Choosing the Perfect Platform for Your Online Course

Are you ready to launch your online course but feeling overwhelmed by all the platform options out there? In this episode of the New School of Marketing Podcast, we’re diving deep into the world of online course platforms to help you make the perfect choice for your business.

We’ll explore the key factors to consider when choosing a platform, from ease of use to integrations and scalability. Plus, we’ll discuss popular platforms like Teachable, Kajabi, Thinkific, and more, giving you a clear picture of what might work best for your unique needs.

Whether you’re a first-time course creator or looking to switch platforms, this episode will arm you with the knowledge and confidence to make a decision that aligns with your goals.

What you’ll learn in this episode:
✨ The most important features to look for in a course platform.
✨ How to prioritise your needs, whether it’s affordability, design, or advanced features.
✨ Insights into the top platforms and why they might (or might not) work for you.

Stop the guesswork and start building your dream course today! 🎧

Tune in now to learn how to find the right platform for your online course success.

Connect with me

Website: www.newschoolofmarketing.com
Facebook: @newschoolofmarketing
Facebook group: @newschoolofmarketing
Instagram: @bianca_mckenzie

Learn from me:

🟣 FREE MASTERCLASS: Sell more of your online course with Meta Ads
https://www.biancamckenzie.com/masterclass

🔵 AIMFUL ADS ACADEMY: Tools, resources & 1:1 support to attract more ideal clients and make more sales with proven, easy to follow Facebook & Instagram ad strategies for any budget. https://www.biancamckenzie.com/aimful-ads/

🟢 FACEBOOK ADS PREP SCHOOL: Find out what you need to know and do before spending money on ads. https://www.biancamckenzie.com/prep-school/

🟡 INVISIBLE AD FUNNEL PLAYBOOK: A practical step-by-step guide to making a big impact with a tiny budget. https://www.biancamckenzie.com/playbook

🟠 FUNNEL FUNDAMENTALS: Building effective sales funnels that drive conversions and grow your business. ...

Transcript

Hello and welcome to the new School of Marketing podcast. I am so grateful to you for tuning in. Now, before we dive in, I would love to pay my respect and acknowledgement to the Palawa people of Lutruwita, who are the traditional owners of the land on which my business operates.

And I pay my respects to the elders, past and present.

Okay, let's dive in. I am super excited about this topic.

I feel like I'm going to open a can of worms, but we'll see how we go. So if you are thinking about launching an online course, or maybe you have one and you're thinking about, you know, where you're going to put it.

Yeah. When you create a big. Sorry. When you create an online course, one of the biggest decisions that you'll make is choosing the right platform. And I'm saying that with a little bit of, I don't know, tongue in cheek, the right platform, because there are so many, I can list some of them off.

You can have it on your own WordPress website. If you have a WordPress website, because there are plugins for this, like member press, you can use a website like Teachable Thinkific, Kajabi Go high level Podia.

There are so, so many options and it can feel really overwhelming. I know that when you first start out with, you know, course creation and, you know, having to put all the things somewhere, it could be super overwhelming.

So I just want to go through things in this episode. And you know, there are so many options, so you need to figure out what is right for you.

That is something that only you can decide.

But I also want to say sometimes just getting it out there is totally fine.

I have moved my courses multiple times over the span of 10 years that I've been doing this, and I would say I'm pretty close to finding to having the perfect kind of place right now.

But if I had to start with that, it would have been way too big. I went over my head. So whether you're just starting out or whether you're looking to upgrade, I'm hopefully going to give you some clarity and some confidence to make the best decision for your course and for your business.

All right. When you Decide to choose a platform, you need to think about these two key things.

One is the ease of use, is the platform user friendly even for non techie people? Like and I'm talking about you, it needs to be user friendly for you as the creator, but also for for your students.

And then the other one is how much you can customize.

Like do you need flexibility to match your brand? Or like can you use templates?

So if tech isn't your strong suit, you really want a platform that is intuitive to use, that is easy to navigate.

And I'm thinking places like teachable, Thinkific. I have used Thinkific in the past and it is really easy to use, easy to navigate, it's also easy for your students to use.

But if you love to like tinker with things and customize things, then you might want to look at WordPress and having a plugin on WordPress so for example a Learndash plugin or a MemberPress plugin so then you can customize things.

I have also used MemberPress on WordPress in the past. So there are so many options but you gotta think about well do I want something out of the box that you know it's just like easy to use, ready to go or do I really want to be able to customize things?

Next features. So you gotta think about all the things that you wanna include. For example do you wanna include like quizzes, do you want to do drip content or are you going to give them everything upfront?

Do you need to have membership options rather than like a full on course? Like do you need like membership options?

And some platforms are better in one area but like not so good in other areas. For example Kajabi is fantastic for like an all in one solution but it does come with a higher price tag.

So you got to think about what is a non negotiable for your course or your membership and for your business goals.

Like are you going to go all out and full on big or are you going to start small, see how much you sell and then potentially scale up?

I know which one I would choose but this is about you and what you need to do.

Okay, I've already mentioned some platforms but I want to dive into some of them a little bit more.

So let's break it down by platform.

Teachable is a really good choice if you are brand new to course creation and you want something that's super straightforward, it's easy to set up, you don't need any coding knowledge like it's out of the box on the other Hand Kajabi is literally like the Rolls Royce of the platforms.

It's perfect if you don't want to just build your course, but an entire ecosystem of membership sites and email marketing and all of it just, you just got to be prepared for the price tag.

Thinkific is similar to Teachable, but it has slightly more customization options.

Podia is a really affordable option for courses and for digital downloads.

And if you're more tech savvy like I said, and you want full control and want to build your own thing, you can use WordPress with a plugin for example, Learndash, MemberPress, there are other ones out there.

