The Best Way To Create Online Courses That Sell in 2024

The idea of online courses is sexy, but just having an online course doesn't mean that you're ever going to make any money from it, or make the kind of impact that you want to make from it.

 

When I have a client who wants to build an online course, they always come to me with tons of ideas.

 

And the problem isn't that they don't have good ideas. The problem is that they're too focused on what they want and what they are interested in.

 

This is incredibly common. So what do we do? We just start building online courses in a vacuum because we saw somebody else build something similar, or we just think it could be a good idea.

 

The truth is that you can spend all the time in the world creating your outline, perfecting your website, or filming your course like it's some motion picture - but if you don't have a good strategy, it doesn't matter if your course was shot in 4K, how many hours you put into it, or if it has really cool editing.

 

Those things aren't going to dictate if your course is actually good or not.

 

In this blog I'm going to tell you about:

 

• Which courses are worth your time to make
• How to map out your course so it gets your students awesome results
• How to film your course so it keeps people engaged and committed to finishing
• How to build your course the fastest way possible

 

Understanding Needs

 

So the first thing is something I alluded to earlier - how we just kind of come up with ideas and make something that we are interested in, something that we feel like is going to be helpful for our audience/be a good course.

 

There's nothing particularly wrong with that. You should be interested in what you're talking about - but you're probably interested in a lot of different things, and you could probably build a hundred courses on many different things.

 

And I'm saying this from experience. I built six online courses that didn't make me any money, because I was just building them in a vacuum.

 

I was thinking, "This is going to be helpful for my audience."

 

I saw somebody else build a similar course (or even the same type of course) and I built it without really understanding what my audience wants.

 

Nobody wakes up in the morning and thinks to themselves, "I really just want to buy an online course today."

 

No, people want transformation.

 

They wake up in the morning and say, "I just wish I didn't have so much belly fat.", or "I wish that I had a six figure business so I could leave this job that's making me so stressed." or "I want to provide for my family."

 

It wasn't until I shifted my thinking that I finally made a course sale that was totally hands off, completely passive.

 

It started to sell for me over and over and over again, because I understood my audience and knew what they really wanted. Then I provided it to them.

 

Find the demand and then supply that demand. What's the transformation that your people want?

 

Now, if you're the type of person who has hundreds of course ideas, then what I'd recommend is to pick two or three of the ideas and then send out a poll to your email list.

 

Or you can always do a poll in a Facebook group that has your target audience in it.

 

You could say, "Hey, I'm thinking of building a course. Which one of these seems more helpful for you right now? Which one would you be more interested in? 1, 2, or 3?"

 

I recently did this with my email list. I had two course ideas and I didn't know which one was going to be the best for them, they both seemed interesting to me.

 

I emailed them a very simple email saying, "Hey, I'm thinking about making a new course. These are my two ideas. Just reply back to this email with a 1 or a 2, and then I'll build that course."

After I sent that, I started getting emails back. The majority of people wanted option number two, so that's the course that I built.

 

So polling your audience is great for finding that course idea, but let's take it even deeper by having real conversations.

 

For example, if you do a poll in a Facebook group or your email list, reach out to those people and invite them onto a quick 15 minute call.

 

It's not a sales call, you're just going to sit down and talk to them about why they chose that option and what it is about that option that sounds so intriguing.

 

The goal here is to figure out where they are at:

 

• What's a struggle for them?
• What's challenging?
• What's frustrating?
• Where do they want to be?
• What's a big dream that they have related to this topic?
• What's the outcome that they desire more than anything related to this topic?

 

And the more conversations that you have with these people, the more you're going to see trends.

 

You're going to notice that pretty much everybody is struggling with this thing, and pretty much everybody wants essentially the same outcome.

 

There's always going to be differences, and nuance, and specific situations - but with an online course that you're going to be selling to the masses, you want to focus on what the majority of people want.

 

Whichever course idea you have an overwhelming response from - that's the course that you build.

 

Mapping Out Your Course

 

After you've found your perfect course idea, the thing that your audience really wants, then you want to map out your course.

 

People ask me all the time what I use to build my online courses with. I use Kajabi. In fact, I run my entire business inside of Kajabi.

 

I love Kajabi because I can host my online courses and they look very clean and professional. You can do so much more inside of this platform too.

 

On Kajabi you can keep everything you need organized:

 

• Coaching programs
• Communities
• Paid memberships
• Podcast
• Sales and checkout pages
• Your website
• Email marketing
• Email list

 

And everything works together on one server, which is what makes Kajabi such a powerful platform.

 

If you're thinking about building your online course, I'd highly recommend you check out Kajabi.

 

Right now you can get a free 30 day trial from me by using my affiliate link. I do get a small commission, but you get double the amount of time that you would get by just going to the Kajabi website. They usually give you a 14 day free trial, but with my link you get 30 days.

 

I'm also going to give you a free online course where I will walk you through how to set up your entire business in Kajabi - in that first 30 days.

 

This way you can start making money way faster, be ready to go, and you won't waste that 30 day trial.

 

There's a lot of things to learn about Kajabi, and I show you the most important things to focus on and when.

 

On top of that you also get a one on one coaching call with me, where I'll sit down with you and answer any questions you have about Kajabi or your online business.

 

To learn more details, just go to profityourknowledge.com/kajabi 

 

So when you build out your course, you want to map out the transformation. You have to remember what your audience really wants, where they are at, and where they want to be.

