how to build an onbline course

by German Hudson 9 min read

How to create an online course
  1. Choose the right subject matter.
  2. Test your idea.
  3. Research the topic extensively.
  4. Write a course outline.
  5. Create the course content.
  6. Bring your course online.
  7. Sell your online course.
  8. Market your content.
Jun 23, 2021

Full Answer

What is the easiest way to build online courses?

  • Requirements: Name, Email, Create password
  • Approximate Payment: $ 500- $ 5,000 per year * (If you fill out all the surveys and offers that you qualify for)
  • Cost: FREE
  • Payment method: Airline miles, cash or gift cards (Electronic and physical) including Amazon, Old Navy and Starbucks.

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How to create and launch an online course?

Some of the other ways that I test the sellability of an online course idea include:

  • online discussion forums
  • pay-per-click testing
  • surveys
  • analyzing popular blog posts (on your own blog and other expert blogs in your niche)
  • posting the right questions on social media

How to start creating an online course?

Step 2: Develop Your First Online Course

  • Creating a course outline. In order to create a course outline, you will need to divide the course curriculum into main topics and sub-topics.
  • Choosing your learning method. Decide on a learning method or a blended approach you want to follow and stick with it. ...
  • Uploading your first course. ...
  • Adding the learning material. ...

How to create the best online course?

The best way is to use it to bring in people and funnel them to an online course like was mentioned in the last section. Then, you can make money from ads on the site. Ads pay very well for the ...

How do you create an online course?

5 Tips for Designing Effective Online Courses in 2022Know Your Audience. ... Create Well-Organized Courses / Micro-Learning. ... Make Your Lessons Interactive. ... Incorporate Synchronous and Asynchronous e-Learning Styles. ... Make Content Accessible.

How can I create an online course for free?

How to create an online course for freeThinkific: Software to create an online course for free. ... Canva: Free and low-cost design tool. ... Beaver Builder: affordable WordPress page builder. ... Camtasia: Cheap software for editing online course videos, with a free trial. ... Vimeo: Free video hosting.More items...•

How much does it cost to create an online course?

It can cost anywhere from $200 to $10,000 to create an online course. The main source of expenses is the labor involved, followed by the equipment and software. If you are creating the online course yourself and not paying someone else to do it, this means that other than your time there are very few expenses involved.

How do you structure an online class?

In many ways, the structure of online courses closely resembles the structure of in-person courses. Each week, students generally must complete a set of required readings, watch one or more lectures, participate in a discussion with their classmates, and finish an assignment.

Which software is best for online teaching?

The Best Virtual Classroom Software For Online TeachingBigBlueButton. It's hard to beat free. ... LearnCube. LearnCube was also purpose-built for teaching and tutoring online. ... Electa Live. Electa Live provides virtual classroom software and a learning management system for online courses. ... Adobe Connect. ... WizIQ.

How do I create my own course?

How to create an online courseChoose the right subject matter.Test your idea.Research the topic extensively.Write a course outline.Create the course content.Bring your course online.Sell your online course.Market your content.More items...•

How long does it take to create 1 hour of eLearning?

How long does it take to develop 1 hour of eLearning? A average 1-hour interactive elearning course will take 197 hours to develop. But development of a 1-hour elearning course can range between 49 hours for the low end of the range of a “basic” course to 716 hours for the high end of the range of an “advanced” course.

How many hours does it take to create an online course?

Depending on the duration and detail of the program, it can take anywhere between 25 – 500 hours to formulate an online course. A mini-course with just 4 or 5 videos you could develop it in a couple of days. An in-depth flagship course with numerous modules and assignments could take eight weeks or more to accomplish.

How much should I charge for an online workshop?

One way to calculate your time and workshop cost is by dividing your hourly rate by how many people you want in your workshop. If you want 10 people for a one hour workshop and you charge $250/hour, then you can charge $25/person + travel expenses and materials (this will make the price jump up to $30-$40/person).

How many modules should an online course have?

For a shorter course, you probably only want 3 to 5 main steps or modules that will comprise the bulk of your course. Every module contains several lessons that teach the actual course.

