The Right Way to Sell Online Courses From Your Own Website

The Right Way to Sell Online Courses From Your Own Website

The Right Way to Sell Online Courses From Your Own Website

  • EzyCourse Team

  • 25 Dec 2022

  • 8 minutes

Whether you have an audience or not, this guide will show you everything you need to know and do to create and sell online courses from your own website.


This guide will teach you how to select a profitable course topic, how you can make your ordinary course into an awesome course, how you could build an engaged audience, and launch and sell your courses, etc.


In a nutshell, if you want to transform your knowledge or passion into a thriving online course business, this guide is for you.


Let’s get started.


1. Why do we need to sell Online Courses? 


The online learning sector is already massive, and it will only grow as more students resort to online courses to enhance their education.


In reality, the global eLearning business was forecast to be worth roughly $250 billion in 2020, with a projected value of $1 trillion by 2027.


So selling online courses is a fantastic option for anyone who wants to share their skills with others while also making money.

 


There are numerous entrepreneurs who earn six-figure or even seven-figure incomes by offering online courses.


More importantly, such success tales aren't limited to a few internet money-making niches. Thousands more creators earn a living by teaching yoga, photography, web design, cuisine, and a variety of other skills.


Aside from the money, what makes the online course business concept so appealing is that you're essentially selling digital products that you develop once but may resell for years. 


So you're not exchanging your time for money, which makes offering online courses great for scalability.


Furthermore, no other internet business model allows you to have the kind of impact on other people's lives as online courses do.


Finally, you don't have to spend a fortune to produce online courses; you can do it on a shoestring budget of a few hundred dollars.


Suggested Reading: Easy ways to increase your course revenue


There is no doubt that selling courses online is one of the most powerful and impactful ways to build a successful knowledge business and achieve financial freedom.


The business model is ideal for bloggers, YouTubers, Instagrammers who have a large following, freelancers or coaches who want to move away from 1:1 work, businesses that are already successful and want to add another income stream, and teachers who have taught in-person classes and want to teach online classes.


To successfully design and sell online courses from your own website, however, you must commit time, money, and attention to the process.

So it's not the ideal solution if you're searching for a quick and easy way to generate money online.


However, if you want to teach online and are prepared to put in the effort, the online course business model is ideal for you.

 

2. A Profitable Course Topic Selection 



After you've decided to sell courses online, it's time to figure out what you'll teach your students. So you must design a profitable online course concept.


How a profitable course topic should be? Okay, now let’s answer this.

A profitable course topic should be something in which you have great knowledge or you are at least an expert in it. Also, you have an interest that you could happily teach your students. And last but not the list, choose a topic that potential students are willing to pay for.


Simply, you must identify the sweet spot of your expertise, hobbies, and market need.


Create Concepts for Your Online Course


You should think about your skills and expertise first.


Consider your everyday activities if you work full-time in a company. For example, you may be familiar with specific processes or software that can be beneficial to others.


You could also work as a freelancer or consultant. In this scenario, make a list of the services you provide to your clientele.


Similarly, if you are a blogger or a YouTuber, you should consider the issues about which you make the material.


But what if you don't have the necessary competence or professional experience?


Don't be concerned! Because you may have a passion or a hobby that people would like to learn more about.


Alternatively, you may have faced a personal obstacle in the past that many people face.


In fact, hobby/passion niches have picked up big time in the past few years, and there are thousands of successful course creators teaching courses in these niches.


Now that you have an idea about what you’re good at, it’s time to think about potential topics for your online course.


Suggested Reading: The 3 Most Effective Methods to Pre-Sell Your Online Course


At this point, just think about what you can teach and ignore things like market demand, competition, and so forth. You may also use this ideation worksheet to keep track of all your thoughts.


Identifying what your potential students are struggling with and thinking of course topics as solutions to these difficulties is a very effective technique for coming up with course ideas.


Presumably, you'll be aware of some of the issues based on your prior experience. Other items can be discovered by following talks in Facebook Groups, specialist forums, or other online groups (e.g., Quora).



