Ask Me Anything - Phil Ebiner, long-time instructor

[PhilEbiner]

Hi, 

I'm Phil Ebiner. I'm a long-time Udemy instructor - been here since 2012. And I'm excited to be a part of this community. Please feel free to ask me any questions!

Since 2012, I've made over $1.5 million from Udemy. And I don't say that to brag, but to show you what a normal guy like me can do... someone who started like many of you without an audience, experience teaching, experience selling, email list, website... nothing.

It has taken a lot of hard work and time to do this, but I believe you can achieve your goals if you have the right mindset and put in the right amount of effort!

I love Udemy, and hope to help you out on this amazing platform!

Cheers,

Phil

[Naeem-Malik]

Each month ...

[MarouaOuakrim]

Thanks naeem I wish you more success

[Naeem-Malik]

You're welcome. 

[Naeem-Malik · Accepted solution]

I see you haven't published a course yet. 

[MarouaOuakrim]

Yes, I am working on it, the course is about motion graphics and video editing. I have a question, please, do you think creating training courses is worth the effort ?

[Naeem-Malik]

It is a marathon, in the long run it can be helpful. But, only one course is not enough. You'll need to publish more than one courses if you want this income stream to become a part of your income portfolio mix. 

I believe the barrier of entry is lower for developing countries like Pakistan, we don't need a lot of equipment and our expenditures are lower as compared to U.S based instructors. 

You can call me on Whatsapp sometime if you need more information, I'll share my number if need be. 

[MarouaOuakrim]

Thnks sir, I sent you a message on facebook

[Naeem-Malik]

Of course, sure. I'll check it when I get back to my laptop, have forgotten FB password and the Messenger app on phone is not working right now. 

[DAbirami000]

How can i become a instructor. I'm unable to find where can i post my articles and videos. 

[LeninPV224]

Dear PhilEbiner 

Really surprise to have a link with you. I thank God for these happenings. My Sincere thanks to Udemy for creating such an arena with studio, Instructor and millions of students.

Best wishes to You and your family including cute twins.

After hard work and with basic experience in Ms-office, I alone create a course titled "Vedic Maths: Fastest Mental Calculation Techniques ". No review yet. 

Please guide me. No other income till now

[RyanHolmes576]

Hi, it is so impressive. As in your chart, the second top source of revenue comes from ad program. May you recommend me which ad program do you use? Thanks

[LaorKaelHel200 · Accepted solution]

Hello Phil, how can we talk in person about your offer? 

[LaorKaelHel200]

I have 20+ published courses, is there a way to talk in person? 

[KnowtoGlow]

Hey Phil,

This Rawan Darwish over here. 

I just started on Udemy, and my question to you is: What is the best Software to Build and Create Online Courses?

Thank yij for offering to help. 

[Andreas22]

Hey buddy, Cool video! I'd like to know some of the best ways you have used to drive traffic to your courses?

Thanks 

Andreas

[Ibrahim13 · Accepted solution]

Amazing job Phil... I'm really impressed! I hope I can make my first $1.5 🙂

[Naeem-Malik]

Hi Phil, 

Please recommend the specifications of a PC for course creation in 2020. 

Regards,

Naeem Malik. 

[Muslim Helalee]

Hey Phil,

Thanks for sharing your experience. It really is something.

i just have a few questions i want to ask. I posted it in the First Curse Creation Section but no one answered. May be because no one knew the answers.

Q1. I want to know whether having two accounts in Udemy is allowed or not. I have an individual account but then I decided to involve my friend as well to teach with me. so I created another joint account because I did not want to publish his courses in my account. is it legal?

I see other instructors do it like Mr. Schwarzmüller  who has an Academind account and a personal account.

Q2. this question relates to the first question. Let's say I create and complete a course and I want to share it in both of my accounts. what I mean is, in the course landing page for some instructors like again Mr. Schwarzmüller's JS course, it says "Created by Academind by Maximilian Schwarzmüller, Maximilian Schwarzmüller". it is available in Academind by Maximilian Schwarzmüller account as well as Maximilian Schwarzmüller account. now back to my question, how is something like this possible? I have not published any course yet but I am curious, is it possible when publishing the course (during the process in Udemy) or the course has to be uploaded twice, separately for each account?

Q3. This question relates to the previous one. this question has two parts. Part 1: If the situation in q2 is accomplished and let's say it is the first course for both of the accounts, then would Udemy ask for Tax information from both of the accounts or only one of them? they belong to one person in the end. Part Two: In case Udemy asks both of the accounts to provide tax info, and because those accounts and the course belongs to one person, then the tax info is going to be the same, would this create a problem according to Udemy's regulations?

Q4. Again this is related to the previous one. if everything goes well and a course is shared between two accounts (there are two accounts as authors which basically is one person), then will the income be shared between the accounts or not? If shared, then what is the ratio? I just want to see the whole picture.

