Who Is Online Course Creator And What Skills Are Needed?

Online courses and education are widely gaining popularity due to providing unlimited opportunities for students. With e-learning, students can choose courses based on their interests, learn safe paced, and still earn certificates acknowledging their skills & expertise.   
 

So, who is an online course creator? And, what skills do they need in order to be on top of the market? Well, we will figure that out in this article.   
 

So, if you are ready, let’s start!   
 

Who is an online course creator?

Let’s start from scratch. So, who is an online course creator? Basically, an online course creator is a person that creates online courses (mostly in pre-recorded format) and shares their expertise with students worldwide, alongside monetizing their knowledge.  
 

You can find various online course creators on Udemy and other similar platforms. Those people do not necessarily have teaching certification or education. However, they have expertise in certain areas and are able to share credible & reliable knowledge.  

Online course creation benefits

There are multiple benefits to becoming an online course creation or e-learning business owner:  
 

• Low start-up costs - especially if you choose an affordable, full-featured automated platform. (e.g. Uteach) 
• Effective course creation
• It is an amazing passive income source. When you create and publish online courses you can get an unlimited number of students, therefore making money from the same course over and over again. 
• The most popular method of learning. Online learning has gained incredible wide popularity due to being extremely accessible and providing students with a chance of self-paced learning of courses they are truly interested in. 

What skills are needed?

As an online course creator, you need to have a specific set of skills in order to succeed in this competitive industry.   
 

• Communication. As an online course creator, you must have communication skills. What does this include? Good interpersonal communication, negotiation, body language, oratory (not to sound boring while explaining the material),and of course, EI. Emotional Intelligence will help you to understand your clients better and have a good CRM strategy. 
• Management. Successful online course creators, especially those with multiple courses and lots of students, know how to organize and manage tasks, certifications, tests, and e-learning. Management skills are extremely vital to tracking & measuring data and provide students with useful insights and materials. Good management will lead to satisfied customers, increase brand awareness with testimonials and recommendations, and create a positive public image. 
• Basic technical skills are required as well. For example, how to use various video conferencing platforms and editing software or know how to fix audio during live sessions. 
• Marketing basics is a must-know for an online course creator. When you publish a course, keep in mind that you have lots of competition. So, if you want customers to give them value and a reason why they should choose you, employ various marketing tactics and strategies to achieve your goals. 

Now, let’s move on from general must-need skills to more specific skills in terms of hard and soft skills.   
 

Soft skills

• Leadership & Project management: As an online course creator, each course you create is a separate project; even the website you are working on is a project. Therefore, it is vital to be able to effectively manage tasks and meet requirements and deadlines in order to have successful outcomes.   
   
• Teamwork: an essential soft skill that online course creators need is teamwork. Why? Well, even if you are working on a product alone, in some scenarios, your students may need to work on n assignment in groups. Therefore, knowing the basics of teamwork will allow you to create a more efficient learning environment for your students and teach them to work peacefully, productively, and collaboratively better than ever before.   
   
• Problem-solving, as a course creator and business owner, is one of the essential skills you need to have. Being able to come up with innovative approaches and solutions will take you to the next level.   
   
• Time management will help you to stay organized and focused and avoid procrastination. To become better at time management, set goals and, based on their tasks, plan for at least a week ahead. Afterward, make sure to put deadlines for everything and give yourself breaks. A very effective method of productivity is Pomodoro. How does it work? After every 50 minutes of focused work, you get 10 minutes break.   
   
• Flexibility is vital for meeting the demand that is changing very quickly in this dynamic industry. As a course creator, you must be aware of nowadays market and your audience changing interests and needs in order to meet them efficiently.   
   
• Decision-making will definitely save you time and resources along the way.   
   

Hard skills

• SEO - as an online course creator, you must be aware of search engine optimization, especially if you do not have a marketing specialist on your team. How do Google and various search engine algorithms work? How do you do keyword research and write SEO-optimized descriptions, titles, and blog posts? Those are the basics you must know. Tools that will help you throughout the journey are Moz, Semrush, Ahrefs, etc.   
   
• Proofreading - as someone who is going not only to speak a lot but also write a lot (blog posts, how-to guides, website content, and course descriptions),you have to know how to proofread your own content. There are certain tips to create a good website content make sure it is readable, use simple language, and use tools such as the Grammarly, and Hemingway apps.   
   
• Industry-specific certification or a degree is also something online course creators must-have. Maybe you are not specializing in teaching, but if you want to be able to provide high-quality materials, choose the area of your expertise and make sure to showcase a certification or diploma that proves your skills. First of all, it will increase trust in you; secondly, it is ethical to provide valuable and reliable information to maintain a positive public image and good reputation. 

Online course creator vs. Online coach

Let’s start from the definitions.   
 

An online course creator is someone who creates various teaching materials, content mostly courses, and publishes them on their website. Most of the content is pre-recorded, ready-to-publish, and resold.   
 

