

Utilising Search Tools

Tools like Answer the Public can provide insights into what potential students are searching for. Use these insights to develop course content that addresses common queries and interests. When naming your course, consider using popular search terms to enhance discoverability.

Setting Realistic Expectations

Setting achievable goals for both yourself and your students is crucial. Break down the course into manageable steps, providing students with small, attainable wins. This approach keeps them motivated and prevents overwhelm.

Identifying Your Ideal Student

Understanding who your ideal student is and what their pain points are can significantly impact the effectiveness of your course. Tailor your content to address their specific needs. For me, my ideal students are small business owners looking to enhance their marketing impact.

Pricing and Delivery Methods

Consider the costs involved in creating your course, including the time and resources required. Choose a platform that suits your needs, such as Thinkific, and determine a fair price. Additionally, decide on the delivery method, whether it’s live, pre-recorded, or a combination of both.

Managing Your Time

Creating a course demands a considerable time investment. I recommend time blocking and possibly setting aside dedicated days solely for course creation. This focused approach can help you avoid distractions and maintain productivity.

Final Takeaway

Creating a course is not just about sharing knowledge; it’s about making a meaningful impact on your students' lives. Embrace the journey, learn from the process, and continuously refine your content to meet the evolving needs of your audience.

With dedication and passion, your first course can become a stepping stone to even greater opportunities. I encourage all of you to leverage your unique expertise and approach to develop valuable and engaging courses. By understanding your audience, setting realistic goals, and using the right tools, you can successfully launch your first course.

For a step-by-step guide to help you kickstart your course creation journey, check out The Course Creation Guidebook and The Course Creators Circle Hub.

Highlights

00:33 Getting Started with Your First Course
01:01 Valuing Your Expertise
01:50 Debunking Course Creation Myths
03:50 Setting Realistic Expectations
04:49 Identifying Your Ideal Student
05:26 Pricing Your Course
05:54 Choosing Your Teaching Style
06:12 Time Management for Course Creation
07:01 Teaching What You Know
08:13 Leveraging Search Insights
09:05 Conclusion and Resources

Resources Mentioned in the Podcast

The Course Creators Circle Hub https://enevergroup.thinkific.com/courses/coursecreatorscircle
The Course Creation Guidebook https://www.enevergroup.com.au/product/the-course-creators-circle-course-creation-guidebook-create-that-course/
The Course Creator’s Toolkit https://www.enevergroup.com.au/the-course-creators-toolkit/
Learning Style Quiz https://www.enevergroup.com.au/what-is-your-learning-style-quiz/ Course Planning Sheets https://www.enevergroup.com.au/product/course-creators-circle-course-planning-sheets/

Teaching Live: Connecting and Engaging with Your Audience

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 11 Jul 2024 22:30:00 GMT

Live teaching offers a rich, interactive learning experience that can be tailored to meet students' diverse needs. By leveraging technology, preparing engaging materials, and fostering interaction, educators can create dynamic and effective live courses.

In this episode, we explore the world of live teaching, especially in the realm of course creation. Live teaching offers numerous advantages, making it a preferred approach for many educators.

Here are some of my insights, tips, and tools to enhance your live teaching experience.

Why Teach Live?

Enhanced Engagement and Interaction

Teaching live allows for real-time interaction with students. This direct engagement helps educators understand their students' needs better, fostering a more personalised learning experience. Live sessions enable immediate feedback and adjustments, making the learning process more dynamic and responsive.

Flexibility and Adaptability

Live teaching offers the flexibility to adapt content on the fly. If students seem confused or disengaged, educators can pivot their approach, ensuring the material resonates better. This adaptability is particularly beneficial in keeping the class engaged and ensuring comprehension.

Cost-Effectiveness

Conducting live online classes eliminates the need for extensive physical resources and storage platforms. This makes it a more cost-effective solution for both educators and students.

Tips for Successful Live Teaching

Utilise Beta Courses and Webinars

Delivering beta courses or a series of webinars can be an excellent way to refine your content. These sessions can later be stitched together to form a comprehensive course. Additionally, live challenges can keep students engaged and provide valuable feedback.

Embrace the Benefits of Online Platforms

Online teaching platforms like Zoom, Google Meet, and Restream offer increased accessibility and flexibility. These platforms allow educators to reach a global audience, fostering a more inclusive and diverse learning environment.

Promote Interactive Learning Experiences

Encourage interaction through discussions, forums, and collaborative activities. This not only enhances learning but also builds a sense of community among students.

Preparing Your Live Teaching Toolkit

Reliable Technology

A stable internet connection, a good computer or laptop, and a quality camera are essential. Logitech webcams are a great choice for their ease of use and excellent video quality.

Video Conferencing Software

Choose a reliable platform like Zoom, Google Meet, or Restream. These tools provide the necessary features for effective live teaching, including screen sharing and recording capabilities.

Quality Audio

Invest in a good microphone. Options like lapel mics or the Rode NT-USB Mini can ensure clear audio, which is crucial for maintaining student engagement.

Learning Management Systems (LMS)

Use an LMS to organise and distribute your course materials. Platforms like Thinkific and Wobo can streamline this process, providing a centralised location for students to access handouts, slides, and other resources.

For a detailed list of all the tools listed here and other tools you can use for course creation, check out The Course Creator’s Toolkit.

Structuring Your Live Sessions

Set Clear Objectives: Define specific learning objectives for each session to ensure that the content aligns with your students' needs and goals.

Prepare Engaging Materials: Create visually appealing slides, handouts, and other resources. Incorporate various learning styles to cater to visual, auditory, and kinesthetic learners.

Plan for Interaction: Encourage participation through questions, polls, and discussions. Use interactive elements to keep students engaged and facilitate deeper understanding.

Be Flexible: Be prepared to adapt your plan based on student feedback and engagement levels. Flexibility is key to a successful live teaching experience.

Collect Feedback: Gather feedback from your students after each session to understand what worked well and what could be improved. Use this information to refine future sessions.

Provide Clear Next Steps: Ensure students know what to expect next. Whether it's the next live session or additional resources, clear communication helps maintain engagement and continuity.

By incorporating robust technology, preparing engaging materials, and fostering an interactive learning environment, educators can deliver enriching and impactful educational experiences. Embrace the flexibility and immediacy of live teaching to connect with your students more deeply, cater to diverse learning styles, and continuously improve your course offerings based on real-time feedback.

For a step-by-step guide to help you kickstart your course creation journey, check out The Course Creation Guidebook and The Course Creators Circle Hub.

Highlights

00:00 Teaching Live Course
00:52 Benefits of Live Online Teaching
01:50 Engaging with Students in Real-Time
05:40 Tools and Equipment for Live Teaching
07:14 Types of Live Online Training
09:54 Planning and Executing Live Sessions
12:03 Final Thoughts and Encouragement

Resources Mentioned in the Podcast

The Course Creators Circle Hub https://enevergroup.thinkific.com/courses/coursecreatorscircle
The Course Creation Guidebook https://www.enevergroup.com.au/product/the-course-creators-circle-course-creation-guidebook-create-that-course/
The Course Creator’s Toolkit https://www.enevergroup.com.au/the-course-creators-toolkit/
Learning Style Quiz https://www.enevergroup.com.au/what-is-your-learning-style-quiz/
Course Planning Sheets https://www.enevergroup.com.au/product/course-creators-circle-course-planning-sheets/

Coming Up with a Good Course Idea

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 18 Apr 2024 22:30:00 GMT

Many people ask me, "How do you think of course topics?"

The secret lies in combining your expertise with what your audience needs.

Amazing course ideas are closer than you think, just waiting to be unearthed and developed.

Ready to explore this together?

Listen to Your Audience

One of the best ways to brainstorm course ideas is to simply listen. Yes, it's that easy!

Pay attention to the questions people are asking you. Whether it's during a workshop, a coaching session, or even casual conversations, those queries are gold mines waiting to be explored. Keep a handy notebook or digital record to jot down these questions – trust me, they'll come in handy later.

Draw from Personal Experience

You're an expert in your field for a reason, right? So why not share that expertise with the world? Think about the areas where you excel and consider how you can package that knowledge into a course. For example, if you're a whiz at software development and people are constantly picking your brain about mobile app creation, why not create a course on the topic? It's a win-win for everyone involved.

Staying Ahead of the Curve:

In today's fast-paced world, staying on top of industry trends is crucial. Keep your finger on the pulse of emerging technologies and developments within your niche. Not only does this keep you informed, but it also provides ample opportunities for course creation. By offering courses or memberships that help learners stay current, you become their go-to source for up-to-date knowledge.

Identify Gaps in Knowledge

Ever come across someone who's eager to work with you but lacks the necessary skills or knowledge? That's where you come in. Identify the gaps in your audience's skill sets and create courses to fill them. Whether it's a beginner's guide or an advanced masterclass, there's always room to empower others through education.

Leverage Existing Content

Chances are, you already have a treasure trove of content just waiting to be repurposed into courses. Take a look at your blog posts, podcasts, or videos – what topics consistently resonate with your audience? Use tools like Google Search Console to identify your top-performing content and consider bundling related posts into comprehensive course modules.

Repurposing existing content, such as top-performing blog posts, can be a goldmine for course inspiration. By organising your blogs into modules, you can quickly develop engaging course content.

Harnessing Search Tools:

Finally, don't underestimate the power of search tools like Answer the Public. By typing in relevant keywords or problems your audience faces, you can uncover valuable insights that inspire course ideas. Use these search results to craft compelling module names or even entire course topics.

At the end of the day, a great course idea isn't just about what you know – it's about solving someone's problem. So don't overthink it. Start with the questions people are asking you, tap into your expertise, and get creative. After all, the best course is the one that's created and done, not sitting on your to-do list gathering dust.

The Importance of Setting Clear Expectations With Your Course Students

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 04 Apr 2024 22:30:00 GMT

In course creation, understanding what a course offers is fundamental to fostering a positive learning experience with your students.

In this episode, I want to dive into a topic that I think is really important for us as course creators and also important for our students. That is setting clear expectations and understanding about what that course is going to offer our audience in the course journey.

Understanding Diverse Needs

Let's face it: learners come in all shapes and sizes. Some are just dipping their toes into the subject matter, while others are practically experts. That's why it's crucial to offer a variety of course levels and formats, from beginner-friendly modules to advanced masterclasses. Whether it's self-paced learning or live sessions, catering to diverse needs is key. Understanding the learning styles is a great way to start.

Benefits of Clear Expectations

Setting clear expectations establishes trust and credibility, creating a positive learning environment for both you and your students.

Plus, knowing what's expected of them keeps learners engaged and motivated.

And hey, who doesn't love fewer confused emails from students?

Setting Clear Landing Pages

First impressions matter, right? That's why our course landing pages should be crystal clear. A friendly video intro from the instructor goes a long way in building rapport and setting the tone.

Curriculum modules should be clearly outlined, providing a roadmap for learning.

Including a checklist of key takeaways and addressing frequently asked questions further clarifies what the student can expect inside your course as well.

Communicating Learning Outcomes

By using tools like our Course planning sheets you should be able to clearly articulate how the course addresses specific problems and highlight key learning areas on your landing pages that allow students to make an informed decision.

Be consistent across all platforms—landing pages, social media, you name it—so students know exactly what they're signing up for.

Setting clear expectations isn't just good for us—it's great for our students too. It builds that all-important trust and lays out the roadmap for success. So let's keep things clear, keep 'em honest, and keep those students coming back for more.

Highlights

[00:00:00] The importance of setting clear expectations
[00:00:54] Differentiating course offerings for diverse needs
[00:02:24] Benefits of clear expectations: trust, engagement, learning outcomes
[00:03:14] Tips for setting clear expectations on course landing pages
[00:05:29] Communicating additional support options and upselling
[00:06:03] The significance of clear expectations

Resources

The Course Creators Circle https://enevergroup.thinkific.com/courses/coursecreatorscircle
Course Planning Sheets https://www.enevergroup.com.au/product/course-creators-circle-course-planning-sheets/
Thinkific http://snip.ly/thinkific
Naming Your Course Modules https://www.enevergroup.com.au/naming-your-course-and-modules/
What Is Your Learning Style Quiz https://www.enevergroup.com.au/what-is-your-learning-style-quiz/

Engaging Students Post Course

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Fri, 22 Mar 2024 02:30:00 GMT

Engaging your students after a course is vital for the ongoing success of your business. It's about creating that relationship that keeps them learning with you and continuing along the journey.

In this episode of The Course Creators Circle Podcast, I will delve into strategies on how you can engage with your students post-course. Join me as we explore effective tips to maintain that connection with your learners even after they've completed their journey with you.

Creating Lasting Relationships

Imagine you've just finished a course. You're brimming with newfound knowledge and eager for more. That hunger for continuous learning is what drives many of our students beyond the course completion. As course creators, it's our responsibility to foster this desire and keep them engaged post-course.

Introducing Membership Opportunities

One effective way to extend the learning journey is by introducing students to our membership programs. These platforms like The Course Creators Circle provide ongoing support, opportunities for further learning, and a sense of belonging to a community of like-minded individuals. By inviting them to join our inner circle, we ensure they have access to continued guidance and resources.

Utilising Free Communities

For those not ready to commit to a membership, offering access to free communities can be equally valuable. These spaces like the Business Business Business allow students to interact with peers, ask questions, and stay updated on relevant topics. It's about providing avenues for engagement that suit the diverse needs of our audience.

Harnessing the Power of Email

Email remains a potent tool for post-course engagement. By crafting targeted email sequences, we can guide students towards their next steps, whether it's joining a membership, exploring additional courses, or scheduling a follow-up call. Personalised communication shows our commitment to their ongoing development.

Automation and Technology

The digital age has given us access to advanced automation tools and AI-driven solutions. Leveraging these technologies allows us to streamline our communication processes and deliver timely, relevant content to our students. Whether it's triggering emails based on course completion or inviting them to join exclusive communities, technology enhances our ability to nurture relationships effectively.

The Importance of Feedback

Feedback is invaluable for refining our post-course engagement strategies. Encouraging students to leave reviews not only provides valuable insights but also offers an opportunity to express gratitude and extend further support. By listening to their feedback, we can continuously improve and tailor our offerings to meet their needs.

As course creators, our journey doesn't end when the course concludes—it's just the beginning of a lifelong relationship with our students. By implementing robust post-course engagement strategies, we ensure they remain inspired, supported, and eager to continue learning with us. Remember, it's not just about teaching content; it's about guiding and empowering our students every step of the way.

Highlights

[00:00:56] Emphasising the importance of continuous learning beyond course completion
[00:01:35] Introducing membership programs for ongoing support and community engagement
[00:02:45] Utilising free communities as valuable spaces for interaction and knowledge sharing
[00:03:03] Leveraging email to guide students towards further learning opportunities
[00:03:42] Harnessing automation and technology to streamline communication processes
[00:04:11] Encouraging feedback to refine post-course engagement strategies

Resources

The Marketing Circle https://enevergroup.thinkific.com/bundles/MarketingCircle
The Course Creators Circle https://enevergroup.thinkific.com/courses/coursecreatorscircle
Business Business Business https://www.businessbusinessbusiness.com.au/ AI, Async, Automation Hub https://enevergroup.thinkific.com/courses/aaahub

Reasons Your Course Might Not Be Selling

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 11 Jan 2024 22:30:00 GMT

As a course creator, one of the most frustrating things that can happen in your course creation journey is to have created a course, to feel like you're marketing it, and then find out that your course is not selling. Let’s explore some common reasons why your course may not be selling and provide actionable strategies to address each of these issues.

