A lot will change after the pandemic. Education is no exception. So the world will not be the same. Only realizing this right away is not easy; it takes courage and the ability to think. What will education be like? Let’s introduce how to develop and run your online course. The article is helpful for those who want to get an additional source of profit, monetize their knowledge, or offer students an alternative in the form of distance learning.
Steps to create an online course
Creating a training course in the online space resembles preparing material for traditional lessons in a classroom form. The critical difference lies in the interaction between the student and the teacher: it happens remotely. As expected, this format has advantages:
- In most online courses, the student can revisit the material over and over again;
- Diverse online course creation activities allow you to fully unleash your creativity and put your technical skills into practice;
- Significant audience coverage when using the services of companies that offer eLearning Localization services or even translation services.
Planning
Making an initial plan is a trivial but essential attribute of a good course. The more detailed its concept and visualization of the final result, the more painless the rest of the stages will pass.
How do you know that you are ready to start implementing your idea? Check yourself on the following points:
- Knowledge system. You have the knowledge that you are going to share. Expert opinion is appreciated, arouses respect and a desire to return for a new portion of knowledge;
- The target audience. You have a clear idea of the target audience for which you plan to create an information product;
- Free time. You have free time, enthusiasm, and a desire to learn on your own. Creating a course from scratch is not easy: it requires physical and mental strength. Money and your time may be required.
The planning phase can be approached in different ways. For some, a cursory sketch is enough. Someone, on the contrary, will go deeper and write a script with a storyboard, provide angles for recording video, and visual interactive for practicing the entire eLearning Courses.
Platform selection and trial run
Decide on the platform for the course as early as possible. You can develop it yourself (create a website) or turn to the aggregator platform, where many other courses are collected. Such platforms are well-known; they invest in advertising and offer a user-friendly interface. Courses on such sites can be created using ready-made modules and templates. You have to pay for such goodies, so all platforms require a commission, but many provide a free trial period.
After creating a draft, we suggest creating a landing page and making a trial run of the course: a starting webinar, edited and uploaded video, a complete lesson from the first module, or its “lightweight” version. Despite the additional hassle of developing such a lesson, you can try your idea in action. So you will assess the relevance of the selected topic, test the system, evaluate the audience live and determine the conversion. A trial run will save you money and be prepared for potential challenges ahead of time. If all goes well, then you can announce the whole course over time.
Starting
You have prepared training materials, posted them on the platform, and the announced launch of the course is already approaching. Spend the remaining time as efficiently as possible to increase conversion:
- Create a group on a social network. So the target audience will be able to feel like a part of the community, find answers to organizational questions, get additional information;
- Conduct an email newsletter. Let it be informative, meaningful, and respectful letters with care for the client: gently remind about the lessons and upcoming webinars, share the news of your course;
- Run ads. Any investment will allow more potential students to learn about you. You can start with the ads on social networks that your target audience uses;
- Collect and publish feedback from students after the trial run or first class, and ask them to tell their friends or colleagues about you. Nothing works better than a sincere recommendation from a friend.
Final word
Feel free to take stock and publicly share your achievements: how many people attended your course, how many of them found answers to their questions and were able to solve their problems. This will show the relevance of your proposal to new students and convince them that the expected result is achievable.
