How to Use Online Teaching Platforms to Earn Money

Learn how to use online teaching platforms to earn money using these 6 simple steps.

One of the most popular ways to make revenue is by teaching your talent online. If you have researched starting your online teaching business, you’ll know that there are tons of online teaching tools and platforms. This is because the demand for online learning has drastically increased over the last few years.

In the U.S. alone, the eLearning market is projected to grow by $12.81 billion from 2020 to 2024. That’s an incredible percentage increase over just four years! 

So, it’s no wonder that more people have started to look at online teaching platforms to earn money. The thing is, with so many modern and dynamic online coaching software today, there’s no reason not to start your own business. Online teaching platforms help you teach courses online, but they also do so much more for your business. They are actually designed to help you manage various facets of your company. 

But before we begin, let’s first look at some of the basic concepts of online teaching as well as the benefits of this practice.

What Exactly is Online Teaching?

Online teaching is when a tutor, instructor, or teacher chooses to complete educational practices for their students via virtual classes only. This allows students to learn from the comfort of their homes. It also helps teachers to have flexible schedules and encourage their students to learn at their own pace.

Online teaching can be done in several methods: 

• Live classes: You can live stream classes to students via an online teaching platform or via software such as Zoom. Students can interact and chat with you in real-time, either via a conversation on the video call or via the chat feature within your live streaming software. 
• Self-paced courses: This is where you would have an online on-demand library of courses for students. Once students pay you a fee (once-off or monthly), they are able to access your course and stream it whenever they feel most ready and comfortable to do so. Once the course is complete, their training is finished, too. Some teachers who use this method choose to end the course with an assignment or quiz to test the student’s knowledge. 
• Additional guides and resources: In addition to your live and on-demand classes, you may want to have additional guides, whitepapers, and eBooks available for sale to your students. These resources can be helpful digital documents they may want to reference in the future. It is also another way in which teachers make money online. 

The main takeaway from online teaching is this: You can teach online regardless of your qualifications, skills, experience, or expertise. 

This is because online teaching has no limits; people from all over the world want to learn specific and new skills. You just might be the person who has those skills. It’s likely that they want to come to someone who has been through a similar experience. As we know, we all learn the best from people who have first-hand experience. 

So, if you have a talent or experience with a specific topic – you can teach that topic to others online. It’s a job that’s not only flexible – it’s fulfilling too.  

Benefits of Using Online Teaching Platforms to Earn Money

If you’re intrigued by the idea of earning money while doing what you love from the comfort of your chosen environment, then online teaching is for you. There are so many online teaching tools out there today that can help you make the job easier and more streamlined. These are online teaching platforms. But how can you benefit from them and use online teaching platforms to earn money?

Online teaching platforms help you:

• Consolidate your data: You can store all your online courses, class notes, blogs, posts, videos, customer data, payment data, and marketing email templates in one platform. You can even message customers via the platform, removing the need for a separate email account to check daily. Some online teaching platforms also allow you to host a one-page or full website with them. This way, all your digital content is in one space.
• Market to students: We touched a little on email marketing in the previous point. Online coaching platforms usually have a marketing tab or section within your dashboard. This area allows you to build new emails to send to clients. Some of the best online teaching platforms also provide templates to you so that you can design an email in just a few minutes. Templates are also customizable, so you can add your brand colors and logo to make it your own.
• Build multiple revenue streams: Another thing that online teaching software gets right is revenue streams. The main revenue stream that you may use will be SVOD (subscription video on-demand). This is where a student pays a monthly fee to access your content. You may also have once-off purchases for learning programs, individual courses, or individual resources and digital downloads. As you can see – there are many ways to earn money while teaching online. 
• Manage your payments with ease: Once you start getting paid, though, there is the thought of how to manage your finances. This is yet another feature in most online teaching platforms – your payments are processed and managed automatically. Platforms like Mastera integrate with PayPal, Stripe, and RazorPay and process auto-payments to you. 
• Measure your success: The reporting feature in online teaching software can be really handy. This reports information about your customers, running memberships, sales, revenue, marketing efforts, and course completions. This way, you can adjust your content and course packages as you see fit – based on real results.

6 Simple and Effective Steps to Launching Your Online Teaching Business

Now that you know how online teaching platforms can help you make money teaching online, you can start planning for your business launch. This includes everything from analyzing your offering to marketing your courses to prospective students. Let’s get into this in a bit more detail: 

1. Decide what you want to teach 

The first thing you need to do is decide what to teach. This sounds like it could be an obvious step, but it should always be analyzed, even if you think you know exactly what topic you will focus on.

There are a few questions you can ask yourself when choosing an online teaching topic: 

• Is there a demand for this?
• Do I have experience with this topic?
• Am I passionate about it?
• Can I easily relate to this topic?
• Will prospects see me as an inspiration when speaking about this topic?
• Can I upskill and reskill with this topic?

Once you have answered these questions, you can start refining your topic. Remember, sometimes your teaching topic can be particular and other times, it may be pretty straightforward. No matter which topic you choose, you need to research the demand for that topic and how many online tutors are already selling online courses for your chosen niche.