How many lessons should an online course have?

The number of lessons you choose to include in your online course mostly depends on the learning objectives you promise to deliver. Most short courses comprise of a couple of 5-minute videos while longer ones have 20 to 50 videos which are each around 5 to 20 minutes long.

What makes a great online course?

Student-Friendly Pacing Good online classes know how to pace the assignments so that students are neither bored nor overloaded on any given week. These courses are specifically designed so that plenty of time is allotted for working on major projects and that minor assignments keep students engaged in the meantime.

Who can create online courses?

Anyone with knowledge in a particular area can create online courses. You don’t need a formal qualification or a degree to teach an online course....

How much money can you make selling online courses?

While some course creators make $50k+ month, most successful ones make between $1k-$10k per month. However, your actual course revenue depends on v...

How long does it take to create an online course?

As you might expect, there is no set-in-stone amount of time to create an online course. Generally speaking, it can take anywhere between 20 and 50...

What is the cost of creating an online course?

Generally speaking, it can cost you anywhere between $140 and $10,770 to create your own online course. But, of course, it could even be more, as m...

Can I create an online course for free?

Yes, it is possible to create an online course for free, but for that, you’ll need to do all the work yourself. Plus, you should use your smartphon...

How long should an online course be?

An online course should be as long or short as it needs to deliver value to your target audience and cover the information thoroughly. Overall, it...

What technical skills do I need to create an online course?

In most cases, you don’t need any technical skills. You’ll have to learn about a few things, such as video creation and setting up your course webs...

Where can I host my online course?

There are several options for hosting your online course, but the two best platforms are Thinkific and Kajabi. These platforms allow you to build y...

How much should you charge for your online course?

There is no definite answer to this, and you need to evaluate your competition, the value your course provides to students, and the niche you’re in...

What should the topic of an online course be?

The topic for your online course should be either a subject that you’re already knowledgeable about or are willing to invest in learning thoroughly. Either way, you need to be passionate about the subject.

How to teach a lesson?

Go in a logical order and try to make your ideas evolve naturally from one to the other , to ensure a smooth and frictionless learning process. Remember that teaching is about guiding your audience through an idea, step by step. To make this clear in your course outline, define an objective for each of your lessons.

What does competition mean in a course?

Having competition means that people find the topic relevant and helpful for them. It’s also a good idea to create content that can comfortably fit into an existing, tried-and-tested space. Once you have a clear target audience in mind, you are best equipped for later creating and marketing the course.

Why is online education important?

Therefore, fostering a community of learners around your course will greatly improve their experience, contributing to the overall success of your course. An active online community can help users share their learning process with a group of peers.

Do you need to run a test before starting an online course?

Creating an online course requires a lot of hard work and effort on your part, so running a test before you begin will allow you to validate this online business idea as one that will pay itself off down the line.

Can you rent a lesson on a video by video basis?

Individual lessons for rent or purchase: Allow users to rent or purchase your online course on a video-by-video basis. When purchasing a video, users will enjoy unlimited streaming of the lesson they’ve purchased, so that they can go back and rewatch the content at all times.

What happens if you don't do online courses?

Don’t underestimate the importance of learning outcomes. If you don’t do this for your online courses you could severely risk your reputation and your bottom line – let alone make the course creation process a frustrating one.

How to get your knowledge out to the marketplace?

One of the fastest and most impactful ways to get your knowledge out to a global marketplace, making a bigger impact and making more money, is to download that knowledge lying dormant in your brain and turn it into a lead-generating, money-making, impact-creating online course.

Do you know what your course will give you?

Of course not. Just because you know what your course will give your students, it does not mean that they will know. If your students don’t know HOW your course is going to help them, they are unlikely to enroll in it.

What is the goal of an online course?

The goal of your online course is to help guide them through that transformation process. However, finding the problem your audience needs to solve is easier said than done. It’ll take time and a bit of research, but you must find the right opportunity before you rush off to build something that you hope someone needs.

How much will the online education industry grow in 2026?

