What comes first: Marketing or Course creation

[Kieranlon]

Hi, 

I'm about to start creating my first course. It's in an extremely competitive area, so I've chosen a course focus that doesn't yet exist in that area. 

My question is this:

Would it be better to just create the course and then focus on marketing (social media chanels, lead-magnet and mailing list, etc.) once its published? 

Or should I start with the marketing to build an audience before I create my course? My fear is that this could take months. 

I've also decided to start with a small course. I don't want to spend months creating a monster of a course that isn't very good because it's my first one.  

Thoughts on the above or any other advice regarding first-time course creation in a very competitive area would be greatly appreciated. Please don't tell me to choose a different area because I've already considered this. 

Thank you! 🙂

Kieran

[DYay2810 · Accepted solution]

Hi, I would say that you should focus on course creation for NOW. Then I think you should go on to marketing, I mean what you could do start doing SOME marketing right now just to get your course idea out there and then focus on course creation. Again as I said that's my opinion. Hope it helps 🙂

[Kieranlon]

Thanks @DYay2810 !

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[astroengineer]

@Kieranlon I guess both marketing and content creation must go in parallel. I will tell what I have done. I started creating course content in Dec 2019 and finished the complete course in April 2020. During this time frame, I released 7 sneak peek videos of the course and attached the survey for the audience to respond. In the 4 months, 134 people responded to my survey and said they are willing to take my course after release. Even if 50% conversion happens, I would be able to sell the course to 65 people immediately after release.

So in my view, the best strategy is to build frequent expectations to your audience before your course release. I will keep you posted on the actual conversion rate when my course is live.

[Kieranlon]

Great advice. Thanks @astroengineer. Let me know how you get on.

[Kieranlon]

@astroengineer Where did you release your sneak peek videos? Did you already have a following before you started creating your course?  Or did you start building one by releasing your videos?

[astroengineer]

@Kieranlon I released sneak peek videos on my Youtube Channel. I have a Youtube channel with 1k subscribers.

[Kieranlon]

Ok, thanks.

[DavidFox818]

May I ask how you put ou the survey? WHat did you build it with and where did you advertise?

[astroengineer]

@DavidFox818 I created a survey with Google forms and shared this link in the description of my Youtube sneak peek videos. I had built questions for my potential audience, such as their Name, Email ID, why did they want to learn this subject, what is their current level of skill etc. At the end of 4 months, I got 138 responses from the audience.

@Kieranlon My course went live yesterday and have notified all my survey responders. I got 31 enrollments for my course on day 1.

[astroengineer]

@Kieranlon @DavidFox818 After the end of 5 days promo sale and notification my audience I got 90 enrollments so far

[KamelElmang233]

Creating a high quality course is the base for marketing 

[ChemEngGuy]

Marketing goes always first... the mere Idea of creating an online course has already selected several "marketing features": an online product, a distribution channel, potential clients. In my opinion, I will go out and research about your topic. See what others are doing and then create a course with your "extra" 🙂

[TomOphir]

I'd just focus on course creation and overtime build up a mailing list and social media following to promote your coupon codes. Udemy is a mighy animal in terms of promotion and they will effectively promote your course for you. 

[Ckumara]

Course creation first.

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@Kieranlon wrote:

Hi, 

I'm about to start creating my first course. It's in an extremely competitive area, so I've chosen a course focus that doesn't yet exist in that area. 

My question is this:

Would it be better to just create the course and then focus on marketing (social media chanels, lead-magnet and mailing list, etc.) once its published? 

Or should I start with the marketing to build an audience before I create my course? My fear is that this could take months. 

I've also decided to start with a small course. I don't want to spend months creating a monster of a course that isn't very good because it's my first one.  

Thoughts on the above or any other advice regarding first-time course creation in a very competitive area would be greatly appreciated. Please don't tell me to choose a different area because I've already considered this. 

Thank you! 🙂

Kieran

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