Creating an effective online course
What is an online course?
An online course is a class that takes place via the internet. They’re usually run via a learning management system, allowing students to see their course curriculum and progress and sometimes interact with other people taking the course. Today, many service-based businesses are creating online courses because it is the easiest way to scale, and the profit margin is awesome!
In this article, I will be showing you practical steps you can also take to create an engaging and profitable online course.
Let’s jump in!
Over the years, the internet has provided us with several advantages, and one of them is the opportunity for anybody to learn a new skill, anytime. You no longer need to enroll in a costly university course to learn a new topic or improve your skills; many online classes are available today. You can also make your very own.
You can present yourself as a pioneer in your sector with an online course and produce passive income from your website. But how exactly are you designing a course people are going to hurry to sign up for? It would help if you took note of the following tips before you even start creating your course.
1. Define your focus for the course.
You need to set out your ideas for the course before you concentrate on designing a course. This means racking your brain and capturing any thoughts you have when determining whether your students are essential to these ideas.
2. Choose the right subject.
It’s not as easy as choosing your favorite topic and jumping in head-first to choose a subject for your online course. You need to select your course subject to decide what challenges your target audience members regularly face — then help them solve them.
For example, if you’re interested in budgeting but all about social media marketing is your Blog or website, would a budgeting course be successful for you? Probably not. But if your audience comes to you for social media marketing ideas, one they’ll want to take is a social media marketing course.
3. Ensure there is high market demand for your Course Idea.
If you have chosen the subject/topic of your online course, the next move is to perform a series of market analysis tests to see whether it has market demand.
Many course developers make the mistake of thinking that since their topic area has so much competition, they don’t stand a chance to succeed and beat the competition. However, this suggests a good chance that that course concept will have a lot of market demand; therefore, it’s worth looking into further.
The following are the three main things to check for:
Are people talking about the topic?
Are others asking you questions?
Is there a void in the market’s offerings?
If you answered yes to the three questions above and your concept is comparable to but distinct from what’s already available, you’ve got a course idea that’s likely to be a best-seller.
4. Create compelling and Magnetic Learning outcomes.
Don’t underestimate the value of the effects of learning. You could seriously damage your reputation and your bottom line if you do not do this with your online courses, let alone make the course development process a stressful one.
Would you hand over your money for a product you don’t understand to anyone, and you have no idea what it’s going to do for you? Not, of course.
If your students do not know how your course can benefit them, it is unlikely that they will participate in it.
Learning outcomes explicitly illustrate what the learner will do, know, and experience with observable verbs by the end of your course.
· What skills would they be able to demonstrate?
· What new information are they going to obtain?
· What emotions have they switched away from or to?
Getting consistent learning results also means that only the RIGHT students enter the course, which suggests higher completion rates and satisfaction and lower demands for refunds.
5. Provide the results that your students expect.
Your students are looking forward to learning about a particular subject, so you need to know that topic. Is your course about enhancing the accuracy of emails from students? If so, you’d better share a lot of tips about sending emails of higher quality.
6. Multiple courses are better than one.
If the course covers a wide variety of subjects, it can be particularly challenging to narrow your concentration on a course. Try to design multiple courses instead, with a very particular subject covered by each course. Theoretically, the more courses you offer, the more students sign up, so sell more by offering several courses.
7. Keep things short and sweet
When planning a course, note that people usually have limited attention spans. If you happen to be long-winded to make the content more consumable, you will need to change your approach. So how is it possible to do this?
Divide the content into short modules (it will be pushed for something longer than 10 minutes). Limit the number of stories (one story is enough to get your point across).
8. Provide something for students to take away from your course.
You want them to get something out of it when students take your online course and not just forget what they’ve learned. After completing the course, you can give students tools that they can easily refer back to. Tools that may be useful include:
· Worksheets
· Checklists
· Summaries
By supplying them with documents that evaluate the significant points, remind students how important your course is.
9. Find the right course platform
There are two primary ways to sell online courses.
· Online course marketplaces
· Learning management systems
There is a huge difference between marketplaces for online courses and systems of learning management.
