In short, I like the design of Teachable and find it fast to get set-up. Thinkific is a solid platform and comes in a close second. Podia (used to be called With Coach) used to be a little confusing to set up and add courses so this is still in third at the moment. The key factors when choosing free over paid plans are usually transaction fees on courses (around 10%) and custom domains.
Now back to my deep dive. Why are you looking to create an online course? It’s the most fundamental question to ask as it makes your choice 10x easier if you know the main reason you want to chop up your information in a specific way and deliver it via an online course.
Let me explain with a few examples.
Sami is looking to create an online course
Mark is looking to create an online course
Rohan is looking to create an online course
Timmy is looking to create an online course
They all look similar until you find out why…
Sami is looking to create an online course so she can train new employees on how to use the software in their company
Mark is looking to create an online course so he can build authority in his profession
Rohan is looking to create an online course so he can make money as a side hustle
Timmy is looking to create an online course so she can teach sewing skills to her cousins and also make a little money for extra sewing materials.
What format (apart from jumping into creating an online course) might be the best for each of the people above?
For Sami, she could record herself using Screencast-o-matic, Screenflow or Camtasia, publish to Youtube (unlisted or password-protected) and then upload into Podio for staff to view. She could also record the videos, store them in Dropbox and use Dropbox Paper or Dropbox Showcase to create a single document with each video embedded for training
For Mark, he could start by signing up to Udemy, learning from the course acceptance process, make a better course than he would have, have his course exposed to more people, offer the course for free to build numbers then switch to paid and offer his course to potential clients with a free coupon code
For Rohan, he could create his course, post the online course preview on Youtube and link to his own course platform site but also publish his course to Udemy & Skillshare to increase his earning potential. He could speak to other instructors in his field and see if they’d like to create courses and publish them on his course platform (with him earning a % of the revenue)
For Timmy, she could post some of her shorter courses on Youtube and enable upfront display ads or she could publish to Skillshare and invite friends with free coupon codes whilst still earning money from other students who enrol
As you can see from the above, sometimes building it and seeing if they come is too narrow an online course strategy and can mean that you’re not getting enough reach or you’re not serving the material in the best format for your chosen tribe. If it’s still the best model, test out one of the free plans above to see if it suits, otherwise get advice or seek to get deeper understanding as to how to best serve the people you’re reaching out to.
We were looking for a simple way to sync data from a Typeform to our client’s CRM, Podio. To do this, we had the form data sent using the Sender Notification feature. We were able to bring across three fields of data using the Subject, Body and Attachment. For more details on emailing data from …
I’ve had a ball working with a popular winery and seeing them using and implementing great systems in their business. A few takeaways regarding their systems: Booking calendar – whether this is online (for people to book themselves) or hidden (so you can enter the dates and keep track of availability), having a calendar online makes …
For many industries, having an email archiving solution is mandatory and it can be hard to find a solution that meets the specific archiving needs of the business. The main considerations when choosing an email backup or archive for your business is the secure of the storage, the process to store, the cost of the …
I recently put together a short course on all the top hosted website builders that you can use to develop your website. The main reason for creating the course was to save people time in evaluating the hundreds of options for developing an easy-to-manage website. Some of my main findings were: You often have to compromise on …
What is the best platform for hosting your online courses and why?
I had this question recently and want to dive a little deeper into it that the standard list post of DIY online course platforms.
Just in case, if you don’t have time to read the deeper why behind choosing an online course hosting platform, go and check out (in this order):
In short, I like the design of Teachable and find it fast to get set-up. Thinkific is a solid platform and comes in a close second. Podia (used to be called With Coach) used to be a little confusing to set up and add courses so this is still in third at the moment. The key factors when choosing free over paid plans are usually transaction fees on courses (around 10%) and custom domains.
Now back to my deep dive. Why are you looking to create an online course? It’s the most fundamental question to ask as it makes your choice 10x easier if you know the main reason you want to chop up your information in a specific way and deliver it via an online course.
Let me explain with a few examples.
They all look similar until you find out why…
What format (apart from jumping into creating an online course) might be the best for each of the people above?
As you can see from the above, sometimes building it and seeing if they come is too narrow an online course strategy and can mean that you’re not getting enough reach or you’re not serving the material in the best format for your chosen tribe. If it’s still the best model, test out one of the free plans above to see if it suits, otherwise get advice or seek to get deeper understanding as to how to best serve the people you’re reaching out to.
Related Posts
Sync form data without using Zapier (or an API)
We were looking for a simple way to sync data from a Typeform to our client’s CRM, Podio. To do this, we had the form data sent using the Sender Notification feature. We were able to bring across three fields of data using the Subject, Body and Attachment. For more details on emailing data from …
Insights from working with a popular winery
I’ve had a ball working with a popular winery and seeing them using and implementing great systems in their business. A few takeaways regarding their systems: Booking calendar – whether this is online (for people to book themselves) or hidden (so you can enter the dates and keep track of availability), having a calendar online makes …
I’m looking for an email archiving solution via BCC
For many industries, having an email archiving solution is mandatory and it can be hard to find a solution that meets the specific archiving needs of the business. The main considerations when choosing an email backup or archive for your business is the secure of the storage, the process to store, the cost of the …
Why be a Weebly Designer in Australia?
I recently put together a short course on all the top hosted website builders that you can use to develop your website. The main reason for creating the course was to save people time in evaluating the hundreds of options for developing an easy-to-manage website. Some of my main findings were: You often have to compromise on …