DIGITAL MEDIA GHOST
  • Ghostwriting
  • Become a Ghostwriter
  • Digital Strategy
  • Indie Author Interviews
  • Industry Insight

Industry Insight

How to Promote Your Online Course For the Right Audience at the Right Time

4/6/2020

0 Comments

 
Picture
by Payman Taei, Guest Contributor

Thanks in no small part to both the ubiquitous nature of high-speed, broadband Internet connections in the United States and the rise of high-quality video collateral, the online education business isn't just popular - it's booming.

According to one recent study, over six million Americans are currently pursuing some type of online education. This is a number that has been rising steadily over the last few years. 
​






But one of the most important things to understand is that about 68% of those students are already experienced professionals - they fall into a category called "industry switches," where they're likely hoping to move from one career field and into another. A lot of this happens later on in life, considering that the average age of these students is 32 years old.
Picture
But this impressive trend doesn't just extend to online educational institutions - far from it. People are turning to the Internet to learn how to do just about everything, and they're using comprehensive video tutorials as a guide. Because of that, the online education industry has taken a number of significant leaps in popularity over the last few years alone - to the point where you may be considering starting one yourself.

For as advanced as educational technology has undoubtedly become, you must understand that it's still possible to "get this one wrong," so to speak. The best and most thoughtfully designed educational content in the world ultimately won't mean a thing if you're unable to get that content in front of the eyes of the people who need it the most.

Therefore, if you really want to make sure that your educational material (and the associated business) is able to "hit the ground running," there are a few key things you'll need to keep in mind.
Picture
Bringing Education to the People: Breaking Things Down
In a lot of ways, creating and publishing an online course and marketing that eventual course are really just two sides of the same coin. They're essentially the same process but optimized to take advantage of which particular part of the "buyer's journey" someone happens to be on at the moment.

On the topic of actually creating that online course, the key factor to play into is that your online "student body" has never been more diverse than it is right now. You're talking about collections of people from not only different age brackets, but different demographics and backgrounds, too.

But this diverse audience is also an incredibly savvy one - meaning that you're not going to be able to get away with simply promising them that yours is an educational course worth investing in. You're going to have to prove it, and you can do that in a few different ways like:
  • Making sure that you're picking the right course topic, to begin with. Yes, it should absolutely be a topic that you love so that your passion can shine through. But your students are going to need to love it, too. So whatever you do, make sure that your course idea is both something that can showcase your skills and that has enough high market demand to actually connect in a meaningful way with the widest audience that it can.
  • Think long and hard about what types of learning outcomes you can help someone achieve. Think about it from someone else's perspective - how likely are you to buy into an online course if you A) don't actually understand the topic, and B) have absolutely no idea what you're going to get out of it? People don't just want to take an online course due to mild curiosity. They want to get some type of value at the end of their journey and you need to be able to identify what that is upfront.
  • Structure, structure, structure. We've all fallen down the Wikipedia or YouTube rabbit holes where we start on one piece of content and after an hour arrive at something totally different, unsure of exactly how we were able to connect those two dots. This is, for all intents and purposes, the exact opposite experience you're trying to create with your online course. When building your materials, you need to group things in a way that not only makes sense, but that moves from one idea to another in a totally logical manner. All of your materials need to flow together to create an experience that someone would essentially be unable to build on their own.

Yes, it's absolutely true that the actual construction of your course will vary wildly based on a number of factors - including the topics you've selected and the audience you're trying to educate in the first place. However, if you don't have those three core elements accounted for, your trip into the world of online education may very well be over before it has even had a chance to truly start.
Picture
Marketing Your Online Course
Once you've actually taken care of the course itself and have made sure it's as thoughtfully constructed as possible, you can then move onto actually getting people excited to take it. This will involve a lot of the same skills you just used, albeit applied in a completely different way.

The number one goal of any marketing professional is ultimately to act as an educator - here, you're doing exactly that, but you're educating your audience about exactly what you can do for them by way of your online course.

In fact, you'll probably end up using a lot of the same tools that you used to make the course itself to actually market it. The chances are high that you sat down with some type of Infographic maker like Visme (which I founded) to come up with compelling visual collateral for your course. You can use that same tool to educate people about what value they'll receive if they happen to take your class and carry it on through to completion.

Along the same lines, social proof is going to be key to marketing your online course - meaning that you want to generate as much of it as possible. If your course may help someone transition from one industry to another, for example, you might use a service like Respona to find thought influencers who are experts in that particular field. They could talk about the joys of working in that industry in a compelling and emotional way, thus helping to build social proof and highlighting a little bit of that value you'll be able to generate for people at the exact same time.
​
Regardless of the methods you choose to explore, you must remember that you'll never be taking your "educator" hat off at any point during this process. In a lot of ways, the process of marketing your online course is nearly identical to that of building the course in the first place - you're trying to get people to understand not only what you do, but why it matters. Provided that you're able to simplify things to the point where you never lose sight of that, there are truly no limits to where your online course may take you.

About the author:

Payman Taei is the founder ofVisme, an easy-to-use online tool to create engaging presentations, infographics, and other forms of visual content. He is also the founder ofHindSite Interactive, an award-winning Maryland digital agency specializing in website design, user experience and web app development.


0 Comments

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Picture
    Become a Ghostwriter!

     

    All
    Agency Spotlight
    Business
    Digital Marketing
    Ghost In A Flash
    Ghostwriting
    Media Relations
    Privacy Concerns
    Social Sabotage
    Technology
    Writer Spotlight
    Writing

    Advertising Disclaimer
 About | Contact | Writer Spotlight
 Privacy Policy | Terms & Conditions | Cookie Policy | Advertising Disclaimer
Digital Media Ghost  @2009-2024
  • Ghostwriting
  • Become a Ghostwriter
  • Digital Strategy
  • Indie Author Interviews
  • Industry Insight