Your own Academy is a learning management system that connects to your website and brand as your network. Online course development makes it quick and convenient to sell plugins or apps for your website’s learning products.
If you have established your course content, you need to find a great online course platform that will provide you with a high-quality learning experience and is excellent for developing online courses. Fortunately, a lot of online learning platforms on the market are open.
LearnWorlds, for instance, provides the opportunity to run your online course in one location, which simultaneously makes the overall process simple and inexpensive. You will also get a package of marketing resources that help you promote your online course and sell it.
Make sure that each online course will earn a fee from this kind of online platform. When selecting a platform, it is essential to look at certain aspects, such as pricing policies, flexible features, interface, customer service, in-build tools, and many more. Anyway, several offer a free trial to test all the characteristics and decide whether they work for your needs.
Standalone platforms vs. marketplace
You can have a dedicated white-label website with a standalone portal that guides people to your online education, and it is entirely your own. You have all the instruments you need to build and sell online courses with it.
While there is no such thing as your website for course marketplaces, you have more limited selling courses. Ultimately, what you will choose depends mostly on your long-term objectives and specific criteria as a course business.
10. Pricing a course
For your online course, it’s time to strategize the pricing model. You should find out what you’re going to pay and predict the number of students you need to repay your money and begin to earn. Note that the price is closely related to consumer demand and whether individuals are willing to pay for the course.
It isn’t easy to find the best price for your online course. Your objective here, however, is to come up with the optimal price. This is the price where your course’s price brings in clients, and you gain enough money from your course sales.
There is no correct pricing plan for an online course you can pursue because it depends on what you are going to offer, what marketing methodologies you are using, and how much value you bring to your course in most situations.
The best way to do so is to test your design in the market against rivals. Check out how they supply content, how much they charge, and how different your course can be. You will push up your online product’s price if you feel that you’ve made yours better. Never undercharge, as it will look like it gives your consumers less value than your rivals. To do this, there are various ways you can charge your learners: free, paid, or subscription.
Free vs. Paid vs. Subscription
It doesn’t give you any money to offer a free course, but it can give you a head start by inspiring people to get to know you and what you do. Paying for online courses are the ones that come with a price tag and charge learners to get access to your learning material in a single time payment. On the other hand, a subscription in payment is perpetual, and they pay a sum of money every month or every year to keep accessing your content.
11. Market Your Online Course.
Most course creators make the mistake of believing that they now have an income stream once their course is developed. To advertise your course and enroll students, you need a start-up and ongoing marketing campaign.
· Will, you run early bird discount promotions?
· Can you partner up with influencers?
· Will, you run an affiliate program?
· How will you use social media?
· Will, you run ads?
· Do you have a marketing plan that will sell your online courses?
The list is endless.
If this is your first online course, giving out quality material for free is a great approach to show off your knowledge. You might, for example, offer a complimentary guide that addresses your target audience’s pain points. This will help you capture and maintain the audience’s attention from the start. Providing free content is a great method to build brand awareness and a strong foundation for a high-converting sales funnel.
Another method to promote your course is to create a pre-selling email campaign. To do so, you’ll need a large email list to share with your subscribers, but it’s also the most efficient method to achieve your goals.
Make sure you have an 18-month marketing plan in place for your online course, and remember that the moment you stop promoting, you stop selling.
12. Use Chatbots and E-Mail-Marketing Tools.
No matter how unique your online course might be, without the interactive aspect, a student might stop caring about the course before it is over. To improve learners’ learning experience, chatbots are an easy solution for teachers and course developers. The chatbots also offer students an opportunity to ask questions, develop online education’s reputation, and recognize the course’s weak points.
Chatbots such as Tidio serve as a tremendous course tool that can help promote your brand with certain marketing aspects, provide updates, and ask learners to share your content. Easily integrated with Instagram, Twitter, or Facebook, chatbots can interact simultaneously with thousands of students.
Email marketing is a smart way to turn more leads and nurture your relationship with your students into paying clients. To make the most of your online course, the use of email marketing services can help you inform, educate, and connect with your subscribers.
