Should You Create An Online Course? Here's How To Tell
Been thinking about creating an online course? Not sure if it’s going to be a fit for your business?
Online courses are popular for a good reason - they have benefits for both you as the practitioner and your clients. But there are several points to consider when it comes to whether you should create an online course.
When you should create an online course
You understand your ideal client
You’ve probably heard me ramble about ideal clients a million times before, so let’s keep this one short. There is no point in creating a course if you don’t know:
Who your ideal client is
What they think their biggest issue is
What they want to achieve
Any other obstacles that they feel are holding them back
An online course should address all of these aspects throughout the creation process, marketing and delivery of the course. Otherwise, your course won’t gain the amazing reputation and rave reviews that it deserves!
You have a following of people that includes your ideal client
In order to sell your course, you need to get it in front of the right people. So ideally, you want to already have a following of people who are a fit for that course!
Can you market a course even if you don’t have those ideal followers yet? You can - but it will be more work, and fewer conversions.
It’s much easier to sell a course to someone who is already following you and engaging with your content.
You’re looking for a lower energy source of income
Looking for an income source for your business that doesn’t require you to be physically in the room? An online course might fit that bill.
This was actually one of the two core reasons I started to create courses. I only had so many hours in a day to help people in a 1:1 capacity, and many of the people I work with are already successful!
Although this is a great place to be in, I knew there were more people out there who needed my support and guidance. So creating a course allowed me to serve more people in a way that required less of my physical and mental energy.
You’ve got time set aside to create your course
A course doesn’t just magically appear overnight. For a course to be right for you, you need to be able to set some time aside to create it.
How long it takes to create an online course really depends on the format. But you need to figure out a rough time it’s likely to take you - then add on an extra 25% because these things always take longer than we think!
To give you an idea - creating my first 4 week course took about 40 hours of my time. This included planning the course, creating it, and marketing it.
There was a total of about 12 hours of filmed content, several resources and tutorials, and the process of uploading and editing that content.
Thanks to the process I went through, I now know how to create them more efficiently. In fact, I would now be able to condense the planning and marketing into a single day of work!
You’re committed to launching your course more than once
Courses are not just a one-off that you create, sell, and then let fall to the side.
If this is your approach, you’re putting yourself on the path to burnout and not building the income you want!
The purpose of a course is to:
Create amazing content once
Deliver it many times
That’s why it’s important to commit to launching your course more than once. Alternatively, you can simply leave it open, so that anyone can join it.
When it might not be time to create an online course
You’re still marketing your services to everyone
Generic courses sell much less than targeted courses - and for good reason. If you create a course to help everyone in the whole world eat better, you’re much less likely to have someone go ‘oh that’s what I need!’
If you don’t have your niche nailed, a course may not be right for you right now. You’re better off spending some more time working with clients and figuring out who is the right person for you!
You’re not confident when it comes to selling yourself
I often see practitioners jump into creating online courses because they think it’s going to be easier to sell than 1:1 sessions.
Newsflash: it’s not.
In fact, it takes more effort to sell 10 course slots at $50 than it does to sell 4 1:1 sessions at $125, or even one 1:1 package at $500.
If you have no interest in doing 1:1 appointments, that’s absolutely fine. But if you’re only looking to use courses because you’re still struggling to sell your clinic appointments, this is not the solution.
Figure out how to offer yourself and your services in a way that feels good for you. Then you can revisit the idea of courses.
You have no time to create a course
A course is content you can create once and deliver many times. But you still need to have that time to create it in the first place!
If you’re at capacity with life and work right now, a course might not be feasible at this moment. But you could look at scheduling specific times off so you can create a course or two and take some of that pressure off.
You saw someone else’s course and thought you should have one too
There are many great reasons to create a course.
But jealousy and FOMO? Not one of those reasons!
Creating a course just because someone else created a successful course and you thought you could do it just as well is not what your business is about.
If anything, it’s actually a way to fail your clients because you’re not investing your energy into what is best for you and for them!
There are many different forms of service out there. Courses are just one of those. So if it’s not a fit for you, or if your business isn’t set up to support a course - put it away in the toybox for later.
You work better with people 1:1 or in person
Your business needs to be designed based on how you work well. Otherwise, you can end up pouring energy into offers that leave you drained and burned out. That is not what we want!
If you prefer working with people 1:1 or in-person, online courses may not be a fit for you. Instead, you might consider other leveraged income options such as packages, workshops, cooking classes and retreats.
Is creating a course on your to-do list?
I’m here to help. Click here to book a 1:1 appointment.
