A SIMPLE business plan to grow a $100k online course

A SIMPLE business plan to grow a $100k online course

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In my early days as an entrepreneur, I thought  that a successful business looked like this.   Private jets, fancy cars, millions upon millions  upon millions of views and subscribers.   The reality behind a very successful business  is that it's actually data driven, super boring,   wildly predictable, and very simple, which  makes it easily accessible and duplicatable   to anyone, including you. And that's  why I wanted to make this video.  

This comes from a lot of experience of  being able to grow my own online course   business from zero, absolute zero, all  the way up past the eight-figure mark,   and have helped thousands of people all over the  world take their experience, their skill set,   their expertise, package it into a highly  impactful, transformational and scalable   online course of business in every niche and  imaginable. And they're scaling all the way up to   $300,000-plus in some cases per month, on a  consistent basis, without any ad spend at all.   And I'm talking everyone, from DJs to dancers,  to accountants, to people who teach exam prep,   to skincare experts, to Airbnb rental experts, to  realtors, to bakers, to crocheters. Yes. I said,   crocheters, multiple and beyond. So give this video a like, if you want  

to see the behind the scenes of what a  very simple business plan looks like,   when it comes to growing and scaling and  impacting all the people that really need you   in the world with your online course business.  That's what we're going to dig into today.   If you want to learn even more about this and  see some real world case studies and examples,   you can go to workwithsunny.com, which I've linked  to that, in the description below. All right,   let's get into it. Here's what we're going to cover.  

The importance of the rule of one. Number  two, the ironic truth of attracting quality   leads, the secret of consistent sales, tiny, but  mighty team, and ops to scale to the Moon.   Okay. So let's dig into the rule of one. And what  that means is one offer, client, and message. Now,   this is so important, because a lot of people  try to run before they walk, when it comes to   business, and they want to start all these  different businesses and offers and courses.  

And they don't realize with every online  course you create, you're essentially   creating a new business. And you're going to understand,   as we go through all of the factors in  this video, why it's so problematic,   and why it leads you to not being able to grow or  scale the business, and just staying plateaued,   stuck, and in a lot of the cases, not able  to really generate any revenue at all.   So in order to extract your one, offer one  client and one message, it has to start with   you, and your experience. Because ultimately,  what you're doing with an online program   and an online course is, you are creating  transformation, based on your own experience,   your own skill set, your own expertise. That all boils down to this proven process   that we've used to help so many people  create and scale these really impactful   online courses. And what that is, the first step  is really identifying your own heroes story.   So what have you been able to achieve for yourself  in terms of a transformation? A couple of clues   and things you can think about are, what  are things that people ask you for help for?   What do you have career or life experience around?  What's a hurdle or a challenge or an obstacle   that you've been able to overcome? What is something that you would like   to teach other people, so that nobody  has to experience what you went through?   Or what do you want your legacy to be? What  do you want your impact to be in the world?   Those should all spark some light bulbs. And I'm  thinking, next week, I'll do a whole deep dive  

video on how to really identify your hero story,  and dig deep on your niche, so that it can really   help you. So let me know if you want that in  the comments below, just by putting Hero.   Oftentimes, your ideal client is a mirror for  you. So this is the zero state. And this up   here is the hero state. And your online course  bridges the gap between these two states.   So you're taking the client from zero all  the way to the hero outcome that they're   desiring. And oftentimes, it's something  that you've been through yourself or you've   been able to help other people achieve. Within this hero story, you start to identify  

three key factors of a highly scalable  online course business. And those are one   ideal client, one specific place on their  journey, that is really a tipping point   where they have urgency to create a change,  and to actually achieve the hero outcome.   Because without any sort of urgency or need or  desire to actually create that transformation,   they're not really interested in what you have  to offer, and they don't really care, and they're   not invested. That leads to bad clients,  that leads to not getting a lot of results,  

or social proof for your online course. This is really important, and then,   the one specific outcome. So let me give  you an example of one of our clients,   and her hero story, and how it turned into  identifying these three key factors that   make up who her one ideal client is. One specific ideal client is ambitious,   driven women. One specific place on their journey  is they are obsessively thinking about food,   and it is controlling their lives, and having  a negative impact on everything that they do.   And the one specific outcome is freedom from their  obsessive thinking around food, so food, freedom,   and complete and utter body  acceptance, and body confidence.  

