The Art of Selling Online Courses

Hosted by John Ainsworth

Business Entrepreneurship Education

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Episodes

313

Latest episode

Oct 2026

Language

EN-GB

About the show

The Art of Selling Online Courses is all about online courses. The goal of this podcast is to share winning strategies and secret hacks from top performers in the online course industry. We are interviewing successful business owners, asking them questions on how they got to the point where they are right now, and checking how their ideas can help you improve your online course!

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60 recent

October 27, 2026Episode 31326 min

313 You Can’t Give Away What You Don’t Own

Send us Fan Mail Struggling with low conversions? Grab our FREE checklist of 15 must-have elements to optimize your sales pages! 👉🏼 https://datadrivenmarketing.co/elements Jeremy Siskind has won international jazz piano competitions, played on Arturo Sandoval's record, and written more than 20 instructional books. He also has 34,000 YouTube subscribers, around 5,000 people on his email list, and personally writes to every single customer who buys a book from his website. Dominik sat down with Jeremy to find out how someone builds a real course business without a viral moment, without a big launch, and without ever feeling like they're chasing attention. What came out of that conversation surprised me. Jeremy makes a strong case that you cannot teach well online until you have taught in person first, because the room reveals things a screen never will. He talked about posture, rhythm, the questions students ask when they feel safe enough to admit confusion. None of that shows up in your analytics. He also talked about his "sloppy first draft" approach to creating, why he thinks beginners are the most underserved and most important audience in almost any field, and how he treats the third-party platforms he teaches on as breadcrumbs that lead people back to him. And the thing about emailing every buyer personally? He explains exactly what that looks like and why some of those people end up staying connected to him for years. If you've been wondering whether you need to be louder or more strategic online to grow, Jeremy's answer is worth hearing. Hope you enjoy this one as much as Dominik did. Check out Jeremy's work: 🌐 http://www.jeremysiskind.com 📸 https://www.instagram.com/jsiskind2 ▶️ http://www.youtube.com/JeremySiskind/

October 26, 2026Episode 31230 min

312 More Courses Won’t Grow Your Course Business

Send us Fan Mail Janette Karaca has two million followers and built one of the biggest English learning brands online. She also came to believe that creating more courses was making things worse, not better, for her students. Dominik sat down with Janette to dig into how she got there. She started from a pretty unlikely place — she used to hate English. She failed an audition for a publishing company's YouTube channel, went home frustrated, and her husband suggested she just start her own channel instead. That became English Era. What's interesting about Janette's story isn't the audience size. It's what she noticed after building it. Year after year, the same comments kept appearing: "I know English but I can't speak it." "I freeze." "I'm scared people will judge me." And she realised she kept responding by making more courses, which gave people more content to consume passively, which was exactly the problem she was trying to solve. So she stopped. She pivoted away from launches, narrowed her audience to a very specific type of learner, and started building toward something that actually made people use the English they already had. She's honest about what she wishes she'd understood sooner, and her thinking on the difference between followers and buyers is worth sitting with if you have a large audience that isn't converting the way you expected. I think you'll find this one genuinely useful. Check out Janette's work: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/the_englishera Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/englisherafb/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/ENGLISHERA TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@the_englishera

