Humans need instruction. We have few instinctive reflexes to help us navigate the world around us. We have to learn from others. Our immediate caregivers, and then the entire world. The person who is able to offer instruction to people who want to learn new skills or ideas in a format that is tailored to their needs is a valuable contributor in the global marketplace.

With the Internet, course creation is no longer about one teacher in front of a blackboard with a captive audience of 30 students. Now there are tens of thousands of teachers, and the range of subjects they offer is as varied as the styles they employ.

Course creation is also not just for traditional subjects. Online instructors can teach how to bulk cook and freeze dinners, how to hit a baseball, how to clean out your garage, how to start an online business, how to travel in Bhutan…and so much more.

And they can provide instruction to millions of people at a time. The most popular creators deliver lasting value that energizes their students by delivering the results they want.

As a course creator, you produce packaged material that can be delivered live or on-demand, to an unlimited number of students all over the world.

You build once and earn money over and over again. Course creation is one of the most lucrative online business opportunities because you can scale your price as you scale your sales, and experiment with market demand. You can also customize the course – for example with live training – that increases the value and provides you with direct feedback.

But you have to create a course that people want to buy, and spend a lot of upfront energy to produce a quality product.

Yes, you can create a course about anything – for free. You can post introductory material online and leave a link to the full course, teach ‘live,’ or have a webinar that introduces the ‘what’ but does not reveal the ‘how,’ or even put the material in an app.

But you have to create a product people want. You can end up spending a lot of time and money on creating professional course materials only to learn you missed the target audience. So make sure you are producing for a buying audience.

You earn money from your online courses when someone is ready to buy. But you might have to spend time cultivating those potential buyers, and learn to deliver in different formats. But once you know what your students want, you can charge anything from $27 or $27,000 or more to deliver as promised.

If that sounds good to you?  Read on for the details…

While starting an online business is an extraordinary opportunity for you to establish a foundation for your own professional satisfaction, financial security, and lifestyle freedom, to get started you have to select an online platform that fits your interests, skills and budget.

Course Creation is a high risk, high reward way to get started.

If you have an area of expertise or even just an interest, on any subject that requires instruction, you can train interested students through an online course.

You create a framework, pathway, system or open a door to new knowledge that helps people understand your expertise. You can take the course content beyond online presentations by holding live in-person or virtual events. Or you can just put the material up in a portal where people can find it.

If you have the right information, course creation is where you should place your focus. Despite being in the midst of the ‘information age,’ people understand less and less each day.

Just think about:

• The functionality in your smartphone – what do you really know how to use?
• The dynamics of artificial intelligence – what’s it going to do to your job?
• The changing workplace – where do your skills fit?
• The contradictions in healthcare and fitness – what really works?
• The massive amount of available information – what can I really use?

How about:

• Healthy, inexpensive meals
• Buying a fixer upper in this tough housing economy
• Learning to drive a smart car
• Making your money last

Sure people have put information about all these topics into the global marketplace already, but still…no one knows anything.

That’s your cue to step in and fill the void.

If your online platform of choice is course creation, you need to be prepared for the opportunity and challenges.

In this article, I explain the real story behind how to make money creating online courses.

Content Creation is For the Detail-Oriented

Online course creation is about providing information, knowledge, education or training in accessible on-demand formats to students anywhere in the world.

You can teach your own material, or aggregate other people’s information – if permitted – into a more accessible format.

You can teach the material yourself, literally using your own voice and face, or leave it to someone, or something else.  So a course creator can be a talker or shy; a speaker, writer or outsourcer; the creator or finder of knowledge; tech savvy or tech averse; a thinker or a doer; and anyone in between.

But you must be delivering valuable information that people want to buy.

The key is content. The most successful course creators produce excellent content that their students can actually use. And when the students are successful, they post about it, tell their friends, and bring more attention to the product.

If you can find questions people want answered, and organize and present an approach that they can successfully follow. You may be on your way to becoming a successful online course creator.

Does Size Matter?

Potential course creators often believe that they need to create massive amounts of content to be considered legitimate. That’s not true at all.  You have to be able to take people from Point A to Point B through a process they can understand.

A 20-module course with 60-minute videos and 114 PDF downloads is completely useless if your target customer cannot understand what you are trying to say.

A one-module overview is just as bad.

When people are paying for information, they want results.  So your number one consideration as a course creator is the pathway and presentation you will deliver to your buyers.

