5 Best Practices of Online Course Selling (Creator's Experience)

Selling your online course like a wildfire takes a lot more than just creating it. You can not just create an online course and then wait for it to sell itself. In this blog, we will cover some of the best practices of online course selling which can help you to grow your online teaching business exponentially.

Today, we have ‘n’ number of online course creators worldwide. Undoubtedly, all of them try to give their best to their learners.

But, do you think all of them are standing in the same place in terms of growth and revenue?

Do you think that all of them have been able to create an impact through their online courses?

Obviously, the answer is a big NO!

In fact, many of them have been in the online teaching business for several years. Still, if we compare their growth with their fellow creators (even with the newcomers), we can say that they are way behind them.

To know the reason behind this difference, we have compared them on different fronts and analyzed a few things.

Let’s dig deeper!

So, when we compared them from the surface, we found that it’s just their bad luck. (Bad Luck: The best way to cover up one’s shortcomings. Isn’t it?)

Well, jokes apart!

As we know, where there is a will, there is a way. Hence, we compared them thoroughly and figured out that there was a major difference in the approach and the practices that they follow.

We have covered all those differences together and here, are presenting you with the 5 best practices of online course selling. Therefore, if you are someone who is finding it hard to increase their sales and revenue, you have come to the right place.

Table of Contents

5 Best Practices Of Online Course Selling

1- Figure Out Your Niche & Validate Your Course Idea

When you are creating an online course, be 110% sure that you have picked the right niche. It’s completely fine if you are not the ‘Einstein’ of that topic, but, at least make sure that:

You love to teach what you already know and
You would always be willing to learn something new about it (even if you have to learn something new each day)

Once, you are clear about your online course niche, make sure the next thing you would do is to validate your course idea. Figure out if the topic that you have chosen has a market demand or not.

To validate your course idea, be active on platforms like Quora. Ask questions about your course topic and see if people would be interested if you create a course around that topic. You could also join Facebook groups and communities for the same purpose.

After a few days or months, you will have a clear picture in your mind. You would also be able to decide if creating a course on the topic that you have decided would be worth it or not.

2- Know Your Customer Avatar

A Customer Avatar (also known as Buyer’s Persona) is a depiction of your ideal customer.

Before getting into the creation phase understand who is your ideal customer. Once you know about your ideal customer, you no longer need to assume that this person can be my customer and this can not.

Moreover, this will help you to plan more effective and practical marketing strategies. While ideating your ideal customer avatar, ask yourself:

Who am I creating this course for?
What should be their age?
What should be the pain points of my audience?
What should be their end goals?

Let’s suppose, you are creating an online course on how to reduce excess body fat and this course is only for women between 16 – 45 years of age. This means that every other person on the internet is not going to be your ideal customer.

Therefore, you would be targeting all the females who are between 16 – 45 years of age and their goal is to lose their excess body fat. Consequently, your marketing campaigns will drive in more positive results and leads that convert into your customers.

P.S. – Assumptions will end when you would be clear about the audience that you would be targeting.

3- Create Compelling Learning Outcomes

Be vocal about your course offerings!

Every individual invests any course or a degree to bring a positive change in them ie, from their current reality to the desired future.

Your audience would invest in your online course only if their end goals are in alignment with the learning outcomes of your course. Hence, make sure your course alone is capable to help your audience reach their final goals.

Before getting started, write down on a sheet of paper the learning outcomes of your online course. For example:

If you are launching a 90 Days Fitness Course, ideate how many inches a person would be able to lose?

If you creating a course on 90 Days Mindset Change, ideate in how many days a person would be able to see a positive shift in their mindset

If you do it this way, you would be able to create a course that would be instrumental in bringing a positive change in your learners’ lives.

Along with this, if you have a clear idea about the learning outcomes, you would be able to create a killer sales page. Consequently, the chances of signing up for your will increase.

launch your online course now

4- Use Right Pricing Strategy

No matter how amazing your online course is, its ‘pricing’ will always be one of the important factors which will influence the buyer’s final decision.

Make a strategic decision and price your online course according to do that. During your planning phase decide whether the course that you are creating –

Is going to work as a lead magnet?
Is going to be your primary income stream?
Is going to work as a side hustle?
Is going to be a part of your subscription model?

Many things will get affected by this single decision. Like the marketing strategies, course format, landing pages, and funnels would be designed on the basis of your final decision. Hence, make sure that you know how your course is going to work for you and how it will affect your online institute.

Moreover, conduct thorough research before giving a price tag to your online course. See at what price your competitors are selling their courses and what are the other benefits that they are offering to their learners.

Keep in mind that it is better to sell your course at competitive prices instead of selling it at low prices. Many creators keep the prices low thinking that low prices will make their audience purchase the course. But, unfortunately, this is not the case. Many people think that low price means low-quality content. Hence, never underestimate your course by selling it at lower prices.

If you are someone who wants to sell a premium online course, make sure that you are offering premium content as well. It would be wrong to say that highly-priced courses don’t sell. Even a $1000 course would sell if you truly deliver what you have promised.

P.S. – The secret of selling a premium online course is ‘Don’t befool your audience’.

5- Course Structure & Delivery

When it comes to course structure, be as creative as you can. Include all the modern teaching techniques in your online course. Use multimedia content like videos, audio, gif, etc.

Teach as if you are teaching in your physical classroom. Interact with your audience as if they are sitting just right in front of you. Few ways that can help you to make your online course more interactive and engaging are:

Crack jokes whenever you can
Encourage your learners to communicate
Host Live sessions
Build a community for your learners to interact

What should be the ideal duration of your online course?

When deciding the duration of your course, try to make a balance. In short, don’t unnecessarily exceed the duration of your course and at the same time, your learners should not feel as if you are going too fast.

If you are a newbie, don’t worry! With time you will learn how to create a balance

What is the best course delivery method?

The best way to sell your online course is to host it on an online course platform like Graphy. You would be able to assemble your online course in the most organized manner. The best part about these platforms is that they are very easy to use and we are saying this from the perspective of both creator and learner.

To Wrap It Up:

Since we know, how much it takes to create an online course, we truly appreciate you if you have created one.

After going through this blog, you might feel overwhelmed if you have not incorporated these best practices of online course selling while creating your online course.

But, till the time you have not made it available to your audience, there is nothing to worry about. Follow these practices religiously and sell your online course like a wildfire on a branded, online course hosting platform like Graphy.