The other important thing to remember when brainstorming course topics is to be as specific as possible. For example, if you’re going to teach a course in the cooking niche, here is how you can get more specific about it:

  • How to Cook(very broad)
  • How to Cook Fish(still broad)
  • How to Cook Salmon Fish(specific)
  • How to Cook Authentic Local Fish (more specific)


Specialized courses are easier to sell than wide courses, so I recommend beginning with a specific course that promises target results to a specific audience.


As you progress as a course creator, you can consider producing online courses on bigger themes.


Make sure your course idea is valid


Most new course creators skip this step entirely. Instead, they will generate some concepts for their online course, but then choose one at random without first determining whether there is adequate demand for a course on that topic.


This ultimately proves to be a costly blunder, as they invest a significant amount of time and money developing an online course that does not sell.


So, before you begin work on content production or promotion, you must validate your course idea and ensure that there is a demand for it.


Calculate Google Search Volume


Checking the search volumes for similar terms on Google is the simplest technique to assess interest in your course topic.


Ubersuggest is the tool we recommend for this reason. It is completely free to use and does not require you to establish an account. Navigate to the Ubersuggest website and enter your term. Analyze the results now.


Then, look at the search volume for your core term as well as similar keywords. People are interested in your topic if there is a large search volume for your keywords.



As a result of this keyword research, you should also be able to discover what related topics people are interested in, which can help you refine your ideas.


Check out YouTube.


Youtube is the world's largest video platform as well as the second-largest search engine. You can find videos on practically any topic and in almost any niche on YouTube.


Furthermore, tutorial-type and how-to videos on YouTube have a large audience, which gives you a solid indication of interest in your course topic.

=> Search YouTube for your course topic. Then, examine the search results as well as the video views.



You can also check the comments on these videos to get a sense of your students' pain areas and what they want to learn.


Look through Facebook Groups and Niche Forums.


This is one of my favorite methods for validating a course idea because it involves listening to potential clients rather than just looking at stats.


You must first locate Facebook groups, specialist forums, or other online communities (e.g., Quora) where your potential pupils hang out.


Once you've joined the community, look for your course subjects and participate in the discussions. Examine what people are asking about and whether or not it is creating enough interest.


You can also initiate a fresh conversation and solicit direct input from your potential consumers.


This can assist you to gain a deeper grasp of your area in addition to verifying your idea. As a result, you may fine-tune your concept and improve your messaging.


Get to know your audience through surveys


Collecting direct feedback from students is one of the most successful ways of evaluating your product idea, and a survey is a terrific instrument for doing so.

Initially, the number of responses might not look good, but experience says that your connections might show interest in learning your chosen topic.


So first send a brief survey to your small audience, asking them what they thought about the course idea and whether they would be interested in enrolling in the course when it launches.


If you have your own audience, this strategy is really simple to implement. If you don't already have an audience, you can still email surveys to your friends and coworkers and post it in other online forums and groups to which you belong.


Sell Your Course in Advance


You can presell before launching an online course if you need further validation for your topic.


To pre-sell an online course, establish a sales page that specifies what the course will cover and when it will be available.


There is no better method to validate your course idea than to successfully pre-sell it, and you can be 100% sure in spending time and money into making this idea a reality.


Another benefit of pre-selling a course is that you gain access to a group of people who you may contact for feedback on your course material and other matters.


Keep in mind, however, that pre-selling only works if you already have an engaged audience. It is more challenging to sell your course concept to a chilly audience.


If you completed all of the tasks in this chapter, you should now have an idea for an online course. It's time to get started on your course content, which we'll go through next.


3. Make a Fantastic Online Course


Many new course creators make the mistake of calculating the value of their course based on the number of content or video hours it contains.


They will then want to include as much content as possible in their course, making the entire process time-consuming and costly, resulting in information overload for the students.


It's important to keep in mind that you are creating a specific course for a specific audience that promises specific results.


As a result, your course does not have to incorporate everything you know about the subject. Rather, it must include everything necessary to assist your pupils in achieving the desired goals.


Create and Plan Your Course


You must first establish an outline for your course before you begin creating content.