And you will be able to demonstrate your delivery success through those results. You will need testimonials and statistics from happy customers to prove that your course does what you say it can do.

Who Should Start a Course Creation Business?

To start as a course creator, you need a topic to teach.

From all your interests and hobbies, education and training, or online surfing, where can you add value?

Unlike a virtual coach who has to be visible and hands-on, you can be a course creator no one has ever seen.

If you:

• Have a topic to teach
• Have a method or approach that people can follow
• Interest in promoting and driving people to your process
• Pay attention to detail to create valuable material
• Can demonstrate results – even if you are example #1

…you should consider becoming a course creator. 

How to Start as a Course Creator

Before spending endless hours creating beautiful powerpoint presentations, you must understand the topic you intend to teach and the type of students you are hoping to reach.

Talk or Write

Start talking about your topic of interest.  If you have created an approach that you think people can be taught to get the results you promise, start telling the world.

Post on social media, guest podcast, guest blog, create mini-instruction videos, start getting the word out. If you receive favorable feedback with people asking for more, you can offer them your course.

Advertise

If your course idea is well-developed, you can go straight to advertising. Use Facebook or Google ads to attract your ideal buyers through great copy that lets them know you have something to offer.

Some course creators advertise the course before they have created it. This gives them a chance to learn customer demand. But remember, if they buy it, you must deliver. So be prepared to create content on demand if you sell it before it’s ready.

Design Your Course

As mentioned above, your course can be any length, scale or format. So you have to know what type of product your dream students are willing to buy. To find out, you can ask them, or start experimenting.

A good course is not about the prettiest powerpoint template. It’s about results. Can your student follow the material step-by-step to achieve a result?

When designing your course:

1. Brainstorm to layout the steps and ideas you want to teach
2. Add examples and stories that illustrate the points
3. Create the material, usually videos, but maybe also audio and text documents to supplement the material, or provide alternative formats
4. Consider bonus material for students who want more detail or different approaches

Test

You can post test material – PDF, audio or video – to see if people are receptive to your ideas. If not, try again with a different version of the same material.

Ask for student volunteers, give the material away for free in exchange for feedback and testimonials. But make sure you have serious students who are willing to help and are the potential buyers of the course.

The final product can be free or thousands depending on your skill and how you want to present the material. Black text on a White background that leads people to their goal is far superior to flashing animations and agonizing over font sizes. Just get the material in front of potential students, let them consume it, and deliver feedback and comments directly to you.

But the training must be engaging and valuable. If you keep the formatting simple, keep the delivery fascinating. People are not looking for flash and bang if they are engaged in the information you are telling them.

From Lecture to Business

You move from selling a few copies of your course from a landing page to creating a business when you build a structure around your work.

If your focus is to remain as an online course creator only, emphasize your website or sales funnel where you will be sending new customers. Manage and maintain that site while continuing to promote the course to your interested potential students.

If you are ready to branch out, take your course on the road by offering in-person instruction, live webinars and guest lecturers. But always stay focused on the results you are delivering.

If your approach works best strictly online, then stay online with it.

Making Money with Course Creation

You set a price for your course and have people pay you for it. If it’s good, they’ll tell friends or leave comments on social media, and you’ll continue to earn more.

But that means you have to let people know what you have to offer. That’s marketing. And you can do it for free on social media, podcasts, YouTube or blogs. Or you can pay for advertising. Either way you have to drive traffic to your course page from the places where your dream students are looking for the material.

As your course becomes popular, you can extend the brand to teach one-on-one, speak or create joint ventures with other creators with complimentary products. Find out what supplementary products or services your dream students are interested in next, and be the first to deliver for them.

What Makes Course Creation Successful

Content is the name of the game with online course creation. The platform is flexible, but the demand is the same – results. Students buy the course because of the promised results. Many never complete the course because of the presentation. Try to meet your dream students halfway by delivering the complete roadmap that they’ll need to follow for success.

Is Course Creation Right for You?

A successful online course can be a lucrative foundation for your online business. And you become the educator, aggregator or influencer of a specific topic that you already enjoy. You must make sure you have an offering that delivers results and you are prepared to market your product to potential dream customers.

So are you prepared to find your dream customers?

Will you create all the core and supplementary content that covers the topic you want to teach?

Are you comfortable adjusting your platform and content to meet the demands of paying students?

If you can answer “yes” to these questions, then online course creation may be your platform for earning money online.

You just have to get started.