7 Top Tips For Marketing Your Online Course with Niharikaa Sodhi

Everyone has knowledge to share, so it’s no surprise that online courses have taken off in a big way. In fact, they are now a saturated market. With online course completion rates at an all-time low, marketing an online course is no walk in the park.

Mia was joined on the podcast by Niharikaa Sodhi, a top writer on Medium (21 times over), online course creator and the Founder of Summit 21.

Here, we summarise the top tips Mia and Niharikaa shared for marketing an online course.

1. Don’t expect it to be easy.

There is so much to creating and marketing an online course that people do not see. Some might think it’s like building a website. They think, “I build a website, and all the traffic comes!”

Building a website is the easy part! Getting people to visit the website is the real work. It’s the same thing with an online course.

It isn’t passive income.

“If things were that easy, all of us would be millionaires.” - Niharikaa Sodhi

2. Confirm there is a market for your offering.

Create a product to solve a real issue that people have. Don’t first create something and then expect to sell it by making people think there’s an issue.

Are you seeing a problem that is causing people to get frustrated? If you think you can help them, then you may have a product idea.

“If you’re on Twitter or on any platform, you can see what makes people angry, what’s not working out for them, and if you think you can help them there, that’s your product. Don’t create another Twitter course because there are Twitter courses.” - Niharikaa Sodhi

Do a competitor analysis to understand what already exists and how it is being delivered. Don’t throw on the overflowing online course pile. Go out there and explore what’s already being offered. See if there’s a gap in the market where you can say, “someone is offering ‘this’, but they’re not talking about ‘this’. I’ve qualified this as a real problem that people need help with, so I’m going to build an online course around that.” If you don’t do the homework, you could be launching an inferior product that no one will buy.

Need help figuring out whether you’ve got a market for your product? Pick up the phone and ask somebody from your target market whether they need this.

3. Why should someone buy from YOU?

The online course world is a cluttered and saturated environment.

“Everybody can make a course. Everybody does have something to teach. The question is, are people going to buy it, and why would they buy it from you?” - Niharikaa Sodhi

Where is your credibility? Why should somebody learn from you?

“If you haven’t been there and done that, nobody is going to learn from you. If people are learning from me, it’s only because they’ve seen a journey. If I’m learning from somebody else, it’s only because I really do look up.” - Niharikaa Sodhi

4. Don’t reinvent the wheel.

Don’t do everything from scratch.

“I would also say, if you want an online course, do online courses. A lot of people want to create products they’ve never been a part of. Invest a few hundred dollars to see the pattern.” - Niharikaa Sodhi

Learn what works for other people. You don’t need to figure everything out on your own. There are way too many free (and paid) learning resources available. You’re doing this right now by reading this article and can learn more from Niharikaa and Mia by listening to the full episode on the Got Marketing? podcast.

5. Don’t have a huge audience? Don’t let that hold you back from creating your online course.

There are undeniable benefits to having a larger following. A large audience size indicates a healthy brand awareness and provides social proof, building your credibility. BUT a large following doesn’t guarantee sales.

“…it doesn’t help as much as you think it does. It’s not like, if I put out something on LinkedIn tomorrow to 27,000 people, 20,000 of them – or even half of them – are going to buy it. It doesn’t work that way.” - Niharikaa Sodhi

Brands should look for ethical ways to grow their audience with accounts representing their target audience. But don’t fixate on followers for followers sake.

“You don’t need to have a thousand fans. If you have 20 fans, you will make 20 sales.” - Niharikaa Sodhi

6. Focus on delivering value and service to your customers.

Be willing to invest in getting to know your customers. Don’t be in a rush to scale.

“I keep a three-month gap between my courses. That’s three months of not earning money from the course and I’m fine with that because I’m working behind the scenes to make it better. I had 30 people then 25 people. I lowered it down to 15 because I wanted to focus so much more on people and learning their problems.” - Niharikaa Sodhi

Set your course apart by providing support and accountability to your people. The most fulfilling part of being a course creator is getting to know your customers and their pain points and helping them overcome them through conversation and tailored support.

7. Pick up the phone, and TALK with your customers.

Learn as much as you can by directly talking with your customers. You will uncover valuable insights that will help improve your offerings.

“See, I’m very lazy. Most of my strategies are to get work done ASAP, to get the solutions to my problems as soon as possible, so I will just ask.”  - Niharikaa Sodhi

Listen to the full episode here, or via Spotify or Apple Podcasts.

You’ll also learn more about Niharikaa’s approach to building her brand, lessons learnt, and how her Summit 21 program came about.