Substance and Style

Creating and selling online classes has become a popular way to boost authority, improve digital presence, and build a passive income stream. If you’re thinking about trying your hand at it, here are some things you’ll want to consider:

Preliminary Questions

1. Does a class fit in with your overall business objectives? Unless the class itself is going to be the focus of your business, you should evaluate your motives. What are you trying to achieve by creating this course? As mentioned above, common goals include improving your online presence and creating a passive revenue stream. It sounds obvious, but you must know your goal so you can tailor your content to it. If you’re trying to build authority, for example, you’ll want to make sure your class is professional, polished, and full of information your audience needs. How will your course support your goals?

2. How will this class serve the needs of your customers? Askyourself honestly if you have something of value to teach people. It’s not enough to be competent; you should be an expert in the subject matter you’re presenting. Your content should be valuable enough that people will pay for it and not regret paying for it. Anyone can create and sell a class, but not everyone should. Make sure you have actual information or wisdom to impart. Make it worth the audience’s time and money.

3. Are you able to teach? Sometimes, expertise doesn’t translate into the ability to teach a subject. Can you present the material in a way that will be easily understood and absorbed by your target audience? Do you have a creative approach or a communication style that speaks to people? You don’t need to appeal to everyone, but you need to be able to communicate information to your target audience effectively. 

4. Do you have time to create and market your courses? No matter how much of an expert you are, or how skilled you are at teaching, you will have to invest some time in order to make your course a success. The amount of time will vary with the complexity of the subject matter, but even subjects you know in your sleep will require some waking effort. 

Business Questions

1. How will you host and distribute your class? The first decision you need to make is where people will access your class. You have several options: hosting it on your own website behind a paywall, offering your course as a benefit for paid members on Patreon, or using a service like Skillshare, for example. Each option comes with its own set of pros and cons. If you want to have complete control over your content and retain 100% of the profits, you should host it on your own site. Partnering with an online course platform will limit your pay based on clicks and view times, but will likely reach a much larger overall audience than you can on your own, especially if your class is of special interest to the platform’s built-in audience. Every option should be weighed carefully for considerations about copyright, future use, audience size, community guidelines, cost, and marketing. 

2. What will you charge? This is a decision you only have to worry about if you are selling your course directly or as part of a membership or patreon tier. Classes you create in partnership with course delivery services will usually be free to view as part of paid membership plans, and you will earn percentages based on clicks and view times, If you’re selling your course directly, you’ll want to consider whether to sell each class or series of classes for a one time fee or allow subscriptions with unlimited usage. Generally speaking, a subscription works better if you have a large library of content.

3. How will you market your class, and to whom? While courses can bring in passive income, they won’t bring in income if no one knows about them. You need a solid plan for finding your target audience and getting the word out. 

Technical Questions

1. Do you have the equipment you will need, or the means to purchase it? There are a lot of different kinds of online courses, ranging from PowerPoints with voiceovers to elaborate productions with actors or animated characters, special effects, and professional scores. You can do a lot with a very small budget, but you’ll need to put some thought into the project specifications upfront. Think about what will appeal to your audience and figure out the cost from there.

2. What are the specs? You should do a great deal of pre-production planning before leaping in. Figure out the format (talking head, presentation, animation, a combination of techniques, etc.). Write a script. Draw out storyboards. Figure out how you will make the information easily digestible, memorable, and visually appealing. The more you can plan out in advance, the better.

3. Do you have the skills you need for post-production? Brush up on visual and sound editing. Make sure you can compress and render video so that the quality does not suffer, but the playback is fast. People who are paying for your course will expect it to look professional and function flawlessly. No matter who your audience is, it’s a sure bet that they won’t like to wait.