Lack of Sufficient Marketing

One of the primary reasons your course might not be selling is that you haven't actually marketed it enough. If people don't know about your course, they can't buy it. To overcome this, it is crucial to tap into evergreen marketing strategies and ensure that you are consistently promoting your course through various channels. Utilise tools like Meet Edgar to automate your promotional posts and videos on social media. Additionally, consider guest appearances on podcasts and explore guest speaking opportunities to expand your reach.

The Course is not Addressing the Desired Problem

Another possible reason for low sales is that your course may not be solving the problem that people are willing to pay to solve. It is essential to deliver what your audience wants and align your course content with their expectations. Take the time to understand the needs and desires of your target audience and incorporate this knowledge into your lessons. Communicating the value of your course and clearly outlining its benefits are key aspects of addressing this issue.

Insufficient Communication of Value

If potential customers cannot see the value in your course, they are unlikely to make a purchase. It is crucial to clearly communicate the benefits of your course and demonstrate how it can help them achieve their desired outcomes. Include detailed information about what the course includes and what participants will learn by the end. Additionally, highlight your expertise and value as an instructor in your biography to build trust and credibility.

Incorrect Pricing

Pricing your course incorrectly can significantly impact its sales. Ensure that your price point aligns with the perceived value and return on investment your course offers. Avoid pricing too low, as customers may question the quality and value they will receive. Conversely, pricing too high can deter potential buyers who do not see a compelling return on investment. Conduct market research and analyse competitor pricing to determine the optimal price for your course.

Targeting the Wrong Audience

Marketing your course to the wrong audience can lead to low conversion rates. Take the time to identify and understand your target audience's interests, needs, and preferences. Leverage highly targeted ads and promotional strategies to reach your ideal customers. Avoid wasting marketing opportunities by targeting individuals who are not interested in or do not have a need for your course.

If you are struggling to sell your course, carefully consider the reasons outlined in this blog post and take actionable steps to address each issue. Be proactive in your marketing efforts, deliver what your audience wants, effectively communicate the value of your course, ensure correct pricing, and target the right audience. Remember, building a successful course takes time and dedication. Seek feedback from course creation communities, ask for help when needed, and give yourself time to establish credibility and connect with your audience.

We hope these insights and strategies will help you increase the sales of your course. Happy course selling!

Highlights

[00:00:00] Why are your courses not selling
[00:01:10] Insufficient marketing
[00:03:04] What the audience wants and their willingness to pay
[00:05:20] Communicate value
[00:06:47] Incorrect pricing
[00:07:06] Targeting the wrong audience
[00:07:41] Competition, technical issues, timing, poor sales copy, and the risk of giving up too soon
[00:08:51] Encouragement to persist, seek help, and give the course enough time to gain traction in the market

Resources Mentioned in the PodcastThe Course Creators Circle

The Course Creators Circle https://enevergroup.thinkific.com/courses/coursecreatorscircle

Creating Your Course - Where Do You Start

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 14 Dec 2023 22:30:00 GMT

Congratulations! You've decided to embark on the exciting journey of creating your own course. In this episode, we will explore the key steps to get you started in crafting a successful and engaging course.

Whether you're an expert in a particular field or have a passion you want to share with the world, this guide will help you define your goals, choose the right topic, create a course outline, and much more. So, let's dive in and discover where to start with your course creation journey.

Defining Your Goals

Before diving into the course creation process, it's crucial to define your goals. Ask yourself, "What do I want to achieve with my course?" Understanding the purpose and desired outcomes of your course will help you stay focused and motivated throughout the creation process. Additionally, identifying your target audience and understanding what they will get out of your course is essential for effective course planning.

Finding Your Course's Place in Your Business

Now that you have a clear vision of your course goals, it's essential to consider where your course fits within your business offering. Take a step back and evaluate how your course aligns with your other products or services. By strategically positioning your course, you can create a cohesive and valuable experience for your customers. For example, if you offer one-on-one coaching or have other entry-level offerings, consider how your course can complement and enhance these existing offerings.

Choosing the Perfect Topic

Selecting the right topic for your course is a crucial step in ensuring its success. Ideally, you want to choose a topic that you are knowledgeable and passionate about. Your enthusiasm will shine through and engage your students. Additionally, consider what your target market is searching for. Using descriptive and straightforward titles for your course modules and lessons will increase the chances of your course being discovered and sought after by your audience.

Creating an Effective Course Outline

Once you have determined your topic, it's time to create a course outline. Begin by outlining the main points or modules you want to cover in your course. These modules will serve as the roadmap for your students' learning journey. Within each module, break down the main points into individual lessons. This division will keep the content digestible and prevent overwhelming your students. Remember, creating a cohesive and well-structured course outline will lead to a better learning experience for your students.

Choosing the Right Course Format

When it comes to course formats, you have several options to consider. Will your course be self-paced, a live workshop, or evergreen? Each format has its advantages and best suits different teaching styles and subject matters. Self-paced courses provide flexibility and allow students to progress at their own speed. Live workshops offer real-time interaction and engagement. Evergreen courses can be bundled with memberships and provide ongoing value. Consider your teaching style, the nature of your content, and the preferences of your target audience when choosing the right format for your course.

Developing Engaging Content

With your course outline and format in place, it's time to develop your course content. This step may include creating videos, tutorials, audio files, lectures, and interactive workbooks. Keep in mind that delivering engaging content is key to capturing your students' attention and driving their learning experience. Leverage different mediums to appeal to various learning styles and make your content as interactive and practical as possible.

Deciding on the Right Delivery Platform

Once you have your content ready, you need to choose a reliable and user-friendly platform to deliver your course. Thinkific, a renowned online course platform, offers a seamless experience for both course creators and students. Its features allow you to upload and organize your content, interact with students, and track their progress. By testing and revising your course on the chosen platform, you can ensure a smooth learning experience for your students.

Launch and Promote Your Course

Congratulations! Your course is almost ready to be shared with the world. But before you launch, take a moment to develop a marketing strategy to promote your course. Utilise various channels such as social media, email marketing, and collaborations with industry influencers to create awareness and generate interest. Engage with your target audience, answer their questions, and highlight the benefits and value your course provides. By implementing a well-planned marketing strategy, you can maximise the reach of your course and attract eager learners.

Creating a course is an exciting endeavour that allows you to share your knowledge and passion with others. By following these steps and implementing a thoughtful and strategic approach, you can set yourself up for success in the world of online education.

So, take that first step, define your goals, choose an engaging topic, create a comprehensive outline, and bring your course to life on a reliable and user-friendly platform. Best of luck on your course creation journey, and I can't wait to see the impact you'll make in the lives of your students.

Highlights

[00:00:00] How do you start creating courses?
[00:01:10] Defining goals for the course
[00:02:06] Significance of positioning the course within the overall business offering
[00:02:55] Choosing a topic that aligns with personal knowledge, passion, and market demand
[00:04:17] Creating a course outline with modules and lessons to keep the learning journey manageable
[00:05:21] Selecting the course format and developing content
[00:05:38] Choosing a delivery platform and the importance of testing and revising
[00:05:55] Final steps in launching the course and engaging in the marketing journey

Resources Mentioned in the Podcast

The Course Creators Circle https://enevergroup.thinkific.com/courses/coursecreatorscircle
Course Creators Circle Guidebook https://www.enevergroup.com.au/product/the-course-creators-circle-course-creation-guidebook-create-that-course
Course Planning Sheets https://www.enevergroup.com.au/product/course-creators-circle-course-planning-sheets
Thinkific https://snip.ly/thinkificeg
Wobo https://snip.ly/woboeg

The Lifecycle of an Online Course

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 30 Nov 2023 22:30:00 GMT

The course creation journey is a life cycle of its own. In this episode, we will explore the different stages of the life cycle of an online course.

Understanding these stages and their respective elements will help you successfully navigate through your course creation journey.

Planning and Development

The first stage of the life cycle is the planning and development stage. Here, you will identify your goals, set objectives, define your target audience, and develop a course outline. Building a content plan is crucial at this stage. Consider using tools like the course credit circle planning sheets or guidebooks to assist you in this process. Additionally, booking a strategy session can provide valuable insight. The planning and development stage sets the foundation for creating a successful online course.

Course Creation

Once you have a solid plan in place, you move on to the course creation stage. Here, you bring your course content to life. This includes creating text, images, videos, quizzes, and other multimedia elements that will engage your learners. You may also develop assessments to evaluate your students' progress. As you progress through this stage, you start to fill in the learning structure established during the planning and development phase.

Marketing and Promotion

Marketing and promotion play a significant role in the success of your course. Consider starting your courses with pre-sale options, allowing interested individuals to pre-order and engage with your promotional materials. Create compelling landing pages, sales pages, and utilise social media channels to reach your target audience. Consider incorporating podcasts and other marketing strategies to generate interest and drive enrollments. Marketing and promotion efforts should be ongoing throughout the entire life cycle of your course.

Enrollment and Delivery

After successfully marketing your course, it's time for enrollment and delivery. This stage involves signing up students for the course and conducting the launch day. Choose a suitable learning management system, such as Thinkific, to facilitate the enrollment process and make the course content accessible to students. Determine whether your course will have a live component or be self-paced and evergreen. Be prepared to deliver the course content effectively, ensuring students receive the necessary support and materials.

Evaluation and Assessment

As learners progress through your course, it's crucial to evaluate their performance and provide assessments. Regularly monitor student progress and reach out for feedback. Quizzes, exams, and live interactions can help gauge comprehension and address any roadblocks students may encounter. This stage allows you to fine-tune the course content and make necessary improvements.

Maintenance and Updates

Once your course is launched, it requires maintenance and updates. Keep the material relevant and engaging by regularly updating and improving it. Monitor student engagement and satisfaction levels. Request reviews from satisfied students and utilise them as a marketing tool to attract new enrollees. Maintain an ongoing marketing journey by leveraging these reviews and appearing on podcasts to keep the course in the spotlight.

Review and Renewal

The final stage of the life cycle is the review and renewal phase. Continuously assess your plan and development, making any necessary additions or modifications to the course. Create new content to keep the course fresh and up-to-date. Update your marketing and promotion strategies to reflect these additions. Maintain the enrollment and delivery process, evaluate and assess student progress, and ensure course satisfaction. This cycle of review and renewal allows your course to evolve and remain relevant.

Creating an online course is a process that involves several stages. Understanding the life cycle and its key components provides a roadmap for success. From planning and development to enrollment and delivery, and through marketing, evaluation, maintenance, and review, each stage contributes to the overall success of the course. Embrace the journey and continue to refine and improve your online course as you navigate through its life cycle.

Highlights

[00:00:00] What is the lifecycle of an online course creation journey?
[00:00:51] Planning and Development Stage
[00:01:34] Course Creation Stage
[00:02:07] Marketing and Promotion
[00:02:39] Enrollment and Delivery
[00:03:12] Evaluation and Assessment
[00:03:46] Course Maintenance and Updates
[00:04:05] Review Phase

Resources Mentioned in the Podcast

Course Planning Sheets https://www.enevergroup.com.au/product/course-creators-circle-course-planning-sheets
Course Creators Circle Guidebook https://www.enevergroup.com.au/product/the-course-creators-circle-course-creation-guidebook-create-that-course
Thinkific https://www.enevergroup.com.au/product/the-course-creators-circle-course-creation-guidebook-create-that-course

Are You Sabotaging Your Course

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Tue, 14 Nov 2023 22:52:00 GMT

As course creators, we often put ourselves in our own way when it comes to creating, launching, and marketing our courses. We may procrastinate, doubt our abilities, or fail to effectively promote our work. All of these behaviours can sabotage our success and prevent us from reaching our full potential.

Here are some of the most common ways course creators sabotage themselves:

Procrastination: We put off starting or finishing our courses, often due to fear or perfectionism.
Lack of focus: We get distracted by other ideas and projects, and our courses never get completed.
Imposter syndrome: We doubt our abilities and convince ourselves that our courses aren't good enough.
Overcomplication: We make our courses too complex and overwhelming for our students.
Not setting goals: We don't have a clear plan for our course creation journey, so we're more likely to give up.
Not asking for help: We try to do everything ourselves, even when we don't have the expertise.
Not engaging with students: We don't build relationships with our students before, during, or after the course.
Not making the course engaging: We create boring and uninspiring content that our students don't want to learn from.
Not marketing the course enough: We don't tell people about our courses, so they don't know they exist.
Not seeking feedback: We don't ask for feedback from our students or colleagues, so we can't improve our courses.

So how can we overcome these self-sabotaging tendencies?

If you find that you are sabotaging your own course creation journey, there are a few things you can do to get back on track:

Identify your sabotaging behaviours. The first step to overcoming a problem is to identify it. Once you know what you are doing that is holding you back, you can start to make changes.
Create a plan. Break down your goals into smaller, more manageable steps. Create a timeline for yourself and stick to it.
Ask for help. Don't be afraid to ask for help from others. There are many resources available to help you create and market your courses.
Join a community: There are many online and offline communities of course creators who can support and encourage you.
Celebrate your successes: Take the time to appreciate your accomplishments, no matter how small they may seem.
Believe in yourself. You have something valuable to offer. Believe in yourself and your ability to create a successful course.

Remember, you are not alone. Many course creators struggle with the same challenges that you do. But by overcoming these self-sabotaging tendencies, you can create a successful course that will help others.

Highlights

[00:00:00] The challenges course creators face in creating, marketing, and selling their courses.
[00:00:42] How procrastination can hinder course creation
[00:02:12] Lack of focus
[00:02:50] Imposter syndrome
[00:03:46] Overcomplication and asking for help
[00:04:24] Setting goals
[00:05:10] Sufficient time for course development
[00:05:34] Engaging with students
[00:05:54] Making the course engaging:
[00:06:31] Marketing and promotion
[00:07:11] Seeking feedback
[00:07:59] Conclusion

Resources

Course Planning Sheets https://www.enevergroup.com.au/product/course-creators-circle-course-planning-sheets/
The Course Creators Circle Guidebook https://www.enevergroup.com.au/product/the-course-creators-circle-course-creation-guidebook-create-that-course/
The Course Creators Circle https://enevergroup.thinkific.com/courses/coursecreatorscircle

How to Get and Keep Your Student's Attention

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 02 Nov 2023 22:30:00 GMT

As course creators, we need to keep our students engaged in the learning journey in order for them to get the most out of our courses. This can be challenging, but there are a number of things we can do to make it easier.

This episode of the Course Creators Circle Podcast delves into essential strategies on how course creators can get and keep their student’s attention, focusing on attracting students to their courses and, most importantly, keeping them engaged throughout the learning journey.

1. Getting Students' Attention

To captivate students, course creators must provide high-quality educational marketing content that aligns with various learning styles. Personal connection matters; showing the creator's face establishes trust and familiarity, making the learning experience more engaging.

2. Crafting an Appealing Landing Page

The landing page should clearly communicate the course's benefits. A video introduction, coupled with concise text, icons, and images, can highlight what students will learn, creating an immediate visual impact. Utilising attention-grabbing elements like checklists enhances engagement.

3. Engaging Welcome Sequence and Nurture Series

Upon enrolment, a welcome video outlining the course's format and learning outcomes is crucial. For longer courses, implementing a nurture sequence via emails supports students throughout their journey, providing reminders and support. Personalised nurture emails also maintain student engagement and motivation.

4. Interactive Learning and Varied Teaching Approaches

Incorporating interactive elements like quizzes and workbooks keeps students engaged. Varied teaching methods, including videos, audio recordings, and multimedia presentations, prevent monotony. Allowing students to submit work fosters a sense of participation and achievement, enhancing their motivation to continue.

5. Evergreen Self-Paced Courses

Structured courses should offer a clear outline, a tour of materials, diverse lesson formats, and robust support through nurture sequences. Celebrating students' progress with interactive tools using plaYEAH adds a sense of achievement, ensuring they stay motivated to complete the course.

