How much is a bootstrapper willing to pay for an online course?
This is a question for all you brave bootstrappers out there. I have bootstrapped many times before and have a tonne of hardware bootstrapping experience. I love the bootstrapping community, but let's face it, we hate spending money, and if we could we would do everything ourselves. I would love to help bootstrapped entrepreneurs, maybe create a course on how to be a hardware bootstrapper and tell you which are the best free tools to use, but would anyone buy a course that helps them bootstrap?
If you are a bootstrapper:
- Would you or have you paid for any online courses?
- What is the maximum you would pay?
- What topics would you pay for?
I just paid a slight discount to the $250 price for Reed Barger's 5 week course on Building an Instagram Clone with React.js (https://react12.io/instagram-clone/). Huge fan of his work, he's a great teacher and as I expected, his lessons really filled in the practical aspects I was having trouble fitting into a cohesive whole. This may sound like a lot for the course but the videos are comprehensive and long. Plus I bought his Serverless React course on Udemy a few months ago (awesome, if a little dated) and with their typical discounts, I practically stole it. So I felt it was time to do the right thing aka pay properly for his contributions.
That course does look good value for money. You make a good point, if the author has already given you tonnes of value then you don't mind paying for a course, because in a way you are helping them out, so its like a thank you.
This is a great question @Cannonball2134. I think definitely think it depends on a few factors.
Timing - I think this plays a large role in whether I am ready to hand over money for something I feel will benefit me and what I am building in that moment. I have joined many different paid communities for example, as I am building a community myself and I would like to learn the intricacies of what makes a successful online community tick. If this was even two years ago, I would probably not be paying for these types of communities. I want access to this type of information and see how they are working in real time. which leads me to point number 2...
Eagerness to take action - As mentioned I am at the point where I'm building a community so I am willing to pay to access premium communities and pay for different types of courses and bootcamps because I am ready to take action. These investments are helping me to push the needle in what I am delivering and producing each day for my own business.
I hope these help.
Thanks @gordon, i guess timing and having a big enough problem is the main motivation.
I have paid $5000 for multiple marketing courses.
What was the most recent course?
Sunny Lenarduzzi Authority Accelerator. Highly recommended if you are trying to sell a course, coaching or consulting.
Hey Richa! Quick question about this course, did they also teach you how to build the course or is it just the marketing/selling of the couse?
There is a module to figure out what goes into your course. And then the course you are taking from her is in itself a good way to learn how to set up your own course - formatting, pacing and community wise.
Perfect I appreciate the response. If you don't mind me asking, what was the price of her course?
It's $5000. I earned that back the first month following her course.
Thanks. I saw her on YouTube. Didn't really like her style, but if her stuff is effective who cares.
Yup exactly. I am curious though what did you dislike about her style?
She's very animated. She uses background music. There are wipes, intros, etc. For some reason I prefer really dry YouTube videos, but I recognise that this is a weird preference and most people do not share it.
Got it. Yeah, it's cool that there is a style that's a match for someone. Speaks to how we don't have to copy a popular person's style.
Wow @richap, that is a lot. Was it worth it? Anything good or bad about the course?
The most recent one I paid for was totally worth it. I have already made back 7x the cost in the past 3 months.
I agree with others that timing matters in that I am feeling stuck and unable to achieve the goal by myself. Once I am stuck, then it's just a matter of evaluating opportunity cost - will I be able to make far more than what the program costs? If I believe that, it's stupid to not go for it.
And yes, sometimes I end up believing in the wrong program and I don't make the cost back, but eventually I tend to find the right ones, and they have sped up growth by multiple years for me.
My suggestion for pricing your course is to not ask what people are willing to pay but rather evaluate how much would they make in revenue from your course. And then price it 1-2.5% of that. The program that worked for me cost $5000 but many people have graduated with multiple 6-figure businesses from it. The $5000 is tiny compared to what it delivers.
Another thing: if you're selling your expertise and you charge cheap for it, people think you aren't very good and they tend to be more dissatisfied with it. I have charged 2-figures per month and 4-figures one-time for my expertise, and the people who paid 4-figures complained less and actually DID the work (which explains why they were satisfied). You want to price it such that people feel COMPELLED to do what you are teaching them. I didn't believe this when I started my coaching but I've learned the hard way this is 100% true.
The meta here is people have zero clue what anything is worth. YOU have to tell them what you and your course are worth with some dot-connecting. And if you are selling to business people, it's easy to do the dot-connecting: just point out how much revenue they'll make and your cost is a tiny fraction.
This is all assuming your course is kick-ass and will get them that revenue if they do the work, of-course :)
As for whether bootstrappers will pay for a bootstrapping course: there exists 30x500 that's popular amongst the tech community. If you look at the non-tech bootstrapping community, there exist 100s if not 1000s of courses and programs aimed at those making $0. I think the answer to your question is Yes. I think the question is how will you carve out a unique position and build trust so people flock to your course instead?
Well said.
Source: I am the co-creator and teacher of 30x500 😄 we generally have ~400-500 new students enroll per year, and have been teaching (and growing to that enrollment size) for around a decade.
Big lesson here:
YOU are not your audience, and further, audiences are not monoliths.
There’s a common trope that folks say “developers don’t pay for things, they want everything to be open source and free” but if you stop for a second and think about all of the tools and resources that developers pay for...the evidence says otherwise.
The key is to understand what people do pay for, and more importantly, why. That’s the foundation of 30x500 itself, since we teach folks how to do the research to answer those questions (and then what to do with the answers to launch products that people buy).
Lots of folks resist this though, since it’s very easy for our own psychology to dominate what we observe. Learning how to observe - not without bias but with an understanding of the biases you bring to the table - starts to make things a lot easier!
You are right, i may not be my exact audience, so market research is key. 30x500 looks great, is your story on how you got started on indiehackers?
Check out this podcast episode: https://janelleallen.com/075
You make some good points, i really like the idea of pricing based on 1-2.5% of the value you could add to customers. Giving customers 10-100x the value they paid for a product is a great goal to aim for.
Thanks for 30x500 suggestion, they look great.