Here are some mistakes you should avoid when creating a successful online course:
· It should be less than 20 minutes to prevent making long videos. Students have minimal attention spans.
· Don’t be a perfectionist and take it easy; don’t overthink all the specifics, even though it is your first online course. You won’t know your errors and build the best version of your course without trying it out. Only continue to study your business, change your course, and land your first customers who pay.
· Keep improving your online course. Checking your product with real customers is a perfect way to find out and correct any potential errors. For example, you forget to add a purchase button or include a learning video you listed earlier. Continue to check the material for errors to become resistant to any problems you have experienced throughout the course.
Now Let’s Design the Course
When designing an online course, there are several facets to consider, whether you are an instructional designer or a course creator. We recommend using these tips to boost the experience of online course design as a guide.
1. Be Prepared
Before starting the semester, it is better to develop the online course because it is not being planned while students are going through the course concurrently. Preparations for first-course design provide the potential for reflection and redesign before the participation of students. To boost online course design, consider introducing the following while planning early:
· Align assignments with defined expectations for learning.
· Integrate all of the scaffolding.
· Various content deliverables, such as instructional videos, primary and secondary sources, infographics, and reports.
· Incorporate strategies for the teacher and students to improve social presence.
2. Keep the Learning Modules and the Syllabus Short
The first step to creating a successful online course is the organization of your course material. Online learners may misunderstand the essence of online education and expect the ease of working online to make it simple for the course. When they find out how much effort it takes, many drop out.
The learners’ attention span is much shorter than other modules of learning. Traditional education falsely persuaded us that for forty-five minutes or more, students would pay attention. The reality is that they never paid attention; they just had no “off” button. The choice to turn the presentation off is readily available with online learning. No one has to keep watching, and they won’t if the material isn’t entertaining.
One secret to preventing this outcome is to present your course contents easily digestible so that the students can find them manageable.
Bear in mind that they would need to view this knowledge independently in a traditional learning setting, without the usual signals they may get from other teachers. It can be a juggling act to separate and present your course content to online students. Too many lessons may be daunting, but students can begin to challenge the course’s importance if they have too little. A useful guide is to have at least ten different courses, but not more than fifty. If the course content is too complicated and more than fifty are necessary, group them into small sections that allow students to track their progress quickly.
For each learning module, fifteen minutes is an advisable goal. Students will remain with it for fifteen minutes, but not longer if the material is created well. It would be possible to run specific modules a little longer; others are shorter. Chunking the material so that it can be presented in smaller bites is very important.
3. Supplement with Video
There are many instructional advantages to the external link presentation of course materials in video format, including:
· Improved inspiration from teachers.
· Improved experience with studying.
· Higher marks.
· The development potential of the subject for more in-depth learning.
· Development of autonomy for learners.
· Strengthened capabilities for teamwork and teamwork.
· Tools for learning to be used by prospective cohorts.
Another value of using video is the opportunity to encourage students to explore lectures on their own time, retaining engaging discussion of class time.
4. Keep It Simple
Avoid the temptation to use live presentation videos. They make the students feel as if they are listening to the conversation with someone else. They’ll give in to the temptation to do something else when we limit students to spectators. They need to sense the speaker’s feelings and communicate visually.
If you can afford to get a video shooting expert, do it. Don’t let a small budget prohibit you from providing the material that interacts with the student.
5. Be Innovative
The learners of today navigate at an incredibly high pace through life. They juggle diverse social contexts and roles in life, which are enabled by technology. Courses can allow students the opportunity to show across various multimedia platforms their interpretation of content.
· One approach for meeting the digital learner is to incorporate several technical tools into assignments.
· Varying course assignments can promote innate encouragement by incorporating any of the concepts below.
· Visual diagrams of the content are generated by digital graphic organizers, including Popplet or Bubble.
· Visual infographics, such as Easel.ly or Canva, allow a map or diagram to represent data or details.
· For students to capture small group conversations, video conferencing technologies, such as Zoom, provide an incentive.
· With Adobe Spark or PowToon, animated video production allows students to create digital tales.