6. Membership Bundles for Continuous Learning

Bundling courses into memberships creates a supportive community. Live sessions, Q&A sessions, and expert sessions enhance interaction. This model ensures continuous engagement, as students can join at any stage, creating a sense of community and support.

7. Live Cohorts and Challenges

Live cohort programs and challenges maintain momentum by offering time-bound, intensive learning experiences. These short-term programs provide quick wins and often lead to long-term engagement in memberships. Structured challenges ensure active participation and create a sense of achievement upon completion.

Additional Tips:

Show your face in your course: Students are more likely to engage with a course if they feel like they know and trust the instructor. Make sure to show your face in your video lessons and other course materials.

Use a variety of teaching methods: Different students learn in different ways. Mix up your teaching methods to keep things interesting and engaging for everyone.

Provide opportunities for interaction: Students are more likely to stay engaged if they have opportunities to interact with the instructor and other students. This could be done through discussion forums, live Q&A sessions, or group projects.

Make it easy for students to get help: If students are struggling, they should be able to easily get help from the instructor or other students. Make sure to provide clear instructions on how to get help in your course materials.

Conclusion

Course creators can keep their students engaged by implementing a combination of interactive elements, varied teaching approaches, and continuous support mechanisms. Personal connections, interactive tools, and diverse learning experiences play pivotal roles in creating a vibrant and engaging learning environment, ensuring students not only enroll but also complete their courses with enthusiasm.

Highlights

[00:00:00] How to get and keep students' attention throughout the learning journey
[00:00:48] Attracting Students
[00:01:21] Naming and Marketing
[00:02:06] Crafting an Appealing Landing Page
[00:02:47] Engaging Welcome Sequence
[00:03:36] Interactive Learning
[00:04:54] Evergreen Self-Paced Courses
[00:05:45] Membership Bundles
[00:06:26] Live Cohorts and Challenges
[00:06:53] Importance of personal connections

Resources

Listen to the Naming Your Course Episode https://www.thecoursecreatorscircle.com.au/naming-your-course-and-modules/
Answer the Public https://snip.ly/answerthepub
Interact Quiz Maker https://snip.ly/interact
Wobo https://snip.ly/woboeg
PlaYEAH https://snip.ly/playeaheg
The Course Creators Circle Guidebook https://www.enevergroup.com.au/product/the-course-creators-circle-course-creation-guidebook-create-that-course/
The Course Creators Circle https://enevergroup.thinkific.com/courses/coursecreatorscircle

When and How to Market Your Online Course

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 14 Sep 2023 22:30:00 GMT

Marketing an online course is a pivotal aspect of ensuring its success, but understanding precisely when and how to execute this is another strategy on its own.

Timing and strategic promotion can make all the difference. So in this episode of The Course Creators Circle Podcast, we delve into the strategies for when and how to market your courses effectively.

1. Start Early and Educate

Begin by understanding that online courses should be a part of your business offerings, not the entire business. Therefore, it's vital to start marketing early. Educational marketing works wonders here. Instead of solely promoting your course, start by sharing your knowledge. Dispense valuable insights and information related to your course topic. This not only establishes your authority but also plants the seed of interest in potential learners' minds.

2. Utilise Short-Form Video

Short-form video is a dominant force nowadays. Platforms like TikTok, Instagram Reels, and YouTube Shorts offer ample opportunities for discovery. Creating short video snippets, sharing tips, or offering quick insights related to your course topic can attract and engage your target audience effectively.

3. Repurpose Content Across Platforms

No need to be overwhelmed by trying to be everywhere at once. Utilise tools like Repurpose.io to streamline content distribution. Record short videos and efficiently share them across various platforms, from TikTok to Pinterest. This approach helps you reach a broader audience without overextending yourself.

4. Network and Engage

Engaging with your audience is crucial. Participating in relevant social groups and online communities is an effective strategy, but don't rush to sell your course. Instead, focus on answering questions and building your profile. This showcases your expertise and provides insights into your audience's needs.

5. Build Your Email List

Your email list is a valuable asset in the course marketing journey. As you engage with your audience and gain insights, start building your email list. Offer valuable content like cheat sheets, webinars, or downloadable resources in exchange for email addresses. Ensure that what you offer is genuinely valuable to your audience.

6. Market While Creating

Don't wait until your course is fully finished to begin marketing. Share your progress and enthusiasm with your audience. Highlight exciting developments or insights you've gained during the course creation process. This generates anticipation and keeps your audience engaged.

7. Countdown to Launch

When it's time to launch your course, create a countdown. Offer a free preview, special discounts, or a free trial to give potential learners a taste of what's to come and what to expect. This approach allows them to experience your teaching style and the value that your course offers.

8. Continuous Marketing

Course marketing is an ongoing effort. It doesn't end after you launch. Allocate a substantial portion of your course creation journey to marketing. Use evergreen marketing strategies, maintain an active social media presence, and regularly communicate with your audience through newsletters.

Consider sharing valuable content marketing pieces related to your course. Convert videos or insights into blog posts, providing even more value to your audience and driving traffic to your course.

Conclusion

When it comes to marketing your online course, timing is everything. Starting early, engaging with your audience, and building anticipation is key. Embrace various platforms and tools to streamline your efforts, and remember that marketing is a continuous process.

Just as courses are built one module at a time, effective course marketing is a series of small, strategic steps that accumulate into a successful launch. By incorporating these strategies into your business journey, you'll be well on your way to building a thriving online course and a dedicated community of learners.

So, when should you start marketing your course? The answer is simple—start now.

Highlights

[00:00:00] Marketing courses within your business
[00:00:52] Why courses should be part of your business offering
[00:01:36] Why use educational marketing strategies
[00:02:28] How to use short-form videos for course marketing
[00:03:12] Networking in social groups and gathering insights about your audience
[00:03:46] How to build an email list
[00:04:26] Why you should market during the course creation process
[00:05:13] Launching your course
[00:06:08] Importance of continuous course marketing

Resources

Repurpose.io https://snip.ly/repurposeio
Descript https://snip.ly/descript
ChatGPT https://snip.ly/chatgpteg
Bard https://snip.ly/googlebard
The Course Creators Circle https://enevergroup.thinkific.com/courses/coursecreatorscircle

Top 3 Ways to Build an Audience for Your Course

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 31 Aug 2023 22:30:00 GMT

Whether you're a seasoned course creator or just starting out on this educational journey, attracting the right audience is essential for success.

In this episode, we delve into three highly effective methods for building a robust audience for your course. While there are numerous ways to attract learners to your offerings, these three strategies consistently yield exceptional results.

1. Captivating Webinars for Pre-Interest Engagement

One of the most impactful ways to initiate interest and engagement is by offering a webinar, free session, or preview of your course. Webinars are particularly effective due to their interactive nature. Participants have the opportunity to connect with you directly, ask questions, and gain insights into the course content. This initial touchpoint sets the stage for a pre-interest interaction, planting the seed of curiosity about your course.

Webinars provide a platform to address prospective students' questions and concerns, thereby easing their decision-making process when it comes to investing in your course. The commitment of time that attendees make for the webinar demonstrates their genuine interest, making them a highly engaged lead. Not only does this strategy offer value to potential learners, but it also grants you valuable insights into your marketing message and calls to action. Starting the audience's journey with an educational webinar can pave the way for successful course promotion.

2. Leveraging Free eBooks and Downloads for Nurturing

Offering a free ebook or downloadable resource is another effective method for audience growth. These resources can be repurposed from existing content, such as blog posts or video scripts generated using AI writing tools like ChatGPT or Bard among others. By creating an ebook or downloadable guide, you provide value to your audience while capturing their email addresses for further engagement.

While not all recipients may make an immediate purchase after downloading the resource, this strategy allows you to establish a nurturing sequence. Through a series of follow-up emails, you can guide recipients towards the desired outcome—enrollment in your course. This nurturing sequence provides continuous value, fostering a sense of trust and credibility, ultimately increasing conversion.s.

3. Engaging Quizzes to Ignite Curiosity and Segmentation

Quizzes are a unique way to tap into people's natural curiosity and ignite their desire to learn. By creating and promoting a quiz, you not only engage your audience but also gain valuable insights into their preferences and needs. Quizzes can help segment your audience based on their quiz results, ensuring that your course offerings are tailored to their specific interests and requirements.

The act of taking a quiz signifies a certain level of commitment and engagement from participants. This heightened involvement makes it more likely that they will be receptive to your nurturing sequence. By delivering content that aligns with their quiz results, you continue to provide targeted value, positioning your course as the solution to their challenges. Quizzes provide a powerful entry point for attracting engaged leads and delivering personalised content that resonates.

Nurturing for Success: The Key to Conversions

Regardless of the strategy you choose, the common thread among them is the importance of nurturing your leads. A lead becomes truly valuable when it's followed up with meaningful interactions. Upon engagement through webinars, ebooks or quizzes, implementing a carefully designed nurture sequence is essential for conversion success.

Begin by expressing gratitude for their engagement—whether attending a webinar, downloading an ebook, or taking a quiz—then provide them with additional valuable content and skills that align with their initial interaction. Gradually introduce your course offer within this sequence, ensuring that learners are well-prepared to make an informed decision. A final reminder seals the nurturing process, reminding them of the value your course can provide.

Embrace Your Unique Approach

As you embark on the journey of building your course audience, remember that these strategies serve as powerful foundations. However, each course creator's journey is unique. While these three methods have demonstrated their effectiveness, you might discover additional strategies that resonate with your audience.

Highlights

[00:00:00] My three favourite ways to build an audience for your course.
[00:00:54] Strategy 1: Offer a webinar, free session, preview, or free trial. Webinars engage participants, allow them to ask questions, and generate pre-interest in the course.
[00:01:39] Webinars provide engagement, answers, and help in understanding potential students.
[00:02:10] Strategy 2: Offer a free ebook or download. Create valuable content that can be downloaded, leading to an email list for nurturing.
[00:02:50] Nurturing through email sequences even if immediate conversion doesn't occur.
[00:03:12] Strategy 3: Use quizzes. Quizzes engage curiosity, segment audiences, and provide targeted nurturing based on quiz results.
[00:04:02] Importance of nurturing leads through a sequence of emails, providing value and skills.
[00:04:33] Recap of the three methods (webinars, ebooks/downloads, quizzes) and the significance of nurturing leads.

Resources

ChatGPT https://snip.ly/chatgpteg
Bard https://snip.ly/googlebard
Designrr https://snip.ly/designrr
Interact Quiz Maker https://snip.ly/interactquizmaker The Course Creators Circle https://enevergroup.thinkific.com/courses/coursecreatorscircle

Do You Already Have the Content for Your Course?

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 17 Aug 2023 22:30:00 GMT

Course creators, both new and seasoned, are often faced with the challenge of sourcing compelling content for their courses.

The quest for the perfect material can be time-consuming. But what if the content you're looking for might already be at your fingertips?

In this episode of the Course Creator Circle Podcast, we're delving into the art of repurposing and leveraging your existing content to craft exceptional courses that resonate with your audience and streamline your course creation journey.

Tapping into the Power of Analytics

When embarking on the journey of course creation, it's important to start by mining your own data. Tools like Google Analytics, social media insights, and YouTube channel statistics can provide valuable insights into selecting what content has resonated most with your audience. This goldmine of information can serve as the foundation for your next course, ensuring that you're building upon what's already proven to engage and captivate.

Transforming Workshops and Presentations

Your past webinars, workshops, and presentations hold a wealth of untapped potential. Have you considered repackaging your PowerPoint or Canva presentations as course material? These visual aids can serve as effective teaching tools, providing a cohesive and immersive learning experience for your students. By repurposing these resources, you're not only saving time but also creating an opportunity to expand on valuable insights you've previously shared.

Bridging the Gap with Freebies and Downloads

The free resources you've generously shared with your audience – such as ebooks, downloads, and guides – can play a pivotal role in your course creation strategy. Rather than relegating them to standalone assets, consider integrating them seamlessly into your course structure. These resources add depth and value, enriching your students' learning journey and providing practical takeaways they can implement in real-world scenarios.

Unveiling Your Operational Expertise

Your operational processes, systems, and how-to guides are also knowledge waiting to be shared. By offering insights into how you've streamlined your own business operations, you provide students with tangible skills and real-world applications. These gems of wisdom, refined through your own experiences, can serve as the backbone of your course content, creating a unique and valuable learning experience.

Optimising Existing Content for Course Creation

A common pitfall many course creators encounter is the tendency to recreate content unnecessarily. Rather than starting from scratch, consider optimising your existing resources for course creation. Delivering your content in a logical sequence and filling in any gaps with additional insights can streamline the process and prevent overwhelm, both for you and your students.

A Game-Changing Tip for Top Performers

For those with top-performing blogs or videos, there's a powerful strategy to expedite course creation. Tools like Bard and ChatGPT can generate comprehensive course outlines based on your existing content. By leveraging your blog posts or videos as a foundation, you can quickly map out your course structure and then utilise your content archives to supplement the material with relevant resources.

A Final Takeaway

In conclusion, as a course creator, you've amassed a wealth of valuable content over time. Each blog post, video, presentation, and guide is a potential building block for your next course. By repurposing and optimising your existing content, you're not only enhancing your course creation process but also delivering exceptional value to your students.

Highlights

[00:00:00] Using existing content to create a course
[00:00:50] Tools to identify top-performing content that could be expanded into a course
[00:01:10] Advantage of using existing content for course creation and marketing
[00:01:25] Resources that can be expanded into or bundled within a course
[00:01:46] Other resources as potential components of the course offering
[00:02:00] Value of various types of content created over time, including operational processes and how-to guides
[00:02:19] Importance of leveraging existing resources to map out the course content and provide valuable learning experiences
[00:02:35] Various types of content that can be included in a course
[00:02:51] Benefit of delivering existing content in an easily digestible manner to streamline course creation and avoid unnecessary recreation
[00:03:20] Using tools like Bard or ChatGPT to generate a course outline based on the content
[00:03:48] Search personal storage accounts for resources related to keywords from the course outline
[00:04:00] More tips at The Course Creators Circle

Resources

Google Analytics https://snip.ly/googleanalytics
Canva http://snip.ly/canva30pro
Bard https://snip.ly/googlebard
ChatGPT https://snip.ly/chatgpteg

What You Need to Know About Student Completion Rates

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 23 Feb 2023 22:30:00 GMT

Completion rates for online courses can vary widely depending on a number of factors, including the subject matter, the level of difficulty, and the commitment and motivation of the students.

Some studies have found that completion rates for online courses tend to be lower than those for traditional in-person courses. However, other studies have found that completion rates can be similar or even higher for online courses when compared to in-person courses.

One study conducted by the Department of Education found that the completion rate for online courses was about 60%, compared to about 80% for in-person courses. However, a low completion rate does not mean your students did not learn or get what they needed from your course. They may have gotten the answer they needed early on.

It is easy as creators to stress over completion rates. but we must remember students have competing demands in their daily lives.

In this episode, we are going to cover several strategies that educators can use to improve completion rates for online courses. These include providing clear goals and expectations, offering support and resources to students, using engaging and interactive teaching methods, and providing regular feedback and assessments.

Highlights

0:00 Introduction to the Course Creators Circle Podcast
0:26 Introduction to the topic of student completion rates
1:00 Factors that can affect completion rates
1:20 Comparison of completion rates for online courses and in-person courses
1:56 Completion rates for non-degree granting institutions
2:00 Low completion rates don't necessarily mean students didn't get value from the course
2:34 Strategies for improving online completion rates, such as providing mini-wins and feedback/assessment on assignments
3:00] Other tips, including creating a strong nurture sequence and designing a well-structured course
6:00 Emphasis on the importance of feedback from students and not stressing too much about completion rates
6:57 Conclusion and call-to-action for checking out the Course Creators Circle website

Join us in the Course Creators Circle: We have a passion for helping you share your knowledge through courses!

