Hi, Mums!
Wish all of you are well, specially with all these pandemic circumstances.
Today I am making an update of what I have been doing and let you know about my new challenge : give you a new article every day 7 of a month. I won’t promise but I will definitely try to stick to it.
To write every week is so challenging at the moment.
My three children are not even in primary school. Two of them just have 3 hours in the morning in kindergarten and the baby is with me all the time , so only at night I can work or study properly ( and sometimes I must tell you that I fall asleep while breastfeeding my baby. There are days I just feel exhausted).
But let’s talk about improvements …
What I made these last months:
1)SEPTEMBER 2020 – I launched a course ( the first one , you can see HERE).
2)DECEMBER 2020 – I launched another course.
3)JANUARY 2021 – I made MY WEBSITE about Portuguese language. A kind of complement to the courses and a way to promote it too. It is still very incomplete and with just a few articles but you can have a look here: 123Portuguese.com
4)Also in January I started a YOUTUBE CHANNEL called 123Portuguese to put videos in 123Portuguese.com website . I am making some videos with explanations ( not as complete as the ones I have in my course) and other real-life context videos that I record with my phone and edit after in Lumiafusion or iMovie ). Once a month , sometimes twice a month, I put new videos.
5) MARCH 2021 – I bought a one year subscription to the most basic plan of TEACHABLE, but I must tell you I feel I took a very wrong decision.
TEACHABLE has advantages and disadvantages as the ones I will mention here:
ADVANTAGES:
– you can build up your “school” in a very personalized way and sell your courses there.
-The website structure is basically done and made in blocks, so is easier for you to buil it up faster .
– You pay just 5 per cent of commission, if you have the most basic plan as mine or even less if you pay more. So at the end you can earn more when selling your courses.
– You can choose different kinds of payment plans. There is a flexibility good for both teachers and students: unlimited access forever, yearly or monthly plan subscription.
DISADVANTAGES:
– Is a platform that does not make the marketing for you. You basically build your website there, you can upload the courses there and sell it. But they do not do anything to help you selling ( yes, they have support in case you need help but you must do all and you must promote your own website alone).
– Apparently they charge only 5 percent of commission but then imagine the following situation: you sell in a year your course for 20 students ( I know it can sound pessimistic, but remember in my case I have a few time to do digital marketing); you sell the plan for an yearly subscription or , worse, for an unlimited time. Then you want to stop paying teachable because you find you are not selling much and that what you sell just pays what you paid them for the yearly subscription.
Then guess what? You created a yearly subscription plan. You cannot give up because student A bought the course in January, but student D bought it right in the month you wanted to cancel the subscription and he ( or she) bought the course for an year, so you cannot leave your student in a bad situation. It would be fraudulent and spot your image as an instructor . At the end you will have to keep paying yearly to Teachable.
I really do not like this last part, so before starting to sell I am really hesitating if I should move on ( my “pay” button is still deactivated. I think I just rushed !)
If you can dedicate time to your website and make all the digital marketing necessary , then go ahead!Teachable can be for you.
Udemy is really practical for a busy mum.
They make the marketing for you ( and well, for your competitors too).
However there is this big disadvantage: at the end you just earn a very small percentage of what you are selling ( they regularly put courses prices with discount values and with their commission and other extra commissions you basically do not get a lot).
I can tell you I am selling my most popular course for $24,99 ( by popular let me say I just sold it to 120 people) .
At the end , I end up earning just between 1 to 5 dollars per course sold . Only if students click in the link I put above to you ( which is called a “promotional link” ) I can get a higher percentage.
However, in Udemy you are not sticking to a yearly subscription as in Teachable ( yes, you also have a free option in Teachable but with many limitations) and in Udemy you upload your course for free . You can let it there and you can upload the amount of courses you want . You pay through commissions but still, they make all for you. You just need to teach.
That, for me, is a big plus.
The ideal would be to sell courses in your own website too as a complement but I do not know already how to do it, because some programming skills are needed and also space to upload them. If you know how let me know.
For now wish you a good and healthy month!
“See you” the 7th May!