October 23, 2026Episode 31126 min

311 She Teaches One Thing. That’s the Whole Business.

Send us Fan Mail Struggling with low conversions? Grab our FREE checklist of 15 must-have elements to optimize your sales pages! 👉🏼 https://datadrivenmarketing.co/elements Anna Brick built her entire course business around one thing. Not a broad niche, not a category. One technique: flowers made out of wafer paper. And she did it on purpose. Dominik sat down with Anna to talk about how that decision came about, what it took to actually turn it into a business, and why the last two years nearly sent her in the wrong direction entirely. Anna has over 100,000 followers, more than 6,500 students around the world, and has never paid for an ad. But the part of this conversation that will probably stick with you has nothing to do with those numbers. Anna is one of the most clear-eyed people we've had on the show when it comes to the difference between building an audience and building a business. She talks about why she now sells in every single email she sends, three times a week, and why she thinks using the word "free" in your marketing trains people never to pay you. She also gets into her $9 thank you page offer, how she thinks about the first sale, and what happened when she spent two years trying to teach business strategy instead of wafer paper. Spoiler: her audience didn't want it, and going back felt like a relief. If you've been wondering whether you're spending too much time making your course better and not enough time selling it, Anna has a lot to say about that. Hope you enjoy this one as much as Dominik did. Check out Anna's work: 🌐 https://floreacakes.com/ 📸 https://www.instagram.com/floreacakes/?hl=en ▶️ https://www.youtube.com/@floreacakes

October 22, 2026Episode 31027 min

310 51% Growth in a Year Without Going Viral

Send us Fan Mail Grow your course revenue up to 30% in 7 days - no paid ads, no sales calls 📈https://datadrivenmarketing.co/roadmap PJ Wren celebrated her 50th birthday teaching a fitness class. Seven days later, she shut her studio down for good and never went back. That moment, March 2020, is where Over 50 Fitness really started. PJ had 32 years in the industry behind her, from rec center classes and home visits to cardiac rehab at St. Paul's Hospital to owning her own studio. But a lease technicality and a pandemic gave her an exit she didn't plan for, and she took it. Dominik sat down with PJ to talk through what she built from there: a subscription app for women over 50 who want to get strong, not just move more. They got into a lot of specifics, the 14-day onboarding sequence, why she removed 17,000 people from her email list and felt good about it, how she words a discount offer so it outperforms a straight percentage off, and why she limits promo codes to twice a year on purpose. What stuck with me most was her take on going viral. She's not against it exactly, but she's seen friends blow up and then watch it fall apart because the systems weren't there. Her line was simple: "Random workouts give you random results." She applies the same logic to growth. If you're building something in a specific niche and wondering how to hold members long-term, there's a lot here worth your time. I think you'll enjoy this one. Check out PJ's work: 🌐 www.overfiftness.co 📸 https://www.instagram.com/overfiftyfitness.co/ ▶️ https://www.facebook.com/overfiftyfitness.co 🌐 www.fitnesswithpj.com ▶️ https://www.youtube.com/fitnesswithpj 📸 https://www.instagram.com/fitnesswithpj/ 📸 https://www.facebook.com/fitnesswithpj

October 21, 2026Episode 30944 min

309 7,000 Kids Taught to Code: How to Prepare Your Child for the AI Future

Send us Fan Mail Get your tripwire product ideas here: 👉🏼 https://datadrivenmarketing.co/tripwire Ali Nemati tried to get his nine-year-old nephew to give up. He handed him material he thought was far too complex, fully expecting the boy to get frustrated and walk away. Instead, the nephew nailed it. So did his eight-year-old sister. That moment quietly ended Ali's plan to build a training business for adults and started something he never intended: Software Academy, now one of the UK's most unusual academies for children. Dominik sat down with Ali to talk through the whole story. How a university lecturer ended up teaching kids game design, animation, and coding using the same professional tools used in actual studios. Why a parent asking for a simple letter pushed Ali to pursue formal accreditation through the UK's oldest awarding body, making Software Academy the only one of its kind in the country. And what it actually means for a student when a qualification is something a college will accept, not just a certificate you printed yourself. They also got into the business side: why Ali targets parents rather than children, why he thinks free PDFs have lost their power as lead magnets, how he structures his product ladder, and what he believes most course creators get badly wrong when they upsell. His take on hidden upsell tactics and what honest retention actually looks like is worth the listen on its own. If you sell courses and you've been thinking about what makes your offer genuinely different, I think this one will give you a lot to chew on. Check out Ali's work: 🌐 https://www.softwareacademy.co.uk/ 📸 https://www.instagram.com/alicodemakers/ ▶️ https://www.youtube.com/@SoftwareAcademy