The Course Creators Circle supports you in your course creation journey, led by our founder Linda Reed-Enever, who is a Thinkific Approved Expert. Linda not only teaches Course Creation but also creates her own courses so she understands your journey and the power of educating your market through courses.

Become a member and create courses with us https://www.thecoursecreatorscircle.com.au/become-a-member/

8 Strategies You Can Use to Market Your Course

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 12 Jan 2023 22:30:00 GMT

Are you looking for ways to get your online course in front of the right people? With the increasing popularity of online learning, there's no shortage of competitors trying to attract students.

You need to create a marketing strategy that will engage and excite potential students, even when they're already inundated with other options.

Marketing your online course is an essential part of success as it helps to promote your service and increase enrollment. Even if your online offering is great, it won't be helpful if nobody knows about it. That’s why many course creators are always on the lookout for the best marketing strategies to use for their offerings.

Knowing how to promote a course involves understanding where your target audience hangs out and how you can deliver meaningful content tailored specifically for them. Fortunately, there are several powerful strategies that you can use to market your course easily and effectively.

In this episode of the Course Creators Circle Podcast, we take look at eight of these tried-and-true strategies you can use to market your course.

Using social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn to promote your course. Create engaging posts and use relevant hashtags to reach a wider audience.
Utilise email marketing to reach out to your existing network or email list and let them know about your course.
Partner with influencers or other industry experts to promote your course to their followers.
Write guest blog posts on relevant websites and include a link to your course in the bio or at the end of the post.
Utilise paid advertising, such as Google AdWords or Facebook Ads, to target specific demographics and drive traffic to your course landing page.
Offering a free trial or a discounted rate for your course to encourage people to try it out and potentially leave reviews or tell their friends about it.
Attend industry events and networking events to talk about your course and make connections with potential students.
Offering bonuses or additional resources to students who refer their friends or colleagues to your course.

Remember to always focus on the value your course provides to the student and make sure you have a clear call to action for people to sign up for the course.

Highlights

0:50 Marketing doesn't come naturally to all course creators
1:00 The big thing to remember for course creators
1:15 How to tap into automation tools for evergree content
1:30 Use social media platforms to promote your course and share your expertise
2:40 Use email marketing to reach out to your existing network
3:20 Create a lead magnet to attract potential students
3:55 Partner with influencers or industry experts that can promote your course
4:30 Write guest posts on relevant topics around your course
5:22 Use paid advertising to reach a larger audience
6:25 Create partnerships and affiliates to promote your course
7:45 Use guest speaking opportunities and interviews to showcase your expertise
8:50 Offer a referral program for students who refer their friends or colleagues to your course
10:35 Please subscribe to The Course Creators Circle Podcast

Resources Mentioned in the Podcast

AnswerThePublic
MeetEdgar

Join us in the Course Creators Circle: We have a passion for helping you share your knowledge through courses!

The Course Creators Circle supports you in your course creation journey, led by our founder Linda Reed-Enever, who is a Thinkific Approved Expert. Linda not only teaches Course Creation but also creates her own courses so she understands your journey and the power of educating your market through courses.

Become a member and create courses with us https://www.thecoursecreatorscircle.com.au/become-a-member/

Expert Course Creation Tips from Alethea Tuitahi & Aaron Morin

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 24 Nov 2022 22:30:00 GMT

The internet has accelerated our society towards a knowledge economy, and the thirst for learning has fueled the rise of educational entrepreneurs or ‘edupreneurs’. If you are an expert in your field, people will seek out your knowledge and spend time engaging with your content.

And if you want to leverage your expertise and monetise your knowledge, it can be invaluable to learn from those who are experts in the world of course creation.

In this episode of The Course Creators Circle Podcast, we are joined by Alethea Tuitahi and Aaron Morin, who are both course creation experts. They share with us their top tips and insights on course creation to help us on our own course creation journey.

??This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

What is the number one course creation tip that you would share with anyone in the course creation journey? Why is this so important for our people to understand and know? And why do you think this is a must-do when creating courses?

Alethea: My number one tip is to build your audience and get visible. The whole build it and they will come analogy does not work. If you don't have an audience to sell your course to, your course launch will fail.

You can start by building a waitlist for your course by setting up a simple landing page and getting people to opt-in. Continue to build your email list with lead magnets, run ads and build your social following. The larger the better.

Marketing is a numbers game. If you base it on the industry average that 2% of people will buy from your sales page, the more people you can get to your sales page, the better your course launch and sales will be.

Aaron: I've had the privilege of educating thousands of people on online courses, building courses, and selling them. A lot of the tips that I tell people amount to one word, and that's validate.

Whether you are a large company, a small company, or a first-time creator, what you want to do is validate everything as you go. Start slow and build up over time.

The best and safest way to go forward is to test everything. You want to test the product and market fit for your topic. You want to validate that there are even people out there that will buy this topic.

You also want to test your content and validate that your content works for your audience. You want to talk to them. Running a beta test with a small cohort of people that can give you feedback is incredibly important. Everything boils down to one word and that's validate.

Now we're looking for your second top tip. This might be another must-do or it could be just something that you think accelerates course growth or course sales or getting that knowledge out of your head so that we can empower course creators to build on these amazing tips you all have.

Alethea: My next tip is to use email marketing to enhance your student experience. The first place to start is by ensuring you have a welcome email set up to go out to your students. In this email, including how to access the course, what's included with their course purchase, how to access any communities you may have, and the best way to get the most out of the course.

This way, your students know from the beginning exactly what they need to do. Then you can follow this up with an onboarding sequence of emails set up in your email marketing platform to continually help your students along.

If you create a course that students love and have a wonderful experience, they will then become raving fans and will do your marketing for you.

Aaron: Beyond all the practical tips that I could give you, I want to give you a tip about what happens to pretty much every course creator that I've ever talked to. And it is called imposter syndrome.

One of the biggest tips that I give people, especially the solopreneurs or the people out there with small teams, is to not only connect with other people in your space so that you can share how you're feeling about this process and come to the realization that you're not the only one feeling this way.

Believe in yourself. Understand that you have what it takes to build something that's going to help people out there. That information being stuck in your head, getting perfected over time, and never being released isn't helping anyone. We're in this to help other people and create transformations.

Talking to other people will help you realize that everyone feels this way and everyone's just winging it for the most part until they actually hit some kind of traction and have somewhat of an inkling of an idea of what they're doing. It takes a lot of boldness and a lot of confidence to get there, so build that up into yourself as soon as possible.

What is the final tip that you think course creators should know? Maybe it's a bonus, a must-have, or an out-of-the-box idea. What is the third tip that you want to share with our course creators?

Alethea: Plan your course curriculum by thinking about the transformation that your student will have by taking your online course. The easiest way to do this is by working backwards.

You start with the end result in mind—the transformation that your students will receive. Then you think about the main steps they need to take to get to that result. Those steps can become the modules in your course. You can fill in each module with the lessons needed to get the results they need for that particular step.

You end up with a big list of modules and lessons. It also makes it easy to see what type of lessons you've got in there so that you can make sure you've got the different learning styles covered.

Aaron: The biggest tip that I could give a course creator is to understand that your online course is the start of something or it is a part of something bigger than just the course. What you want to do is you want to look at the relationship that you're building with your audience and understand how it evolves over time.

You want to investigate concepts like the value ladder, upsells, cross-sells, and down sells. This isn't a one-and-done thing. You want to grab people's attention. You want to build trust with them over time. Then you want to get them into a low-cost item, like an ebook or a template, something along those lines, and build up from there.

You want to get them all the way up to the point where you are doing one on one coaching with them, potentially, or running a mastermind or a community, which is something more exclusive.

You need to understand that online courses are part of an entire ecosystem. You need to build your list. There is a ladder that you need to build for people to climb, to help you grow your business, and to help you reach more people with your transformational education.

About our Guests

Alethea is a tech-loving online course creator, a website designer, and a lover of chai lattes who’s been building in the online space for 7+ years. Tackling all those techy headaches for her clients, Alethea takes your content and turns it into a beautiful, student-focused online course ready for you to launch into the world! If you're a coach, consultant or service provider monetise your knowledge and amplify your impact online with the help of her boutique online course agency at CloudXS Digital.

Aaron is currently working to enable creators to sell their expertise online via learning products and communities. He is the Senior Manager responsible for the Education & Community teams at Thinkific.

Highlights

0:00 Welcome to The Course Creators Circle Podcast
0:38 Three top tips from course creation experts
1:18 Introducing Alethea Tuitahi
1:41 Introducing Aaron Morin
2:05 First course creation tip
2:21 Alethea: Build your audience
3:15 Aaron: Validate
4:12 Second course creation tip
4:30 Alethea: Use email marketing to enhance the student experience
5:20 Aaron: Connect with other people in your space
7:13 Final course creation tip
7:31 Alethea: Plan your curriculum with transformation in mind
8:34 Aaron: Your online course is the start of something
10:13 Thank you to our guests Alethea and Aaron
10:31 Please subscribe to The Course Creators Circle Podcast

Resources Mentioned in the Podcast

CloudXS Digital
Thinkific

Thinkific Tips with Kyrie, Aaron and Mary

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 10 Nov 2022 22:30:00 GMT

Thinkific’s powerful platform makes it easy to share your knowledge, grow your audience, and scale the business you already love. Everyone from consultants, experts, authors, and speakers use Thinkific today.

Here at The Course Creators Circle, we love Thinkific and so do our three guests Kyrie, Aaron and Mary.

In this episode of The Course Creators Circle Podcast, I am being joined by three of my favourite people when it comes to Thinkific—Kyrie and Aaron from the Thinkific Team and Mary, one of my fellow Thinkific experts.

We are going to look at their favourite features and apps in Thinkific, and their advice for course creators like you to help you along your course creation journey.

??This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

What is your favourite Thinkific feature and how do you think it makes an impact on course creators, not just only for their own course creation experience, but for the learning experience for their students?

Kyrie: As a community manager, I may be biased, but my favourite Thinkific feature is the communities feature. And that's because it makes a huge impact for course creators to be able to connect with their students as they're learning. And it really allows students to connect with one another.

It creates a more experiential learning experience for the students and it allows course creators to glean insights on what their students are having questions about, what they're thinking, where they get stuck, and what they're enjoying. So communities are a huge asset and a really great feature.

Aaron: First off, my favourite features in Thinkific are still anything that's available on the free plan. If you're just getting started, jump onto the free plan because you get a full course that you can sell right off the bat. You can also use it for a community space. So it really does give you an incredible amount of runway to get started with.

Now, for specific features on the free plan, the multimedia lesson is probably my favourite and most used because I love to add really interactive things to my course.

I also want to shout out our App Store, which has some incredible and really innovative apps that you can start adding to your course website. The two that I wanted to shout out were Hoist. What Hoist will do is host a landing page on your Thinkific website where you can ask your students to record a video testimonial. I have automated the process of testimonial outreach in that way,

We also use Wobo, which is a workbook app, in which you can embed fillable workbooks. People can type out their answers right inside Thinkific.

Overall, the free plan features are definitely hands down, my favourite, and I think they've done the most in the world in terms of real impact out there.

Mary: My favourite Thinkific feature is the multimedia lesson because it allows you to create HTML5 interactive content using third-party tools like Genially or Storyline to add more interactivity, engagement, and fun to your courses.

Course creators love an app that makes their life easier. So as a Thinkific team member, I thought it would be very important that we ask you what your favourite app is from the app store, and how have you best seen that app used in the learning experience, either for you as a course creator or for your students to make their lives easier.

Kyrie: The Superpowerups suite is amazing by Rob Galvin. There's Wobo, which is really cool to empower notetaking and allows students to work through digital workbooks.

But I think my favourite would probably be DropInBlog and that's because I'm also most familiar with it. I've used it on our Thinkific Academy site as well and it allows you to set up a really quick blog on your Thinkific site.

It's helpful for creators to be able to share their knowledge with students, and it's helpful for students because they have a resource where they can go and digest all of the awesome information that their teachers are sharing.

Aaron: I have used other apps on the training.thinkific.com website and what we found is that the Search is an incredible tool for students. What it does is it indexes all of your content, even images, even video content, and it turns it into this searchable word file in the background.

I'll also shout out ActiveCampaign. What it does is it allows scrappy entrepreneurs who need a lot of power behind their email marketing and CRM services to get down and dirty with a lot of automation and do really interesting things with automation.

Mary: I'm going to say playYeah from Rob Galvin's Superpowerups because it allows the motivational messages and the quick tour of the courses. My clients find that it really improves their engagement with their learners.

The other app is Wobo for creating more engaging and interactive workbooks for your courses that really allow the learners to do deep reflection and keep track of what they're learning in the course.

And it wouldn't be an episode of the Course Creators Circle Podcast without a tip or two from our guests. So we would love to hear your top tip for our podcast listeners so that they can implement it in their course creation journey.

Kyrie: My biggest tip for Course creators is that done is better than perfect. I recently had to do some filming for our thriving communities course and I wanted it to be perfect. I would have spent hours on it had I not had a very strong deadline to film it in a day.

When you get your content out there, just listen to your customers, listen to your clients, listen to your students, and then you can change and perfect it as you go. But holding on to perfection and allowing that to stop you from moving forward is probably one of the least impactful things you can do as a course creator.

So get your knowledge out there. People want to learn from you. People should be learning from you, and you have so much to share. You got this!

Aaron: My number one tip is to validate everything as you're creating your first online course. Or maybe you've made two or three other ones before, but validating everything is an important part of the process.

Take those initial first steps to validate certain things. Like, for example, are people actually searching for your topic online? Are they buying things about your topic online? Would your audience buy a course from you if you have a small email list? If you have an Instagram following?

Ask those questions. You want to get in touch with people and get their feedback on things, and then when you actually create the content, get feedback on that too.

I like to use the word empirical creativity. What you want to do is think of really creative solutions to things, but be a scientist about it. Check them out, test them, see the results, and then make an informed decision from there.

Mary: My top tip for course creators is to plan your course, write an outline, determine what assets you need to create the course, and then realize that the first version is never going to be the last version and be okay with having to make updates and changes on a regular basis.

About our Guests

Kyrie Melnyck is the co-founder of the 7in7 Digital Nomad Conference. By offering retreats, conferences, and events across five continents (so far!), she has helped hundreds of people pursue and sustain location-independent lifestyles. She has over a decade of event and community management experience that she brings to her role as the Community Program Manager at Thinkific.

Aaron Morin is working to enable creators to sell their expertise online via learning products and communities. He is currently the Senior Manager responsible for the Education & Community teams at Thinkific.

Mary Nunaley is the co-founder of Lavender Dragon Team, Inc. She is an instructional designer and Thinkific expert, and she's proud to work with her son on their business. When she's not creating courses, she enjoys ballroom dancing, crocheting, photography, and reading.

Highlights

0:00 Welcome to The Course Creators Circle Podcast
0:48 Thinkific tips with Kyrie, Aaron and Mary
1:05 What is your favourite Thinkific feature?
1:20 Kyrie: The communities feature
1:55 Aaron: Anything available on the free plan
4:40 Mary: The multimedia lesson
5:05 What is your favourite app from the app store?
5:20 Kyrie: Superpowerups, Wobo, DropInBlog
6:10 Aaron: Search tool on the training.thinkific.com website
7:45 Mary: playYeah from Superpowerups and Wobo
8:20 What is your top tip for course creators?
8:28 Kyrie: Done is better than perfect
9:35 Aaron: Validate everything
11:44 Mary: Plan your course
12:03 Thank you to our guests
12:30 Check our full range of resources at The Course Creators Circle

Resources Mentioned in the Podcast

Thinkific
Wobo

Lessons for Course Creators Just Like You with Melissa Hiemann and Maria Fernandez

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 27 Oct 2022 22:30:00 GMT

The course creation journey is full of lessons. As we create our courses to teach others the knowledge that we know, we in turn also learn valuable lessons and insights along the way.

