Launch your first online course: a four-week plan

Many courses that never sell are already finished. The creator has spent weeks recording, everything is ready, and then there is no audience to sell it to.

That is why I reverse the order: start selling before you finish creating, or create while you sell. Below is the four-week plan I give business owners. It shows what to do each week and how long it takes, whether your list has a hundred email addresses or a thousand.

What you need before you start

Two things. An audience that knows you, even if it is small. And a topic about which you are already receiving questions.

One hundred people who downloaded your free giveaway and open your emails is enough for an initial launch. If you don’t have one yet, start there and come back here in three months. How to build that list is included leads and newsletters.

Week 1: topic, promise and price

Don’t record lessons yet. This week, decide what you will sell.

Start with the questions you receive most often. Take your last twenty conversations or your emails and look for the question that keeps coming back. That is your topic, because the question has already been proven there.

Write the promise in one sentence: ‘After this course, you can do X.’ Make it observable. ‘More confidence’ is vague; ‘Give a ten-minute presentation without notes’ is clear.

For your price: a first course of four to six lessons costs between €97 and €197. Below €97 you work too hard for too little and above €297 you want to be able to show results from previous participants. You don’t have that yet.

Time this week: half a day.

Week 2: the lesson overview and the sales page

Now write the table of contents. Four to six lessons, each lesson one step, together all the way to your promise. For each lesson, list what the participant can do at the end.

Six lessons of ten to fifteen minutes can be enough. First-time creators often make eight-hour courses because they mistake length for value. Your students want a result, not more hours to watch.

Then you create your sales page, with your promise, who it is for, the lesson overview, the price and who you are. At Findori Links, every course automatically receives such a page, with the name, your explanation, the price and the lesson overview, so that visitors can see what they are purchasing without being able to access the lesson content.

Time this week: one day.

Week 3: announce and record the first lessons

This week you announce the course while recording the first lessons. That is the heart of the plan.

You announce. Send your list an email that your course is coming, what it will do and that it will be available for purchase next week. Put a sign up for the waitlist in your Instagram bio, with a form on your link page itself. Post three times on the topic and give away one piece of content in each post.

And you answer. Lesson one and two. Not anymore, because you don’t know yet whether people will buy. Use your phone or your laptop and a quiet room. No studio, no editing that would take days.

Time this week: two days.

Week 4: the sales week

You put the course up for sale and you keep it short: open for five days, then closed. A short period of time forces a decision and without an end date everyone procrastinates.

The week looks like this:

• Monday: email your entire list that the course is open, with the promise and price. Post about it.
• Wednesday: email with the three questions you received and your answers. This removes doubt.
• Thursday: story or reel in which you show one lesson.
• Friday: email that it closes tonight. This email often yields half of your sales.

While the sale is in progress, record lessons three through six. Your participants receive an additional lesson every week and that works fine, as long as you say in advance that this is how it will go. It also keeps them on their toes, because they know something is coming.

Time this week: three days, spread out.

A calculation example

Suppose your email list has 150 people and your course costs € 147. If four per cent buy, that is six students and € 882 in revenue.

On Growth at € 10 per month, Findori charges 7.5% on course sales. On € 882 in revenue, that is € 66.15. Mollie charges its own transaction fees. If you sell more often, Premium at 2.5% or Course Pro at 0% can become worthwhile. Compare the plans on online courses.

This example is compiled from what I saw with several customers and the numbers have been rounded. Six participants sounds small and it is a course that you sell again next month, to a larger list.

What happens in week five

Close enrolment but keep access open for those who bought the course. After the last lesson, ask what they gained and what they would change. Their answers can help you improve the next round and describe the result more clearly.

Then you sell it again, every two or three months, to the people who weren’t ready for it the first time. You create a course once and sell it for years. It explains how to structure the content create an online course.

Frequently asked questions

Do I have to complete my course before selling it?

No. I don’t even recommend it. Record the first two classes, sell, make the rest while the course is running. State in advance that the lessons will appear weekly so that no one is surprised.

How long should a first course be?

Four to six lessons of ten to fifteen minutes. Together, an hour and a half is enough if the result is correct.

What if no one buys?

Then you will have learned in four weeks that your subject or your price is wrong, without having put months into it. Ask five people on your list why they considered it and didn’t buy it. Usually it’s in the promise.

Do I need a paid plan?

To publish a course, yes. On Free you can have a link page, a form and a digital product; a publishing course starts with Growth. See prices.

How do I deliver the course to my participants?

With Findori Links, each participant receives a personal access link by email after payment. No password is needed. In the learning area they can watch lessons, download files and track their progress.