A course outline (or curriculum) is similar to a plan, and it will help you stay organized and focused during the process of creating an online course.


Begin your course outline by outlining the end results for your course - the problem you're attempting to solve or the desire of your audience that you promise to fulfill.


Then consider the various steps a learner will need to go through (milestones) in order to reach the desired goals.


You can read our detailed article regarding this: A step-by-step guide to create an online course



These stages are essentially modules (or sections), and most course makers have 7-8 of them in their courses.


Each module should have its own learning objective and will contain many lessons.


Individual lessons can be thought of as the steps that your students will need to perform in order to meet the learning objectives for a specific module.


Before you can finalize your outline, you'll need to do some brainstorming. You can note them in your notepads and after finalizing your ideas, you can put them in a google sheet.


After you've prepared an outline for your online course, you must choose a delivery format for your courses.


Because video is by far the most popular and engaging delivery option for online courses, it must be included in your course.


The key here is to keep your video lessons short, preferably between 2-10 minutes, as shorter videos result in higher student engagement.


You should distribute your material in a variety of media, including video, audio, text, PDFs, and so on.


PDFs are an excellent format for developing worksheets, cheat sheets, checklists, case studies, and other course materials.


These assistance PDFs can help simplify key insights from your courses, highlight the most important action items, and improve your students' learning experience overall.


Finally, you must recognize that your online course should not consist solely of videos and other pre-recorded content, as your students will quickly lose interest and drop out of your course.


It is critical to building your course in such a way that it is as engaging as feasible. You can, for example, include interactive quizzes, assignments, a community, live coaching calls, and so on.


Having said that, the distribution formats you utilize in your course will ultimately be determined by a number of factors, including the nature of your course, your niche, its learning objectives, course price, and so on.


Based on the formats you've chosen, you can begin producing the actual material for your course, which we'll go through next.


Content Creation for Courses


Let's start with making online course videos. Creators commonly include two sorts of videos in their courses:

  • Screencast videos are videos in which you record your computer's screen.
  • Talking head videos are videos in which you speak in front of a camera.


Screencast videos are extremely useful for creating tutorial-style content or recording slides with audio narration.


The nicest thing about screencast videos is that they are considerably simpler and less expensive to produce than talking head videos.


In fact, with the exception of the course summary, all of the videos in my first course were just screen recordings, and they worked really well for my course topic.


This is the perfect video format for you if you're developing an online course for the first time or if you're not comfortable appearing in front of a camera.

To create a video of your screen recording, we recommend that you use a tool like Camtasia.


Camtasia is a user-friendly screen recorder with extensive video editing tools. Simply put, it is the greatest screencasting software for online course producers in general.


Some people choose to provide their course content in real-time. If this is the case, you can use Zoom to present live videos and record them for later use in your course courses.


Let's talk about talking head videos now. It is more difficult to record high-quality talking head videos than it is to record your screen.


To begin, you'll need a camera to record your face, and you can use either your iPhone or an external webcam such as the Logitech C920.


Second, to acquire good results with your talking head films, you'll need basic equipment such as a lighting kit, a backdrop, and so on.


Unless video quality is critical for your courses, you don't need to invest in a professional camera or video recording equipment at this moment.


Sample Talking Head Video


While making talking head films requires more time and work, they are worthwhile since they allow you to interact with your students on a more personal level.


We recommend that you include at least a couple of talking head videos in your course.


You'll also need to set up a decent recording setting at your home (or business) with no background noise and minimum echo.


Your course videos may not first appear professional, but that's just acceptable. Instead, focus on providing value through your films, and you'll be good!


PDF files are commonly used by course creators to create worksheets, checklists, case studies, and other support resources.


Content creation for your courses (especially video creation) is time-consuming and includes a lot of trial and error. As a result, you should start focusing on other things, such as increasing your web presence and growing your email list, at the same time.


4. Create an Engaged Audience



One of the most common mistakes that course creators make is failing to build an audience from the start.


I'm surprised that so many individuals don't grasp that you can't effectively offer online courses unless you have an audience.


