Online courses are one of the best ways to share knowledge in today’s digital world. Through these valuable educational resources, thousands of users can learn something new regardless of physical barriers such as time or distance. But, as with all types of content, it’s essential to know how to promote your online course to ensure it reaches the biggest possible audience. So, if you’re looking for the best way to promote your content, we’re here to help. In this post, we’ll show you how to launch an online course successfully and, what’s more, to get it noticed!
Why is it important to get the launch of your online course right?
There are many reasons why you might want to learn how to launch an online course successfully – some of the most common include helping your business to scale up, or monetizing your knowledge. Whatever the reason, the launch of your online course is crucial, because it’s your opportunity to reach as many people as possible – and that means more people who understand the value of your content and why they need it.
These days, most modern companies create specific marketing strategies to promote themselves and thus convert a majority of their potential customers into buyers. The same principles apply to the promotion of your course. With a well-designed launch, you’ll be able to make clear to potential users all the advantages, benefits, tools and solutions they stand to gain by taking your course.
As you can see, learning how to launch an online course is vital if you want your content to have a greater reach and impact. Now, the best way to discover how to launch an online course with success is to learn how to create a good course in the first place. So, let’s get to it!
How do you create an online course?
To create an online course, you should always start with a good course idea. A common mistake is trying to make your first course too complex or overloading it with information. This could however have a detrimental effect, making your course too complicated to construct and much more difficult to promote. Instead, you could start by creating a basic course or a ‘first steps in…’ guide.
Once you have an idea, you must determine exactly what outcome you want for your users or, in other words, what skills you want them to gain. It might be tempting to focus on creating a beautiful course, but practicality matters – what’s most important is designing a course that meets the needs of your students and helps them achieve the best results.
With this advice in mind, all that remains is to find the perfect tool to help you achieve your goals. For that, you need an authoring tool that allows you to create, edit, and share your courses. Everything from a single environment.
isEazy Author is the ideal authoring tool to help you create courses with incredible designs and professional results in just a few minutes. No need for previous experience – you’ll have instant access to over 25 interactive and dynamic resources such as games, exercises, graphics, infographics and more.
How to promote your online course
Have you ever wondered how people successfully advertise their online courses and maximize their visibility? The secret lies in using the correct strategy and platform to promote courses. Below we share six of the best strategies with you.
1. Make use of a mailing list
Within the online course market, most experts agree on one thing: you need an email list. It’s no secret to anyone that contacts are a highly valuable commodity, and if you can build a database of potential clients through their email addresses, you’ll l have a great way to reach them. Mailing lists allow you to offer up your content in a personalized way.
To promote your course using this strategy, try to give your subscribers a sense of excitement – start by releasing a ‘course trailer’ email explaining what it’s all about and that it will be launching soon (a little like a movie!). Next, you can send more emails in sequence: one with important information about the course content; one announcing how many places are open; one dedicated to frequently asked questions about the course; and even one where you offer incentives to early buyers.
2. Take advantage of advertising
Online advertising gives you the opportunity to reach lots of potential customers and attract them to your course. You can also focus on a specific group of prospective users – simply choose your target audience and then share your ad only with those who are likely to be interested in your course. This can be done through tools such as Google Ads, which will launch your ad to specific people based on keywords found in their searches, through advertising banners, or through ads on social networks such as Facebook or Instagram.
3. Launch through your website
Launching online courses from your own website is the best way to connect with an audience that is already interested in your brand. This strategy allows you to play by your own rules, and promote content without limitations in terms of format, size or design.
In fact, a website, be it a blog, landing page or e-commerce site, is all you need to start selling your course. Why? Because it’s easier and more natural for a user who is already familiar with your content to take an interest in expanding their knowledge of it through your courses!
4. Utilise social media
Social networks are the perfect places to launch online courses right now. You will have noticed that we’ve mentioned some of them in our previous strategies, and that’s because they are informal, relaxed and everyday environments for a wide array of people – giving you a great reach and allowing you to establish close relationships with customers.
With this strategy you can make good use of your own social networks, taking advantage of the followers you already have to publicize your course. You can do this through stories, posts, or simply by providing a link to your course in your description. You could also create Facebook or Telegram groups, post images, infographics or videos on Pinterest, or even run contests or slick advertising campaigns on Instagram.
5. Promote through other types of content
Is it possible to promote your course through other content? The answer is yes! Whether you have a blog, a website or any form of social network, you can promote your courses as a valuable proposition within your regular content. For example, if you are a writer and share your work through a digital medium, you could offer a sample creative writing course for your clients – a limited version of what they would find in the full course, coupled with an invitation to buy the full course at the end. You could also split up your course content, offering a learning path or a series of step-by-step courses, which you could then promote together or separately.
6. Build an online reputation
Finally, consider this: anyone looking to buy a course from you will be much more likely to do so if they know that you’re an expert in the field. What does this mean in reality? Simply put, if you demonstrate your knowledge through an impressive online reputation, more people will be willing to purchase your course.
You can easily build an online reputation through various means. Podcasts, for example, are increasingly in demand, with more and more people subscribing to platforms like Spotify or iTunes to listen to interesting stories, fun facts and scintillating discussions. YouTube is also a perfect platform for building your online reputation, since most people seek information through videos. Here the possibilities are endless. By creating your own YouTube channel you can share tutorials, reviews or even animated videos that show how much you know about a topic and allow you to promote your online course simultaneously.
Create online courses 3 times faster with isEazy Author
Now that you know how to launch an online course and promote it successfully, it’s time to start creating your own. To help you with this, we present isEazy Author, the easiest authoring tool on the market to create, edit and share your e-learning courses in record time.
With isEazy Author you can create courses for your LMS in standards such as SCORM 2004, SCORM 1.2, Tincap/xApi, share them by direct link, upload them to your website or intranet or even share them through your very own integrated distribution environment: isEazy Author Go.