These lessons and insights are huge, especially for beginner course creators like you who are just starting out. Learning these lessons from someone who’ve made it can help us bypass common mistakes and help us launch our own online course in no time.

In this episode of The Course Creators Circle Podcast, we are joined by Melissa Hiemann and Maria Fernandez who are both course creators just like you.

Mel and Maria will give you an insider’s perspective to help you create your online course. They share with us the biggest lesson they have learned creating courses, what it taught them, and advice they can give to their fellow course creators.

??This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Please tell us a brief introduction about yourself, your business, and the courses you teach.

Mel: My name is Melissa Hiemann, and I am the co-founder of the Center for Healing. Through our online courses, we teach and certify therapists, counsellors and healers or people that want to help people heal and create a trauma-informed business that they can be passionate about and love.

I have authored a book, the Natural Secrets to Letting Go of Instant Gratification and Finding Inner Peace. I have also created two internationally recognized and accredited methods and certification training called Root Cause Therapy and Trauma-informed Manifestation Coaching which we all teach online.

My business partner and team have also created numerous other methods and training. We have an amazingly supportive student community comprising over 5,000 incredible people from all over the world who have taken our courses.

In the last two years alone, we have sold over $1.5 million in course sales alone. My partner Ryan and I also consult and mentor people who want to start their own online course business to gain time and freedom to be with their family, as creating online courses is what has massively and positively changed our little family's life.

Maria: My name is Maria Fernandez. I'm a language teacher and also a language learner. I've been learning languages since I was a teenager and for the last six years, I've been teaching Spanish and English online.

Before that, I taught languages for over 5,000 hours, one on one or in group lessons. That gave me the experience and motivation to create online courses. It is much easier today than it was six years ago.

I have created several courses for Spanish and English. I'm constantly learning not just the languages themselves, but how to create courses faster and how to create courses that my students like.

I love the challenge. It's been difficult. Sometimes I still don't get it right. But it's a marvellous business. What I like the most is the freedom that it gives me because I can work from anywhere, travel around the world, work at any time that I fancy, and take holidays. The freedom is exceptional. There are very few jobs that are going to give you this kind of freedom.

Lessons are part of the course creation journey. As we start to create our courses, we're going to learn lessons along the way. And it's pretty exciting because that is the evolutionary and ever-changing world of course creation. So today, we ask our course creators, what was the biggest lesson you have learnt when creating courses?

Mel: One of the biggest lessons that we have learned in creating online courses is that you really need to believe in yourself. There are going to be doubters and people that might project their fears onto you, but you've got to really dig deep and believe in yourself.

A part of that is letting go of being perfect at the start. You've just got to build something and put it out there. And as you mentioned, it is something that will be an evolution over time. As you learn more, as you grow as a human being, that will reflect in your online courses and what you put out there.

I think the other thing, too, is sometimes we'll do a launch and won't get signups, or sometimes we'll make an offer and no one's interested. But at that point, you've got to keep going and not give up.

Maria: The biggest lesson I have learned by creating courses is that before I do anything, I have to ask my students. If I don't ask my students what it is they want, what it is that they have trouble with, what they want to improve the most, and what they want to work on, then I'm going to create a course that they are not interested in.

If I don't ask those questions, I will create a course that I think they need. And time and again, my students have proved to me that that is not the way I should do it. I have created several courses that literally nobody was interested in, only myself.

And when I have asked them, when I said what it is that you really want, what it is that you would pay for, and they've told me, because people will tell you very clearly, you create the course that they need, the course that they want, and the course that they will pay for, and you will succeed.

If I don't ask these questions, I will get it wrong every single time.

Lessons are all about learning. As we're creating our courses, there's going to be something that particular lesson taught us. So we've asked our course creators to share with us, what did that lesson teach you and what value did it bring to your business?

Mel: That lesson of believing in ourselves and also just putting yourself out there even when you feel like no one's listening, but doing it consistently over and over.

The biggest thing that taught me was the resilience that you get from that. It always pays off. Because if you keep showing up, at some point, people are going to recognise you, start to get to know you, or you're going to come across the right people and they're going to enrol.

So that would be the main lesson that I learned from that. And our sales just went crazy after that when I stopped giving up.

Maria: Easily by asking my students what it is that they want to learn and what they would pay for in terms of online courses. What I've learned is that when I create those courses, they will pay for them. They will be interested in the courses, a lot more than the courses that I come up with in my head.

The courses that I create now are 1 hour long with just a few videos focusing on one topic. For example, I just created a 1-hour course on English accent reduction. That's a 60-minute course with five videos of 12 minutes each. I would have never thought of a course like that.

I never thought that people would be interested in that kind of thing, but people want courses that are short, to the point, and not very expensive, even if they end up having to pay for several courses. That is the way it works in my industry.

I've learned that by asking my students what it is they want. And since they've told me, these are the courses I'm creating now and they are much more successful than anything I've created in the past.

What is your advice for other course creators about what you learned from your lesson and how to avoid it? Or how to grow from that lesson that you learned within your course creation journey?

Mel: My background is therapy and coaching and healing, so I'm going to explain it with that kind of filter. There have probably been times in our lives growing up where you've gone to do something like speak in front of the class and you went blank and felt ashamed, or you got a sales job and you had to do some kind of presentation and you felt rejected.

These little moments in our lives create memories in our nervous system and having your own business and online course business can really activate those memories. We can't remember the memory, but our body goes into this fight-or-flight response and we can either shut down or get really anxious.

Working through those can be super helpful. You can do it on your own with meditation or you can sign up with someone to work through those things. But sometimes it's deeper than just mindset.

Just keep in mind that your body is trying to protect you from that past pain, but you can let your body know that it's safe to go ahead.

Maria: The advice I would give other course creators is to ask your audience questions like, what is it that you need from me, what is going to make the biggest difference to your knowledge, and how can I help you improve the fastest?

If you ask these questions, your students will answer. They will tell you because they do want to help you help them. If you ask these questions, they will tell you and you will create fantastic courses. The courses that they want and the courses that they need.

About our Guests

Melissa Hiemann is the co-founder of The Centre for Healing. Through online courses, they teach and certify therapists, counsellors and healers who want to help people heal and create a trauma-informed business that they can be passionate about and love. With her partner Ryan, she also consults and mentors people who want to start their own online course business to gain time and freedom to be with their family.

Maria Fernandez creates Spanish and English language learning courses. After teaching in person for over 5,000 hours, she set up a Spanish learning website, KeRapido.com. A couple of years later, she set up Learn English with Maria.

Highlights

0:00 Welcome to The Course Creators Circle Podcast
0:45 Lessons from course creators just like you
0:57 Introducing Melissa Hiemann
2:20 Introducing Maria Fernandez
4:05 The biggest lesson you have learnt when creating courses
4:17 Mel: Believe in yourself
5:00 Maria: Ask your students what they want to learn
6:29 What did that lesson teach you and what value did it bring to your business
6:48 Mel: You get resiliency
7:20 Maria: Students pay for what they ask for
8;34 Advice for other course creators about what you learned from your lesson
8:53 Mel: When you get anxious, let your body know that it's safe to go ahead
9:51 Maria: If you ask questions, your students will answer
10:35 Thank you to our guests Mel and Maria
10:55 Join The Course Creators Circle Community of Facebook

Resources Mentioned in the Podcast

The Centre for Healing
KeRapido.com
Learn English with Maria

Expert Tips with Rob Galvin, Jean Pak, Lucas Marino

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 08 Sep 2022 22:30:00 GMT

The age of information that we live in has seen business owners and entrepreneurs from all over the world capitalise on their knowledge in many ways, online courses in particular. We’ve seen people who are experts in their fields turn to course creation to monetise their knowledge and help others learn in the process.

In this episode of The Course Creators Circle Podcast, we are joined by three of these course creation experts—Rob Galvin, Jean Pak, Lucas Marino. They share with us their top tips and insights on course creation to help us on our own journey.

??This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Rob: Don’t start by spending a lot of time creating your course. What you want to do is you want to start by connecting with your audience. To build an audience, you're going to learn so much about what they really want as opposed to you imagining what they want and then spending a lot of time building it. Remember, connection creates conversions. You're going to have an audience that wants exactly what you're going to be able to provide them.

Jean: My number one tip is to add games or activities to your online course. The games can be built directly into your LMS, and you can encourage your students to play games or create games that are really interactive, engaging and fun to balance out all the material that the students are required to learn.

Lucas: Well, it is my belief that no matter what your course is about and no matter what type of business your course supports, Courses are essentially about the learner. It's not about what you're an expert in, it's about designing your course to serve your students' needs. Your course exists to help someone else learn. So design your courses to serve your students' needs first.

Rob: Think about your launch process. Lots of times, course creators think that just creating a sales page for their course and putting it out online is launching the course. But that is a surefire way of slow growth.

I highly suggest including some sort of live component to your launch like doing a live workshop that leads to selling your course. You're going to answer questions and get them engaged before they even see your course sales page. Just putting up a sales page is not launching your course. There's so much more that goes into it if you want to see some success right out of the gate.

Jean: Add quizzes like multiple choice, short answer, or fill-in-the-blank. Use tools such as Quizlet that can help you build exciting, fun, and interactive quizzes that are more challenging, more engaging, and more effective for your learners.

Lucas: Start thinking like a business owner, not just a creative expert. Being an expert is only part of the equation. Being a business owner means that you have to consistently speak and serve customers and clients, be proactive in strategy development, monitor your business functions, getting smart on marketing and sales.

There are plenty of experts out there that fail to actually get a business off the ground, even though they're one of the best people in their field at whatever they do. So start learning how to think like a business owner, not just a creative expert.

What is the final tip that you think course creators should know? Maybe it's a bonus, a must-have, or an out-of-the-box idea. What is the third tip that you want to share with our course creators?

Rob: Remember this phrase: Done is better than perfect. You want to get something done as soon as possible because you're going to learn from it. As you're learning through these micro implementations, that is where the true power of being a successful course creator comes from because you're going to realize things that you may not have until you get it out there in front of real people.

Don't worry about being perfect and having everything all together. Sometimes it's a mess and sometimes you may not need all the things you think you need, but just get something out there in front of your audience.

At the end of the day, it just boils down to simply three basic things: You need to connect with your audience, you need to convince them to buy something, and you need to convert them into a customer and lifetime member. So try to get something out there as quick as possible so that you can show your expertise, learn from the process, and set yourself up for continuous growth.

Jean: Add learning outcomes using Bloom's Taxonomy will help you guide and structure your curriculum so that it's more clear where your students are headed and where they are going to accomplish from the beginning to the end.

Lucas: Find a healthy network and invest your time, energy and money in building that network. It is almost always more desirable to have referrals for your business and courses than it is to try and invest in all these online paid ads and slowly building a network of social media followers. All of those things are fantastic, all of those things are viable, but the strength of a good, healthy referral network is amazing for your business.

About our Guests

Rob Galvin is a fellow Thinkific expert. He's had five-plus years in the seat and he's the creator of Superpowerups. He's an expert when it comes to making sure that you've got the best site and delivery experience for your students

Jean Pak is all about working on Thinkific opportunities and increasing student engagement. She teaches about using quizzes and learning outcomes to make sure that we are guiding our students through that process.

Lucas Marino helps entrepreneurs launch successful and sustainable training products for businesses. He's a serial entrepreneur and a Thinkific expert as well. He has a doctorate in engineering and he’s a retired US Coast Guard with over 20 years of experience.

Highlights

0:00 Welcome to The Course Creators Circle Podcast
0:40 Thinkific-approve experts and their course creation tips
1:00 Introducing Rob Galvin
1:35 Introducing Jean Pak
1:55 Introducing Lucas Marino
2:40 First course creation tip
2:55 Rob: Connection creates conversion
3:50 Jean: Add games and activities to your online course
4:35 Lucas: Design your course to meet you students' needs
5:20 Second course creation tip
5:40 Rob: Really think about your launch process
7:20 Jean: Add fun quizzes that challenge your students
7:50 Lucas: Think like a business owner, not just a creative expert
9:50 Final course creation tip
10:05 Rob: Done is better than perfect
11:40 Jean: Add learning outcomes to structure your curriculum
12:00 Lucas: Find a healthy network
14:12 Thank you to our guests Rob, Jean, and Lucas
14:40 Please subscribe to The Course Creators Circle Podcast

Resources Mentioned in the Podcast

Superpowerups by Rob Galvin
Learn with Jean
East Partnership
Thinkific

Boosting Online Completion Rates

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 25 Aug 2022 22:30:00 GMT

You've created and launched your first course, and now you see the enrolments coming in. However as you're seeing your numbers clearly, you're realising that only a few students are finishing your course, thus your low completion rate.

Don't be dismayed as you are not alone in this situation. Self-paced learning, which is most of our online courses, has a normally low completion rate. And even those of us who have experience in the classroom know that not all students pay attention.

A study on course completion rates

In 2018. Columbia University's Teachers College did a study on Coursera and online courses, and they showed that the minimum completion rate was about 15% or less.

The situation changed in 2020 when we had lockdowns and we had more people wanting to learn courses, so they were able to engage with online content a little bit more, but the industry standards still sit at about 20% to 25% completion rate.

There are a couple of factors that add to this:

One is the distraction of everything else going on in their lives.
And two is that online learners naturally come to us with a pain point. They come to us with a need and your course might be the answer to that. When the answer that they need gets answered in the earlier parts of your course, their intrinsic motivation to continue with the course is gone.

Now, we can increase that motivation in a number of ways. A little boost of engagement in our course creation journey plays a significant role in encouraging our students to keep on with the course, thus increasing our completion rates.

Here are some ways you can boost your course engagement and increase the completion rate for your course:

Break down your course into smaller pieces of content

Are you putting too much into your course? You need to structure your course in a way that does not overwhelm your students and will help avoid learning paralysis. Make sure that your content is being delivered in bite-sized chunks that deliver small wins to your students.

You can use our course planning sheets to help you plan out your course.

Create a solid nurture sequence of emails for your course

This is your welcome email that gives your student an introduction and helpful links. Followed by a couple of emails asking them what they’ve learned so far and encouraging them to keep going.

If you're doing a drip-based course, then the nurture sequence is essential to remind people that they have new content, new information, and new things to learn.

Make your course more interactive

Now, I'm a big fan of video content because it targets the different learning styles. Videos include visuals, audio, and a connection with you as a teacher.

The next tool that I love is interactive workbooks. Now, I'm a big fan of Wobo workbooks. Wobo allows you to use slides, polls, and downloadable workbooks. It also allows your students to submit their workbooks to you for the feedback thus increasing that engagement with them.

The third tool that I love to increase engagement in my courses is gamification. Not the high-tech gamification but the simple gamification-type apps like plaYEAH! that Rob Galvin has created. It gives confetti at different moments like when people log in or when they complete a section or module. We also use another one with Rob's apps called Sidenav, which allows us to teach our students how to use the course.

Give students more time to complete the course

The biggest thing when it comes to our courses is making sure that we give our students the opportunity to learn what they need to learn when they want to. So if you have a short completion rate and you end your course at maybe the 60 or 90-day mark, look at extending your course to give our students enough time to access their course content.

Try running your course live and do a Q&A session

The other thing that we can do if our completion rate is low is to try running a session live. Run it with people but deliver the same content. Get a little bit of student feedback about where they’re getting stuck.