In reality, most people don't think about funnels and email lists until their school is up and running, which is why they struggle to sell.


If you start building your email list as soon as you decide on your niche and course topic, you will already have an audience to sell to when your courses are ready.


Let me show you everything you need to do to build an engaged audience for your business. I have broken the whole process into three steps.


Step 1: Create a Lead Capture Funnel


The first step in creating an audience is to create a lead generation funnel. The goal is to collect your visitors' email addresses so that you may engage them and promote online courses to them.



You can create free content related to your niche by creating free content


The initial level of your funnel should always be some publicly available content that does not require a visitor to opt in.


The free material might take the shape of blog articles, videos, podcasts, infographics, and so on, and its main objective is to provide value and warm your target audience.


So you can start a YouTube channel to share videos, a blog to post articles, or a podcast to interview others in your industry.



Social media platforms and search engines are getting much smarter at detecting crap and rewarding quality content, so it's important to create high-quality content.


Many beginners might ignore it initially, but they don’t realize that this is the most important step in building the funnel and generating leads. However, most successful course entrepreneurs consistently create free content.


The best way to generate leads is to create an effective lead magnet


After you've warmed them up with free material, getting individuals to sign up for your email list should be simple, and you'll need a lead magnet to grab their email.


A lead magnet is a piece of content that is only available to people who sign up for your email list.


It is easy to come up with ideas for your lead magnet. The following lead magnets are suitable for teaching online courses in the weight loss niche: Weight loss checklist, 30-day weight loss challenge, diet plan for weight loss, excel-based weight loss tracker, weight loss exercise guide, weight loss quiz, etc.


A good lead magnet should solve a specific problem, be designed for speedy consumption, and be connected to the content of your course.


Remember that a 2-3 page lead magnet is just as powerful as a 300-page ebook, so prioritize content and quality over quantity.


Once you've decided on a lead magnet idea, you can format your text and design a visually appealing lead magnet using a program like Canva, or you can hire a freelancer on Fiverr to do it for you.


Create a landing page or opt-in form


If you don’t already know about it, a landing page is a dedicated page with a singular focus on making your offer convert. In this case, the offer will be a lead magnet.


Landing pages are quite effective at converting visitors into subscribers, and you should make one for your lead magnet as well.


On the landing page, you should clearly define your offer and allow visitors to input their information to download it.


When someone joins up, they are directed to a thank you page like this, where you may direct them to the following steps and even urge them to take additional action, such as purchasing a low-cost ebook or a mini course.


Opt-in forms are another common technique to collect email addresses, particularly on a blog.


There are various sorts of opt-ins available, with inline opt-ins being one of the most prevalent (or within content opt-ins). When you click a button or link, a window will open asking you to enter your email address in order to receive the freebie.


You have a few options for developing landing pages and opt-in forms when it comes to technology:

  • ​Option 1: Use a course platform that offers the ability to generate landing pages and opt-in forms natively, such as EzyCourse.
  • ​Option 2: Use a landing page builder and an opt-in form tool such.
  • Option 3: Some email service providers also allow you to create landing sites and opt-in forms.

When a user enters their email address, the information is sent to your email marketing platform, where you may contact and engage them.


Step 2: Email Marketing Can Help You Engage Your Subscribers


It's rare that a new subscriber will buy your course and become a paying customer the moment they sign up. As a result, you should generate and automate a sequence of emails for your new subscribers.


The primary idea behind delivering a welcome email marketing campaign is to provide value to your subscribers while also getting to know, like, and trust them. You should not engage in any selling at this time.


Although you can create a welcome series in a variety of ways, the first email should always be a welcome/introduction email that is sent out immediately after subscribing.


You should send at least 4-5 additional emails as part of the welcome campaign during the next 7-10 days, in addition to the introductory email.


One option is to create an email course to teach your subscribers something of value and something related to your online course.


One alternative is to develop an email series in which you inform your readers on some of the most common mistakes users make in the business, as well as some popular myths.


These are only a few suggestions for your welcome email series. You can also send free resources, YouTube videos, or even articles from other blogs.


