Fall 2020 pricing and marketing updates

Hi everyone -

As we head into the last few months of 2020, the Udemy team is preparing for some of our biggest seasonal promotions: Black Friday and New Year's.

If you've been around for a while, you know that our approach to marketing and pricing has evolved as we've tailored promotions to each course, market, and moment. With these big sales on the horizon, we wanted to take this opportunity to share some of the ways we're continuing to build a thriving marketplace. Read on in the Teaching Center for updates on new marketing strategies, promotional practices, and ongoing testing.

We invite you to ask questions, give feedback, and share your best Black Friday tips with one another below!

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Comments

Can1

I had a big revenue drop in September compared to August, 30% reduction. It is now below the last year level when I had 3 less courses than now. My course rating is steady, almost nothing has changed in the courses. Might this be related with the tests Udemy is running? I want to make sure my courses are ready for Black Friday but I don't understand why this big hit occurred in the sales. It would be helpful if Udemy can share the total Udemy revenue change compared to last month so that we would know if it is specifically related with our courses or a general trend in the sales.

Uri-Naor

I would love to ask a question!

Are there any contests for instructors this year to submit our new courses to?

I'm hoping to finish creating a new course before Black Friday, and I remember when I originally joined Udemy, I had a very concrete dead line because of a contest like that.

I'm curious to hear if you're planning to do something along the same lines this year? Thanks!

Abbie

Hey @Can1
, thanks for sharing your thoughts here.
As a private company, we can't share generalized performance data. However, you can rest assured that these tests did not result in a 30% loss; any test with a severe negative impact would have been turned off as soon as the data revealed the problem.

As for comparing August to September, keep in mind that there was a major sitewide sale in August that may have pushed that peak up. For the year over year comparison, we'd suggest you look at trends in your topic area to contextualize. Has the topic demand changed from last year? How about the competition, has that increased? Also, considering the disruption of COVID and the effect in all industries' sales patterns, year over year comparisons are tough. You may want to check out the post here from a fellow instructor which points out some seasonal variables and new factors that have come up during this unprecedented time.

Finally, you are in the right track here when it comes to Black Friday in terms of course ratings. Keeping up that mindset can potentially help get your course ready and attract more students once the big sale comes.

Abbie

Hey @Uri-Naor
, thanks for reaching out. The current instructor challenge we're running is the Newcomer Challenge. The challenge promotes courses of challenge winners, eligible instructors who sign-up for the challenge, and publish their first course in 45 days.

While we're not running an instructor challenge specific to Black Friday this year, we encourage instructors to update, publish, and promote their courses before the big seasonal moment. Updating and ensuring your courses have social proof gives students more signals to help them find courses that best fit their learning needs. This is particularly helpful during Black Friday, a time where we typically see high site traffic and student demand.

Art_by_Benjamin

I'm fairly new to Udemy and just released my 4th course. Haven't experienced these seasonal sales yet, so how do I prepare for them? I'm reading something about social proof, do you mean like ratings and reviews or something completely different? If it's ratings and reviews, how would I even get those at all? Isn't that up to the students?

Abbie

Hey @Art_by_Benjamin
, by social proof we mean enrollments and reviews. We've found that social proof is a huge aspect of launching your new course successfully. You can find more on this topic here: https://teach.udemy.com/marketing/establish-your-credibility-with-reviews/

Prospective students want to see that other students found the course valuable before they decide to purchase it, so the first few sales are the hardest to get. To get this social proof, it can be really helpful to share a couple free coupons to folks interested in your subject matter (Facebook groups are a great place to find these people). You can find very specific rules about asking for reviews here: https://support.udemy.com/hc/en-us/articles/360007512653.

We also recommend you browse the Marketing board in the Published Instructors' Club to see what your fellow instructors recommend for raising social proof. https://community.udemy.com/t5/Marketing/bd-p/Marketing

Art_by_Benjamin

Thanks for answering my question Abbie. I'll study those links you gave.