Pricing your course is a crucial decision. Take it too high; courses may not sell. Mark it too low, you won’t make enough money, and you will need more to run the business or spend on other crucial stuff such as ad spend! So then, should the price always be lower, and how low is too low?

What can you do to make consumers pay more that really makes an effort worth it? If you’re thinking about these things, you’re at the right place! One of the most crucial things to be kept in mind for course pricing is the fact that you cannot ‘price’ based on your instincts. This is not a decision that you can make lightly.

A proper pricing strategy, decision-making, and discounting model have to be created while thinking about course pricing. There has to be significant research in place to build a roadmap.

You must think of which strategies are to be implemented at what time that drive sales and push customer acquisition costs to the lowest. You can’t get up on one day and decide it will be a 50% discount day today. You also need to keep past and future customers happy within the price range in which you offer your courses.

 

Before discussing pricing, you need to finalise who your target audience will buy the courses from you. These are the people you would focus your marketing efforts on. And it is their buying capacity that will direct your pricing strategy.

Recommended Read Articles:- 18 Powerful Online Marketing Strategies To Sell Courses Faster

But first: what is your buyer persona?

A deep understanding of your buyers will support you in multiple aspects. You will be able to build a better course, your marketing efforts will be in the proper channels, sales numbers will be better as a result, and your business will thrive. Everything you do in your business boils down to the vital question: Who is your target audience?

And to help with that, here’s a deeper look at some of the main buyer personas. While this is indicative, this gives a brief outline of which one to focus on to achieve your goals.

The no-buying type

This one is a no-brainer. It’s the typical window shopper type. One that does complete research about the topic one is interested in will go through every free trial for a course, reach out to the creator, put in a whole lot of questions, and when the time comes to click the “buy now” button, poof! He’s gone! No purchase, no contact, nothing.

The buying decision has ended for this profile. He now will resort to generic online information to get his curiosity satisfied. Such a person may come close to making the buying decision, but at the last minute, he will back out.

It’s evident this is not the person who you will direct your marketing efforts at. If you are thinking of working with this kind of buyer, it will be long before you can get sales from this persona.

A buyer without strings

This is the type of customer who will complete their buying process, pay for the course and disappear. Nothing more. This persona won’t engage in the community or the lessons. At most, such a person won’t complete an entire section, let alone the course.

These are the typical hoarders. Someone who buys the book and lets it get drenched in the dust. For the digital world, the course keeps on gathering the ‘digital dust’ and remains in their library forever. They do refer to it at times when they recall paying the money for the course and try completing it or even beginning it. But that just doesn’t happen.

With this kind of persona, while the initial sale may come in, this person usually is not interested in learning. At the same time, you are building a community of engaged learners who drastically improve their lives via learning from your courses. So while they are great at adding revenue to the business, you ultimately want long-term loyal customers who love learning from you.

Premium price takers

You get it this is the type we have been looking for. The enthusiastic ones are the learners who will take an interest in the buying decision-making process. A learner from this category will not only complete the course but will most likely be converted into a regular customer. This one will continue to support your endeavours if they find benefit from your offering.

They will interact with you, join the community, share opinions, interact, engage, and share information to help you with the discussed topic. Most importantly, when you launch your next course, they will definitely consider a purchase.

You may face criticism through them, but that will be constructive. Not only will they tell you what can be improved, but they will also take the pain in talking about the steps you can take to help you reach your goal of a successful course.

Ideally, you would want to focus your marketing, promotions, and advertising efforts on the last two and more so on the last persona.

So now that you know the buyer personas out there, here’s how you can strategise the course price.

When to price it low?

Lesser efforts input 

Is your learner getting enough value out of the course? Can you support them with feedback, manual learning interventions, etc.? Depending on the amount of effort required from YOU beyond promoting and selling the online course, you need to price it accordingly.

If it’s a purely pre-recorded and completely automated online course where zero intervention is needed, these courses need the least amount of your time. Hence price them the lowest. As the number of efforts, time, and involvement increase, so should your pricing. After all, you can only do so much each day has only 24 hours.

Cost of acquisition of customers is low

Pricing your course low will definitely help in generating sales. You can sell a lot if you price a lot less. But you must proceed with caution. Leads have to be generated, promotional activities have to be completed, targeting has to be optimised, and there’s so much more to it. While a platform like Knorish may help in automating a lot of things, sales and marketing and the related costs need to be monitored closely.

Since profits may be less, you will be regularly in a situation where ploughing back the profits in the business will be difficult. And without the money to promote and save the falling ROI, you will end up losing money rather than gaining.

This will create a cycle and haunt the business’s survivability since the wiggle room is less due to a lower course price. Therefore it will be sensible to price the product appropriately where break-even is not the goal; profitability is the thing to target for.

When the competition research says so

This is one of the most regarded strategies for pricing decisions. You are already aware of the competition for your online course. If you don’t already, check course marketplaces and other online businesses. How are they pricing the course? Sign up for a few and check the content quality. 

Pro Tip: When launching your first course, price your course lower than the market leader of the segment. Learn from your students what additions they want in the course, keep improving your content and when you feel your course content is as good as any, mark it up to the price of your choice!

With a deeper knowledge of the actual course content comparison, you will better understand the price range where your course can fit right in. Not only will this give you a fair idea of how to price, but this will also enable you to understand the market where you are stepping in, in a better way.

If you have a strong following and are a renowned expert in the niche, you must charge higher than the market to maintain that exclusivity and brand value!

Hit and trial

Still figuring out the nuts and bolts of an online course business? Haven’t figured out the right course price yet? Price it high, and give discounts! Start low. Keep trying Hit and trial should be your go-to Mantra! 

Then check how consumers respond and the differences in the number of courses sold at a particular price. This is a great starting point. This might not be the fastest method but can come out to be quite fruitful if you hit the bullseye with changes here and there.

Consider your goals

Another reason a course can be priced low is based on your goals. By taking stock of your goals, long-term and short-term, you will have a fair idea of where you want your online academy to reach in the foreseeable period. With that in place, you can afford to price your course low if your goals permit.

BONUS: NEVER price THE COURSE based on its length

In the list of strategies you can undertake, this is the one which you should refrain from. Pricing according to the length of the course is not advisable. The end value a user gets from it defines the price of a course!

When to price the course high?

Additional Resources on Offer

Are you bundling a few courses or content? Are there high-value content pieces being given in your courses? By adding such value and learning adds, the learner will see the value and learn much beyond the online academy.

Personal Time Investment

Personal connection with the learners is vital if you wish to precisely your course well. If your courses include regular individual interventions, interaction on social media handles, one-to-one interaction, webinars, etc., you must price your courses higher than other courses that do not offer this. You have to assign a greater value to your personal time being consumed. And learners will appreciate that.

Pricing structure

The classic discount-based pricing model. Price the course at 5X, and sell it for 3X now and then X during special events. Almost all course creators use this technique, and so should you. You create enough wiggle room for your business by pricing the course higher. Allowing you to modify pricing and offer discounts based on the seasonality and demands of the customers. This also allows you to revenue share with affiliates.

The creator can provide upselling discounts to the learners who have completed the course and can benefit from a relatable course. By this, they can be retained; therefore, the acquisition cost will decrease, thus saving money. Pricing your course right is a complex task.

You must consider the various factors involved and then consider them. With all of these marketing strategies explained, find the right price that best fits your online course sales and the business. Make it a regular activity to gather feedback from potential students and improve the course, and then really; there’s no holding back.