The other component is running the course with some Q&A support or membership options for people to be able to access you. Now, I have my Marketing Circle and Course Creators Circle Membership, where people come and ask me questions about marketing and course creation. These Q&A sessions give me a bit of an idea of what I need to teach next, what is missing from the courses, and how I can improve it.

Final takeaway

I hope these tips will help you increase your course completion rate. Try one strategy at a time. You don't need to try everything at once, but make sure that you are guiding your students, you're supporting them along that journey to learn with you.

And don’t forget to pat yourself on the back if you are sitting within the industry of having a 15-25% course completion rate. Remember, wins come in different forms for different students, just the same as they have for you and your course creation journey.

Highlights

0:00 Introduction
0:40 Ways you can boost your online completion rate
1:07 Factors that affect completion rate
2:05 Statistics around course completion rates
3:05 Activities to help boost course engagement
3:10 Break down your course into smaller pieces of content
3:20 Create a solid nurture sequence of emails for your course
3:50 Make your course more interactive
4:05 Use Wobo to build interactive workbooks
5:10 Give students more time to complete the course
5:30 Try running your course live and do a Q&A session
7:10 Final takeaway
7:40 Please subscribe to The Course Creators Circle Podcast

Resources Mentioned in the Podcast

Wobo
plaYEAH!
Sidenav
Course Planning Sheets

The Stages of the Course Creation Process

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Fri, 05 Aug 2022 02:57:00 GMT

The different stages of course creation goes through a process. And successful course creators spend time and effort researching and planning their content before they produce it to ensure their courses meet students’ expectations and allow them to learn and get a win from the course.

Along these stages, there are a few little gremlins that kick into your thoughts, and they are the feeling of overwhelm and being not good enough to teach. Make sure to check out The Course Creators Circle Podcast to listen to these previous episodes. Remember, our people are wanting to learn from us so we just need to breathe a little and break down those overwhelming steps.

So, here we are sharing with you our recommended process for course creation based on best practices and principles that we've developed in-house and with our clients.

Stages in the Course Creation Process

Stage 1: What do you want to teach?

The first stage of the course creation process is figuring out what you want to teach and whether that course is going to be right for you and your business. Essentially, this is the research phase of course creation. This is where you are going to research your topic thoroughly.

Tools like AnswerThePublic is an excellent source to see what people are typing into search. You might want to poll your existing people and ask what they want to learn about. You want to make sure that you’re finding the right audience for the course you want to create as well as understanding who these audiences are and where they hang out online on social media.

You might want to delve into your Course Creator Circle Membership and go through the Creating a Student Persona Exercise to help you kickstart your course creation process.

Stage 2: Choose the right platform for your courses

The next stage is choosing the right platform to host your courses. Personally, I'm a Thinkific expert, so I'm going to naturally suggest to you Thinkific, but there are a lot of other available platforms for you.

I have a 30-day FREE trial if you want to check out Thinkific Pro. If you use the link, you also get some extra bonus information from Thinkific about how to use and create your platform.

Once you've researched your topic though, the platform of your choice is going to teach you how to set up your course, how to deliver your content, and how to get paid.

This stage is also where you decide whether you are hosting your course on your website or on an external platform. I host my courses on an external platform because at the start, my web development team advised me that volume of students that would be coming through would create problems for my website, so it’s good to stick with a focused LMS platform.

Another platform to make sure you have is a mailing platform like Mailerlite for your email nurture sequences, and then a community-building platform like Volley to help you run your community.

Stage 3: Planning your modules

The third stage in the course creation process is to draft your course outline and plan your modules. Start to look at what's going to be included in each module, each lesson, what workbooks you need, and the materials that you need to record in your course, and then also make some time to make and record those materials within your course.

Our Course Planning Sheets would be able to help you with drafting your course outline and modules. They are designed to help you get the knowledge out of your head and into a plan of action so you can start working on and creating your course.

Stage 4: Content production

Then it’s time to go into content production for your course. We love tools like Designrr to put together our workbooks and WeVideo to record our courses and start putting all the components together. There are different lesson types you can choose to produce your courses and a good mix of these lesson types is a great way to engage your students.

I strongly suggest you block out a series of days, particularly days in a row when you can focus them on content production so that you get that course out and done, and it doesn't sit over your head on an ongoing basis going.

Stage 5: Creating your course marketing materials

After you’ve done your course, it’s also important that you create your course marketing materials. These are your course description, landing pages, promo videos from you, and social media graphics that are going to attract your students and invite them to purchase and address their needs.

Stage 6: Marketing your courses

Then it comes down to marketing your course because “build it and they will come” does not exist in the course creation world. We need to market it.

That includes things like submitting your course to online directories, buying banner ads, and creating lead magnets that nurture your student along the course creation journey.

You need to market your course and you need to keep marketing your course. If you can teach an Evergreen Course, then that's going to help you along the way.

You want to check out 10 Ways to Market Your Course as You Create It when you have reached this stage in the journey.

Stage 7: Delivering your course

Once everything is set up, it is now time to deliver your course and answer your students’ questions.

This is where your community and your question-and-answer slots come in so that the students are actually nurtured through the learning journey and it helps them achieve the outcome that you put into your course.

This helps you ensure that your course is successful by giving your students wins, and it also helps you motivate yourself to be able to create the next course.

Stage 8: The next course

And then you have the final stage. That is to create that next course and continue the learning journey for your students and do the stages all over again.

Here you can look at opportunities of bringing your courses together in a membership option.

Final takeaway

There you have it, these are the different stages of the course creation process. We hope that you have gained valuable insights and tips that you can apply to your course creation process.

Highlights

0:00 Introduction
0:40 The stages of the course creation process
1:20 What do you want to teach? Research phase
1:50 Choosing your platforms
3:14 Draft your course outline
3:37 Content production
4:05 Create your course marketing materials
4:28 Marketing your course
5:00 Delivering your course
5:25 Create the next course and continue the learning journey
6:15 Check out our Course Creators Circle Membership
6:25 Please subscribe to The Course Creators Circle Podcast

Resources Mentioned in the Podcast

An Exercise for When You Feel You're Not Good Enough to Teach

Are You Putting Too Much into Your Course?

Course Planning Sheets

Course Creators Circle Membership

Getting the Knowledge Out of Your Head

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 21 Jul 2022 22:30:00 GMT

Creating online courses is a great way to get the knowledge out of your head and sharing it to an audience. It is how you can share your expertise with your people, and potential students who might need that knowledge.

But what is the best way to take that knowledge out of your head and create it into an online course?

Inside the Course Creator Circle resources area, we have a number of tools to help you with this activity– Monetise Your Knowledge Worksheet and Course Planning Sheets which are available for download if you're a VIP Course Creator Circle Member.

There are a number of ways for you to monetise your expertise, but we're particularly going to focus on courses.

Getting the knowledge out of your head through courses

In this journey, we're going to start with you. What makes you different and what separates you from others within your field? These are the things you want to brag about. What makes people want to work with you? Do you have a unique way of doing something? These are the thing that you could possibly teach.

What do people refer to you for? Think about what they're asking you for and what people send to you for. What is absolutely second nature to you? Don’t forget the basics because these are where people are going to start out.

Next, when we start to think about our audience, we've got to think about who needs our expertise. What questions are they looking at? Tools like AnswerThePublic allow us to look at topics that your audience is interested in.

The next thing you think about is the questions that you are being asked on a regular basis by your potential clients or with your current clients. These are great opportunities for you to create courses from these questions.

As a course creator, we break these questions into steps. Personally, when I work with people about creating courses, I talk about one course that leads to an outcome or action and then breaks down the outcome or the action into many steps which become modules and lessons. Just remember to give each student a win after every lesson.

When we start to put together our course into planning sheets, what we're looking for is being able to guide our students from end to end. You can use post-it notes and planning sheets to plan out your course.

The big thing about getting your knowledge out of your head is understanding that through that process we might find five or six courses along the way. That's a great thing because you're able to plan and make sure that you can launch a course and have a membership opportunity as well.

The course creation journey is not as scary as you think. Once you start jotting down ideas, you will come up with more ideas. To end, one top secret is to use a tool like ClickUp where you can start putting all your course ideas and infrastructure into a plan and into a timeframe that you can use and implement

Highlights

0:00 Introduction
0:40 How you take that knowledge out of your head and turn it into a course
0:50 Monetise Your Knowledge Worksheet and Course Planning Sheets
1:05 Monestising through online courses
1:20 What makes you different from others in your field?
1:48 What are the questions people are asking? Look at AnswerThePublic
2:07 What are the questions you are being asked on a regular basis?
2:30 One course that leads to an outcome or action
2:55 Planning for your course
3:10 What do we want students to know by the end of the course?
3:50 Start implementing your ideas
4:30 Use a tool like ClickUp when putting your ideas into a plan and timeframe
4:50 Please subscribe to The Course Creators Circle Podcast

Resources Mentioned in the Podcast

Course or Membership Which One to Choose

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 07 Jul 2022 22:30:00 GMT

When you are on your course creation journey, you come across this question quite often, course or membership? And then it will be quickly followed by which one is better?

There is a place for both courses and membership within your offering. As a course creator myself, I think we should be doing both.

The reason I think we should be doing both is we're going to create standalone courses. And once we're ready to bring in a membership model, means that we can bundle a series of those courses together, add in some time from us, and be able to create a community around our courses.

First, let’s look at the difference between an online course and a membership?

What are online courses?

An online course is normally solution-level based. A student or client has a problem. They come in and take your course. At the end of the process, they've got their answers.
Where courses have their place within the market is when people maybe don't know who you are. They're wanting to understand who you are, how you teach, and how they learn, and they're not ready for that membership commitment.
Courses are well suited for topics when the students want to learn a tangible skill or achieve a measurable result by the end of the course.
Courses work for project-based tutorial content really well, but they also work in the opportunity to throw them into memberships for that sort of content.
Online courses are best for evergreen content that changes slowly, not need updates all the time.
They're easy to validate your ideas. You can have a look at YouTube videos, webinars, and other video-based mediums, and you can start to create lead generations around them and lead directly to the course. You've got the pain point, and the solution is the course at the end.
You've got high potential in being able to do sales prices. There's minimal post-launch maintenance and it comes down to marketing compared to membership sites.
Revenue growth is limited to new sales. There's no recurring income. Sales typically come in a cycle and revenue can actually be quite difficult to predict because you don't know how the cycle is going and they tend to only come when you push it.
It can be challenging to sustain engagement and participation when students are passively involved in a self-paced learning course. They're not interacting with a teacher and they're not part of a community.
The access is normally granted for a short period, and it's all about giving the student a solution and a win. And there are going to be students who only want a solution and a win to their problem.

What are memberships?

Memberships, on the other hand, are all about community. They're about access to you as a teacher.
Memberships bundle a series of things together and they fit well when you've got a topic that bridges multiple skills or multiple areas of achievement.
Memberships are good for clients who need a little bit of guidance along the way or a little bit of personalisation but they're not ready for coaching.
Memberships are great for creators who may want to expand or pivot upon their expertise and their offerings in the future.
Memberships are great because they are community-based and this community tells you what they want to learn next. And that's amazing because you're able to work with your people.
It's easier to predict revenue than it is with online courses because you've got recurring income and you can pretty much get a bit of a gauge of how many members are going to keep renewing each and every month.
Memberships are normally done on a monthly, quarterly, or annual basis.
There's a less upfront cost to produce because you'll have to produce a series of courses. You can start making content along the way.
Members get access to you and to the community.
A membership is lower priced than the cost to buy all the courses themselves. You'll put the bundle together, but the opportunity is to attract more people and it's an ongoing payment. You want to be able to make sure that a year's access is going to give them all of the courses plus some bonuses from you.
Inside our memberships, we tend to offer a community space where they can come attend live sessions and have Q&A sessions with me and Clive.

So which one is better?

There is no winner. The winner is what's going to work for you and your business. If you don't want to turn up for a community and you just want to keep selling courses, then maybe self-paced evergreen courses are for you.

If you're like me and you love the teaching component, you love being in front of your students, then membership is for you. You can still sell courses one-off, but also have them add value to your membership and you're able to turn up and learn from your students along the way.

When you are starting this journey out, maybe it is advisable to start with courses first, then bring your memberships into your journey.

There are no rules when it comes to course creation in this space. The important thing is what best suits you and your students. Ask your people, do they want your guidance? Do they want you alongside them as they learn? Or are they happy to learn self-paced?

And then ask yourself, am I happy to turn up and help and support a community? Am I going to give them quizzes? Am I going to give them prompts? Am I going to give them emails along the way? And if you can do that, then I would be looking at running courses and running a membership base as well.

Final takeaway

Both standalone courses and memberships can be great options depending on the subject matter you’re trying to teach, your needs, and the expectations of your students.

An online course is better for specific topics that can follow a set number of lessons to achieve an end result, without the need for ongoing additional content. A membership site is better if you want to create ongoing content, recurring revenue, and a strong community.

Highlights

0:00 Introduction
0:44 Course or Membership -- Which one is better?
1:15 What are online courses?
2:10 Online courses are best for evergreen content
2:20 Courses are easy to validate
2:35 Minimal post-launch maintenance
2:50 Courses revenue potential is limited
3:10 Challenging for engagement
3;25 Courses deliver solution and a win
3:40 What are memberships?
3:55 Memberships can have more personalisation
4:00 Memberships are good for expanding to other topics
4:12 Memberships are community-based
4:23 Memberships income are easier to predict
4:45 Memberships are exclusive
5:05 Memberships are lower-priced because of bundling
5:30 Live and Q&A sessions can be included in memberships
5:45 What's the winner?
6:25 When you're starting on your journey
6:45 There are no rules
6:50 My number one tip
7:15 One final tip
7:40 Check out our Course Creators Circle Membership
8:05 Please subscribe to The Course Creators Circle Podcast

Resources Mentioned in the Podcast

Course Creators Circle Membership

Why Teach and Create Courses

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 30 Jun 2022 22:30:00 GMT

Creating an online course is a great way to connect with your audience, increase your authority within your niche, and build another stream of passive income. They tend to go deeper than your blog posts but are just as fun to create.

Quite often at the start of the course creation journey, we ask ourselves, why teach and create courses in the first place? Being able to teach and create courses is a great privilege because we've developed skills and knowledge that people want to access.

Also, since the pandemic, we've seen lots of people move towards finding knowledge and information online. The global e-learning market reached a value of US$ 253.3 Billion in 2021. Looking forward, the market is projected to reach US$ 521.8 billion by 2027, exhibiting a growth rate of 9.9%.

Here are the top three reasons to create an online course and why you should do it:

You have the knowledge to share.

Whether it’s an academic- or hobby-based knowledge, you have expertise. Are you growing vegetables in your backyard? Are you creating your own video games? That’s knowledge!

That knowledge has taken you a long time to learn.

You’ve actually taken the time, often years, and effort to be an expert of your knowledge. You’ve learned the bad and the good. You’ve made mistakes that turned into lessons. And you’ve learned the best way to learn that knowledge.

There are people that actually want to know how we do things.

Whatever expertise you have, someone out there online is seeking that information. There’s a nice for everything, and people want to learn from people who have already done it. What is second nature to us quite often isn't second nature to everyone else.

If you really want to delve into this a bit further, then head to our Monetise Your Knowledge Worksheet and run through that worksheet and look at all those things that come second nature to you that you can teach.

Other reasons why you should teach and create courses online:

It diversifies our income.

Online courses allow you to bring in another income stream. Once you’ve set it up, it becomes a source of passive income for you.

They are evergreen.

People can come and take them at a time that suits them, when the problem is an issue for them and when you can deliver the solution that they need.

