Hello @istuff360 , First of all I congratulate you for makin your first wonderful course. I am not an active member in the Udemy Community but as you are a new instructor and don't know much about udemy so thought of helping you a bit. I have been an instructor on udemy for the past 7 months so let me share a few tips which you need to keep in your mind if you want to make some crazy amount of money and at the same time add value to the udemy community. So as you are saying you are a new comer. I assume that you don't have any audience to promote your course , nor any email list, blogs etc. But still you want to dominate your XXX field. So let me assume that you are creating a course about SEO. Well then the basic requirements for you to succeed in here is- 1- Time (It is always necessary) 2- An extraordinary course (If your course fails to impress your students then you might be stuck with a bunch of bad reviews that will ultimately ruin your course. ) Here are the points you need to keep in mind to be the best one- 1- Analyze the market first .....Like if you want to create a course on SEO first see are there any courses about it?? How much audience do these instructors have?? How many reviews?? What are the ratings?? How are new courses performing in this field?? Look at marketplace insights?? I understand, you are bored by now but bear with me you are gonna get great value. 2- Now as noone knows you so if you release a paid course chances are you will get a few bucks into your paypal but if you want to play a big game then stop dreaming about making quick bucks ( as I told you earlier that you need time ). 3- Lets say you made an SEO course that is 7 hours long ( gave every possible information that you had in that field , made a masterpiece course) and thinking of giving it away for FREE or Paid. Let me tell you FREE would be a bad idea because (my fellow instructors already explained the reasons in some answers). But wait listen here......I have a trick for you now........Don't upload that course now . 4- You need to create a short version of SEO course (1-2 hrs approx.) . That course would be a basic SEO course that won't provide all the value that you offered in your 7 hours course but would be an introductory course (Keep promoting your paid course in that short course and tell people that the paid course would be available soon.) NOW release that short course for FREE on Udemy. Promote your course accross the internet, using coupon websites, fb groups, friends and family, Reddit etc. 5- Now here the time factor comes into play........if your course would be nice then eventually your course will start earning praise and a lot of positive reviews (well there would be always some negative reviews don't worry about that they would be nearly 2-3% if your course is excellent.) 6- Now the people who completed your FREE course will know how good you are at explaining something so they would be happy purchasing your new SEO course. 7- Now after a few good reviews and 2-3 months later upload your 7 hour SEO paid course. You will have collected a lot of emails by now through udemy. Send promotional emails and just watch BIG BUCKS flowing into your account and a lot of praise coming from your students. ALL THE BEST Buddy!!! And yes I hope this article helps a lot of instructors who are new in this platform. Dhabaleshwar
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