How to Choose an Online Course as a New Coach and Get the Best Value for Your Money

If you are a coach, a solopreneur or just getting your feet wet in this entrepreneurship journey, I’m sure you have considered buying online courses to grow your business.

In fact, I’ll be surprised (and envious) if you are a profitable entrepreneur and not bought any ebooks or courses by now!

You may be tempted (as I have) to purchase *that* hot course which all bloggers and influencers are raving about. Or you may see a course being mentioned often in Facebook groups. 

I have to iterate that online courses are not magic pills. 

In fact, I tend to trust recommendations in Facebook Groups more than recommendations via blog posts with affiliate links. (This blog post contains ZERO affiliate links!) 

I believe that if a course is not as good as it’s trumpeted to be, other members of the Group will have a comment or two about it. Or they will recommend other better courses. 

If a course is awesome, many members will also chime in (even those with no affiliation) to vouch for how great it is.

I am very picky about spending money on courses nowadays. Because I have burnt money before ($999 to be exact) getting a course which was not value for money in my opinion. 

Please don’t email me asking which course this is - because I respect the course creator :) Besides, what does not work for me may work for you and vice versa!

I have some tips, based on my experience, for you as a new solopreneur to choose the right course or ebook so you will get the best bang for your buck!

1. Buy courses or ebooks which focus specifically on one topic

If you want to learn about Pinterest, make sure the ebook or course is solely about Pinterest.

If you want to learn about SEO, choose an online course or an ebook which has a laser focus on SEO

This means, the writer will go in-depth and you will learn a lot from it.

I prefer to choose depth, not breadth. 

There are many all-in-1 courses which teach you everything under the sun about business or blogging. 

Right now, I choose to steer clear of those because 

• they can be very expensive 

• some topics will likely be touch-and-go topics and not helpful at all

• I don’t have the time to devour so much content!

2. Affordable courses and ebooks can be very good!

The most helpful ebooks and courses I bought are less than $100 each.

I admit that I have bought several of these over the last couple of years, so they do add up!

I believe in just-in-time learning. If I need to sharpen my SEO skills at this moment, I’ll get an SEO course/ebook which is value-for-money.

With my busy days, I can’t commit to expensive courses which have 57 videos and 786 hours of content.

Also, don’t discount great audiobooks from Audible.com. 

If you are busy and want to learn about email marketing or even how to use your intuition in business, for example, you may be able to find a great audiobook about that topic.

To be fair, I’ve not bought online courses which cost more than $1000 before. So there may be very good courses out there which do cost that kind of money - you’ll have to dig out these gems yourself :)

3. Some affordable courses and ebooks I recommend for new coaches and solopreneurs 

I have some links below but they are solely for your convenience. They are NOT affiliate links!

A good Pinterest course I like is Carly Campbell’s Pinteresting Strategies. I go over it again and again over time to refresh my knowledge.

Debbie Gartner’s books are helpful too. Very quick to read and cost about $47 each at this time. I’ve bought quite a few. Each book focuses on only 1 topic. 

If you struggle writing emails to your subscribers, you may like Kate Doster’s The Email Marketing Fairy. She has a GAZILLION email templates you can use. Note: You have to add your own personal touch to these templates or they may seem ‘soul-less’. 

I relied a lot on those email templates during my early days. Now I pretty much write what I feel inspired to write to my 6000 subscribers. I think The Email Marketing Fairy costs $36 at this time.

These are the ebooks I’ve bought which I can remember off the top of my head right now.

4. Buying online courses for fun? 

I rarely buy digital products for fun unless they are cheap, honestly.

But I have gone on to a new level in my business where I need inspiration and intuition to help me - not sales funnels or structures.

So I just purchased Steve Pavlina’s Amplify course yesterday. It is a course about how to be productive as a creator. 

I hemmed and hawed about it because 

1) the course outcome is not specific 

2) it costs $497

and

3) it sounds like too much fun for me (wait - how is this a problem again?)