October 20, 2026Episode 30839 min

308 Mailing Twice a Month Is Hurting Your List

Send us Fan Mail Want to 2-10x your email list size quickly? Download our FREE Lead Magnet Guide and increase your email list size by 2-10x, simply by following our proven step-by-step guide 👉🏼 https://datadrivenmarketing.co/lead-magnet Ben Settle has been selling online since 2002. He runs a physical print newsletter called Email Players, prices some of his books above a thousand dollars, and has a sales page that actively tries to talk you out of buying. Dominik sat down with him to find out why any of that works. What came out of the conversation surprised me. Ben's whole approach to email is built around one idea: proximity. The more often you show up in someone's inbox, the more they trust you, the more they remember you, and eventually, the more they buy from you. He's been sending daily emails for years and makes no apologies for it. His argument against mailing twice a month is hard to argue with: if people don't remember who you are, they hit spam. And at that point, you've done it to yourself. He also talks through something most course creators never consider: the difference between a buyer and a customer. A buyer purchases once. A customer makes a habit of buying from you. His whole business is built around creating the second kind, which is partly why his sales page tells unqualified people to leave. There's also a genuinely interesting section on where he thinks the AI wave is heading, and why he thinks right now is actually the moment to double down on relationships rather than automation. If you're emailing your list twice a month and wondering why sales feel inconsistent, this one is worth your time. Check out Ben's work: 🌐 http://www.bensettle.com/

October 19, 2026Episode 30731 min

307 A $925 Course Sold in 47 States by Word of Mouth

Send us Fan Mail Grow your course revenue up to 30% in 7 days - no paid ads, no sales calls 📈https://datadrivenmarketing.co/roadmap Freddie Fernandez spent 31 years at Miami Fire Rescue, retiring as a deputy fire chief overseeing 14 stations, 150 people per shift, and 250 emergency calls a day. Then he built a course business. No ads. No launches. No algorithm. Just word of mouth, challenge coins in the mail, and a $925 product that has reached 500 agencies across 47 states. Dominik sat down with Freddie to figure out how that actually works. What came out of the conversation surprised me. Freddie started teaching at 22 by volunteering to cover a canceled class for 30 veteran firefighters, with less than 24 hours' notice, on a topic he hadn't fully mastered yet. That same instinct, just jump in and figure it out, runs through everything he's built since. His product ladder is worth paying attention to. He walks people into the right package based on timeline and need, not price. He'll actively steer someone away from his most expensive option if it's not what they need. And he thinks that's exactly why customers keep coming back, and why they send their colleagues. His take on discovery calls is something I've been thinking about since we recorded this. He spends the first part of every call asking questions, not pitching. He says if you listen first, you can sell later, but only what they actually asked for. Freddie also talked about refilming his entire course library in 2023, ten years after the originals, because he felt the material was getting stale. That kind of honesty about your own product is rare. I think you'll enjoy this one. Check out Freddie's work: 🌐 https://www.fireassessmentcenterprep.com/ 📸 https://www.instagram.com/fireassessmentcenterprep ▶️https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCiCoJql6gw_KGQ7ZIS4fHfQ