If you sell an evergreen course, you can now move your subscribers into a sales campaign as soon as they finish the welcome sequence (we'll go into selling online courses in more detail in the final chapter).


It is important to note, however, that if your course is not open for enrollment or isn't ready yet, you won't have anything to sell them right away.


In this instance, you must ensure that your subscribers are always engaged, thus you must send them good content on a frequent basis.


Lastly, you will need an email service provider to store subscriber information, send emails, and, most importantly, automate email marketing.


Having your lead generation funnel up and running is the first step in getting people to use it.


Step 3: Drive Traffic to Your Funnel


Your online courses might be awesome and your funnel might look great, but without traffic, you won't have much success. You will have awesome online courses, but you won't have much success.


Let’s take a glance at some strategies that are effective for driving traffic.


Use Social Media to Promote Your Content


Sharing your material on social media is an important strategy for driving traffic to it. There are numerous popular social media networks to target, including Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Pinterest, and Instagram.


The idea is to choose one social media channel that you believe would perform best for your niche and content, and then go all-in on it.


Create a YouTube Channel


YouTube is the world's second-largest search engine, and millions of people use it to view video tutorials of various kinds.


To get started, you'll need to build a YouTube channel and then consistently publish relevant videos on your channel.


The good news is that this will not only help you obtain traffic from YouTube, but it will also help you rank for the search terms in Google.


In many categories, Youtube is still an underused traffic source, and if you plan to generate video content, you should surely target it.


Posting/Podcasting as a Guest


Guest posting and guest podcasting are two of the most effective ways for helping novices increase their audience.


Guest posting entails writing content for other blogs, and guest podcasting entails appearing as a guest on other podcasts.


Both of these techniques aim to get you in front of a broader audience in your niche. If you routinely write guest blogs or appear on podcasts, you will gradually gain authority and are nearly certain to see results.


Utilize Affiliates to Increase Traffic


Affiliate marketing is one of my favorite methods for advertising digital products. So you may approach and collaborate with popular bloggers, YouTubers, and Facebook group administrators to advertise your course.


How affiliate marketing works


Affiliate marketing is preferable since you don't have to invest money upfront, but you do get a percentage of the revenue after the transaction. Furthermore, if done correctly, you may scale swiftly.


The idea here is to provide substantial commissions. Because you're selling a digital product, we recommend a 50% commission.


Search Engine Optimization

Search Engine Optimization is highly recommended if you publish blog posts on a regular basis. In reality, SEO is one of the primary traffic generators for this blog and a number of my other blogs.


To rank your blog entries in Google, you must first select the proper keywords, optimize your content (and website) around these keywords, and then develop backlinks to boost your authority in the search engine's eyes.


However, bear in mind that there is no quick fix for increasing search engine traffic, and it will take months before you see any benefits from your efforts, but believe me, it will be worth it.


There are many creators who struggle with driving traffic because they try to drive traffic from every possible source.


Rather, concentrate on a few traffic sources that you believe will be the most beneficial for your content and niche. Go all in on these sources and master them before moving on to another.


Another thing to consider is that you don't have to run sponsored ads to expand your audience. If you're willing to put in the effort, you can increase your audience only through organic traffic sources.


Drive traffic with paid advertisements


It's not as simple to get organic traffic to your website as it was 5-6 years ago. Furthermore, many organic traffic tactics, such as Search Engine Optimization, require time to produce results.


As a result, you should think about employing sponsored ads to bring targeted traffic to your blog posts and landing pages, but only if you have a budget.

There are numerous advertising platforms available, such as Facebook Ads, Google Ads, and LinkedIn Ads, and the optimal one for your situation will rely on a variety of things, including your niche and audience.


These are just a few of the most popular methods for increasing traffic and growing your email list. There are, however, several alternative methods via which you can advertise and market your material.


In fact, even the most basic tactic of commenting in relevant Facebook groups or answering questions on Quora can attract traffic.


So, establishing an audience is a continuous effort that will continue long after your course is released. Therefore, you must put in the persistent effort, and you'll watch your business expand with time.


5. Bring Your Courses Online


To sell online courses, you must first make them available online!