Any help is appreciated. 

Thanks in advance.

Muslim Helalee

Love From Afghanistan

[Panagiotis288]

Hello,My name is Panos Hadjigeorgiou.I am a personal trainer coach,am trying to create my first video on udemy.I want your help....What video editing do you recommend to me.I thinking to make one big video about 30 minutes and then small videos for the explanations of every exercise and the to combine them together.Or is better to write them in a slite before every exercise?

---

@PhilEbiner wrote:

Hi, 

I'm Phil Ebiner. I'm a long-time Udemy instructor - been here since 2012. And I'm excited to be a part of this community. Please feel free to ask me any questions!

Since 2012, I've made over $1.5 million from Udemy. And I don't say that to brag, but to show you what a normal guy like me can do... someone who started like many of you without an audience, experience teaching, experience selling, email list, website... nothing.

It has taken a lot of hard work and time to do this, but I believe you can achieve your goals if you have the right mindset and put in the right amount of effort!

I love Udemy, and hope to help you out on this amazing platform!

Cheers,

Phil

---

[Panagiotis288 · Accepted solution]

Hello,My name is Panos Hadjigeorgiou.I am a personal trainer coach,am trying to create my first video on udemy.I want your help....What video editing do you recommend to me.I thinking to make one big video about 30 minutes and then small videos for the explanations of every exercise and the to combine them together.Or is better to write them in a slite before every exercise?

[SDPSuccessCoach]

That's very inspiring and encouraging too Phil. What would be your 3 vital tips to a person like me who has just started on Udemy?

[NafiulAlamNayem]

Definitely, That is impressive. Thanks for sharing your story, and you are very inspiring.

[JasmineBayer]

Congratulations! I'm new here and you certainly Inspire me . I want to ask you , Did you initially promote more free courses to grow your audience for the first few months

---

@PhilEbiner wrote:

Hi, 

I'm Phil Ebiner. I'm a long-time Udemy instructor - been here since 2012. And I'm excited to be a part of this community. Please feel free to ask me any questions!

Since 2012, I've made over $1.5 million from Udemy. And I don't say that to brag, but to show you what a normal guy like me can do... someone who started like many of you without an audience, experience teaching, experience selling, email list, website... nothing.

It has taken a lot of hard work and time to do this, but I believe you can achieve your goals if you have the right mindset and put in the right amount of effort!

I love Udemy, and hope to help you out on this amazing platform!

Cheers,

Phil

---

or did you post free and paid courses side by side? Thank you for all your support.

[LucieMic123]

Hello Phil, 

i am from Montreal, Canada and am new to this!

I am an art instructor would like to teach painting on this site. First, I am not sure what category I fall into..Design?? Wish there was an art section to Udemy. Next, is microphone: Part of this course, I will be standing and moving around. What microphone wold you recommend? One that is affordable, if possible. Any help you can give me would be great!

Thank you, 

Lucie

[ElianaC]

Hi @LucieMic123 I'll recommend you to go through the marketing insights tool https://www.udemy.com/instructor/marketplace-insights/ 

Here is a list of his recommended instructor resources: https://community.udemy.com/t5/First-time-Course-Creation/A-list-of-useful-sources-for-instructors/m...

I was able to found a post regarding the experience from other instructors with microphones https://community.udemy.com/t5/A-V-Solutions/What-microphone-do-you-use/m-p/2056 

Hope this helps!

Eliana Cerna

Udemy Community 

[Ed_Foychuk]

I pop into this thread pretty often to get inspired. 

Thanks, Phil

[G2ondbeat]

I believe I can achieve this too congrats 

---

@PhilEbiner wrote:

Hi, 

I'm Phil Ebiner. I'm a long-time Udemy instructor - been here since 2012. And I'm excited to be a part of this community. Please feel free to ask me any questions!

Since 2012, I've made over $1.5 million from Udemy. And I don't say that to brag, but to show you what a normal guy like me can do... someone who started like many of you without an audience, experience teaching, experience selling, email list, website... nothing.

It has taken a lot of hard work and time to do this, but I believe you can achieve your goals if you have the right mindset and put in the right amount of effort!

I love Udemy, and hope to help you out on this amazing platform!

Cheers,

Phil

---

[Israel9246]

Please I have a question. I am new to udemy and I don't know how to introduce a course 

[ElianaC]

Hi @Israel9246 You can start here https://teach.udemy.com/course-creation/ this course creation section of the Teaching Center.

Eliana Cerna

Udemy Community 

[DarylleJohnson]

Wow, this is very inspiring! 

I noticed that many of the highly successful instructors are doing tech-based courses. Do you think that somebody can be highly successful teaching dance? Or perhaps leadership and self-help topics? 

