What is Your Promise in Teaching Online?

You are trying to create a course to sell online.

Have you thought about your Big Promise, which clarifies the goal of your online course for your students?

Hi, this is Dr. Echo, the creator of Teaching Online 123.

I discussed the importance of knowing who your target market is in my previous video. Today I will talk about your Why, What & How. These are all related to your big promise, the Transformational Statement, which I call TS. I believe setting up your TS is one of the most critical steps in teaching online.

What are your answers if your potential students ask: Why should I buy your course? What unique and valuable skills will I learn from your course that I won’t get from anywhere else? How is your course going to change my life?

You may tell them your Big Promise is the cornerstone of your course. The TS will inform you when you start creating your messages & content moving forward. And more importantly, it will show your ideal students how you will help them.

There are four super important questions you need to ask yourself.

#1 Who… are you going to help, or who are your ideal students?

As this was covered in the previous video, I will just summarize it here in a short sentence: Who are your ideal students – who is the perfect fit for your course?

#2 Why… do they need your help, or what are their pain points?

You must ask yourself, what are the problems that your ideal students are experiencing. What is keeping them awake during the night? What are the struggles in their career or family life? How are you going to help them remove the pain? How are their lives going to be transformed if this pain is removed?

#3 What… are they going to learn from you, or what are the values of your course?

Beyond the content & materials such as videos, PDF files, PPTs, worksheets, etc., what unique knowledge & information are you offering that they will not find from anywhere else? For example, you may offer struggling artists how you can help them sell their artwork; you may offer strategies to help high school students earn perfect ACT or SAT scores in a short time; you may offer the techniques to adults how to sing opera, or you may teach people how to learn a 2nd language quickly.

#4 How… are they going to be transformed, or what are the benefits they will learn from you?

This is indeed a “golden ticket” in selling your course. It will show your students the real solution to an important, or even life-saving issue. For instance, I have dreamed of playing piano since I was a little girl. If you teach piano, how are you going to show me an easy way to learn playing piano as an adult? Another example, if someone has been suffering from migraines for a long time, how are you going to help heal her or him? To me, #4 is the end result you will help your students achieve, and it may even change their lives in a very positive way.

So, here is a sentence with blanks for you to fill and create your own TS:

I help [Ideal Students]

with [Pain Points]

learn [Value]

so they can achieve [These Benefits].

Here is my sample:

I help [educators]

who are [underpaid & underappreciated]

learn [how to create & sell their online courses]

so they can [earn more income and make a greater impact to the world]