Or you can look at things like Udemy, which is a marketplace and it's really good for beginners because Udemy has a built in audience.

But if you go on Udemy, you do have less control over your pricing and over your branding.

So really it's completely up to you which way you want to go.

It really just comes down to what is your budget, what are your sort of future goals, like what is the plan?

My main thing I want to say to you is just get started, just do it. I know people who have created courses that have actually I've, I have bought that Live in Dropbox, there is no course platform.

So the main thing is that you do get started.

Now in terms of someone else platforms, here are some mistakes that I really want you to consider because yeah, I, I see a lot of people give up on their dream because of certain things.

So one big mistake I see creators make is overpaying for features that they don't actually use.

It is really tempting to go for the platform with all the bells and whistles, but if you're just starting, a simpler option might be all that you need. Like I said, you can always upgrade later.

And another one is like another mistake is ignoring your audience.

So for example, if you're targeting an international audience like outside of your country, you want to make sure that the platform that you are going with actually supports global payments like PayPal, Stripe.

And you want to test this before you commit. Now most platforms do take PayPal and Stripe, but you just, you gotta, you know, make sure that all your bases are covered.

A lot of the platforms actually use free trials, so make use of them, play around, see if they feel right for you. So for example, Teachable and thinkific, they're very similar in terms of like sort of that starting level and like you can scale with them very well as well.

But when I use Teachable, my brain just could not just didn't work for teachable, whereas Thinkific felt very intuitive to me. So have a play with them and see if it actually makes sense for you and how to use it.

Because I know other people who use teachable and love it. So it has to work for you as well.

Now how to make the final decision.

So it's so hard, isn't it? Like you know, there's so many options out there and you might be trying a few different ones and go, I don't know which way to go.

Firstly, start by defining your goals.

Are you creating a one off course or again, are you planning an entire business around courses?

You want to put down your must have features and then rank them by priority.

So really think about what must it have. Things like does it need an email marketing platform or could you have a different, you know, a different one? For example, I use Mailerlite.

Does it need to have that customization or are you okay with an out of the box and you can change the colors and it's okay.

So and then rank them by priority.

Then you also want to use the free trials and the demos because you really want to know each platform and like sort of what they are like and you see them in action really.

And if you know some people in the course creation world that are either a bit more advanced or at the same level, ask people, ask what's worked for them and why.

Like I said, I have used multiple things and a lot has changed over the years as well. But I started with WordPress and that worked, actually worked really well for me because I'm quite techy, I can do a lot of these things.

But I have to say, and this is well over 10 years ago now, I was having issues like tech issues that I couldn't resolve and I thought, you know what, something out of the box will actually be better for me.

So I moved away from WordPress because it was actually quite tricky and I used Thinkific for quite a long time and that worked really well for me because I could have multiple courses.

It wasn't as pricey back then as it is now, but it just, it was such a simple and easy system to use. I liked that you could like update the videos and things like that.

Like I just, I had a lot of control without having to worry about the tech side.

And now I am using go high level through my mentor, Social Charlie, the Social Charlie system which is basically go high level and honestly it's a beast. It is I beast.

If I had to start with this, I would probably be, yeah, I don't know what I would be doing. I still am not using it to its full advantage. I love it, but there is so much more it can actually do all the things that at the moment I'm still relying on other platforms for like I shouldn't, like I don't need to use Mailerlite because Social Charlie can actually do this.

But my brain just again can't wrap around how it all works. I can easily set up my courses in it super, super easy. Um, but there's a lot of it that I don't actually know yet.

But there are experts out there that can actually help you set up courses in like for example, go high level.

Um, and I know it can track the funnels really well and all of that does really well. But you need to think about where are you right now and what is going to work for you right now.

And like me, you can move to other places and it's not easy. It is super, super hard to migrate courses but starting really, really big. And like I'm talking about someone who I mentored a few months ago.

She had started with Kajabi and it was, it was too big for her. It was like she wasn't using it and the price tag that comes with Kajabi, it was just not feasible for her.

And starting smaller, even with digital downloads or a video hosted on a, on a, on a hidden page or a password protected page would a much better step to ease into it.

So think about what do you need right now, what's your budget and what are your goals? And you're like, you either go and start small and then you work your way up or you find that middle spot.

I find it really hard to go big at the start and then having, having those difficult times where you're actually not selling as much yet and like, but you still have to pay for the software.

So think about all of these things, think about where you're at right now.

And just the other thing is it's not like I say, it's not a tattoo. It's not permanent. You can move.

So to recap, choosing the right platform is. It can feel overwhelming. It really can feel overwhelming, but it doesn't have to be. It really is important to figure out what your goals are and what features matter most to you.

And then you test, you know, road test two or three platforms beforehand before you commit, See what works for you, see what works for your brain and then just dive in and if you can't choose, reach out to People, I'm totally happy for you to reach out to me on Instagram, like you can DM me, but the main thing is to get started to just, to actually just do it.

Whether that is like putting out a guide that like you don't even need the platform, you just sell the digital product or other ways. Like, like I said, I have taken courses that were delivered in Dropbox and it was fine, totally fine.

So, you know, dive in, do the research, figure out what you need and what your must haves are, road test some of the platforms and do it. That's the main thing to do it.

Don't leave it sitting there because I know that a lot of people will be putting it off. Putting it off because you know they don't have the right platform and they've got this course that just like is not going anywhere because you know the right platform hasn't come along.

So the main thing is that you need to do it.

All right, thank you so much for joining me on this episode of the New School of Marketing podcast. I hope it was helpful. I hope you got to find the perfect platform for you.

And you know, as always, I'm excited to share more marketing tips and strategies with you next week.

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