“You only need ONE online course to change your life.”
That’s not stupid make money online hype. That’s freakin’ reality.
Countless creators have built life-changing freedom with only one online course. I’m one of those quiet dudes.
But reaching that milestone wasn’t an easy journey. It was damn hard.
It took me over 60+ courses to get there and 8 years in the trenches.
The reason?
There are just too many things you need to master.
And you know what? Crafting a great email launch sequence is cool. Writing a hypnotic sales page, too.
But the most important thing ever is to start picking a best-selling course idea.
Here’s how.
Forget everything you know about surveys
Half of creators spit on data and go with the flow.
The other half look at the wrong data. And that’s why their course painfully fails.
I was one of those losers, too.
I created my first online courses based on questions I got from the audience. I thought that asking questions was a great way to come up with best-selling course ideas.
I was dead wrong.
When I launched the courses based on “questions,” they tanked. The reason? Asking questions doesn’t prove that people are willing to pull out their wallets to get an answer. Nor do stupid Google surveys. Nor do trending social media posts.
Instead, putting people in front of a cold order form where they can enter their card info does.
That’s why it always pays off to look at stone-cold sales numbers. But how do you do that when you’re just getting started and don’t even have a damn email list?
How Amazon can help you find your best-selling course idea
Amazon is a virtual goldmine.
Not only for Uncle Bezos but also for you as a creator.
The reason is simple: Amazon offers a wealth of valuable information that can guide you in creating courses that resonate with your target audience. Books and online courses share a similar trait — they’re both information products.
Here’s how to use Amazon to uncover popular topics, trends, and profitable course ideas within your market…
Find a best-selling course idea with Amazon’s intuitive search feature
Ever noticed that one?
You know it when you head over to the search bar, start typing a few letters, and start seeing suggestions. That’s called autosuggest. In short, Amazon suggests the most searched products based on what you just typed.
Remember: Amazon is a store. Not a mere search engine.
The suggestions you see popping up tell you something: This is something people want to buy. Nobody searches on Amazon without buying intent.
So instead of simply using this shortcut to waste your money on useless stuff, use it to find new product ideas you can launch.
Let’s assume you have some expertise with the vegan diet. Here are powerful clues to what your next online course should be about:
Use the alphabet soup.
Crack the numbers
The most powerful data you could gather is sales numbers.
They tell you something: People have proven with their wallets (not their lying mouths) that they want that product.
So instead of speculating about virtual likes or yikes, let’s look at what people are actually buying. Let the wallets talk. The great thing here is that each product on Amazon comes with a best-seller rank (BSR).
You can find it in the middle of the product listing.
Here’s an example:
The lower the BSR, the more it sells. You want to find topic ideas that have the lowest BSR possible to ensure that there’s a starving market.
Start dissecting Amazon product pages.
Find a great course idea by reading other customer’s minds
What if there was a way to see how to create a better course than any of your competitors?
Too good to be true? Nope, it’s possible.
We all know that Amazon allows you to rate any product and make that review visible to everyone. Take advantage of this valuable resource. Spy on the books that tackle your domain of expertise and start reading the reviews.
Pay attention to what customers love or loathe.
Eat a bowl of good reviews to understand what they liked. And eat a greater bowl of bad reviews (3 stars and below.)
Use this to your advantage to double down on those insights.
Here’s an example:
This 3-star review praised the visuals in the book. However, there are too many tofu/soy recipes.
So one of the things you might consider for your own vegan fast food course is to incorporate great visuals but also add alternatives to tofu/soy.
Read reviews.
Hack the outline
Structuring your course is a nightmare.
Honestly. Even after creating dozens of courses, it’s still the part I wrestle with the most. The reason? You want to find something that makes sense logically and is also easy to implement for your students. That eats up some serious bandwidth.
Amazon can help you kick many of those frustrations in the butt.
Here’s how: Amazon provides you with a “Look inside” feature. This means that you can check out the outline of every book on Amazon for free.
A bestselling book tells you something: the topics covered resonate with the audience. Find out the common patterns of what a course in your niche should cover.
But please don’t blindly copy and paste like a zombie. Instead, iterate and make it better.
Get ready to rock
The opportunities to monetize your knowledge and share your expertise have never been greater.
It’s not just about what you want to teach. It’s about creating a course that people are hungry for.
Put your ego aside. Look at what people are already buying first.
Then hit record.
Want to create and launch your online course? Get my free course (safe link to my website)