You'll need an online course platform that allows you to host your content, build a members area, deliver your curriculum, and engage your students for this.


The good news is that you have several alternatives for hosting and selling your online course as a course creator.


The bad news is that you have so many options that it might be difficult to examine all of them and choose the best one for your organization.


Suggested Reading: 7 Best Online Course Platforms


There are so many online course creator platforms like EzyCourse, Thinkific, Kajabi, Teachable, LearnWorlds, Podia, etc,


Of all the course creation software out there, our best choice is EzyCourse.


Let’s take a look at why EzyCourse is the best option for you.

 

EzyCourse


You can get paid while you learn with our powerful communities, group chats, and private chats. You can also brand your website with loads of amazing pre-made designs or create your own using our powerful drag-and-drop site builder.

 


EzyCourse’s biggest strength is that it brings you all features from course creation, to hosting, selling and marketing your courses online, so you don’t need to keep switching platforms anymore. 

 

EzyCourse not only makes content delivery convenient for creators, but also ensures that students get an engaging, interactive learning experience. 

 

Setting up your course will be rather simple once you've chosen the right course platform. 


6. Make an Amazing Course Offer



You must decide on your pricing plan and create a sales page before launching your course and selling it to your audience.


These are the two most critical aspects of your offer because they have a major impact on your conversion rates.


So it's critical to get these correctly, and that's what this chapter will focus on.


Price Your Online Course


Pricing your online course is difficult since most producers don't know where to begin. As a result, they price their online course in one of the following ways:

  • Calculate the cost based on the number of hours of video or other content.
  • Set extremely low pricing in order to reach a larger audience.
  • To undercut competitors, set a lower price.


However, these approaches won't give you the best price for your course.

To know how to price your online course, you can read this article: 7 Tips For Pricing Online Courses


The first issue with low prices (say, $20) is that you may obtain a bigger number of enrolments, but this will not help you maximize your course revenue.


As a result, you'll often earn less money even if you put in the same amount of effort as selling a higher-priced course.


Furthermore, if you drop your course pricing solely to undercut your opponent, you are essentially starting a race to the bottom. Instead of undercutting, you should differentiate your offer.


So, how should you charge for your online course?


We would like to consider the price in terms of the value and benefits that a student will receive from a course. For instance, if a course solves a major issue for a student, you can easily charge hundreds of dollars for it.


Assume the focus of your course is website design for wellness entrepreneurs:

  • If an entrepreneur is to learn website design utilizing free content, he would need at least 30-40 hours to learn everything.
  • It would cost him $3,000 to $4,000 to hire someone else to design a website for him.


When you consider your course from this perspective, you'll see that it's far more value, and you can justify premium pricing with the correct marketing.


So, eventually, it comes down to the perceived value of your course, and giving bonuses on top of your course is a highly efficient way of increasing it. It's not without cause that so many prominent course creators sell online courses with bonuses.


You don't have to make such a large bonus stack, but even a single bonus that is extremely valuable to your students will suffice.


Consider the "web design for wellness professionals" course once again. In this example, you may include the following bonuses:

  • Gaining access to a private community.
  • Live Q&A sessions or coaching sessions are available.
  • Themes for pre-built websites.
  • SEO training for websites.
  • Case studies.


These are just a few suggestions; eventually, you'll need to figure out what works best for your course.


If you believe that charging a higher price may make your course unaffordable for some of your students, you can always provide a payment plan that allows students to pay for your course in installments.


If you are still unsure about charging a premium, you might begin with a "baseline price."


Finally, you know your course and your audience the best! So take things into account when determining a price point for your course.


It is entirely up to you whether to go with baseline or premium pricing, and you can always test different prices and modify them as you go.


Make a Course Sales Page


A sales page is required to present your course offer. A sales page is a form of landing page that describes your course and persuades your audience to sign up for it.


At this stage, your potential customers decide whether to enroll in your course or not, and your sales page can actually make or break the success of your online course.


