Pre-Selling Your Online Course: A 5-Step Strategy for Success

The Power of Pre-Selling Your Online Course

Creating an online course can be a game-changing move for your business. But what if you could generate revenue, build confidence, and validate your course idea before investing time and resources into developing it? That's where pre-selling comes in.

In this comprehensive guide, we'll explore a proven 5-step strategy for pre-selling your online course. This approach has helped entrepreneurs across various niches generate substantial income and build thriving online education businesses.

The Three C's of Online Course Success

Before diving into the strategy, it's crucial to understand the three key factors that set the foundation for a successful online course:

1. Cash flow: Generating revenue in your business provides proof of concept and financial stability for growth.
2. Client results: Quickly testing your program with real people allows you to gather social proof, which is essential for scaling and longevity.
3. Confidence: Taking action and getting your idea into the world builds your confidence in what you have to offer.

Keeping these factors in mind, let's explore the 5-step strategy for pre-selling your online course.

Step 1: Make Your Program Sellable

The first step in pre-selling your online course is to make it sellable. This involves creating a unique selling proposition (USP) or transformation statement that clearly communicates the value of your program.

Creating Your Unique Selling Proposition

To craft your USP, fill in the following blanks:

"I help [target audience] go from [current state] so that they can [desired outcome]."

or

"I have gone from [previous state] to [current state] so that I was able to [achieved outcome]."

This statement should focus on the transformation you provide, not just information. People pay for expertise and efficiency in achieving results, not just access to information.

Example USP

Here's an example of a powerful USP from two successful course creators:

"We help highly motivated, driven people who are successful in every other area of their life go from suffering with their health, being distracted, disorganized, fatigued, stressed, demotivated, and off track to organized, ultra-focused, energetic, motivated, and plugged into a strategic daily health and self-care system that provides high-level, healthy, and motivating accountability and clear action steps so that they can experience improved health, increased confidence and joy, and a high sense of accomplishment and decreased stress so that they can flourish in all areas of their lives."

By clearly defining who you help, how you help them, and what the desired outcome is, you create a program that efficiently focuses on delivering results for your clients.

Step 2: Become Magnetic to Your Ideal Clients

Once you've made your program sellable, the next step is to become magnetic to your ideal clients. This involves identifying three key factors:

1. Who your ideal clients are specifically
2. The tipping point where they are most ready and willing to invest in themselves
3. The desired outcome they're seeking

Identifying Your Ideal Client

Using the example from Step 1, we can break down these factors:

1. Specific ideal client: Highly motivated, driven people who are successful in every other area of their life
2. Tipping point: Experiencing health issues and setbacks, particularly related to gut health, that are affecting their overall well-being and happiness
3. Desired outcome: Becoming organized, ultra-focused individuals who are confident, healthy, happy, and have low stress due to consistency in their daily overall health routine and system

Finding Your Ideal Clients

Once you've identified these factors, you can start finding your ideal clients. Here are some strategies:

1. Leverage your internal network: Reach out to friends, family, and professional contacts who fit your ideal client description or might know someone who does.
2. Utilize online platforms: Join relevant Facebook groups, engage with Instagram accounts in your niche, and participate in YouTube comments sections where your ideal clients are likely to be.
3. Conduct research conversations: Reach out to potential clients and ask for brief conversations to better understand their needs and challenges.

Key Questions to Ask Potential Clients

When building relationships with potential clients, ask these questions:

1. What are your biggest frustrations related to [your niche]?
2. What is your biggest fear about [the problem you solve]?
3. Where do you need the most support right now?
4. If you could wave a magic wand and fix this issue, what would life look like?

By focusing on building relationships and understanding your ideal clients' needs, you create a foundation for a successful pre-sale.

Step 3: Create a Curriculum Outline

Before fully developing your course content, create a curriculum outline based on your research and understanding of your ideal clients' needs.

Building Your Curriculum Outline

1. Identify the starting point (Zero state) of your ideal client
2. Define the end goal (Hero outcome) you want to help them achieve
3. Map out the key steps or modules needed to take them from Zero to Hero
4. List the main topics or lessons within each module

Remember, at this stage, you're only creating an outline. Don't invest time in developing full content yet, as you may need to make adjustments based on feedback from your first group of students.

Step 4: Offer Them What They Want

Now that you have a community of potential clients and a curriculum outline, it's time to make your offer.

Making Your Offer

1. Reach out to the people you've connected with during your research phase
2. Explain how you've created a program based on their input and needs
3. Offer them the opportunity to be part of the first group to go through the program
4. Highlight the benefits of being an early adopter, such as personalized attention and the ability to shape the course

Example Outreach Message

"Hi [Name],

I wanted to thank you for sharing your experiences and challenges with [problem] during our conversation. Based on what you and others have shared, I've developed a program designed to [desired outcome]. I'd love to offer you the opportunity to be part of the first group to go through this program. As an early participant, you'll receive personalized attention and have the chance to shape the course for future students. Would you be interested in learning more?"

Step 5: Deliver and Iterate

The final step is to deliver your course and continuously improve it based on feedback.

Delivering Your Course

1. Deliver your curriculum live in a "Profitable Offer Prototype" (POP) format
2. Use simple tools like Google Docs, Google Sheets, and Zoom for your first delivery
3. Gather feedback from participants after each session
4. Make real-time adjustments to improve the course as you go

Iterating and Improving

1. Analyze the feedback and results from your first group of students
2. Identify areas for improvement in content, delivery, or structure
3. Implement changes for the next iteration of your course
4. Consider pre-packaging the improved version as an evergreen course for future sales

Real-World Success Story

To illustrate the power of this pre-selling strategy, let's look at a real-world example from two course creators, Molly and Lindsay:

1. They initially planned to launch a course without proper validation but decided to use this pre-selling strategy instead.
2. They set a goal of enrolling 20 students for their POP course.
3. Due to high demand, they expanded to 30 students and generated $56,250 in revenue.
4. Within 10 days of launching, they began receiving positive testimonials and social proof from their students.

This success story demonstrates how pre-selling can generate cash flow, build confidence in your offer, and provide early client results – all crucial factors for long-term success.

Conclusion: The Benefits of Pre-Selling Your Online Course

Pre-selling your online course offers numerous benefits:

1. Validation: Confirm there's a market for your course before investing time and resources into full development.
2. Cash flow: Generate revenue upfront to fund course creation and business growth.
3. Confidence: Build belief in your offer and your ability to deliver results.
4. Client feedback: Gather valuable insights to improve your course in real-time.
5. Social proof: Collect testimonials and success stories to use in future marketing efforts.
6. Community building: Create a group of engaged, invested students who can become advocates for your course.

By following this 5-step strategy, you can set yourself up for success in the competitive world of online education. Remember, the key is to focus on providing transformation, not just information, and to continuously iterate and improve based on real-world results and feedback.

Whether you're a seasoned entrepreneur or just starting out, pre-selling your online course can be the catalyst for creating a thriving, impactful, and profitable online education business. So take action, connect with your ideal clients, and start building the course that will change lives – including your own.

Article created from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SpUPnNfitzc