3 Mistakes Course Creators Make

Creating courses is not rocket science but it’s also not a stroll in the park. It requires you to understand you want to help, why your course can help them and how you will achieve your course objectives. Before you start creating your first (or next course), read this post about three mistakes course creators make and how you can avoid them.

Let’s kick things off with one of the mistakes course creators make. The first mistake we will highlight in this post is not ensuring that their audience is interested in their course topic. We could have a fantastic idea for a course but we shouldn’t assume that others will feel the same way. So, how to fix this before you start creating your course?

Do this instead

1. Visit sites such as https://answerthepublic.com/ and https://trends.google.com/. Enter your keywords and see what type of results come up.
2. If you have an audience on social media or in your emails, run a poll to get their feedback.
3. Go a little further with Step 2 and invite persons to participate in a live 1:1 market research (depending on the number of participants). Create a list of relevant questions (a mix of open-ended and multiple choice is fine) to get your audience’s thoughts and challenges. The live session will also allow you to really hear what they are feeling and determine how you could best support them.

Before creating your course, make sure you know that there is a demand for the topic you’re planning to cover. Without this information, you risk spending a lot of time and money creating a course that no one wants to buy. Check out our post for other ways to research your course topic idea.

Mistake #2: Creating the Entire Course Upfront

Another mistake course creators make is creating the entire course before they’ve started promoting it…or pre-selling it. Does this mistake resonate with you?

If you’ve created a course before or thought about doing one, you don’t need to have the entire course ready right away. Instead, start marketing your course after you’ve validated it. In other words, promote your course to the people who shared their views in your market research, answered your poll, or expressed some interest in your course. They can be your first buyers.

Do this instead

1. Create your MVP (minimum viable product) – this is just enough information to help your audience experience transformation. Your MVP doesn’t need fancy slides or worksheets. It could be delivered via email, live, or based on your audience’s preferred learning style.
2. Create your sales page and include an outline of your course (i.e. modules, lessons, and other deliverables).
3. Offer the course at a discounted price to a few beta testers. As they go through, they will give you feedback which will help you make improvements/tweaks to your lessons.

While this is not the only way to approach it, it is one method to help you get your course out, start making money, and refine as you go along.

Here’s another mistake course creators make – giving their audience too much too soon. Are you guilty of this? Do you feel like you need to share everything with your students in one go? Well, it’s not necessarily the best approach.

Information overload!!!

Do this instead…focus on the “One Problem. One Solution” approach.

1. Think about the problem your audience is facing.
2. Identify your solution to their problem.
3. Create your course to help them take action based on your solution.

This is one solution you could offer these mothers. Focus on developing this point in one lesson. Or, it could be the focus of an entire mini-course. Because creating routines could be tricky for some, you may break this down further and provide each step as a lesson. You could include group sessions to discuss what works and what doesn’t or to hear from other mothers.

AVOID DOING THIS!!!

You already identified your solution so avoid adding other solutions in your lesson (or mini-course) For example, do not include a lesson on exercise. While exercise would be helpful for these mothers to stay alert, remain healthy, and so on, it is not the first solution to their problem.

Remember, we all live busy lives and want quick solutions to our problems. So think about what you could offer your audience without providing too much upfront. You don’t want your students to put your course on a virtual shelf 😉

Final Thoughts

We shared three mistakes that course creators make and what you could do instead. What are some other mistakes you could think of? Share them in the comments below.