 

Because that's what people pay for. They don't pay for an online course - they pay for an outcome, for a transformation. The course is just a vehicle to help them achieve that transformation.

 

So for example, let's say you're creating a course about learning piano. When you're mapping out a course outline, each lesson is going to become a mini transformation that leads to the big transformation, which is what your course is promising.

 

So in this example, the first module or collection of lessons would be understanding the basics.

 

If someone's trying to learn piano, they need to understand the basics; an introduction to piano, understanding the instrument, some basic music theory, and then understanding the keyboard. These are all incredibly important to helping them learn the piano.

 

This is just a really simple outline, but the idea here is that you understand the big transformation that your audience wants to achieve.

 

You understand point A and point B, and the fewest yet most important steps necessary to take them from point A to point B.

 

Try to pinpoint it down to 5 to 10 steps. Then in a tool like Kajabi, or you can even do this in a Google doc, you want to write out what those steps are. Remember, they are the mini transformations that lead to the big transformation.

 

That's how simple making an outline really can be.

And when I say 5 to 10 steps, you might be thinking, "James, that's not enough. I need to teach people way more than that in order to get them this transformation."

 

Well, that's where I challenge you to think simpler.

 

Oftentimes when we build online courses, we have a tendency to give people nice to know information rather than need to know information.

 

So the goal with your first draft or outline is to give this person the need to know information.

 

And when you do that, you're going to realize that there aren't as many steps as the nice to know information. The nice to know are like sprinkles that you can add in there. Helpful, but it's not entirely necessary to achieve the result.

 

And the thing is, with online courses, people think that they need to build this massive online course right off the bat. What I have learned, and what I recommend to my students, is to focus on a mini course.

 

Those 5 to 10 lessons in your course will evolve over time when you get more students inside of the course. Then you can add information based on what they say they want, rather than you just thinking this information could be helpful.

 

Because that's a waste of time. I only like to add things into my course when I know for a fact that real people want it.

 

That's what's going to make your course stellar.

 

Why What How Script

 

So when you map out your outline, you might be thinking, "What am I going to say? How do I teach the lesson so that it is impactful and not me just talking to a camera?"

 

This is something I call the: Why What How Script.

 

With every lesson that you create, you always want to open up with Why. Why is this lesson important and related to the overall transformation?

 

Remember, your lessons are stepping stones, mini transformations that lead to the big transformation.

 

So tell them right in the beginning why this is so important, and keep hitting home and coming back to how it's going to help them get to the big transformation that they want.

 

After you've got them invested and they understand why this is so important, then we move into What. You're going to give them an overview of what they're going to learn and what you're going to teach them to get them this mini transformation.

 

"So now that you understand why this is so important, here's what we're going to cover."

 

After you've told them what the steps are, then you're going to teach them How. How to do step one, and then step two, and then step three.

 

And then at the end of the lesson, it's always helpful to do a recap where you pretty much just summarize the main point or key takeaway from this lesson.

 

And because you're hitting home why things are so important, and keep going back to the overall transformation and desire that they had when they first signed up for your course, that's going to keep them emotionally invested in learning this lesson - and the next one and the next one, so that they can get the big result that they want.

 

Build Your Course FAST

 

Now that you know how to build a great course, here's how you can build it fast.

 

There's no doubt that in the world of coaching and teaching online, the fastest path to cash in is one on one private coaching.

 

It's not in building an online course, it's in coaching.

 

So what I always tell my students to do, and what I do myself, is I focus on enrolling clients into one on one coaching with me, and I take them through the process of the course that I want to build.

 

I build the course for them as I'm going through the process.

 

So rather than you taking six months to make an online course, you can take your clients through a four or six week process, and then every week you're building lessons for them and giving them access to the course.

 

And then once the course is built, because you built it for them, you can just give them that course.

 

Now, the thing here is that you don't want to say, "Hey, John, in this lesson, I'm going to teach you this." You keep it generic and say, "In this lesson, I'm going to teach you this."

 

That way it doesn't matter who's going through your program, you are just speaking to whoever is listening. You're not calling out a specific name of your client, for example.

 

Because you need to build it for them, that's going to force you to actually do it. But keep it small. More content doesn't always equal more value.

 

In fact, the shorter your course can be, the more valuable it's going to be to someone (as long as it's still getting them the transformation that they want).

 

So start off with a mini program that you eventually sell for $50, maybe $100 or $200, and then that mini course will end up turning into a $400, $500, $1,000 course down the road when you get people in the program and then get their feedback on what the course needs to become an even better program.

 

So me, for example, I have a course called Effortless Income. It's all about how to turn your knowledge into an online business, create passive income, digital products, really cool stuff like that.

 

It's the same thing that I do with people one on one. It's just a process. There's a transformation that people want to experience and achieve in their life and their business.

 

So effortless income comes with my one on one coaching, because it's great for me to refer them to the course in between our calls.

 

It also sells as a standalone course where I'm not even involved. It is my one on one coaching process, just in a self-paced version.

 

Now, once you have an online course, ideally you want that course to sell by itself on autopilot and make you basically passive income.

 

And if you want a deep dive into the funnel that I've used to make this happen, check out this blog where I show you the funnel formula that has made content creators like you and me, millions of dollars.

 

When you're building an online course, just remember that people pay for a transformation and an outcome, and that's what your course should speak to.

 

The lessons in your course are the mini transformations that lead to the big transformation you're promising.

 

And if you want to build that course fast, start coaching people and then building the course while you're coaching people through the process.

 

Get out there, make something happen, I'll see you in the next one.