Modern technology has opened up boundless opportunities for educators to share their knowledge and expertise online and make money. The growth of the online education market is attractive for many entrepreneurs. If you are thinking about starting an online school, you are on the right track. With a carefully crafted business plan and access to the best technology, you can build an online education Start-up to broaden the reach.
With online learning becoming the new norm, online classrooms are becoming an easy and convenient way for tutors who want to share their expertise to help people sharpen their knowledge and acquire new skills.
This blog is a step-by-step guide that will take you through the essential steps you need to follow to establish your online education business.
Table of Contents
Understand and research your target audience
Before you start building your online education business, perform in-depth market research to identify and understand your target audience better. Find out what your target audience is interested in, how much they are willing to spend on education, whether they prefer free or paid courses, and whether they will buy certificates.
To understand the preference of your target students, study their behaviour on social networks. If you know the essential needs of your students, you will be able to create your classes in a way that addresses the real needs of your learners.
Perform a competitor analysis
Competitor analysis is inevitable as it gives significant insights to your competitors and their learner base. For example, you can compare your business plan with the functioning of the online classroom of your competitor to identify what you lack and what opportunities you are missing. Conducting a competitor analysis will help you understand the features you must add to your online classroom to differentiate yourself in the market.
Select the revenue model
Choosing a revenue model for your online education Startup is a very critical step in building a successful business. Here are some ways with which you can make money out of your online classes.
- Pay per class or courses
This is the simplest and very basic business model where you change your learners for the individual online classes or courses. When you are starting out, your target audience might not be willing to subscribe to your services. In that case, this business model works great as they don’t have to commit to a long-term relationship with your eLearning brand.
- Charging subscriptions
Charging your students for monthly or yearly subscriptions to access your eLearning content is another business model you can adopt. When your target learners have trust in your brand due to its authenticity and reputation in the market, they will be willing to buy your membership plans.
- Charge for certification
Charging your learners for certifications is another way by which your eLearning website can make money. You can either combine this revenue model with other revenue models to make some extra money or offer your courses for free and just charge for certificates.
- Affiliate marketing
Running affiliate programs includes both direct and online sales channels opportunities. You can earn commissions when your learners make a purchase through the link you have placed on your website. Affiliate programs are generally easy to set up, and you can start earning commissions right away and in the long run.
Differentiate your online education business
As online education is booming right now, there are plenty of online education businesses in the industry. Hence it becomes more important for you to differentiate your online tutoring business from the fierce competition. If you don’t want to focus on a general offering, you can focus on a specific niche and create your online tutoring service around it.
Having unique offerings in your online tutoring website will help your learners come back to your website for more. Start with a small niche, and once you expand your learner base, you can widen your niches.
Create your own online tutoring website
The most important step in establishing your own online education business is to build your online tutoring website. Before getting into creating your tutoring platform, choose the development method. The simplest and convenient way of creating your online tutoring site is to use an open-source eLearning software with basic and advanced features and an integrated tool for scheduling live classes and hosting self-paced online courses. In addition, selecting an online tutoring software like Pinlearn helps you to create and customize your online tutoring platform.
Choose a pricing strategy
As a thumb rule again, never price your online classes or courses for low price thinking to please your target audience. Yes, there might be several classes priced at a low price than yours in the market. But, the best bet is to quote your offerings based on the value it provides and the efforts you have put in. Also, do not blindly copy the price plans of your competitors, no matter how successful they are. You can definitely analyze their pricing plans to understand the market pricing trends, but not adopt the same.
Market your online education business
Once you have an eLearning website in place, you can start promoting your online education business. First, create a dedicated page for your brand on popular social networks where your target audience regularly visits. Second, make sure you create meaningful and engaging conversations with your target audience to bring them to your eLearning site. Third, implement a combination of marketing practices like email marketing, social media marketing, paid advertising, influencer marketing, etc., to attract learners to our new venture and to grow your business.
Conclusion
Online education is one of the thriving industries that takes less effort and minimal costs to enter if you plan it right and ensure the right technologies and tools. Approach your online education business with a strategic mindset and a carefully crafted business plan. Make sure you do thorough market research to study your target audience and their preferences which is an essential step towards building a successful eLearning business. Consider each online class as a great opportunity to deliver the best learning experience to your students.
