Why it's harder to sell online courses than you think (and how to succeed)

A lot of clients come to me when they are already running a profitable business and now want to scale. Meaning they want to keep growing their income and impact, but they don’t want to work more hours. 

Typically they assume that selling online courses is going to be the best way to make this happen. But knowing how to create an online course and knowing how to sell online courses are two separate things entirely. 

Far too often I realize that what savvy entrepreneurs are getting wrong is that they are so focused on course creation that they let their regular marketing fall by the wayside. Because creating a great course can feel really daunting and time consuming, most of the focus goes here, and things become imbalanced.

You might create the best online course in the world, but if nobody knows it exists, your launch will flop. And then you’ll be incredibly frustrated that you spent so much time creating something and not getting a good return on your investment. 

When selling online courses successfully you need to keep building up your audience as you build the course. And if you have a lower-priced course, you are going to be reliant on volume of students. 

This isn’t to say you always need to sell your online courses for top dollar, but it means you have to be clear about your objectives at the outset. 

For instance, maybe your mission with your business is to serve as many people as possible at a lower price point. This is great, but you’ll either need to build a large audience organically first or partner with a savvy Facebook ads manager to help you launch your online course. 

If you are creating the course because you are booked up and can no longer take on more clients you can create an online course that guides them through your process you take your 1:1 clients on. And this can likely come with a higher investment. In this instance, you don’t necessarily need paid ads because if you are already turning people away for your work, this could be a viable option instead. 

So when creating your online course and preparing to launch it, just remember that you need to continually focus on your marketing efforts. Nurture your list, build up some hype, create a waitlist and keep getting in front of new ideal clients. 

If you are thinking about creating a course or other offer to scale your business, and you want it to be as successful as possible, reach out with your questions so we can be sure you aren’t overlooking any crucial details.