How to make your course 100% more valuable

Funny story from the weekend…

My wife and I went into Bournemouth town centre to see the Christmas lights with our son.

And it was nice. Lots of colourful installations with flashing lights in festive shapes. Hot chocolate stands. Christmas music. The boy loved it.

And in the middle of it all were two young guys in Santa customers, standing behind a popup table and giving away books. Specifically, Gary Vaynerchuk’s latest book:

Twelve and a Half: Leveraging the Emotional Ingredients Necessary for Business Success

(If you don’t know “Gary V” he’s a serial entrepreneur, social media influencer and self-proclaimed “king of hustle”. He’s very much a “love him or hate him” kind of guy.)

Passers-by were grabbing copies of the book while the guys behind the table explained to anyone who’d listen what it was about.

I’m pretty sure most had no idea who the author was but liked the sound of a free book.

But for me it was like: “I absolutely know who that is and that’s a book I would actually buy.”

So I grabbed a copy and ended up chatting to the two guys.

And it turns out they’d bought 2,000 (!) copies. (For every 12 they received some kind of limited edition digital artwork that could increase in value over time. Or something…)

Anyway, I was pretty pleased with my free book. Nice unexpected Christmas bonus, right?

But as we wandered back to our car, I saw more and more discarded copies - on the ground, on benches, even in rubbish bins.

This is a brand new book that would cost you £13 (or $16) right now on Amazon.

I guess some people didn’t value them enough to carry them home. And I’m not judging them by the way (apart from the littering).

They just weren’t the right audience.

Much like a book, an online course is only valuable to the right people. To everyone else it’s close to worthless.

So consider this…

Instead of trying to work out who you can sell your course to, work out where the people who understand and value what you do hang out.

Because if you suspect that people aren’t interested in your course it probably means you’re hanging out with the wrong people.

Enjoy the festive period and see you soon,

Glen