Your sales page should include the following elements:

  • A captivating headline captures your reader's attention while also conveying the content of your course.
  • Describes all the course's important aspects in a sales video.
  • Text that is relatable and convinces your reader that they need to remedy the problem.
  • The course description promotes your course as a solution to the problem that your potential consumers are experiencing.
  • Author bio that promotes you as an expert, highlights your experience and aids in the establishment of credibility.
  • Testimonials from previous students/clients that contribute to social evidence and so increase your trustworthiness.
  • The pricing section informs readers about the cost of your offer and what they will receive as part of it.
  • A money-back guarantee ensures that your users' investment is risk-free.
  • A FAQ section that answers frequently asked questions.
  • Several call-to-action buttons make it simple for users to sign up for your course.


Apart from copy, a solid design for your sales page is essential. Make it a point to include a lot of high-quality and relevant photographs on your sales page.


As far as the tech for building your sales page is concerned, most online course platforms allow you to create sales pages natively.


Furthermore, you can always use a dedicated landing page builder like ClickFunnels to create high-converting sales pages.


A solid sales page will help you increase your sales conversion, therefore you should put work into building one for your online course.


Your online course setup is complete, and you can proceed to the final phase, where you can see how to market and sell your course to your target audience.


7. Market and Sell Your Course



You've worked really hard to construct an online course and build an audience, and it's now time to sell your course to them.


This is the most critical phase in the process because everything you've done up to this point will be useless unless you get this part perfect and your subscribers purchase your course.


So let's start with the two most common approaches of marketing an online course:


Evergreen vs. Closed Cart Courses


You can offer an online course utilizing a closed cart strategy, in which the course is open for enrollment for a few days (the launch period) and then shuts.


You could also sell it as an evergreen course that is always available for registration.


If you take the first approach, depending on the price of your course and the size of your audience, you can open your cart every 2-6 months.The course will be offered for enrollment for a few days, after which the cart will be closed.


The main benefit of this method is that there is a time limit for enrollment, which creates a sense of urgency and forces consumers to make a choice.


You will also be able to work closely with students when they enroll in the course in batches.


The downside is that the course is not always available for enrollment, so potential students will have to wait. Another downside is that developing a course from scratch might be time-consuming.


Another strategy is to make your online course evergreen. Evergreen courses are always available for enrollment, thus the user does not have to wait.


It is necessary to automate your sales funnel in order to be able to sell an evergreen course effectively, which means you can focus on driving traffic and experimenting with your funnel and email sequence regularly, which is what I like the most about evergreen courses.


Although it is relatively easy to incorporate a sense of urgency into your evergreen sales funnel because you will be required to offer a bonus or a discount that is unique to every subscriber, it is relatively difficult to integrate a strong sense of urgency into your evergreen sales funnel.


You should keep things simple at first! If you're offering a premium course ($200 or more), we recommend using a closed cart.


Selling a lower-priced course is simpler, and you don't need the same sense of urgency. As a result, I advocate selling a non-premium course as an evergreen course.


That is not to imply that a premium-priced course cannot be sold as an evergreen course.


There are evergreen sales funnel tactics that are nearly as effective as any closed cart strategy, but they are more advanced and will be discussed later in this chapter.


Start Your Online Course


Whether you're introducing a new course or expanding access to an existing one, your launch strategy must be flawless.


So let me go over how to launch an online course in a nutshell. Your course launch is divided into two stages: pre-launch and actual launch.


The goal of the Pre-Launch phase is to nurture your audience and prepare them for the launch. You can send blog posts, videos, and other content to your subscribers via email to assist educate them on the problem that your course solves.


In terms of email volume, you should send at least four emails throughout the course of seven to ten days.


Give an indication that you'll be making an announcement soon in the previous email you send during the Pre-Launch phase. Don't introduce your course or give any specifics about it just yet.


For the actual launch, we recommend that you follow this breaks down:


Day 1 – “Announcement Email” – Tell what’s in your course. Talk about how many modules are there and what the students can expect to learn. Also, mention that the course cart will open tomorrow.


Day 2 – Course Opens Email (+Fast Action Bonus) – Tell your users that the course is open for enrollment now. Include a link to the sales page and explain how they can enroll in the course. Plus, mention that they get a fast action bonus if they buy in the first 24 hours.