Then that turned into the entire foundation  of her offer, her client and her message, all   one focus. So it makes it really easy to identify  who she's serving, what she wants to be known for,   and create content around that is super  clear and magnetic to the right people.   The transformation statement looks like  this. "I help ambitious, driven women  

go from obsessively thinking about food, and  having to control every aspect of their lives,   to being free from the obsession around  food, and achieving total food freedom,   so that they can be 100% confident in their bodies  as they are, and have full self-acceptance."   Now, this is why it is so important to  have the rule of one when you're creating   a really impactful online course business. If  we have multiple different clients at multiple   different stages on their journey with multiple  different outcomes, how are you possibly going   to be able to find all of these people? And  more importantly, how are you going to create   content that's actually magnetic to them? So this is why it's so important, in terms   of your messaging. Because if there's multiple  different tipping points or stages on the journey,   your messaging, all of a sudden, goes like  this, and you can't create a curriculum   that actually leads to the hero outcome  effectively and efficiently, because   you're taking people all over the place. And you're trying to satisfy different clients   at different places on their journey, seeking  different outcomes. And that leads to a really bad   online course that people don't need. And  here's what's really incredible about this,  

and what creates a true business. I talk about this often, but online courses have   changed a lot. And there is definitely more focus  on transformation, as opposed to tactics, because   tactics can be found for free on the Internet. To achieve a deep and meaningful transformation   for your clients, you need to make sure that  you are really specific in who you're serving,   so you can go deep with them. And ultimately,  if the value of your outcome is so  

impactful for your ideal client, it  allows you to price adequately.   So when we work with our clients, the  lowest possible price point is $500,   because the value of the outcome is so high.  In this example that I just shared with you,   the clients that are enrolling in that  program are suffering in so many ways.   It is affecting their day to day lives.  It's affecting their work. It's affecting  

their mental peace and clarity. It's  affecting their relationship.   The biggest indicator of how you price a  program adequately to attract clients who   are ready to do the work, and actually  get results, and are super invested,   because they're at the right place on their  journey to take this seriously, is knowing   what it's costing them to not have the solution  that you provide. That allows you to charge a   price point that allows you to really grow your  business, make a really good income for yourself   while also creating deep, deep transformation. Because it is true that people who pay,   pay attention. And if you are invested into  something, and think about your own habits,   you're more likely to actually do the  work, to take it seriously, and to achieve   this hero outcome, so everyone wins. You have happy clients who are actually   seeing results, and your business has so much  social proof to back up that you know what   you're doing, and you are the true authority  and expert in that space. And not only that,  

this is such a simple way to start your business,  because it allows you to know exactly what your   north star is in your business. And you're not  trying to go in all these different directions.   So it becomes so simple, peaceful, profitable,  and purposeful. When you have your messaging down,   it makes everything a lot easier and simpler  in your business. Because when you know who   you're looking for in terms of your ideal  client, you know how to find them. And   this allows you to grow a really successful  online course business from absolute zero,   which a lot of our clients have done. And in order  to attract clients, you have to have leads.  

That doesn't mean you need a lot of leads, it  means you need the right leads, and having the   right messaging, which we just covered. And every  piece of content you put out has to be directly   relevant to the transformation statement, and  to your ideal client that we just went over.   And when you do that, you get the  right quality clients in the door,   and you don't need a ton of leads. So for our  clients in the beginning, it's not about going  

on YouTube and pumping out a bunch of videos,  because that ultimately takes time and effort.   And you want to really test your messaging first,  to attract your first round of your leads.   So we help our clients get their first 50 leads  simply by identifying, "Okay, who's my ideal   client, where are they out on their journey?  And what specifically are they seeking?"   When you know that, you can then reverse engineer  and go, "Okay, where are they hanging out?"   In that example of ambitious women  who are seeking freedom from food,   there are so many blogs, influencers,  YouTube channels that are dedicated to this,   and Facebook groups that are all about this. It's not about going in and being spammy and  

trying to push your message or make a  sale. We are deep, deep, deep believers   that relationships lead to revenue. It  is all about really listening to people,   and knowing how you can best serve them. So it's going at it from a approach of, "Okay,   I now know where my ideal client hangs out.  That's half the battle. Now, how can I add value   in these spaces, through value driven comments,  through creating content that serves a purpose,   through sharing my own personal story that will  really engage people to connect with me?"   The more connections that you make, and the more  you can ask the right questions to these people,   the more leads you have in the door,  and that builds the entire foundation   of how you know that you can attract  leads in perpetuity. So you have to have  

very basic actions of identifying more people  hang out online that are your ideal clients,   building relationships with them through providing  value, connecting with them, and listening to   what they truly need, and then, hand delivering  the solution to them that they're seeking.   That is the generosity of the sales process, and  of working with the right people. Because they're   going to be grateful that they found you, as  opposed to pushing your message at everyone,   and people going, "Shh, I don't  need what you're selling."   The more intentionally you are  about breaching the right people,   it doesn't really matter what platform you're  on, it's always going to convert, and you   don't need millions of viewers, or millions of  eyeballs. You just need the right people.   So why this is so important is because  there's really two flywheels that run   the online course business. And this is what  we've identified, this is what we work with in   our business, and we help all of the people  that we work implement for themselves.  