You can create online memberships.

Creating an online membership that offers your audience access to all your courses and other content is a great way to create recurring income for your business.

Delivering courses online took away the geographical boundary.

You are no longer limited to working in the area where you are located. You can work with people all around the globe.

So, if your topic is particularly evergreen, and if it can be taught the same way over and over again, then I suggest that course creation is something that you have a look at. If you've been looking at being able to service a wider audience, then course creation is something that you have a look at.

Access to knowledge is the market today and it is huge. There's a whole term around educators out there that allows us to be able to teach online, share our knowledge, and monetise our knowledge.

Courses allow your audience to come away with unique skills and insight that you as an expert can offer. They help build authority in your brand and serve to see you recognised as a leader in your field.

Highlights

0:00 Introduction
0:47 Why teach and create courses in the first place?
1:10 People want to access knowledge online
1:15 Three top reasons for creating an online course and why you should do it
1:50 Other components for teaching an online course
3:05 Why course creation can be perfect for you
3:30 Access to knowledge is the market today
3:45 AnswerThePublic helps you run a search of what people are looking for
3:51 How to start sharing your knowledge
4:25 A challenge for you
4:45 Please subscribe to The Course Creators Circle Podcast

Resources Mentioned in the Podcast

Monetise Your Knowledge
Course Planning Sheets
AnwerThePublic
Thinkific

Naming Your Course and Modules

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 16 Jun 2022 22:30:00 GMT

When you are creating an online course, details matter and it is things like naming your course that can make all the difference.

The content is still the most important part, but coming up with a name that catches the attention of your audience and sells is also a significant decision that you have to make.

Now, the name of our course is our headline. It's the thing that says this is what we're going to learn. A good course name is catchy but still relates to your course. We need to make it stand out and say “buy me” in that title.

A good course title should be about five or six words. We don't want it to be too long either because we want it to fit within the 65 characters that Google likes for search and appear with headlines and titles.

So how do you create a good first impression with your course title? How do you create a headline that catches people's attention, gets them to click, and makes them want to enrol in your course?

Tips on naming your course and modules:

Use keywords that people are typing in search

There is a tool that we have access to as course creators, which we can do searches for free called AnswerThePublic. If we type in the keywords that we're looking to teach, AnswerThePublic is going to come up with a wheel of questions that people are actually typing into search engines when they're looking for answers around that topic.

You can pick one of those questions as your course name. You're already in a winning space here because your course name is being typed into search engines and you've got a chance of appearing for that keyword.

Make your course outlines stand out too

There’s a new tool that we love called Bramework. Similar to AnswerThePublic, you can type in the keywords of your topics and it helps you come up with headings for a blog outline. This blog outline gives you the key topics or modules you can discuss in your course.

In addition, Bramework returns search topics based on country. So you can choose the keyword that is highly searched for in your country.

Keep everything about your course simple

It's not just your course name that's going to help your course sell, but your modules and lessons as well. If your module names can make sense, and then each lesson underneath it can answer a problem or solve a problem for your potential student, then you're on the right track.

If we get too clever in naming our courses and it doesn't explain what people are going to get from your course, then people are going to be a little bit confused. The last thing we want when someone's landing on our sales page is confusion.

When naming your course, the key really is to just keep it simple. Use what's going into search and make sure that it's answering a question and solving a problem for your people.

Avoid being too fancy because what you want when you're putting your course together is a course that explains what your students will learn, what they get by the end of it, and is found within search.

Highlights

0:00 Introduction
0:45 How do I name my course so people are likely to buy it?
1:00 The name of our course is our headline
1:40 Make sure the name explains what people are going to learn
2:15 Using AnswerThePublic to search for what people are asking
3:15 Keep your naming simple
3:30 Avoid the confusion
3:40 Using Bramework to help you name your course outlines
4:05 Bramework gives you a blog outline which can be your modules
4:50 Final takeaway for naming your course and modules
5:15 Please subscribe to The Course Creators Circle Podcast

Educational Marketing in Course Creation

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Fri, 20 May 2022 00:00:00 GMT

Education Marketing is all about educating potential customers on our topics or industries which can then guide their purchasing decisions. It is about the value they get from using our product or service.

Specifically, it's about moving leads further to our sales funnel and creating content that focuses on educating them rather than promoting hard selling.

So, what is the role of Education Marketing when it comes to course creation?

Education Marketing places you as an expert in your field and empowers your students to know more about the topic you are teaching and thereby create better working relationships with them.

Like anything in marketing, Education Marketing is like a tree. It starts with a seed. When we educate our market, we grow our audience. By answering questions they have, we can create content that becomes our lead magnet like webinar or ebooks to answer those questions.

A handy tool like AnswerThePublic can give us ideas on what our audience are asking. We can put in the keywords of the topic that we are baout to teach and look at opportunities to create content that will asnwer the questions that are related to your topic.

Why use Education Marketing?

It builds trust and loyalty. When your students learn something from you, they get a win. Their trust increases with each win until such time that they are ready to make a purchase from us
It builds authority. You are seen as the expert and get a reputation of being known as the go-to person teaching the topic. By sharing useful content, you can position yourself as the leader in the industry, provide real value and build a loyal community.
It retains and upsells existing clients. Once you have the students, educating them leads them further to the next step. This is where our nurture sequence comes in when leading them through to our product or service.

Educational Marketing methods you can use

Content that you already have like blog posts
Live and evergreen webinars
Cheatsheets and ebooks
Guest writing and appearing in other people's audiences

Creating your nurture sequence

Address the need of your student. What are they asking? What are their pain points? What do they need to be answered right now. Again, tools like AnswerThePublic is a great way to find out what these are.
Create valuable content in exchange for their email address (lead). Start building an email list by giving away a free download like ebook or sign up to a free webinar.
Give them a win. What can they get from the free ebook or webinar? What can they learn from us that they haven't already?
Make sure to follow up. What happens to the lead after getting the free ebook or after attending the free webinar? Make sure that they get a follow up email so that you can nurture a call to action from there.

Educational Marketing is an ongoing process. Students seek the information and we take them into a cycle. So make sure that you learn to automate some of these processes to save on time. A tool like MeetEdgar is very handy when automating evergreen strategies.

Not only is educating your market critical to outining your expertise, but it is also imperative that we inform our customers about how we teach. This is why Educational Marketing is amazing because it empowers our students to choose to work with us and learn from us.

Highlights

0:00 Introduction

0:50 The role of education marketing in course creation

1:09 What is education marketing?

1:48 Education marketing is a tree

2:05 AnswerThePublic suggests questions on what you're about to teach

2:20 Educating your market builds trust and loyalty

2:36 Educating your market builds your authority

2:57 Education marketing helps retain or upsell existing students

3:17 Educational marketing methods

3:30 A look at blog post as an example

3:50 A look at videos you already have

4:08 Questions that are being asked

4:45 What a good educational campaign needs

5:19 Why ebooks and webinars are worth for the nurture sequence

5:37 Run through an example of an ebook campaign

6:22 An example webinar campaign

7:20 Ways you can promote your educational campaigns

7:35 Why the nurture process is crucial

8:10 Handy stats to remember when employing education marketing

8:17 Things to remember

8:32 Learn to automate processes by using tools like MeetEdgar

9:00 Educational marketing recap

9:37 Thanks for joining me in this episode

9:45 Subscribe for more episodes of The Course Creators Circle Podcast

Are You Putting Too Much into Your Course?

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 05 May 2022 20:30:00 GMT

One of the easiest and most impactful ways to get your knowledge out to an audience while making more income is to get that knowledge out of your head and turn it into a lead-generating, money-making, impact-creating online course. As course creators, we want to create a course that is valuable to our students but we also have the tendency to add too much to a course in the name of value. That leads to overwhelm for your students both pre and post enrolment. Take it from me, I have made that same mistake. When I first started teaching online, I thought I could pack the value of two or three workshops into a course but I was wrong. That course only sold a total of 3. What I'd learn from that experience, however, is that I get inquiries about certain sections. So I'd broken down the course into sections and sold these sections individually instead. Now, to help you avoid the same mistake as I did, here are some tips to help you structure your course that does not overwhelm your students and will help avoid learning paralysis. •Plan your course with the help of a course planning sheet. •Break down your into small sections that are engaging and fun for your students. •Lesson videos should be in 10-15 minute lengths so it's short enough to be viewed and inserted during breaks. •Give students a win after each section of the course to help them progress along. •You can always bundle related courses into a membership to offer more know-how If you are overwhelmed in creating your course then your students will be too. Deliver them small wins that can add up to create impact and a skill learned. Highlights 0:00 Introduction 0:45 Avoiding putting too much in one course 1:05 Tips to avoid overwhelm and learning paralysis in your course 1:15 We know a lot of content as experts 1:40 How to structure your course with a winning formula 1:55 A personal experience on my own course creation mishap 2:25 Turning it around by breaking a big course into smaller sections 3:15 We all go through this thinking of packing our lessons into just one course 3:30 Planning your courses 3:35 Use a course planning sheet 3:55 Break lessons into smaller chunks 4:10 Give students a win with each lesson or module 4:20 Teaching online is self-paced learning 4:45 My rule of thumb for creating courses 5:05 Lessons should be in 10-minute marks 5:40 Is your course one course, two courses, or more? 5:50 Bundling multiple related courses 6:12 Look at making small changes that add up for your students 6:30 Subscribe to the Course Creators Circle Podcast 6:35 Also, subscribe to the Talk Podcast for marketing tips on marketing your course

The Lesson Types You Can Use

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 21 Apr 2022 22:00:00 GMT

In course creation, your lessons are the structure in which you divide and present your learning materials to your audience. I often get asked the question, "What is the best lesson type when it comes to course creation?"

The truth is, there is no golden lesson that is the best to teach. There is no one-size-fits-all lesson type that's going to work like magic.

When it comes to course creation, the best lesson comes down to a number of factors, but mainly it's the one that you can produce and the one that your audience is going to receive.

It's the lesson, or mix of lessons, that you can deliver to your audience and your students will respond to. This is why it is also important to learn the different learning styles when it comes to creating your lessons. I have covered the different learning styles in a previous episode of the Course Creators Circle Podcast, so I encourage you to listen back to that episode if you haven't already.

To engage your students in the best way possible, the goal is to create a content mix. In this episode, you'll learn about the variety of content and lesson types you can use within your course. I personally use these lessons in my own Thinkific courses.

All the tools below can be found on The Course Creator’s Toolkit.

Ten lesson types that you can apply in your course creation

To camera video (where you face the camera)

Online learning is lonely. By doing a to camera video setup, you create a human-to-human connection with your students. Videos allow you to engage with your students, convey emotions, and help you connect with your audience.

We can use slides with your video to alternate with your face on camera. We can add in a transcript that allows people to read along or clarify anything they've misheard. To even make our video lessons more dynamic, we can even add notes, handouts, downloads, activities, or worksheets along with our video, which can increase the engagement and participation of our students.

Videos can be quick to produce. Don't aim for perfection. In fact, we want to encourage our students that it's okay to be imperfect. Aim to be real and authentic. Showing your audience the real you makes you more relatable to them.

Tools that I use: My recording hardware set-up includes my smartphone, Sony V1 camera, Logitech C922 for webcam, and Rode microphone. My recording software includes the Open Camera app on Android (Filmic Pro for iOS). And Descript is our favourite app to edit our recordings and put in our intro, outro and slides.

Screencasting

If you want to teach people how to do something through a how-to video, then share your screen. Screencast and share your presentation. You can even use a clicker so people can feel like you're in a room with them doing an actual presentation.

Tools that I use: WeVideo has a built-in screen recording feature. Screencastify is a good alternative which is a simple Chrome extension. And if you want to record your phone, AZ Screen Recorder on Android is a great app to use.

Audio

Producing audio lessons allows you to break up your content when you have produced heaps of video. You can include a podcast for them to listen to and have some discussions.

Audio content is a great way to engage your auditory learners and also allows people to absorb your content on the run.

Tools that I use: I use my smartphone, PC, and Rode microphone. We use Descript to clean and remove unwanted parts of the audio.

Text

People like to read. Text is good for stagnant content. It's good for concepts that need to be explained or videos that need additional information. It's great for checklists or further reading that people need to do.

Tools that I use: Designrr is a powerful tool that creates ebooks and other different content sources and turns them into PDFs or dynamic flipbooks. You can embed them in your course library and make them into downloadable content for your students.

Slides

You can present slides with audio behind them and text that people can read and follow. If you want to do slides, record them while screencasting so you will have that smooth transition between slides and an editable video along the way.

You also get that enthusiasm from your voice like you're presenting to an actual audience. Again, if you have a clicker, use it and present your slides like you normally would.

Tools that I use: Canva is my favourite tool when creating presentations. Canva has a library of professional design templates to choose from and create your slides in no time.

Quizzes

Quizzes can enforce the learning or what they want to learn next. They are a great way to measure effectiveness. Quizzes are interactive and allow the students to feel like they are making an accomplishment. Interactivity allows our students to progress and get good wins.

Tools that I use: Interact is a quiz-maker tool that I like to use to build quizzes to go along with your courses in no time.

Surveys

If you want to get feedback or run a poll during your live sessions. Surveys are also good when you want to insert assignments into your courses as well.

Tools that I use: Thinkific has a built-in survey tool that you can employ, while Typerform is another good option.

Infographics

If your content is so clunky with text, then infographics are a great way to present your information. Infographics are an aesthetically pleasing way to summarise data and share information in a more compelling, engaging way with your audience.

Infographics are educational, entertaining, and useful. They are fun and deliver the information you are trying to relay in an engaging way. Infographics can keep your lessons interesting and can keep your students coming back for more content.

Tools that I use: Not only does Canva allow you to easily create beautiful documents and designs, but it also has a dedicated section just for infographics where all sorts of templates, designs, tips, and tools are available. Remember to brand your infographics so that your audience will remember you when they refer to that resource.

Live lessons

Live lessons keep your students moving and engaged. Not every course needs a live lesson, but you can include memberships that have live lessons as part of them. Live online classes allow much-needed interaction with students through chats and comments. This makes the class more dynamic, encourages discussions, and allows immediate answers to questions.

They can be presented in different formats like Q&A sessions, how-to sessions, role-play as in like a career advice situation, team exercises, or simply just guided learning as a way to connect with your students.

Tools that I use: Live lessons can be delivered via Zoom or Google Meet.

Coaching

One of the things that I like to include in my courses is the opportunity to do one-on-one coaching with my students. If someone is just a little bit lost in the course or needs more guidance and encouragement, then coaching can be the right solution for them to get that additional help.

Coaching has been shown to have a powerful, positive impact on the self-confidence, skills, and work performance of students. Coaching can provide expertise, insights, perspective, and a growth mindset to the coaching relationship.

Coaching can be included as part of the course through membership. For example, I upsell coaching through a discounted rate on my Marketing Circle Membership so members can work with me when they need a little bit more help.

Tools that I use: I also use Zoom or Google Meet in my coaching sessions.

There you go—ten different lesson types that you can use when creating your own courses, along with the tools that will help you through the course creation process.

Personally, my favourite lesson types to produce are workbooks, ebooks, to camera videos, and some further text and explanations to support the course with one-on-one coaching added in to support the course.

However, this is my personal bias. These lesson types are what have worked for me and my students over the years, that is why I have stuck with these types quite often. You can have your own choice of content mix that you can produce and ones that your audience can engage and connect with.

So go ahead and start producing and see which ones your audience will respond to. Keep creating until you find the right mix for you.

