Making money while you sleep from online courses is the ultimate dream.

However, just because you have an “idea” for an online course, doesn’t mean people want your course and more importantly, are willing to pay for it.

This is why it’s important to create at online course that people want and to “validate before you create” and there’s only one way to do that – sales!

That’s right, you must get sales from your target audience first which validates the course.

A while back I did a webinar that over 200 people signed up for.  I thought that “validated” my idea for the course.  So, I did a sales page to see how many people would sign up and guess how many signed up?

Zero.

It happens to a lot of course creators and it comes down to having these 3 things right:

1. The right offer
2. The right price
3. The right audience

If you get one of these wrong, then you probably will get zero or minimal sales.

Before we talk about validating our course, let’s talk about how to create an online course that people actually want.

Here are 10 steps you can take to select an online course topic that people actually want:

1. Find a Problem to Solve – It’s not about having a great idea; it’s about solving a problem that needs solving.  Here are 4 questions to help you:  What problem have you solved in the past (for yourself and others)?  What problem would people pay money to solve?  What problem are you passionate about solving?  What is something others struggle with, but that you find easy?
2. Be specific; don’t be vague.  For example, a course on “writing a book”. That is very vague.  Next level would be “Helping people write books that have writers block and struggle to get their book done” or “Writing a non-fiction book for income and impact”.  Another example would be dog training.  A vague idea would be “Dog training for bad dogs.”  A more specific idea would be “Dog training for dogs that keep running away, misbehaving at the dog park and barking all day causing their owners to be embarrassed about being a good dog parent and not being able to take their dog anywhere.” The more specific you can be the better.
3. “They want to learn…” is not a problem.  Instead of creating a course like “Learn how to Speak Italian”, you need to be more specific.  “Learn how to speak Italian so you can travel across Italy and speak fluently.”  Learning something is not enough.  There must be a problem you are solving for a specific audience.  “Learn how to write a book so you can get more speaking engagements and make more money” is more specific than just “Learn how to write a book.”
4. Your course is NOT for everyone.  You don’t want a course that is vanilla, you want to have a course that is for a very specific person.  You want to reach a small segment of the market rather than trying to reach everyone.  To do that, you need to define who your ideal customer is, and you do that by figuring out what symptoms they are having in their life.  Problem: Stress in their marriage.  Symptoms: Fighting with spouse, unable to communicate effectively, having lots of misunderstandings, etc.  So, think about the symptoms people have.  
5. Close the “Illusion to Reality Gap”.  You are the expert in solving the problem, your audience is not.  Here is what the “Illusion to Reality Gap” looks like:  

A                              B                                C

————————————————————>

A = Where they are today. B = Where they are when they buy your product.  C = Where they are when they finish your product.

• The Illusion to Reality GAP is between point A and point B
• The product gap is between point B and point C.

Most course creators will try to go from Point A to Point C in their free and launch content.

There are 3 parts your audience goes through to be ready to buy your product:

• The problem – Do they know they have a problem? Maybe they think it’s normal to have the problem.  Do they understand the expert level problem?  What do they say about the problem? What do they think about the problem?  What do they think about themselves regarding the problem?  What are they trying to do about the problem?  How do they feel about the problem?    What myths or misconceptions do they have about the problem?  What beliefs do they have about the problem?  What mistakes they are currently making?  None of this is salesy, but it moves them closer to being ready to buy the product and it’s valuable without giving away the paid content.
• The solution – Why your course is the solution they need to solve their problem.
• Your Product – What results, benefits and transformation will people get by purchasing your online course?

Your audience isn’t the expert – they don’t know everything about the problem yet.

They might not even know they have a problem.

We want to be intentional with our content so that it helps move people through the Illusion to Reality gap.

1. Pick a name for your course that will resonate with your ideal audience.  For example, “How to get [desired outcome] without [usual problem].  [Number] Simple Steps to [desired outcome] without [unusual problem].  How to get [desired outcome] in [a short time] without [usual problem.].
2. Talk to your ideal audience and learn their language and how they talk about the problem they are having.  For example, how do they describe the problem, what are their challenges, what have they tried to overcome the problem, what negative feelings do they have about the problem, what are their fears, why haven’t they been able to solve the problem.
3. Identify Your Ideal Customer by figuring out who is NOT the right person for your course.  Let’s go back to the example about dog training.  Maybe the wrong person for your course is someone who is too busy to work with the dog, who expects instant results and who is not committed to the goal long term.  Once you know who your course is NOT for, you will get more clarity on who it is for.  (Someone who is committed long term, who has time to invest with their dog and knows that it will take up to 3/6/9 months to achieve).
4. Be clear on the outcome your student will get when they finish your course.  For example, if your course is on how to write a book so you can get speaking engagements and 10x your income, then what outcome will they get at the end of the course?  Will they have 3 paid speaking engagements?  Will they have 5 free speaking engagements?  Be very clear.  Going back to the example on dog training, will the result be that they have a well-behaved dog that you can take to the dog park, that doesn’t jump on strangers and doesn’t bark all day.
5. Create a system that takes them from where they are now to the result they want.  Having a step-by-step system is how you can take them from having the problem to solving the problem.  Example:  10 Steps to having a Well-Behaved dog that you can take to the dog park, that doesn’t jump on visitors in your home or strangers on walks and that doesn’t bark all day.

Now that you’ve taken a deep dive into what problem you solve, who your ideal audience is, and what the results are that your course will deliver, it’s time to validate before you create.

You can:

• Research the market to see if there are other successful online courses out there on this topic.
• Check Skillshare or Udemy to see if there are courses on this topic.
• Look on Amazon to see if there are books written on this topic.
• Use SEO software and see how many searches there are per month on this topic.

Once you’ve done that and you are confident in your topic and that there is a market for it, then to truly validate before you create you need to follow these 7 steps:

1. Put up a sales page
2. Market to your ideal audience 
3. Find your ideal audience on social media and create a free Facebook group if you don’t have an audience already.
4. Warm up your audience with emails and posts about your upcoming course.
5. Create a free lead magnet related to your topic and have people sign up for it.
6. Create a waiting list form  and get 50-100 people on your waiting list.
7. Pre-sell your course at “Beta” pricing to your waiting list.  If you have enough buyers, then create the course.  (You can drip the lessons out weekly as you create.

Yes, there is a lot of work to validate your idea, but you don’t want to create a course that no one wants.  So invest in doing the research and validating first… so you save yourself time, money and energy in the long run.

If you want to create your own online course with a small audience that makes 6 figures, sign up for the waitlist for Course Cash Cow, HERE.