First and foremost is really the engine that runs  the business. You have your offer, which we just   identified and talked through. From there, you  have to get people enrolled into the actual offer   itself. From there, you create transformation. And from transformation, you create happy clients   who are so excited to tell more people about  your offer, and then organically, you start to   get more and more humans that are ideal clients  in the door. Now from there, because you know  

exactly what your offer is, you know exactly,  specifically who you're trying to reach, it allows   you to crush it on any platform that you tackle,  and you only really need to be on one platform   that leads into building an e-mail list. Because your e-mail list is the only thing you own   in terms of having an online business. For  us, it's YouTube, but in the early days,   I was testing on different platforms, and I  was doing more direct marketing to people,   and creating conversations, as I talked about. So it was more one to one, things like Twitter,   or things like Instagram. I do think that it's  important to test your messaging before committing  

to YouTube, because you don't need a YouTube  channel to scale to 20, $30,000 a month. Our   clients are scaling to 20 and $30,000 a month  simply by having direct connections with the right   humans, because they know where to find them.. In terms of how to crush it on any algorithm,   because you know exactly who your ideal client  is, and how to serve them, and what your offer is,   you then know, okay, ideal client/viewer/follower.  And from there, that allows you to know, "Okay,  

this is relevant content to this person." The more relevant the content is to your ideal   client, the more the algorithm then knows how to  categorize you on any platform. And from there,   once you, the algorithm knows to categorize  you, it then uses its internal traffic sources   to organically find more of these people. Then, all of a sudden, this little flywheel  

starts to work, and you have to put in  less effort, you have to post a lot less,   and you're organically attracting more of the  right people, because you fed the algorithm with   the right information. And this goes for YouTube,  this goes for any platform, Facebook, Instagram,   TikTok, doesn't matter what you're using. The more relevant your content is to your ideal   clients, the more ideal clients you will naturally  and organically attract. So in the beginning,  

in terms of attracting leads, all  you need to know is who they are,   where they're at in their journey, and exactly  what they're seeking in terms of an outcome.   That makes creating messaging super intentional  and super targeted to the right people. So it's   less effort, and more clients in the door that  you can really have an impact on. So it's all   about being hyper, hyper intentional. And when you know how to do that on other   platforms, then when you get to a space like  YouTube, which really is this evergreen lead   generation machine, you know exactly  what messaging works. And then you turn  

those into YouTube videos, which work for you on  autopilot, to bring in leads every single day.   Because people all over the world, who are your  ideal clients are searching for the content that   you're creating, to solve their problem, and to  create the transformation that they're seeking.   So you're being discovered by new  people every single day on YouTube.   You got to lay the foundation, prove your  messaging, test your messaging, know it works,   and then dig into YouTube to make your videos as  effective and impactful as possible to the right   audience. That brings in this evergreen stream  of leads, and allows your flywheel to start   working on autopilot, and for more enrollments  and more happy customers to spread the word, to   get more people into your course. Make sense? Now, the key to consistent sales? Simply put,  

math. And oftentimes, this is way overlooked, but  now you have leads, now you know how to attract   leads. So how do you actually convert those  leads into paying clients and customers?   As I spoke about earlier, in terms of the value of  the outcome that you're creating with your online   course and program, and I'm not talking about  some very superficial tactical program here.   The way that we create online course businesses  that can truly scale to the Moon is, they're all   about transformation, and so, the value of the  outcome is really, really valuable to people.   When that is the case, you want to make sure  that you're getting the right people in the door.  

