Before we get started with the Thinkific setup, are you a teacher looking to make money on the side? Last week, I started researching the online teaching platforms that allows you to put up your course, start enrolling students & start charging for your expertise.
Click here for the seven online teaching platforms if you want to view more teaching options. There was one clear winner out of all the ones that I reviewed, and that is Thinkific.
Thinkific allows you to put up three courses for free while also not charging you revenue split. Now, you can build up your classroom, start making money with little to no risk to you.
Let's walk through how to get started with Thinkfic.
Step 1: Visit Thinkific.com
Once you are on the website, as shown below, enter your email address then click on ‘GET STARTED FREE’.
Step 2: Create a Thinkific Account
You will be redirected to a registration form like the one shown below. Enter your details, name and email then choose a password and finally, click on ‘Create your account’.
Next, you will be redirected to a page, as shown below, where you will share about your teaching experience and the course. All you need to do is select an option that best describes you, your experience and your course.
Once you answer a question, the next question will be displayed. As shown below. Just answer all the questions and then click on ‘start creating courses’.
Step 3: Get Started with Thinkific
After the above step, you will be redirected to the next section as shown below. In this section, there is a quick video tour of Thinkific. If you're looking for a promotion or discount, check here.
It's important that you love what you're teaching. The teachers who are not passionate about their topic are not as successful as those who are ready to master their craft. Are you ready to master your teaching craft?
This section will also allow you to add your course name, select a primary color as well as upload your logo. You can also preview your course player here.
Step 4: Build Your High Demand Course
After getting started, it is now time to build the course.
Everything you think about marketing and building a business is counter-intuitive to what is actually happening. I used to think that no competition was a good thing for breaking into markets, but I realize that HIGH COMPETITION means that people are buying.
Make sure your course idea has a high market demand by conducting quick viable option tests. Do a quick search to see if you people are talking about it?
Use Google Trends to see if people have an interest in it. I chose “I Love Making Money” because that trend will never die and has a solid flat line of interest meaning that the interest has stayed exactly the same over a period of time, and since I have 8 different income streams, I love talking about making money strategies.
To start working on your course, click on the ‘START BUILDING’ button. This will direct you to click on ‘MANAGE LEARNING CONTENT’ which is in the sidebar menu as shown below.
Once you open the menu, click on ‘courses’. This will display all your courses as shown below. Thinkific allows you to build three courses for free.
To add a course, click on the ‘+ NEW COURSE’ button that is on the top right corner. Next, select a template (preferably the blank template) as shown below:
After selecting a template, enter the course name as shown below:
And then click on ‘CREATE COURSE’. This will create the course and redirect you to the course page as shown below:
Step 5: Upload Course Content to Complete Thinkific Setup
Marketing 101 – This is one skill I'm trying to master for the 2020's. Copywriting for Marketing. Everything about your course should transform your student from a beginning point of problem to the end point of problem solved.
You'll want to make sure each of your lessons details how your course will help them when they enroll in it.
- What skills will they be able to demonstrate?
- What is the outcome for the new student?
- Is there new knowledge they will obtain?
These are the “learning outcomes” that become important selling factors when you gather your course content.
The Thinkific course page will allow you to upload your course content. To add a new chapter, click on ‘ADD CHAPTER‘ at the bottom left corner. It will allow you to add a chapter title and save the chapter as shown below:
Next, you will be able to add course content in the form of a lesson as shown below. To do this, click on ‘ADD LESSON’ on the left. This will allow you to select the lesson type including assessments as shown below:
Most Engaging and Effective Delivery for Course Curriculum
As you can see, Thinkific makes building an online course as easy as possible. You can then upload the course content depending on its type. To upload content, click on the lesson type.
I find that videos make for the most engaging and effective delivery. I like mixing videos with worksheets and adding a pop quiz after each module.
There are two types of content creators: one who plans and creates all the media in advance, uploads it all at once. One who outlines and then makes the content as they go. I'm the latter. I like creating the outline and then, crafting each module with visual, quizzes and videos. Then, moving on to the next module in the lesson plan.
If you want to upload a video, click on ‘video’ and you will be able to select and upload the video file as shown below:
To upload a file, click on ‘SELECT FILE’ which will allow you to select a file from your computer and upload it. Finally, click on Save which is at the bottom right corner to save the uploaded lesson content.
If you have a lot of content that you need to upload, click on the ‘Bulk importer’ tab and it will allow you to select multiple files and upload as shown below:
Step 6: Pricing
Congratulations on uploading your first Thinkific course! We now need to move on to pricing which is a very important step. To price your course, click on the pricing tab and you’ll be able to add pricing as shown below:
When you are on a free plan as an instructor, you can only offer two pricing options which are either Free or One-time payment. To offer subscriptions, memberships and monthly plans, you may need to upgrade your plan.
The more you specialize in your topic, the higher price you can charge. For example, if you're a life coach who helps people lose weight or stop drinking, you can charge more for your specialization.
We'll talk about a specific marketing strategy that I recommend when launching your course.
Step 7: Publish
After uploading the course content and pricing your course, then you can publish the course and students from all over the world can access it. For seamless publishing, first, ensure you have verified your email address. Second, if you are anticipating a large number of students to access the course after its launch, ensure you let Thinkific know beforehand. This will allow Thinkific to ensure your site is at optimal performance and can handle a high number of students.
To publish the course, just click on the ‘published’ option and click save as shown below.
You can then preview your course by clicking on the ‘Preview Course’ button that is on the top right corner. If you think anything needs to be changed at this point, you can always go back and make the changes as needed.
Step 8: Build your Landing Page
This step is very important in ensuring your students have a great experience and your course has great aesthetics. On the top right corner, click on ‘Build Landing Page’. This will allow you to customize your online school and courses’ landing page.
Step 9: Make Money
After publishing your course, now it's time to make money! Thinkific can be a great source of passive income. I recommend spending 80% of your time marketing and 20% of your time teaching.
Easy Marketing Strategy for Your Online Course
There are three ways that I've seen to successfully market your course. The concept is called “Move the Free Line”. You'll want to give out valuable content across every channel you can find. I recommend picking three main channels: TikTok, Facebook, YouTube.
Take a concept and teach it on TikTok or Facebook or YouTube. These teaching videos are small 1 minute videos that pack a punch. The idea is to grow your following by giving value that builds trust.
Remember, your course is closed at this point.
Then, when you open your course up for students, you will go to your new following on TikTok, YouTube and Facebook to let them know that the doors are open for ten days.
Then, close the doors & put up a waiting list. Use this list for the next launch and the next launch and the next launch…
And here's the retention part: each time you upload a new video, send an email out to your list. Over time, that will boost your views and subscribers which help boost your views and subscribers.
Finally, ask your students for feedback & reviews so you can become the best teacher for your craft. When people see the reviews and feedback, that will increase the number of signups. I'm excited to see what you create & come up with. Drop a link below to your new course.
If you have any questions or need anything added to this account setup, please let me know in the comments below.