Highlights

0:00 Introduction
0:42 What is the best lesson type?
0:58 There is not a golden lesson
1:05 The best lesson comes down to the one we can produce
1:20 Develop lessons for the different learning styles
1:30 Aim to have a content mix
1:32 Set up a to camera video
2:40 The video accessories and tools that I use
3:22 The video you can create is the best video that you can put out there
3:35 Screencasting if you want to show something
4:05 Audio lessons like a podcast
4:35 Text for reading content
5:34 Slides with or without voice
6:08 Quizzes
6:40 Surveys
7:00 Infographics
7:25 Lives lessons
8:30 One-on-one coaching
9:35 Recap: There is no best lesson type
9:50 Getting the information across
10:05 Think about the best way to engage your students

Resources

10 Ways to Market Your Course as You Create It

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 07 Apr 2022 22:00:00 GMT

Course creation is a great way to connect with your customers, build your authority within your niche, and increase your sources of income for your business. Courses tend to go more in-depth than your blogs, and if you do it right, your clients will keep coming back for more to learn from you. Now that you've finished (or almost finished) creating your online course, it is time to let your people know about it. It took several weeks (maybe even months) to create, record, and edit, so it is only right that you also put in some time and effort to promote your course. Here are 10 ways to market your course while you're creating it: •Offer a sneak preview of your course. You might release a short video, a handout, or a checklist. This addresses the "what's in it for me" question so give people some insights on what is inside your course. •Let people see what's behind the scenes. This is a good way to show people how you're creating your course. If you're recording, you can go off-camera to show some behind the scenes footage so that you can build some excitement around your course, and you can take people to a pre-sale page. •Offer a tip from your course. One way that I love to work with first-time course creators is to create a series of tips from the course that they are about to launch. Your course is packed full of tips, so why not create them into social graphics on Canva that you can release in the days leading up to your launch. This is also a great way to build your evergreen social bank as well. •Tap into questions that are being asked about the topic. What are the questions being asked about your topic? If you've done your research using tools like Answer the Public and DisplayPurposes, you've already tapped into questions that your clients are asking. You can call for questions on your social media. This allows you to establish a meaningful conversation with your audience. •Answer questions on Facebook Groups and Quora. Start adding value by answering questions on your topic and mentioning that you're covering more about the topic in your upcoming course. •Go on live video to connect with your audience. People want to get to know the person behind the course. So going on a live video gives you a chance to connect with your audience more personally. You can share about the topics that will be covered in your course and what's in store for them when they sign up. •Do some guest blogging. Guest blogging is a great way to get in front of other people's audiences and it's a powerful way to build your profile and authority. Start looking for opportunities where you can write guest blogs. Just be sure that their audience also shares your target audience for your course. You can share ideas and tips, and then share information about your course topic. •Optimise your email signature. Your email is a goldmine when marketing your course. You send an email almost every day to people. Make sure that your signature includes a link to your course. You can use a tool like Wisestamp to get the most out of your emails with a professionally designed email signature. •Be interviewed. Do some research on podcasts or websites where you can be interviewed around your course topic. The most important thing when you are being interviewed is to add value to their listeners or viewers. Be sure to share a helpful tip then promote your course after. And...

An exercise for when you feel you're not good enough to teach

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Wed, 10 Nov 2021 23:37:00 GMT

It happens to all of us, and not just to teachers either. It happens in all industries. But it hits particularly hard for teachers, those moments of doubt. "Who am I to teach this? Why should I be teaching?" We feel our responsibility to our students is greater than our belief in ourselves. So I want to delve into that. We all need this reminder now and then, you are good enough to teach! In this episode, I'll share with you mindset exercises that will remind you that you actually know your stuff and you are good enough to teach what you want to teach. Exercise #1: List all the questions people take to you for answers. These people ask you that question because you're trusted in your industry. They believe you are the expert to give them the answers they need. They trust your feedback. They want your input on these questions and issues. So list them down. This is your field of expertise. Exercise #2: List all the questions and problems you can answer and solve. When you go through Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, TikTok, your groups and pages, are there posts that make you think, "I can help that person." And in fact you probably do help that person. You probably answer the question in the comment section! And sometimes you probably think, "I've answered this question before." As educators, helping is second nature to us. We're naturally helpful beings. When you start doing this exercise of listing down the questions and problems you know you can help with, you discover areas you didn't realize you had the skills and expertise to teach! For us, as experts within our field, these questions and problems might seem like basic stuff and we expect no one would need to be taught about them. But that's not the case. People can learn from you from the ground up. It's part of setting your students up for success, the basics, the foundations, and you can even market that as starter courses that can lead people to the more advanced levels you can teach. What is a Marketing Tree: https://lindareedenever.com.au/what-is-a-marketing-tree/ Exercise #3: Read your testimonials. You've helped people. Your testimonials are proof of that. And during your moments of doubt, it's amazing how fast your testimonials can reassure you that you do know your stuff. Just like with the first two exercises, reading your testimonials, seeing exactly how you've made your students' or clients' lives easier, can also show you hidden gems about what more you can teach, hidden secrets and goldmines of ideas for your next series of course content. When you think you're not good enough to teach, or you don't know enough to be teaching, do these three exercises. Look at all the questions that people bring to you and which are just second nature for you to answer. Look at the testimonials of people you've helped. You'll rediscover your expertise, your niche. And remember that even if someone else or many others are already teaching the same thing, it doesn't mean they're teaching it your way. Your way is different. Your way of teaching, your own expertise and experiences, are just as valuable and needed. We have a passion for helping you share your knowledge through courses! Our founder Linda Reed-Enever has been teaching since she was 14 and here in the course creators circle she shares with you her inner wisdom when it comes to Course Creation. Linda is a Thinkific approved expert and a generous and natural educator when it comes...

Reducing Failed Payments with Richard from Stunning

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Tue, 10 Aug 2021 07:40:00 GMT

Failed payments are a pain. They stop you from growth, they stop you from moving forward with your next course offerings. The passive income you were aiming for with your courses is suddenly no longer passive because you're actually putting in more work chasing payments. In this podcast, I had a great interview with Stunning founder Richard Felix. We talk about ways you can reduce failed payments. A lot of these are unintentional. Your students aren't being delinquents. The payments might be failing due to circumstances outside their control, like bank fraud protection, expired cards, and so on. Good news: You can manage this process, reduce the risk of failed payments, and see more money coming into your bank accounts with tools like Stunning. Automate your payment reminders You have payment plans, you have memberships. The last thing you need is to be in the middle of charging your students, trying to keep track of things in spreadsheets or emails. That's just a huge headache. And that's not counting the failed payments, which happen 20% to 40% of the time, depending on the type of business, the users, the banks, the cards used. Whatever the case, Stunning gets notified by Stripe about a failed payment, and Stunning reaches out to your customers via push notifications (integrated with Thinkific), SMS, and dunning emails. A dunning email is basically a dunning letter. To dun means to demand payment. It's that simple. And user-friendly! Because Stunning sends an email with a link your students can click. It goes to a payment page where they can easily update their billing information without any required logins. Stunning supports face ID, fingerprint authorization. If their card information is stored in their phone, this billing/payment update can be done in seconds. Stunning also monitors email send rates and bounce rates, so that if your email doesn't make it to your student and the failed payments continue, you'd be prompted to reach out to them. You want to implement failed payment management immediately Once it's in place, it's like an insurance policy. Stunning actually has a plan where you can start for $0, and you can do something for as long as you need, and you won't be charged until you start recovering revenue. As Richard Felix says in this podcast, they know, "how important it is to get a handle on as soon as possible." Failed payments can seem like a small issue at first, but it's an insidious problem that over time, becomes a huge stumbling block for the growth of your course as a business. https://stunning.co/?via=enevergroup

Your Course doesn't have to be a "course" an interview with Karen Hillen Course Creators Circle Member

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Mon, 19 Jul 2021 03:00:00 GMT

One of the most common pitfalls in course creation is getting stuck with your course format. In an interview with Karen Hillen, we talk about how your course doesn't have to be a course. Karen Hillen is a HR advisor. Karen and I've known each other for many many years, and I'm excited to say that she's finally teaching online and she's delivering her programs by her Thinkific school, and the Course Creators Circle has been lucky to be part of that journey. How Karen's course started It was something people mentioned every now and then. They say, "You should do a course. Put all this information in a course." And Karen always sort of just discounted it. She couldn't see how this could be a course, so it's just been there and she "never seriously thought about it until I started talking to you, Linda. You made me see that the information I know can be made into courses, whether they're short or longer courses." "Or you know, a course that's not really a course. I've been thinking about it but didn't take it seriously." Karen's course and course format A course that's not really a course meant Karen offers her services and expertise in a membership style. She's an HR advisor so she provides HR services to small businesses. Performance management, managing staff and managing HR for businesses. Rather than courses, Karen offers membership, and this membership entitles you to a virtual HR management service. She puts all her clients' documents together and gives them templates like employment contract templates. Creating memberships is something we've focused on in particular throughout Karen's course creation journey. It makes sure you get paid and you continually get paid. You can easily remove access if someone cancels or is not paying. A course doesn't have to be a course Karen had the most amazing programs for her members, but it was also taking a lot of manual work to get everyone what they needed. If you're in the same boat, that's where the courses that aren't really courses can come in. These are materials and course content that can lead people through your other, more advanced offerings as they progress. These contents or materials aren't technically courses, but you're using a course to deliver that component. What you can teach or impart doesn't have to be a course. As Karen said, "It may be the delivery of a service or information. It doesn't have to be what you think of when you think of a course." Once you get your head around that, you can have tons of "lightbulb moment" ideas. What do your students need? You can think about different ways you can package your expertise for your students. For Karen, she has step-by-step videos and downloadable templates her students can consult and tweak instead of a course on how to create their HR policy handbook. A course is guidance Any way your students can take guidance from you is a course, even if it's not a course. For instance, anyone confused about HR can consult Karen's templates and get guidance from there. Start with something small and easy. You don't have to create a full course with a whole heap of content. Sometimes we think this or that is too basic, but remember, you do have to teach the basics. You can have a workbook on the basics, some video instructions, and you have an entry-level course that will allow people to come in and learn from you. Karen shared that...

Embracing Learning Styles in Creating Your Course

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Sat, 10 Jul 2021 04:41:00 GMT

Ask any teacher worth their salt and they will tell you they embrace every student's learning style instead so the student gets the best experience in their courses. Now when it comes to course creation, online or face to face, that remains true. You need to understand the different learning styles so you can engage every type of student with your courses. Important Big Thing to remember: We know our stuff. Our students don't. Not yet. We need to bridge that knowledge gap, and to do that, we need to step away from our own learning style because we naturally have a bias toward it. We need to embrace all the learning styles when it comes to putting together your course content. The Three Major Learning Styles The Visual Learner Perhaps the most common type of learner, and I think all of us are visual learners to some extent. After all, our brain receives 80% of information visually. Visual learners prefer images. They retain information better from infographics, flash cards, and they love interacting with content they can see, like filling in worksheets. What you need for visual learners: graphics, video walkthroughs, annotated transcripts, show notes, flowcharts, text images, workbooks, imagery in your course materials like boxes for important notes The Auditory Learner Auditory learners can be mistaken for visual learners because they love to read, but the difference is they like reading to repeat it to themselves, or they listen to it in podcasts or audiobooks. They store it in their heads in their own words or memorized. Auditory learners work well with repetition and rote learning. They love hearing a concept and turning it over in their minds, taking notes while listening to help themselves remember or understand. What you need for auditory learners: discussions, talks, interviews, audiobooks, podcasts, audio chapters The Kinesthetic and Tactile Learner Kinesthetic and tactile learners like immersion. They want to take part in things. These learners love pop quizzes and learning the answers through those tests. They like going underneath or behind the scenes, building things and getting really hands on. What you need for kinesthetic and tactile learners: Step by step guides, activities, projects, workbooks. New type of learner: The Social Learner The social learner prefers learning within groups. They like that group or class component, brainstorming or discussions. This branches off the auditory learner, but while an auditory learner might prefer listening and taking notes alone, the social learner thrives in group settings, participating in a discussion instead of just listening to it. So these are the four learning styles. It's important to consider each one as you plan your course content. And every learner type's preferences are also goldmines of ideas for your course materials and creative assets in your course creation journey!

Questions to ask yourself before Creating Your Online Course

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 17 Jun 2021 23:45:00 GMT

As the saying goes, "Those who can't do, teach; and those who can't teach, teach gym." Funny as that may sound, nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, teaching is one of the most time-consuming jobs you can take on. Is there a need? Before asking yourself how to market an online course, the first thing you need to establish is whether or not this particular class already has a need. In other words: Do some market research before creating your online course. Use tools like Answer the Public to see what people are searching for around your area of expertise and base your courses around them. Who is your ideal student? Creating a student persona (your target audience) early on will save you future headaches as you will be attracting the right people. (There is a student persona template for you in the Membership area of the Course Creators Circle). What's your price point? This is a factor that too many online course creators leave as an afterthought. They build their product and then determine it's value. While you don't need to think about the exact cost of this course, you should have a rough idea of what the price tag will be. Or, at the very least, you should determine if this will be a high-ticket course (over $1,000) or a low-ticket course (under $1000) Lots of course creators either drastically undervalue or overvalue the worth of their online courses. So spending a little time getting the pricing right is key. How Will You Present Your course? You should determine how you're going to get your knowledge to your students in a way that they'll retain the information. A lot of that has to do with your personality and teaching style. But there are other factors as well: What's your budget? What platform will you use? Will it be mostly video-based or text-based? Your budget is an obvious concern. If you're creating an online course and working with almost no money, then you need to get creative. This will also impact the platform you use to deliver your content. Do I have the time to create a course? Yep... I said it, course creation does take time and we need to have time to create the course, as well as sell the course so it is a really important question to know the answer to this. You can also, of course, outsource the creation of course materials. You can hire writers who can adapt your voice and write the course materials from your voice notes or other existing content. But even then, reviewing the course and creative assets your team creates will still take your time. When you're the teacher, you're the sun.

What can you teach as a Course Creator?

The Course Creators Circle Podcast — Thu, 17 Jun 2021 20:54:00 GMT

So you want to teach a course but are stuck for ideas on what to teach. In this episode of the Course Creators Circle Podcast, we are going to tackle the topic of "what can teach" as a course creator. Course Creation comes from the knowledge that we have and someone else (hopefully many) want to know about. So when starting on our course creation journey one of the natural questions will be what can I teach, so let's dive in Course creation comes from knowledge. The knowledge you already have. Your expertise is something truly valuable, and you just need to tap into that and share it to people who want and need it. So how do you unlock ideas on what you can teach as a course creator? Teach what you know: These are your passions. Something you can talk about for hours. If you know it inside out and you're very passionate about it, you can teach it. Both your expertise and your passion will come out in your courses. So make a list of the things you know and love doing. It doesn't have to be related to your niche. If you're a lawyer, you don't necessarily have to teach lawyering techniques or even marketing your law firm, though you absolutely can. You can offer a baking class if you love baking! Think of the key steps you can teach people, the key steps that might be unique to your own experiences and expertise. Teach what you've learnt: These things stick to you: the things you wish you knew when you started, the mistakes you can now teach others to avoid because you made them, the shortcuts you have picked up throughout the years. This is where it really gets interesting and special, because your expertise comes with unique systems and processes you've learned or built from what you've learned along the way. Teach what you know your students should know: What do people always ask you? If you find yourself answering a specific question or set of questions all the time, you can bet on it that people are also asking Google. And they can learn so much better from you than from Google. Turn their questions into a course. At some point, it probably frustrates you that you end up talking about this again and again, but for the people asking you that question, they don't know that. The question is important to them. They want the information and the advice you can give them. So there you have it a few ideas on what you can teach and hopefully, you have some answers to your own "what can I teach" question ready to put into a Course Creation plan.