And what we have found is the only way that  really truly works to have these legacy clients,   that you would be happy to serve for the  rest of your life, is to get them onto a   Zoom conversation, to actually speak to them, ask  them questions, and really prescribe and identify,   "Am I the right fit for you? Is this program  going to solve the problem that you have? Are you   in a place where this is truly the transformation  that you need, and are you the perfect match   to create the zero to hero outcome that  I have inside of my curriculum?"   So our process of generating sales is simply from  the messaging that we put out into the world,   whether that is a story on Instagram, whether  it's a YouTube video, whether it's an e-mail,   it doesn't matter what the source is,  could be a direct conversation.   It's important for us to always take  those people and to get them onto   a phone conversation via Zoom, so we can really  audit and identify, is this the right fit on both   sides? And if it's not, that's okay, it's better  to know before somebody enrolls into your program   then after, and they become a bad client. So we do like to create a little bit of friction   in terms of our enrollment process, so that  we know we're working with legacy clients   that we want to work with for the rest  of our lives, and are truly committed to   seeing results and outcomes. Because if you  create a course that doesn't get results,   what's the point at the end of the day,  and it's not going to last very long.   In terms of the numbers, let me tell you a little  story, and break down the numbers of how you   create consistency in sales. So we have another  client, and she helps married couples who are  

stuck and stagnant in the bedroom, go from being  stuck and stagnant and frustrated with each other,   lacking intimacy, and truly on the break divorce,  to having a thriving, intimate relationship.   When she did the work, to know exactly who she  was serving, and ended up finding these people   online, in all of these different hubs  and platforms that she identified,   because she really knew who she was  serving, and where they were hanging out,   she listened. And these people said, "I  would pay a lot of money if you could truly   help me achieve this outcome." This woman has so much credibility  

to back it up, and so much social proof,  because she's been doing this for a long time   in a completely different format. This is the  first time she's ever created an online course.   And people said, "I would easily, at a  minimum, pay $5,000 for you to help me   create this outcome that I'm seeking." These couples are in the right spot on their   journey, where they're like, "We need your help,  we know we need your help." At $5,000 per client,   this is how the math breaks down.  So if the goal is to hit $100,000,   let's say we need to start at $10,000 per  month. From there, that is two clients,  

two clients of 5,000, 10,000. Now, conversion rate, I've talked about this   before, but on average, it's around 20%. That's  on the lower end, but just to be safe, you kind   of want to start there. And then, some people's  conversion rates are all the way up to 90%.   So conversion rate is 20%. That means  that if you need two clients to hit  

your $10,000 per month target, which  equals $120,000 a year, that then means   that you need to speak to two times five. So if  you times the amount of clients you need by five,   that gives you 20% conversion rate. Two times five equals 10 humans, 10 human   conversations to achieve your goal of two clients  and $10,000 a month, $120,000 a year. From there,  

that monthly revenue would hit target.  And that's how you do the math.   So you just have to figure out, "How many clients  do I need per month to hit my target? Then how do   I reverse engineer that, based on a 20% conversion  rate?" The simple way to do it is you just need to   times the amount of clients you want by five. That gives you the amount of conversations and   humans you need to connect with, in order to  convert at least two of them. If your conversion  

rate's higher, you're going to convert more. Now, here's the very exciting thing   about this. Now you have your  offer. You have your ideal client,   very clearly identified. You know exactly who  you're serving, so you know where to find them.   You then know how to generate  leads, and now you know how to   create sales, and turn those leads into actual  paying clients, who are going to get this   amazing transformation that you provide.  This is the foundation to be able to scale  

to the Moon. You don't need anything else. If you know these four things, you can scale   to your heart's content. The sky truly  is the limit. And this is how our clients   are able to go from zero, all the way up  to, in some cases, over $300,000 a month   in sales, for their online course on a consistent  basis. And like I said, without any ad spend at   all, because they know exactly what the math  is behind their very simple business model.   Which brings us to once you know how  to scale to the Moon, and once you have   consistent sales in the door, and you have  profit, and you have cash in the business,   then you can reinvest and truly become the leader  of your business. And that means having a team.   Like I said, it's a lean team that I like to  focus on, and a tiny but mighty team. Because  

you don't need a lot of people in this kind of a  business to really be able to create the impact   you want to. And to run super efficiently. You don't need really anyone at all. And a lot of   our clients are able to scale to $100,00 without  anybody in their business. But when you do want   to start bringing people on to support you, so  you can elevate from being the founder of the   business, to being the leader, and to really focus  on your zone of genius, this is an example of what   our business now looks like, in terms of teams. So there's me. Then we have a head of   ops, we have a head of community  and content, and we have finance.  

And then this entire section is all sales, so  we call them our enrollment team.Each one of   these people is part of it, our enrollment  team. And that is the very simple structure   and team that runs our business at this point. But in the beginning, it started out with just me.   Then I brought on my now ops person, who  started as an admin person in my business,   to learn every aspect of it, part-time,  and now, really is my right hand person.   Then we started bringing on sales people and  enrollment people, because we knew we had a proven   offer, and we knew that we could really make a  bigger impact, so why not bring on a team who's   able to help reach more people, and get more  people in the door, to create that transformation   for them? But like I said, if you're just  starting out, you don't need a big team.  

