Comment by DeusExMachina | Hacker News Reader

Comment by DeusExMachina | Hacker News Reader

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> I have over 40,000 students taking my online courses and they have generated a few thousand in gross revenues.

I have 400, and I made a living out of it for the past couple of years.

Sure, I was earning more when I was a freelancer. So, I guess his point stands, I am losing money in that sense. And if money was the only metric, he would be spot on. But money is not the only reason.

It's also true that most people just wing it, thinking they will make easy money online. And then, fail.

But well, guess what. Business is hard work. Any business. Creating educational material is not any different. A lot of work goes into positioning, copywriting, marketing, and sales. I would like to see his.

I know many people making excellent money with online courses. A couple of them are in the bi-weekly business mastermind I attend. Heck, if Apple didn't introduce SwiftUI two years ago, forcing me to re-do my courses from scratch, I too would be doing great, instead of just OK. But well, that's just "cost of doing business".

So, saying "you are going to lose money with online courses" is the same as saying "you are going to lose money if you start a business". I don't think that's a sentiment shared here on HN.

May I ask how you're able to make a living for several years with only 400 students? Do you sell each course for like $500 or more?

Yes, my basic course is $500. My advanced one is $1.000 and it's probably underpriced. Most of my students buy both courses.

Not OP: Probably a monthly membership program, $25 per student per month would be $10k gross.

Ionic Academy is a good example I can think of, I was a member for just under a year, super helpful and regular content and probably doesn’t need huge amounts of members to be viable

I guess that's true. I didn't really consider monthly fees for a course from one person. But then I would say that he/she probably didn't have 400 students in total, but instead 400 subscribed students at all times. Unless each student stayed subscribed for several years, which I find unlikely unless he/she releases new high quality content every week.

Yeah, Simon Grimm from Ionic Academy releases a big course about every 6-8 weeks I think and two or three minis in between

i actually hate subscriptions like those, both as a customer and as a seller.

I prefer to buy/offer a high value course with a price that matches it. I bought several of such corses myself in the past years.

I do offer payment plans for people that can't pay a big lump of money at once, but that's not a subscription they can stop. They still have to pay all installments.

that is awesome! Are you using a platform like Udemy or something on your own? I'm also curious if you are publishing courses in areas you are genuinely interested in or strictly doing for income?

If I did it strictly for income, I would have gone out of business long ago. I am an iOS developer and I teach iOS development.

I obviously don't love every aspect of it, but still. Income is not a good motivator, especially when you are on your own. You have to like most of what you do, including the business side. I do write code, but most of my time is spent on text for articles, courses, emails, sales pages and video transcripts.

Regarding the technology, I use Wordpress with a couple of plugins. On Udemy you have to compete with a ton of low-priced low-quality stuff and you have no way to differentiate yourself from that.

makes sense. congrats!!

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