You don’t have to be a business guru to successfully open an online school. Even if you do not have such experience, you can successfully launch a project at the first time. Use the technique described below to take into account all the main points and not to make popular mistakes.
Market and Audience Analysis
We start from the situation that you are already an expert in a certain field and understand what knowledge you will share with your audience. The first thing you should do now is to gather more information about your chosen niche.
Analyze companies that are already doing business in your segment. You can gather information about competitors with the help of special services, by simply typing in queries on search engines, or by talking to experts in your field. Evaluate current offerings, their advantages and disadvantages.
- Choosing a training concept
When determining the concept of a training program, it is important to understand what results a person should get after completing it. Training can produce the following outcomes:
If you have valuable knowledge, you can earn from simply sharing it with others. For example, you can record a series of video tutorials, write a series of articles, or host a series of webinars. Knowledge transfer is the easiest and quickest result that training can provide. The cost of such products is usually relatively low. Strengthen the product can provide not only transfer of knowledge, but also by controlling their proper understanding and assimilation. This is done with the help of special exercises to consolidate the material. In this case you can ensure that you not only transfer the necessary knowledge, but also ensure that it remains with the person after the training. People are already willing to pay more for such a result.
- Choosing the format of training
Having decided what product you want to provide to the client, you need to choose a training format.
An online course is assembled in a special designer on an online training platform. You publish your materials, the client pays for the course using the Internal Marketplace module and receives access by email or phone. In addition to posting online courses, the platform will be an indispensable assistant to you in managing the learning process. With the help of the platform you will be able to collect various training programs, assign training courses, divide students into groups, manage trainers, send the necessary notifications in time and get a complete report on the training passed by the students.
- Launching a trial course
It’s not always possible to release the perfect product at the first time that will appeal to a wide audience. You can spend a lot of time and money to create a high-quality online course and find that there is no demand for it. To avoid wasting valuable time, it is better to test the demand first. To do this, you can run a trial course or MVP (minimum viable product). This is not yet a full-fledged training program, but rather an outline of it. The first prototype, which already contains some value and can sell itself. For example, you can record a short series of videos and release a small online course. - Development of the main product
Without stopping the MVP sales, move on to creating a full-fledged training program. Think in detail about the trajectory of the training, work out the structure of the modules and sections. Which steps your student will take from point A to point B. What knowledge and skills and at what point he will receive.
When the structure is ready, you need to develop the materials themselves. Depending on the chosen format, write texts or record videos. Try to divide the lessons into small parts. The optimal length of video today is 15-20 minutes. Long training videos are better divided into parts. Long stories should fit into 4-7 A4 pages. Write the text in simple and clear language. Use pictures to simplify the perception of the material.
- Development of the sales funnel
While the full product is in development, you keep selling the MVP. Don’t stop selling. Every touch with a customer should turn into another insight. At the first stage you can sell according to the most simple scheme – set up the advertising and send your traffic to the landing page with the product description. At this scheme, you can stop if the product has a small check or it is so clearly and extensively painted on the landing that closes all customer objections. But more often, they develop a more complicated scheme for selling products in the infobusiness – a full-fledged sales funnel.
The sales funnel is a marketing model that describes the intended “journey” of the potential client from product introduction to direct payment.