· Summative objects can be presented using Lesson Paths using digital portfolios.
6. Be Concise
When they navigate through a course, Clarity facilitates improved accessibility for students.
· Create a user-friendly template. Course models provide a basis for the design of courses and provide continuity to help streamline courses’ production.
· Clear labels on course products eliminate user uncertainty. For example, where there are needed readings in various modules, giving a particular title for the required readings is essential.
· Streamline tools such that clicks are reduced. For instance, through hyperlinks or embedding, everything needed in a module should be located within the module.
· Assignments should have defined standards and requirements and assignment examples, if applicable.
· Further clarification on task requirements is given by rubrics or assignment checklists.
7. Be Unique
In online classes, instructional videos are a core content delivery component because they allow students to receive content conversationally.
Instructional videos increase their ability to engage with the instructor in a one-talk where the instructor’s personality is displayed during content delivery. It should take no longer than 15 or 20 minutes to record the video. There are two main kinds of videos of instruction that can be used in courses:
Video for demonstration: The teacher exemplifying a demonstration or talking directly to the camera will be included in this video format, which can be produced using a video camera or a smartphone/tablet camera or webcam. We suggest that videos be hosted via YouTube.
Audio Screen Capture: This video format provides a picture-in-picture where the computer desktop and the teacher are filmed. A webcam, along with a software program, is necessary for this video production. We recommend buying Camtasia and Snag-It, but Screencast-O-Matic is an alternative if you are looking for a free solution.
8. Include Short, Non-Graded Quizzes
It would help if you encouraged them to internalize the content and provide course materials to your students. Including regular, fast, non-graded quizzes is one of the most successful strategies for this.
Frequent quizzes have been shown to improve external link performance and have several additional external connection advantages, including:
· Identifying Knowledge Gaps
· Helping with retention
· Allowing students to check the right or incorrect answers immediately
· Promoting stronger information organization
· Providing teachers with input
· Encouraging study
They are less likely to bully students by including these quizzes as a necessary but non-graded feature. The learners will use them as the educational tool they are without the tension of a ranking.
9. Create Interactive Elements
Discussion boards are also effective learning elements because they offer the opportunity for learners to communicate with each other. This can be a significant boost to the experience of learning because it negates the alienation cited by many students as a reason for not engaging in online learning.
You are providing the opportunity for contact to take place at any time by using these forums in your course. Students can continue discussions during the lecture or bring a platform conversation with them into the classroom. Participation in these discussions enables students to become more acquainted with new subjects being discussed.
When you include discussion forums in your online course, there are a few items to be considered:
· ‘Netiquette’: These are the laws of your online platform for actions and interaction. Much like conduct in a classroom, they will need to be developed and implemented.
· Monitor discussions: Like you would in the classroom, look for unanswered questions, students who are not interested or need support.
· Guidelines for participation: Be specific about participation deadlines and guidelines.
· Discussion topics: To encourage insightful conversations, plan thought-provoking topics.
One of the best ways to connect with your students would be an easy-run discussion platform and help build your sense of presence in the online classroom.
10. Be Available
Online courses may be perceived negatively in many situations because students may feel disconnected from their teachers and the material. The social presence within a course can overcome the sense of loneliness. Some practical ways to improve social presence are:
An introductory, three to five-minute instructor-led video that introduces itself, summarizes the course and sets its tone by establishing open communication. Students can easily access teacher support via several venues, such as email, chat/instant message, video conferencing (Skype, Zoom, etc.).
Consistent ‘check-ins’ establish teacher participation and encouragement during the course. This can be done through announcements, alerts, reminders, and other possibilities to facilitate academic or professional development.
All assignments should receive the instructor’s guidance. Assignment feedback should include clear examples as well as illustrate outstanding characteristics for areas of development. Video feedback is an option for enhanced social presence.
The bottom line is, if you understand how learners learn and how to use technology, you will build engaging online courses. But, bear in mind, an online course is not a boring presentation filmed and made available online; it is a boring presentation with an “off” button. These tips can help you to prepare and execute an online course that is productive and engaging.