2. Bolster your skill set for online teaching

This may sound like a step you can skip – but trust us; you don’t want to do that! If you are thorough with your skills and knowledge around your teaching topic, your business will naturally flourish with little to no fuss. If you want to bolster some skills, here are a few you can focus on:

• Communication skills: Communication is the root of all business. If you are someone who struggles to strike up a conversation with others, then you may need to upskill here. By taking communication courses, you can quickly learn how to break the ice but also learn how to get students to open up to you and communicate transparently. This is always a must-have tool in your arsenal.
• Demonstration skills: As a teacher, you must be able to demonstrate concepts easily. Part of this is describing how something works or explaining why you do this activity in a specific way. So, building up your demonstrational skills is always a good call. Remember, students will ask you questions, and it’s vital that you are able to answer them effectively. 
• Marketing skills: A large part of owning your own business is to sell your products! This is where the true revenue potential lies. So take the time to learn some marketing tactics. It’s a good idea to understand how social media marketing and email marketing as a whole work (seeing as you would have an online business). If you are able to, invest in a digital marketing course and some books to help you along the way. 
• Technical skills: The last skill set we have here is technical skills. You can have all the know-how on your teaching topic but still need to know how to technically manage your online business. Now, online teaching platforms help you do this with little fuss. But it’s still a good idea to learn how best to record videos for courses, use templates for email marketing, or use Zoom for those live streams. 

As you can see, there can be quite a bit to learn when getting started – and the truth is that software, learning, and the internet all constantly change, so consistent learning should be a pivotal part of your business plan. 

3. Identify your target audience

Now that you have your topic and an understanding of your skillset, it’s time to look at your target audience. Much like any other business, your online teaching business should have a business plan including your target audience. But what does that really mean?

Well, your target audience can be identified quite quickly. All you have to ask yourself is, “Who is my ideal student?”

Once you write down a few points about your ideal “persona”, you can flesh it out a bit more. 

For example, if you want to teach yoga online, your target audience may be women between the ages of 25 and 35. But, if you wanted to specialize even further than just “yoga,” maybe you want to focus on yoga for pregnant women. Now your target market has evolved from a woman between 25 and 35 who is pregnant. 

This sounds like you’re narrowing down the audience – and the truth is you are. But that’s a good thing! The more niche and appropriate your offering are, the higher the chances of your target audience converting to a customer.

4. Research and invest in online teaching tools

Once you feel like you have a plan in place, it’s time to look at the next phase, which would be your implementation phase. This is when you really need to consider which online teaching tools to invest in. 

We’ve spoken about how you can use online teaching platforms to earn money. We’ve seen that they help you in a number of ways. But in addition to this must-have tool, you can use other software that is available to you. These types of platforms are designed for specific things, such as document management, scheduling appointments, and checking your spelling and grammar. If you’d like to learn about these tools in a bit more detail, read our article on how to boost your business with these twelve online business coaching tools.

Remember, only some tools on this list are going to be required. It’s essential to identify which areas you need the most help with and go from there.

5. Create your online courses

When you’re fully equipped with all the online coaching tools you need, it’s time to start creating those amazing online courses! This step is mostly done on your online teaching platform, but you’ll also need to consider a few things before creating your courses: 

• How many courses are you going to have?
• Will you be offering course packages?
• Will you have an overall learning program for students that include multiple courses?
• Would you like to have beginner, intermediate, and expert courses?
• Will your courses be on-demand, or will you host live classes?

The answer to these questions helps outline how many products you will be selling as well as your potential pricing and profit margins. 

Some teachers prefer to have just one or two courses up and to run simultaneously, while others enjoy having a range in their product set.

6. Market and sell your online courses

Okay, we’ve come to the last step: selling your online courses! This is the exciting part. It can be tricky at first, but if you follow a few marketing best practices, you should be well on your way.

Here are a few things you can do to boost those sales:

• Have a social media presence and stick with it. 
• Use email marketing for product launches, discount codes, and access to exclusive content. 
• Get together with fellow teachers and host live Q&A sessions. 
• Try to use text marketing tactically when launching a campaign. 
• Make use of your website by blogging and uploading content consistently. 
• Become a voice on teaching forums.
• Host live webinars and demonstrate what you teach for free.

These small but useful marketing tactics can make all the difference when trying to win clients over. It’s important to also be consistent with marketing – even when you’re at your busiest. 

Ask the Experts How to Use Online Teaching Platforms to Earn Money in 2023

Creating an online teaching business can be done quickly, provided you have the right online teaching tools and are willing to do some planning upfront. Once you plan, the rest is up to your online teaching platform. 

If you feel like you’re ready to start teaching your passion online, why not speak to our experts at Mastera for more information on how our platform can help you? 

We can show you how to start teaching online and set your business up for success from day one. We’re all about scalability, modernism, and adaptability here. And we want to empower people like you to do what you do best – create those online courses and teach your students all the knowledge you have! To learn more about online teaching platforms, feel free to schedule a demo with us.