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So, imagine this with me. If I were to sit down with you for a cup of coffee and ask you about launching your OWN digital course, what would your response be? Now, more often than not, when I do ask people this question, I am met with a look that feels like I asked when they’re launching their next rocket to Mars.
For a lot of people, this can feel like a massive move. Something for when alllll the ducks are in a row and the stars are aligned. But here’s the thing: creating your own course will always stay a dream out of reach until you really take a look at what it takes to create and launch your own. And the good news is that it’s WAY easier than you think (aka nothing like rocket science.)
And that’s why I am here to answer YOUR real questions about digital courses! And you asked some VERY important ones, about how to know when you’re ready and what you NEED to have in order to start, taking care of students, and where I think the online course world is headed. We’re getting you SET today!
Before we even dive in though, I want to make sure you know about another learning opportunity to bring your course ideas to life. My friend and course creation extraordinaire is leading a Digital Course Bootcamp that will help you prep your idea, your audience, and yourself to create and launch a course of your own. Join the Boot Camp at LINK.
Do I Know Enough?
Gabriela Valdez, a member of the Goal Digger Podcast Facebook Group, asked: Do I know enough [to create a course]?
I love this question and I’m going to answer it with a few more: Have you gotten yourself a result? Have you gotten someone else a result? That’s where you begin.
When it comes to course creation or even positioning yourself as an educator, there is this massive identity crisis and imposter syndrome really rears its head and I think that is so natural. From there, though, you can consider whether you’ve studied the topic or skill, if you’ve spent time learning from other people how to do it and then expanding on their methods to create your own, and if you’ve invested your own time and energy into improving your own knowledge in that area.
But rest assured, you don’t have to know everything about it. You just have to know enough to teach someone else a piece of it and lead them towards their own results.
Do You Need a Big Audience?
I hear a version of Katie Walsh Loesch’s question all the time: What is the benchmark or right audience size to launch to?
When I launched my first program I had an email list of around 500. I had been growing my email list while I was developing and building the course. My one regret in business was that I waited so long to start my email list. Now, my email list is the number one priority in my business. It is the number one indicator of my business’s health. It is the number one results driver in everything that I do.
If you do not have an email list, you want to start building one today. If you need help with that, I have a mini-course that is absolutely free to get you started building a list from zero to 250 subscribers. It’s called the Zero-250 Challenge and I created it because a great benchmark to aim for before launch is 250+ subscribers on your email list. Yes, success is possible with fewer people on your list, but 250 is a really great sweet spot to get started.
What is the Future of Online Courses?
Amanda Rush asked: Where do you see the online course world headed in the future?
I think that the online course world is shifting to more specific and niche courses that are shorter in length. We don’t have the patience anymore for long, drawn out material. We walk fast results.I would rather pay and take a one-hour masterclass and know that I can learn how to do something in that one hour than take a 50 module, eight week program with a 96 page workbook.
I think what’s so cool about a micro-course approach is that people will build up their confidence in themselves to follow through, to harness that power of knowledge to get themselves results, which will make them want to take more courses.
Gone are the days of everything in the kitchen sink inside of a program and we’re welcoming in the idea of shorter courses that teach you something very specific with faster results and simultaneously build your belief and your confidence in yourself.
More from this Episode
What’s a need versus a want when creating a course? How do you market an online course? What are my tips for pricing? All of these questions plus way, way more are inside the full episode. Press play to hear my answers to your course creation questions.
Okay, now here’s the part during our coffee date together where I’d lean in and tell you that while we could tackle every little detailed question about digital courses until the cows come home, the only thing that’s left is for you to learn by DOING. Like most of life, talking about the goal is a very small part of it, right? But trust me, you do not have to do this learning journey alone!
Your mentor and course creation genius, Amy Porterfield, is waiting for you inside Course Confident, her LIVE course creation bootcamp. You don’t need to be a pro, you just need to be ready to GO! Head here to get a spot in the bootcamp with Amy (and get my best-selling IG mini-course Insta Essentials for FREE when you do!) Get ready to see how you can turn what you already know into a course that works for you while you go live your life.
