Online courses are the hottest thing right now. Everyone seems to be launching their own course, and looking for ways to make what they believe is “passive income” – but here are five of the biggest makes people are making with their online courses right now:
1. Not thinking about who they are writing for
When you are creating a course, you need to think really carefully about the end user. Who are they? How much do they know already? What do they want the outcome to be? How do they want to consume the information?
If you really want people to learn from your course, and get results from it, then you need to make sure the information is carefully targeted to meet their needs.
Imagine you were writing a course on nutrition. There is a big difference between writing a course for a professional athlete who really wants to fine tune their diet, and writing a course for someone who has been clinically obese for many years, and needs a lot of support to start from scratch.
Think carefully about who you are creating the course for, before you start creating. Really focus on a single, specific need.
- Trying to fit everything in
It took you years to learn everything you know.
One of the biggest mistakes people make when creating their own course, is to try and share all of their knowledge. I get it, you want to add value, and make sure that you give them as much as you can.
The problem is, there is no way they can absorb all of that information, and actually start to implement it, all in one go.
It took you years to develop your skills and get to where you are, it will take them a while too.
Focus on delivering smaller chunks of information, with a bigger focus on implementation (that is getting your students to actually try doing things) rather than just giving them lots of information.
- Just recording videos and making PDFs
A course is more than just great content.
Sure, videos and PDFs are useful way to provide information to a student, but there is more to a course than simply content.
Before you start throwing together your content, consider the following:
– What support will they need?
– How will you get them actively involved?
– How will you get them to implement what they have learnt?
– How will they know if they are getting it right/wrong?
– What might they need before the course or after the course?
A course is a process, you take your students on a journey from beginning to end. Before you start to put content together, it’s worth thinking about that journey as a whole.