Way back in February 2020, I launched my very first online course. It was a course for wedding photographers about how to photograph wedding day details – like shoes, jewelry, and so on. Anyway, it was my first time launching a course in an organic way. I didn’t do any paid advertising and I generated over $5,000 during the first week of launch, even with a pretty small audience. Today, I want to share how I created my first online course and had a successful launch. These 5 tips will help you have a successful launch for your online course, too! Let’s jump into it! 

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#1: Build Your Email List

If you’re thinking about launching a course, the first thing I always tell people is to build your email list. Whether it’s a course or just digital products that you want to sell, your most valuable asset is going to be your email list. Of course, social media platforms are a great tool, but they should always direct people to your email list. The best and most realistic way to build your email list is through freebies. This essentially means that you’re offering something of value that’s completely free in exchange for someone’s email address. A freebie could be a template, checklist, a guide, training, or quiz results. After you’ve built your freebie, you should be sharing it everywhere! This is how you’ll get people signed up for your email list. 

Building your email list is valuable. You’ll see a 1-3% conversion rate from your email list that turns into sales. So, the more people that are on the list, the more money you’ll generate, even with a 1% conversion rate. Basically, out of every 100 people, 3 people could buy. You can get a feeling for how that means your launch would go. Remember, social media is great to grow your brand, but email is designed to sell. You want to be building that list before you start pitching and offering things – at least a month in advance, if not longer. 

#2: Decide on Your Course Topic

The next thing to do for a successful launch is to decide on the topic for your course. As you’re building your email list, determine what topic you want to teach on in your course. I recommend that it goes hand in hand with the freebies you’re using to build your list. That way you’re building your list with people who are actually interested in the topic of your course. For example, it won’t do me any good to build a list of people who are interested in growing on YouTube if I’m going to launch a course on Instagram Reels. I know that can feel overwhelming.

Going back to my first launch, the first thing I was thinking about is what is my existing audience looking for? What free education am I providing that they’re resonating with? Originally, when I wanted to launch my first course, I wanted it to be business related. But, I got a lot of requests for help with photographing wedding details. So I went with that first –  and it ended up working out. I took the time to poll my audience and find out what they were struggling with. These ideas became part of the freebies I created and then the course content, which was the full, in-depth resource.

#3: Create a Course 

After you’ve decided on your topics and created your course outlines, it’s time to make your course and have it beta tested. There’s a LOT that goes into these two steps, but they do happen simultaneously. When it comes to beta testing, that basically means that someone is purchasing your course before it goes live, provide feedback, and you can then modify whatever you need before it goes to the public.  Usually, I have my beta testers get the course for free in exchange for testimonials and feedback. But, I am toying around with the idea of having beta testers buy into the course before it’s created and give me feedback as I create. Either way, I think testing the course before going live is important to validate what you’re doing and ensure people will want to pay money for your hard work.  

Other than beta testing, there’s a few other tips for creating your course. One of the steps I’ve found most helpful before filming my video lessons is to have an outline for each module. I’ll list out which videos I want in each module and spend 3-4 weeks working on this, really flushing out what I want to discuss. Once the outline is done, I’ll create my slides and then finally record. I’ve recorded in a few different ways, but I think that the value of your course increases if people can see your face and hear you talking. I love doing this on Loom! But, another option is to hire a videographer, though that’s a bigger investment. If you’re working on your first course, that’s probably not the route you want to go. Just film it yourself. 

#4: Prime Your Audience 

Step number four for a successful launch is to prime your audience. Now that you’ve got some free content that people have to join your email list to get… what do you do with it? You share about it and prime your audience! This step is important because it establishes your credibility and it’s partly your marketing for the course. Sharing free content online helps develop the know, like, trust factor with your audience so that when you do release your course, they want to buy right in. 

So, this process of sharing free content and serving it to your audience on a daily or weekly basis leading up to your course lunch is called priming your audience. The main goal is to establish yourself as the expert in this topic. When 4-6 weeks later rolls around and your course is out, people will be SO ready to buy from you. It won’t be a hurdle you have to jump to get people to buy in because you’ve already shown them so much free content that they trust you and know you’ll deliver. Your course topic will dictate what the free content looks like and what it’s about. 

#5: Decide on Launch Week Strategies 

Essentially, leading up to the launch week, you’ve got to create your strategy for the 4 to 6 weeks ahead of the launch. You’ve primed your audience and now it’s time to decide how you’re actually going to launch your course. There’s generally two ways people go: a webinar or a challenge. This is another last chance to build your email list and provide something valuable for free. Many people do a webinar or challenge and then pitch their product at the end, which is a great way to see higher conversions (10 to 15%). You’ve just provided all of that content for free and shown them what’s next. It’s definitely worth it to launch that way rather than just to your email list alone (remember 3% conversion there). 

With my first course, I hosted a free challenge around photographing wedding details. It was a lot less intimidating for the first time than doing a webinar.  I had 345 people sign up, organically, for my challenge from Instagram and my email list. We did five days of content and on the third day, the doors opened to my course. People could get in with a discount, along with a bonus, before the course went to the public on Monday. 

When it comes to your launch week, just really focus on serving your audience. I have found that if I put a huge focus on giving, giving, giving, and then asking, it works better than just asking non-stop. This goes back to building that like, know, trust factor so that people can see you as someone who is credible before they make a bigger financial investment.  Ultimately, taking care of people is going to create a more successful launch for you, no matter what. 

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