October 16, 2026Episode 30635 min

306 Why He Put Live Trainings Ahead of Online Courses

Send us Fan Mail 15 sales page elements you can't afford to miss - free checklist 📝 https://datadrivenmarketing.co/elements Yogi Aaron built a retreat center in the Costa Rican jungle, wrote a book called Stop Stretching, and developed a method that says conventional yoga is actually hurting people. That contrarian position came from a personal crisis: in his mid-40s, after decades of aggressive stretching, he was told he needed spinal fusion surgery. John sat down with Aaron to talk about how he turned that moment into a business — Blue Osa Yoga Retreat and Spa, a teacher training program he's scaling toward $500K a year, two books, a podcast, and an audience of over 160,000 on YouTube. What made this conversation interesting was how candid Aaron was about what isn't working. He openly shared that around 80% of people who book sales calls don't show up. He talked about pulling back from online courses because he believes people want in-person experiences more than ever. And he made a pretty strong case that if you're going to spend money on ads, remarketing is where to put it, because some of his customers follow him for five years before booking. There's a lot in here about long nurture cycles, hybrid course models, Facebook and Google ad strategy, and what it actually takes to run a location-based business around a contrarian idea. Aaron is thoughtful, funny, and genuinely not trying to be anyone else in his space. I think you'll enjoy this one. Check out Aaron's work: 🌐 https://www.yogiaaron.com/ & https://www.theyogi.club/ & https://www.blueosa.com/ 📸 https://instagram.com/yogi_aaron ▶️ https://www.youtube.com/@yogiaaron

October 15, 2026Episode 30528 min

305 4 Months Free Before His First Paid Client

Send us Fan Mail 2-10x your email list size in just 3 steps 📩 https://datadrivenmarketing.co/guide Finbar Horgan spent nearly seven years playing solo acoustic gigs up to seven nights a week in Edinburgh before he ever tried to sell a coaching program. No studio setup. No microphone. Just his phone, a Zoom account, and a free School community he ran for four months without charging anyone a penny. Dominik sat down with Finbar to talk through how he built the Pro Gig Academy from scratch, starting with zero audience and an 800-subscriber YouTube channel, and growing it to 5,000 community members and 19,000 people on his email list. They got into the real mechanics of it: how his funnel actually works, why most of his serious buyers never join the free community at all, what finally pushed him to quit gigging full-time and go all in on coaching, and why he set up a separate YouTube channel just for testimonials. There's a moment in this conversation where Finbar talks about showing up on discovery calls and having people say, "You don't need to pitch me, when can we start?" He explains exactly how he got there, and it has nothing to do with clever sales scripts. He's also refreshingly honest about what isn't working yet, including how uncomfortable he still finds selling through email and why he spent five months after his March launch not promoting anything at all. I think you'll like this one. Check out Finbar's work: 🌐 https://www.skool.com/@finbar-horgan-5856 📸 https://www.instagram.com/finbarhorganmusic/ ▶️ https://www.youtube.com/c/FinbarHorgan

October 7, 2026Episode 30435 min

304 The Fastest Way to Sell Online Is Offline

Send us Fan Mail Add 30% to your revenue with order bumps in 3 simple steps 🏅 https://datadrivenmarketing.co/order-bumps Courtney once sold a Christmas tree on Facebook Marketplace. Eight months pregnant, dragging trees out of her photography studio, a stranger asked if she could learn photography. Courtney handed her a discount code, and walked away having sold a course. That story says everything about how she sells. Dominik sat down with Courtney, a professional family photographer in Australia who runs two businesses side by side: Blury Photography, where she shoots newborns and families, and Mum Nostalgia, where she teaches moms to photograph their own kids. She has a signature course, a brand new mini course, a podcast, three lead magnets, and a welcome email sequence. She is also studying psychology, and has small children at home. What makes Courtney's approach unusual is that she deliberately uses her in-person photography business to sell her online courses, and it works because the trust is already there. She talked about why that matters, how she structures her two courses at very different price points, and what happened when she first launched and spent money on ads expecting the students to roll in. She also shared something I thought was refreshing: she genuinely does not believe passive income is passive. Her words on that are worth hearing directly. I think you'll like this one. Check out Courtney's work: Instagram: www.instagram.com/mamastalgia The Art of Childhood Podcast: https://open.spotify.com/show/2GSRPWsWlBqCxuPKcgwOsd Snap Mini-Course (learn photography from your phone): www.mamastalgia.co/snap Don’t Say Cheese (learn photography on your big girl camera): www.mamastalgia.co/dontsaycheese Use code ONLINE30 for 30% off either course.

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