We have clients who have scaled to ridiculous  numbers, and still have a team of just two.   And this leads to your operations. When you  have a team, it's really important to dial in   your operations. And really, what it means is  that everything in the business is documented,   so that if someone leaves, if someone goes on  vacation, you know that you have a backup plan,   and you can follow exactly the instructions  and steps to do anything in their role.  

We have an internal course, shockingly, that  is actually our training guide inside of our   business, and documents every single role in the  business, every single duty inside of that role,   so that it's really easy to take over for one  another, when necessary and needed. So operations   simply means that you have the foundation of  the business, you know how everything works,   you know your key activities to generate leads  in sales, you have the proven offer, you got your   messaging, you know your ideal client. Then everything else just becomes easily   duplicatable, repeatable, and scalable, because  it's all documented and easy to follow, and you're   not just throwing spaghetti at the wall. Because  the more that you customize and do one-off things,  

the harder it is for you to scale, because nobody  can come in and actually take over for that role,   be a part of your team, or allow  you to grow, because everything   you're doing only lives in your brain. So you really only need team and ops. And this   only really comes into play when you actually  have a proven offer in a business. You have   to have your offer. You have to know your ideal  client. You have to have your messaging sorted,   so you can attract the right leads and get sales  in the door consistently, because consistent   sales allows you the peace of mind to be able  to bring on a team, and to create operations to   remove you from the business in the day to day,  so you can again stay in your zone of genius.   Here's where this gets really exciting. So this  is how you turn a $100,000 online course into,   really, a seven-figure, eight-figure online  course. When you know the math and when you know  

all of your numbers that back the business, as we  identified earlier, you know exactly how to scale,   because essentially, you just need more leads and  more conversations to achieve higher revenue.   If we break this down, and based on the example  that I shared earlier, so the client who's helping   married couples, this person is probably going to  start around the 5K price point. But the thing is,   as you get more social proof, and as you  get more credibility for your program,   you can absolutely raise the price point, which  means less clients at a higher price point,   which means higher revenue and higher profit. Let's say she then moves the price point up to   $10,000, and she wants to scale to $100,000  per month, which equals a 1.2 million business.  

If that's the case, then we would just  need to reverse engineer that target.   So if the goal is 100K per  month, that would be 10 clients,   okay? 100K month, 10 clients. Conversion rate?  The conversion rate as you grow. Remember the   flywheel that we discussed earlier? It becomes higher and higher, because   you have more credibility and proof,  and your clients start to recommend   more people to you. Let's say her conversion  rate moves all the way up to 50%, for ease.   If the conversion rate then becomes 50%, she  needs 10 clients. That means she needs to multiply  

this number by two. So that'll be 20 humans, 20  sales conversations a month, in order to achieve   $100,000 per month. And that  would be 1.2 million a year.   So 10 clients a month would lead to having a  seven-figure business. And profit means, okay,   if you're bringing in revenue, some people may pay  on a payment plan. And that means that the revenue   is not a match to the profit. So you do want  to be really aware of how much cash you're  

actually collecting, and what your expenses  are, so you know what your profit is.   But with a business like this, and a business  model like this, you can operate at a 95% profit   margin. I've seen it in many cases, as long as you  keep things lean and efficient and intentional and   purposeful, your profit can be very, very high. This is how you take an online course business  

that starts with a transformational  offer, and you can scale it all the way   to the Moon. And like I said, this is what  we do. So if you're interested in creating an   online course business, that's super impactful and  transformational, be sure to click the link below,   and you can apply to speak to a member of  my team, a real human, so we can ensure   that this is the right fit for both sides. And I hope that we can support you on the inside,   and help you get your message out into the  world, because that is the mission behind our   business. My whole purpose is to create success  ripples in the world, by allowing you to reach  

a global audience with your zone of genius, and  to create the impact that you're here to make.   So I hope that resonates with you.  And if you like this, and it hit home,   let me know what your light bulbs were in the  comments below. I love to hear takeaways.   My love language is comments. I've mentioned  that before. Let me know when the comments below,   and I'll chat with you there, give  this a like, be sure to subscribe,   and I have a whole playlist on how to create  an online course business right here.  

So check that out next. I'll  see you in the next one. Bye.

2022-06-22 19:45

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