Shownotes
Creating and marketing an online course for psychologists and therapists part 1: Creating a freebie to grow your online audience
This is the first episode in our series on how to effectively develop and market an online course. This series is designed for any psychologist or therapist that is thinking about developing an online course as a passive or semi passive income stream but the strategies we talk about are equally useful for any other product or service that aims to help lots of people at once. So keep listening even if your dream is a book or a resource pack or an app rather than a course.
It might seem weird that we are talking about creating a freebie before we start thinking about your overall online course. This is actually a very important part of your strategy for two reasons. Firstly because if no one downloads your freebie you may need to re-evaluate the topic of your course and secondly because in order to sell an online course you will need at least a few hundred people on your list (even to sell just a handful) so you need to get cracking right away.
Later in the series we will have episodes on how to create a landing page for your freebie, how to promote your freebie, how to create engaging course content, and how to eventually sell your course via email marketing to the people who have downloaded your freebie. I will be bringing in experts along the way to give their input and I will be sharing my experiences too.
So with that, I am excited to get going with part one!
Why should psychologists and therapists create a freebie to sell an online course?
You can't expect people to trust you enough to buy your online course based on an advert, or even a google search. People need to develop a relationship with you before they can trust you with their time and resources. The best way of developing this relationship is collecting contact information for people who you know are definitely interested in what you are offering. You can then regularly contact them with valuable free content and information about your paid products and services. In a nutshell a freebie helps you to:
- Grow a list of interested ideal clients for a product or service.
- Create a stable base of interested people to promote future products or services to.
- Create an audience you can talk to when designing products + services.
- Create a valuable asset for your business that gives you something to sell when you retire see the episode on the three marketing strategies to read/hear more about the importance of online audience building.
When should a psychologist or therapist create a freebie to sell an online course?
It is beneficial to start growing your email list as soon as you have an inkling you might want to create an online course or other passive income product. However, a few things need to be in place first.
- Consistent revenue from your core practice (focus on high touch relationship building if you are still struggling, listen to the podcast episode on this here).
- You need a good understanding of your ideal client for the online course you want to create and what they need. If you don’t have that yet then go back to our episode on finding your ideal clients here.
- You need to have created some "cornerstone" content. See our episode on blogging here.
- You need a GDPR compliant email marketing software set up to collect emails. Check out mail chimp, convert kit and active campaign.
What should a good freebie for selling an online course contain?
A good freebie solves a problem for your ideal client. It should take them one step closer to the overall goal that your paid product or service will help them achieve.
Examples:
1.
Ideal client: Psychologists and therapists feeling burned out in PP
Problem:They want to create an online course but don’t know how
Freebie: Template to create the perfect freebie to start growing your email list
Main Course: Complete online course showing how to create and market an online course
2.
Ideal client: Parents of toddlers who are seen as “difficult”
Problem: They want to shout less and be a calmer parent
Freebie: Three ways to a more peaceful dinner time with your toddlers
Main Course: Calm parenting course
3.
Ideal client: Executives feeling burned out at work
Problem: Work/life boundaries are a mess
Freebie: Three ways to say no to your boss without annoying them
Main Course: Create the work/life balance you deserve. 12 week programme
There must be a logical thread that links your freebie to your paid offer. This is important because you don't want to spam people who are not interested with information about products or services that aren't relevant. It is also crucial because, when you grow your business, you will likely start paying facebook or google to bring people to your freebie. If your freebie is very specific and only interesting to people who would also want your paid offers you will make your money back.
How to structure your freebie
The best freebies are short and sweet as people are busy and they have not fully committed to learning with you yet. Checklists, step by step" how to" guides and video tutorials all work well. You can also use a webinar as a freebie but these require higher commitment from people so can be more difficult to attract people to if they don't know you at all. Whatever format you choose the following elements should be included:
Name the pain. Let your ideal client know in 2 sentences that you understand their problem and remind them of why they downloaded your freebie (or attended your webinar)
Name the solution. One sentence or two about how your guide will help.
3- 5 action steps. This is where you give your valuable advice on how to solve their problem. Keep it short and friendly to the overwhelmed mind. Remember it is better to give practical help and just link to the theory behind it as this is all about moving them forward fast.
Call to action. 1-2 sentences about how they can get further support from you. Ideally a clear next step such as "book a call" or "check out the full programme!” You will follow this up with emails you send to them.
Note about the author. I like to put a little picture of me and a few words about what I do at the end of longer freebies. I think it helps to build the relationship.
Top tip!
Plan all this out on one sheet of paper before you start creating. That way you can make sure you don't create something too big and overwhelming and you can sense-check that the golden thread that leads to your paid offer is really clear throughout. Download our free guide/template that walks you through creating your first, value packed freebie here.
I hope that episode has got you bursting with ideas about a freebie you can create to start growing your email list. The most important thing is not to hold off waiting for “perfect.” You will achieve great things if you let yourself get started today.
Want more support?
The Do More Than Therapy membership is the perfect place to gain the knowledge and skills you need to grow your creative projects, make more impact and do all of it without burning out. If monthly expert masterclasses, in depth courses and a community of like-minded professionals sounds good to you then check out our membership options here.
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Links:
Podcast Episode 76: Marketing strategies for psychologists and therapists: Three styles of marketing to get more therapy clients or grow your practice: https://psychologybusinessschool.com/the-business-of-psychology/marketing-strategies-for-psychologists-and-therapists-three-styles-of-marketing-to-get-more-therapy-clients-or-grow-your-practice/
Podcast Episode 19: How psychologists and therapists can use an ideal client avatar to co create and market their services: https://psychologybusinessschool.com/the-business-of-psychology/ideal-client-avatar-psychologists-therapists-marketing/
Podcast Episode 34: What you should be blogging about: Choosing topics and titles for your psychology blog: https://psychologybusinessschool.com/the-business-of-psychology/titles-for-psychology-blogs/
Creating and selling an online course for psychologists and therapists part 1: Creating a freebie to grow your online audience: https://psychologybusinessschool.com/create-and-sell-online-course-psychologists-therapists-part-one/
Do More Than Therapy Membership: https://psychologybusinessschool.com/the-do-more-than-therapy-membership/
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Do you dream of creating an online course? Are you desperate to reach more people but sceptical that you can ACTUALLY make it work?
The truth is a lot of online courses do fail but that isn't because the content is bad. It is because the marketing strategy sucks. The truth is your marketing isn't a separate thing. Talking to the community you want to serve should be part of the development of the course.
Getting to know them, giving them free resources and building relationships WHILE you build your course in the background is the key to success that most psychologists and therapists launching courses miss.
Well not you! Because you can download my free course creation guide and get yourself on the right track to creating a course people actually want and need.
The guide talks you through the first, essential steps you must take when planning your course so you can avoid the expensive mistakes I see so many well-intentioned people making.
Get yours at PsychologyBusinessSchool.com now.
https://psychologybusinessschool.com/creating-a-valuable-freebie-psychologist-course-creation
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Thank you for listening to this week's episode of the Business of Psychology podcast. If you share my passion for doing more than therapy, then make sure you come over and join my free Do More Than Therapy Facebook community, where you can work on getting your big ideas off the ground with like minded psychologists and therapists. I'd also love it if you could leave the show a five star review wherever you listen to your podcasts. It will help more of the people who need it to find it.