An online coach is someone who works with people one on one or in groups, but they work with people directly. For an online coach, it is vital to have certification because coaching involves several techniques and methodology behind working with people.   
 

Online course creators nowadays have more financial potential because of the growth of the e-learning industry and flexibility. Anyone who has certain expertise in specific areas can become an online course creator; even online coaches can create courses besides offering 1:1 coaching sessions. To become an online course creator, unlike online coaching, you do not have to have teaching and coaching certification.   
 

Now, let’s take a look at the pros and cons of both. 

Online Courses Pros & Cons 

Pros 

• Passive income - online course creators have an incredible opportunity to generate passive income from the same courses. Due to courses being pre-recorded and published from each purchase, you will get income without the need to spend extra time on one on one sessions. 
• Larger audiences - another benefit of online course creation is that you can reach global audiences, especially if the content is in an international language such as English. 
• Teaching what you want is another benefit for online course creators. Basically, you can teach everything you would like and, of course, have qualifications in because you want to provide value to your audience to increase trust. 
• Freedom (time & money) - Less time is spent on making money, and fewer investments are required. For example, you can rent a room for a few days and shoot a course that you can resell many times.   
   

Cons 

• Pricing - online courses are a lot cheaper than coaching 
• The constant need to update - let’s say you created a course a year ago, do not be fooled by selling it over and over again for years. The material you taught a year ago most likely is currently outdated. Therefore you need to create a new one.   
   

Online Coaching Pros & Cons 

Pros

• Charge premium rates because sessions are 1:1 or in groups and live. 
• Personalized experience - each client gets a personalized experience with direct real-time feedback. 
• In-depth learning 
• Reach global audience - due to being offered online; coaches also have the opportunity to reach global audiences.   
   

Cons

• More clients = more time
• More time and resources are required for each client.   
   

It is worth mentioning that once again, online coaches can also create online courses and make passive revenue enough to maintain smaller clients and still make high profits, at the same time have more free time. There is no clear answer to which one is better online coaching or online course creator because certainly, both are on demand.   
 

So, the best way you can go through is to start with online course creation, and if you are new, invest some time into learning to coach and then offer coaching services on your website.   
 

Read How To Start Online Coaching in 2022

Will you become an excellent online course creator?

So, the question is will you become an excellent course creator? Well, of course, you will! However, make sure to acquire all the necessary skills first.   
 

For example, if you are an online course creator who is an expert in their field, however, fails to provide engaging content, that practically equals fail. Why? Because students will not even finish the course to comprehend the quality of the material. The same thing goes reversed way. So, if you are a course curator who is able to provide engaging content, but has no value, then students will be disappointed, and your public image as a course creator will be damaged.   
 

Therefore, make sure that you can provide both engaging and high-quality content. Online course creation requires patience, writing, communication, technical and many other skills that take some time to learn, but once you do, you will have all the chances to succeed. 

Common reasons why courses fail? 

• Fail to validate the idea: Do you have a new idea? That is great! However, if you want to see something, you must remember the cruciality of market research and idea validation. In short, check out the demand before you invest your time and resources in the product. 
• Failure to offer USP: in this competitive market, your product should offer at least one unique feature that will help you to stand out. Most courses fail in sales because they fail to offer something different.
• Failing to choose the right platform: will cause extra resources, investments, and lots of technical issues. 
• Not knowing your niche: before launching a course, you must know who is your target audience, their expectations, needs & pain points. 
• Failure to set correct pricing: too cheap is associated with low quality; meanwhile, too high will cause an imbalance in the equilibrium point. 
• Failure to promote: share as much as you can, and ask your friends to do that too. Besides, post about your course in public forums, and create an email campaign and landing pages to generate leads. Also, you can organize pre-selling.   
   

Check Top 7 Reasons Why Online Courses Fail.

How to Avoid Failure & Choose the Right Platform?

Also, as a course creator, remember the vitality of marketing and choosing the right platform.   
 

How can one avoid failure? First of all, remember that even if you fail, it is not the end; you can definitely try again and again until you succeed. Success loves consistency. There is also a practical method to avoid possible failure caused by some technicalities. In order to avoid failure, look for specific features in the platform:  
 

• Enough functionality 
• Easy to use 
• Automation of routine tasks 
• All-in-one (marketing campaigns, payments, LMS)  
   

I will recommend you to take a look at Uteach, which will help you to create a professional, full features online learning website in under 2 minutes. Plus, with Uteach, you will be able to:  
 

• Control every aspect of online course business from one place 
• Enjoy good user-interface 
• Choose from flexible & affordable pricing plans, with a 14-day free trial run period 
• Enjoy end-to-end live sessions and integrations 
• Automate routine tasks to save a great deal of a time 
• Get a return on investment   
   

So, start your online course creation business right away, and be on top of your field.

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