How To Make Money By Creating & Selling A Course

An excellent way to earn money from your blog is by selling an online course.

Maybe you don’t see yourself as an “expert” about anything, but that’s not true and you shouldn’t let that hold you back.

After all, you’ve probably spent thousands of hours in your niche, which is more than the average person starting out.

To earn money by teaching others, you just need to know more than the people who are paying you for your expertise and knowledge.

Did you know that you can become an “expert” on a topic in about two hours?

Now, this doesn’t mean that you can become a doctor or attorney in two hours, but for some topics, a few hours of internet research will make you more knowledgeable about a topic than most other people.

And if you want to genuinely master a new skill so that you have enough expertise to teach it well to others, you can do that in about six months, according to the Harvard Business Review.

To create an online course, you first need to develop expertise in your chosen topic.

To do that, follow these steps.

1. Examine your readiness. Do you have the basics in place for learning a new skill?
2. Ensure that the information you want to sell has an audience. To do this, you need to conduct some market research.
3. Get busy. Get busy adding more knowledge to what you already know.

Why not turn this expert knowledge into an online course that you can sell?

What is an Online Course?

An online course, also called an e-course, is a course that is taught online rather than the traditional method of teaching in person.

Online courses are usually pre-recorded, but some courses offer life sessions online.

With an online course, learners can learn in their own preferred time and space, making them ideal for people who need flexibility.

How Does Selling an Online Course Work?

To sell an online course, you need to first come up with an idea for your course.

Do this by asking yourself some questions.

• What do I know more about than most people?
• Is there a topic that I can easily explain to someone who knows nothing about the topic?
• Can I make myself an expert in something that I already know a lot about?
• What skills or information have I learned from my career and past jobs?
• Does my existing audience have a problem I can help them solve?
• What do people ask me for advice on?

To find out what your audience would like to learn from you, do some of these things.

• Send surveys to your audience. To learn what your audience wants to learn, simply ask them. You can use a tool like Survey Monkey or just send an email to your subscriber list.
• Stay on top of your blog and social media comments.
• Use Google search, Google Trends, Answer Socrates, or Answer the Public to find out what people are asking questions about.

Once you know what you want to teach other people, it’s time to build your course.

Hosting Your Online Courses

To host your online course on your blog, you will need to use a WordPress LMS plugin.

Different plugins have various features, so be sure to thoroughly research each one that you’re considering.

Here are a few popular LMS plugins.

• LearnDash
• LearnPress (free with premium options)
• Tutor LMS (free with premium options)
• Lifter LMS
• MasterStudy LMS
• Good LMS
• Namaste! LMS (free with premium options)
• WP Courseware

Third-Party Online Course Platforms

Do you want to sell your course on an outside third-party platform that will help you grow your brand and drive awareness and traffic to your blog?

The best online course platforms listed below are great tools for helping you create and sell your online courses.

• Teachable
• Udemy
• Podia
• Mighty Networks
• Gumroad
• Kajabi (read our guide)
• Skillshare
• Creative Live
• Xperiencify
• Thinkific
• Pathwright
• MemberPress Courses

Note that these platforms will charge you a monthly fee or keep a percentage of your sales.

However, it’s worth it because it will help you grow your brand.

Types of Online Courses

There are eight main types of online courses.

1. Mini-course: Short course your learners can finish in an hour or two
2. Interactive online course: Keeps your audience engaged as they learn
3. Self-paced online course (Massive Open Online Courses): Helps people learn a skill at their own pace with video, presentations, text, discussions, and animation
4. Written online course: For people who like old-school learning
5. Webinar: Interactive and accessible, can be recorded for learning outside of the live webinar
6. Masterclass: Signature course developed by an expert
7. Email course: For sending your subscribers course modules over a period of time (usually a week or a month)
8. Boot camp: Comprehensive and immersive experience for learners

How Much Can You Make Selling Online Courses?

There is big money to be made in selling online courses.

According to Global Newswire, the e-learning industry will grow to approximately $325 billion by the year 2025.

The big earners such as Joseph Michael make six figures from their online courses.

Michael got his entrepreneurial start with a blog about learning life skills, and he spent six months (remember that Harvard Business Review article we linked to above?) learning how to create his first online course with a small budget.

How Easy is it to Create and Sell a Course?

Joseph Michael notes that he wrote his online course during his lunch breaks when he was still working in a corporate job.

Sometimes Michael would go to his office’s parking garage, while other times, he would go to a Starbucks parking lot to use their free wi-fi.

This shows just how easy it can be to create an online course if you educate yourself on how to do it correctly.

As for equipment, Michael created his first online course with a cheap USB microphone and a laptop.

Why is Selling a Course a Great Monetization Method?

If you’re blogging in a niche, you’ve probably become an expert in that niche and adjacent niches.

Here are three reasons selling an online course is a great blog monetization method.

1. People who are enthused about your content will be more than happy to shell out cash to go in-depth with you to learn more.
2. You’re already sharing your knowledge on your blog. However, with an online course, you can dive deeper into your topic and sell your expertise to your readers.
3. You can even use your online courses to pivot into another revenue stream: selling your services with one-on-one coaching or consulting.