Day 3 – FAQ Email (+Last Call for FAB) – Answer the commonly asked questions for your course and tackle common objections in this email. In addition, you should talk about how long they will have access to the course, money-back guarantee, payment options, etc., and include a reminder for the Fast Action Bonus.


Day 4 – Sneak Peek Email – Pick an important topic or a framework from your course and create an awesome blog post or video teaching the same topic. Tell them they will get more valuable lessons like these once they’re inside the course.


Day 5 – Surprise Bonus Email – Announce a surprise bonus to your audience. You can offer some other courses, ebooks, group coaching calls, etc., as a bonus. Tell them that you want to make their decision to enroll in the course a no-brainer.


Day 6 – Thank You and Social Proof Email – Tell them how much you appreciate them being part of your launch. In addition, you should include some testimonials, social media messages, etc., that will help you build social proof.


Day 7 – Logic + Cart Closes Email – Remind the users that the cart will be closing soon. Build a logic as to why they should buy now and make sure to mention your surprise bonus.


Day 8 – Cart Close Email 1 – Send a quick reminder to the users that this is the last day to enroll in the course and briefly summarize what they will miss out on if they don’t enroll. This email should go out in the morning.


Day 8 – Cart Close Email 2 – Send the last reminder to users that the cart will close soon and there is no way they can enroll in the course. This email should go out 2-3 hours before the cart closes.


Now, this launch strategy is ideal for launching a premium course, and so your actual approach can vary based on your niche, your audience, and course pricing.


For example, if you are launching a lower-priced course (say $99) to your audience, you can simplify this launch sequence, and sending even 4-5 emails will work.


Selling an Evergreen Course


There are some strong arguments in favor of keeping your online course enrollment always open, and the strongest one is that your students can enroll in your course anytime they want and don’t need to wait for your next launch.

If your evergreen course is a lower end offer, you can sell it using a simple 4-part sales sequence that follows the welcome campaign that you send upon subscription:


Day 1 – Introduce Your Course – Introduce your course, explain what’s in the course, what they get when they buy it, and what they can expect to learn from it as well. 


Day 2 – Overcome Objections – Tackle all the objections that your potential customers might have and help them decide whether the course is right for them or not. You should also answer questions related to your target audience, refund policy, etc.


Day 4 – Case Study and Social Proof Email – Include any testimonials from your past students or clients. If possible, include a case study and share how you helped your students get results in the past. Tell them they can also get similar results by enrolling in the course.


Day 5 – Opportunity Cost Email – Create a sense of urgency by pointing out the opportunity cost of not enrolling in your course now. Build a case of why they should enroll now and remind them that there is a money-back guarantee, so it’s a no-brainer.


If someone doesn’t buy the course during your evergreen campaign, you should put them into your regular newsletter so that you can keep them engaged and sell again in the future.


While this sort of an approach works well for selling lower-priced courses, it won’t be effective for selling a premium-priced course, and the simple reason is that your subscribers will need a stronger push in this case. 


To make a stronger push, you need to offer a special discount or a special bonus which is available only for a limited time but at the same time is unique for each subscriber.


Conclusion and What’s Next?


In this guide, you have learned in detail how to create and sell online courses from your own website. We went through all the steps involved in the process, from finding an idea to creating your course and marketing it.


Now it’s your turn to implement what you have learned in this guide and while doing that, try to keep things simple in the beginning.


It’s very unlikely that you’re going to get everything right the first time. So focus on getting things done rather than aiming for perfection. And you can always tweak and improve things as you move forward.


Another thing you should keep in mind is that there are no shortcuts to building a sustainable online course business, and you’ll need to put in some serious work before you get any significant results. 


But if you do things the right way, believe me, the results will be worth it.


I hope you enjoyed this step-by-step guide on The Right Way to Sell Online Courses From Your Own Website. If you’re new to creating and selling online courses, it’ll be extremely helpful to go through this guide a second time, even referencing it when you go out and try putting everything into action.