Are you considering becoming a course creator? Either to help scale your coaching business or to create a new passive income stream.
Whatever your reasons for setting up as a course creator, in this post, I’ll be going through the true cost to become a course creator and the answer may shock you because it’s cheaper than you may think.
First up we have the tech side of things and the course tools you’ll need to set up your online course.
Hosting platform for course
If you’re wondering which course platform to choose to host your course there are an abundance of options out there to choose from. I even reviewed some of the best course platforms in a recent blog post.
Budget Option: Teachable
Teachable is a great option if you want to become a course creator on a bit of a budget. There is a free option available, however, even if you are new to course creation I recommend upgrading to the paid option as one of the
Their basic plan is just $59 and it gives you everything you could possibly need to host your online course.
Advanced Option: Kartra
Kartra is an all in one course platform that not only allows you to host online courses but also build out beautiful websites and sales pages and integrate email marketing funnels, too. The price of Kartra ranges from $99-$299/mo
Designing Your Online Course:
There are a couple of options available to you when you’re creating your course assets (like slides/workbooks etc.
Budget Option: Canva Pro
Yes, Canva has a free version, but I strongly believe Canva Pro is one of the best investments you’ll make for your business and if you have a team, you can add up to five members without additional cost using Canva for Teams.
Canva Pro is $12.99 per month but totally worth it considering the number of design tools and templates available to you. Their background remover tool for images is so good and far easier than trying to use Photoshop.
Advanced Option: Hiring a Graphic Designer
A more advanced option could be hiring a graphic designer to create your course slides. As an alternative, middle of the road option, you could also hire a Virtual Assistant to create your course slides in Canva. Most VAs are skilled in using Canva and this can be a cheaper alternative to hiring a professional designer to create custom slides.
Recording Your Online Course
You have a bunch of different options to record your online course. You may want to record yourself speaking, or you may want to use a visual aid such as slides. Depending on how you want to record your course, will depend on the equipment/software you want to invest in.
Budget Options: Using Your Laptop
If you’re filming yourself rather than using slides but still want a budget option for recording your course, most laptops come with a built-in webcam and mic.
However, they may not be the best quality. I’ve found that cameras on Macs are usually quite good compared to some Windows laptops but you may want to upgrade your camera and microphone. You could also use your smartphone if it has a HD camera.
If you want a budget option or creating slides, you can use the free version of Canva, or if you’ve invested in Canva Pro, you’ll get more template options
Advanced Options: Loom and Camera Equipment
Loom is a software that allows you to record your videos by recording your screen. If you want to save a bit of money, Canva does have this option, but I feel like Loom is a far more versatile tool and has more options. It’s also great if you have a team and need to show them how to do something without having to hop on a Zoom call with them.
Related: Course Creators Checklist
Looking to become an online course creator but not sure where to start?
For any course modules where I’m just speaking directly to the camera, I personally use the Sony ZV1 and I love it. It’s so compact, quite affordable and I use it to create videos for my YouTube channel as well as for general content creation.
Sales and Marketing Costs of Becoming a Course Creator
Once you’ve created your online course, you need to start thinking about how you can market your course organically and get people signing up.
Email Marketing
One of my favourite ways to do this is through email marketing. The people on your email list are literally your VIPs. Email marketing alone has brought in over £150,000 of revenue into my online coaching business.
Plus, email marketing is how you’ll be able to sell your online course passively further down the line and make sales in your sleep…talk about a one-way ticket to freedom.
If you haven’t started an email list yet, you can get started for free.
My favourite email marketing provider right now is ConvertKit and is free for your first 1,000 subscribers.
ConvertKit is quite an advanced email marketing tool and so even if you have over 1,000 subscribers and need to pay for the service it’s more than worth it.
You can set up automations, segment groups, add specific tags to people who are clicking specific links on your sales page and retarget them, it’s an incredibly powerful tool for increasing your conversions.
Funnels and Webinars
Your email marketing platform will help you to nurture your leads once they’ve signed up to a free offer, however if you want to create a lead magnet like a webinar (which I highly recommend) then you’ll need some kind of webinar software.
Budget Option: Webinar Kit
WebinarKit looks like a great budget option for course creators looking to pay just a one-time fee to promote their online course. It’s just $97
Advanced Option: EasyWebinar
The webinar software I use is EasyWebinar and I highly recommend it if you’re wanting to start marketing your online course passively. It costs from $83/mo, is super easy to use and it connects seamlessly with ConvertKit
Other Marketing Tools to Market Your Online Course
If you’re on a budget, I genuinely believe you don’t need to pay for anything else at the beginning and everything I’ve spoken about in this post will suffice and you can use the free social media platforms to market your online course like Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, YouTube, etc.
If you’re looking to invest in some more advanced marketing tools, Repurpose.io is the one. I discovered it recently and it helps me to repurpose my content across multiple platforms automatically without me lifting a video. Repurpose.io costs $25/mo but when you think of the time you save, it’s a no-brainer.
Another great marketing tool I recommend is Flick.
Flick is a hashtag tool for Instagram and has massively improved in terms of functionality recently. It analyses and helps you to find the best hashtags for your content and saves you so much time in the process. Flick costs around $10/mo
Total Cost to Become a Course Creator
So there we have it, everything you need to get started as an online course creator.
For ease here, I’ve popped all of the above information in one spot so you can see which option you want to choose.
One-off Course Creation Costs
Budget: $79 one off
Advanced: $1700 one off (this includes buying new equipment and paying for a graphic designer)
Monthly Course Creation Costs
Budget: $38.99/mo
Advanced: $452/mo
How Much I Spend Per Month as an Online Course Creator
Curious to know how much it costs me to be a course creator?
I currently spend $380 a month on my course creation tools, which to me is TOTALLY worth it and I more than make that back from my online courses.
This doesn’t include what I spend on my team per month.
Let me know in the comments below what you think of these costs and if it was more or less than you thought.
Claudia xx