According to market research firm Global Industry Analysts, the online education industry will grow from $107 billion in 2015 to $370 billion in 2026. Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, online courses had overtaken traditional education in all aspects.

Is online learning self sufficient?

When creating an online course, most instructors forget that online learning is almost entirely self-sufficient. It isn’t like school, where you have a teacher or parent constantly telling you to do the work.

How long does it take to create a course?

Keep the 10-minute rule in mind, that is, any chapter (containing text, presentation, or video) should take only about 10 minutes for learners to complete.

Can you create a course without software?

Create online courses without any software installation. Courses are adaptable to different devices including laptops, smartphones, and desktops to facilitate ‘anytime’ and ‘anywhere’ accessibility. You can create a course in multiple languages. Configure over 100+ settings to develop secure courses online and provide private or public accessibility.

What are the limitations of online learning?

One of the most significant limitations of online learning is that students can’t interact with you or each other as directly. If you don’t include an interactive aspect of the course, the education students are receiving will be little better than if they simply bought a textbook and read it on their own.

How to get students to get out of a course?

Determine learning objectives. Decide what you want students to get out of the course as a whole and out of each individual unit. These outcomes should be explicitly stated to the students and guide your development of the content. Start with objectives for individual units.

How to save yourself time in a class?

There is nothing wrong with borrowing or remixing material that other teachers have used for similar courses. You can save yourself a lot of time and maximize the quality of your content by reading other curriculums and adapting it to your class.

Why is online learning so popular?

Many prefer online courses because of the convenience while others note challenges for interactive and engaged learning. Before you start designing your course, it’s important to recognize the differences that will make lesson plans originally designed for an in-person class an ...

Why should each unit include some kind of interactive assignment?

Each unit should include some kind of interactive assignment so that students are consistently engaged. This type of assignment may be more difficult for math or science course. However, you can use message boards to encourage students to explain how they worked out certain problems or applied formulas.

How To Build Your Own Online Course Platform

Before we dig deeper, let me quickly cover what online course platforms essentially mean.

Step 1: Choose a Foundation for Your Online Course Platform

To use a construction analogy, your house is only as strong as your foundation. If the base is weak, surely it’ll come crashing down in an earthquake.

Step 2: Pick a Feature-rich LMS

Remember, your LMS plugin is going to be your strongest ally in setting up a powerful online course platform.

Step 3: Set up your eCommerce plugin and Payment Gateway

Since online courses are essentially digital products, you can use either WooCommerce or Easy Digital Downloads to sell them on WordPress and LearnDash.

Wrapping up,

This wraps up our preliminary on setting up an online course platform with WordPress.

What is Thinkific course?

Thinkific is an online course software designed for the marketing-savvy instructor, Thinkific manages to combine the best parts of automation, marketing, and course building in a neat package.

What is accessible teaching experience?

Offering an accessible teaching experience means taking your student’s welfare in mind more than anything else, and you’ll need the corresponding online course software that can meet that need. Those looking to generate income from online courses should use a software that also supports course marketing.

Why is Teachable so popular?

Teachable has been the source of success for many course instructors, due to its accessibility and intuitive design. As a software for online courses that’s designed to be accessible in both setup and execution, Teachable joins the ranks of the many DIY-sites for digital content.

Is there a course software that works better for certain subjects than others?

Your subject should also be of heavy consideration when picking a compatible software. There is some online course software that can work better for certain subjects than others. Don’t get too focused on the fancy features of certain software, your primary concern should be teaching your lesson effectively.

Is it possible to learn anything online?

With access to the Internet, it’s easier than ever to access all sorts of educational opportunities. Online course software now makes it possible for almost anyone, to teach almost anything. And, on the other side – it makes it possible for anyone to learn virtually anything.

Do online classes require participation?

Like their real-life counterparts, online classes will always require some level of participation from the instructor—you can’t just give away your reading material and expect your students to teach themselves.

Is teaching online a lucrative career?

Due to the teacher profession being undervalued, many teachers have started to look at alternatives: online courses. Teaching online courses can be a highly lucrative career if done right. Those who are able to create online courses which engage with students can easily earn seven figures of yearly income.

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