It was $297 upon launching in early March. I thought and thought about it for weeks and when I decided to go for it yesterday, the launch discount was over. Bam!

I can afford the cost, hence it’s not about the money.

But I could not justify spending $497 on a course with no defined outcome, if you get what I mean.

But I felt great relief after purchasing it. I believe it is something I need at this stage of my business.

When you are at a different stage, you need different tools. The old ebooks and courses may not fit you anymore.

So that was the first time I bought a course which can help me in my business (in the long term) AND is fun to me.

Wish me luck!

5. I have gone for in-person seminars too

To be fair, since 2016 thereabouts, I have gone for many in-person seminars about copywriting, digital marketing, mindset and more.

So I can’t say that the courses and ebooks alone have helped me in my business.

All these in-person seminars add up to lots of money (as you would expect!), but they are mostly paid by my husband. He is self-employed and when he attended seminars, I would tag along.

My last words about choosing the right online course…

I believe there is no magic online course - even if you pay someone thousands of dollars to give you private guidance.

To me, the best way to learn is to try some strategies you’ve learnt from courses or ebooks, make mistakes and learn as you go.

At the beginning, you may follow an expert’s recommended template or structure.

But as time passes, you will find your own groove and style which work for you and your audience.

It’s a long journey! 

I feel like I have to place a disclaimer again that this blog post is based on my personal experience + opinions.

You may have a different opinion and that’s fine! Every person has a different style and preference.

Also, if you have the resources to splurge on big-ticket courses which make you happy, lucky you!

Meanwhile, I wish you all the best in your business.

Sincerely,

Shikah

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How to Get Hits of Inspired Action when You are Busy and Overwhelmed

As coaches or self-employed individuals, we know that inspired action is the key to a smooth-sailing business.

I know for sure that if I take inspired action, be it for work or personal matters, everything falls into place beautifully.

But how do we get inspired action ideas when we are stressed and busy?

The issue is...how do you get those nudges of inspired action when you are busy and overwhelmed?

From what I know, when we are busy, stressed or fearful, our channel for creative energy to flow through, is constricted.

But when you are feeling free, expansive and joyful, inspired action ideas will hit you left, right and centre.

I came across Jess Lively’s podcast episode: What I Do When I ‘Work’ to Find Alignment and Inspired Action and she shared a technique which helps her get those hits of divine inspired action.

She mentioned that she will sit in a cafe with a laptop. And will start typing a gratitude list on autopilot.

For example: “I appreciate the sunny weather today.” “I appreciate the comfortable jeans I’m wearing today.” The list goes on.

During that gratitude typing session, she will get hits of inspired action to call someone or do something.

I thought this technique is genius. (I tried a modified version of this because I hate lugging my heavy laptop to a cafe.)

So I did a mental gratitude list whilst at a cafe. “I appreciate my healthy body.” “I appreciate the beautiful morning” and so on. I just think these sentences in my head.

At first, I thought I’ll run out of things for gratitude fast. But surprisingly, the things to feel grateful for kept flowing to me in my mind. I rarely run out of things to appreciate.

(Always remember that you have to genuinely appreciate those things at that moment. You  usually appreciate different things at different times of the day!)

It’s similar to meditating in a public place. If you hate meditating alone with your eyes closed, you can try my method 😂

I had better perspective and a stream of ideas just flowed into my mind. I had clarity to make better decisions too.

If you are willing, you can try this technique on busy days when you don’t know which task to do first.

As you mentally appreciate your life at that moment, you will be nudged to do THIS task first. And then THAT task. And somehow, your to-do list is more or less done.

Not always in a chronological order, though. You may be inspired to start tomorrow’s task or even next week’s project, today. But what needs to be done, will be done in an almost effortless way.

So when do you leave the cafe? When you feel ‘done’ and fulfilled.

Let me know if you have tried this method to get inspired action and if it works for you!

I wish you the best in everything you do.

Shikah