Do you teach exclusively on Udemy and is this the platform you find to bring you the most success? 

I'm very excited to learn and get started! 

[JoeConstant725]

HI Phil

I just watched your video and think its great that you want to help newbies like me. I am 61 years old living in the UK and this is my very first attempt at creating an online course. I have been in personal development for over 25 years working with both young people aswell as adults.

My question is where do I begin I want to create a course for people who are over 50 plus that might think it's to late to pursue their goals and dreams and this course is about overcoming obstacles to achieve your dreams, based on a book by Ryan Holiday called the Obstacle is the way. And my course title is to be called 'Beyond the Obstacles' any help and advice you can give would be greatly appriciated. Joe

[SabrinaElai225]

Hi Phil,

I'm trying to do a bit of marketing, and was wondering how did you make your email list??

Cheers

[Yahyakhan472]

So inspiring..

I have a one question that I have posted in the community many times, but have got the accepted solution. 

The question is that I am about to publish my first course on Udemy, but I am new instructor and I have not an audience right now. So I want to publish my course for free for a while, but there is a rule of Udemy that

[AhammadAdel]

What you did is inspiring, indeed. I plan make my course through mobile camera. What do you say? Do you recommend any learning links within Udemy before I jump offering my course.

[AndrewDobos990]

Hi Phil, Do you rec to offer the 10usd price promotion, go for the 75% off promotion or stick with the regular Full course price? I ask epxecially for the beginning stages when I lauch a course.

[Francisoji048]

Hi,Phil. I am new in this community and I am just struggling to publish my first course.After watching your video, I was highly motivated to work harder in order to achieve this goal. However,the challenge I have now is I don't know the best software to edit my video. Please can you kindly help out.thanks.francisoji048.

[StephenZAMB993]

Hi Phil, how do you choose your subjects? I mean, I'm a software developer. Software development courses are always long > 5h or 10h. So It takes weeks to create one, how can I be sure that it something that people want? 

Do you test the market before? If it's the case, how do you do?

[mwitiderrick]

Congratulations Phil. Very inspiring 

[FarzanSajahan]

Phil, You have been a great inspiration and a wonderful teacher. I have enrolled in your wordpress and digital marketing courses and they are amazing. Your story inspired me to start my journey with Udemy. I just launched my first course last weekend . Thank you for being a such a wonderful inspiration.

Cheers,

Farzan

[ScottDuffy]

Congrats and good luck!

[FarzanSajahan]

Thanks Scott!

[MariaDru2020]

very inspiring, thanks for sharing! If I may ask, how many courses does one needs to be able to hit the 1Million sales milestone?

[ScottDuffy]

Could be "1", if it's the right course.

https://www.businessinsider.com/rob-percival-online-coding-courses-2015-2 

[EstelleB]

Hi,  I am new on Udemy and have just published my first course.  I am a Baby Boomer with limited advanced Tech skills!!  My daughter had to help me with the editing of my videos but I am glad I discovered now that you offer a course in video editing for beginners.  So, if I need to do things myself in the future I will definitely invest in your course.

I am on a major learning curve so looking to see what I want to an need to learn to become better as an instructor.  

Estelle

[BruceAlexander]

Phil - thanks for the offer to help first time Udemy instructors

My problem is that customers I direct to my landing page via my own promotional efforts and my direct course link are shown my landing page populated with pop up ads for other courses!

If Udemy originated the enquiry they can show whatever they want. But when I generate the customer interest by my specific course link I expect the customer to see my landing page without Udemy trying to steer them to alternative courses

It seems to me that Udemy's reason is that if they can steer the customer to some other course they get around 50% of the course fee but if the customer buys mine Udemy get only 3%

Thus Udemy have a perverse motive for persuading a customer who enquired about my course to change their mind and buy something else

Any suggestions?

But if the customer buys mine, Udemy get 3% 

[LaorKaelHel200]

I belive you are right. 

Personally I have zero understanding why Udemy doesn't have a PPC option

Inside their own platform. 

It will benefit the users and them. 

As for your statement... Yes, they are a business aimed to gain profit. 

As long as they control your students list

You have zero ability to promote again to your audience. 

Promotions are nice, coupons are nice, but there is no compersment to a good solid aimed promotion that brings paid costumers to you. 

Hope they will give us more tools to promote and earn

[VivianAdemy360]

Nice meeting you here Phil

[MachhindraK356]

Your teaching awesome! i love it

[Jerry535]

Wow!!! Really motivating 

[KloudBahnas1212]

Hi phil 

So happy for you. wish you more success.

so i just started my first course on udemy . I have so many questions.

1- how to attract student to take my course ? 

2- should i make facebook adds , youtube adds ?

3- I noticed that students take the courses which are not comprehensive more. what do you think should i keep it light ? or should i really put all my knowledge on it?

Thanks