Selling online courses is one of the most popular ways for individuals to share their expertise and knowledge and earn money from it.

Building a profitable online course involves more than just course creation. Now that your online course business is live, you'll need to promote it.

Social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, Threads, and Instagram allow you to reach millions of potential students at absolutely zero cost.

In this blog post, we'll show you everything you need to know about promoting your course as an online course creator on social media.

Why sell online courses on your socials?

There are loads of reasons why social media is one of the ideal places to find potential students.

1. It's free: Social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter (X), YouTube, and Instagram require absolutely zero cost to sign up.

2. Reach a larger audience: There are hundreds of millions of users on social media. With the right strategies, you can reach hundreds, if not thousands of potential students with your content, much more than you would with online course marketplaces.

3. Build connections with your audience over time: With social media, you can nurture genuine relationships with the people you're trying to serve through direct messages and comments and create an engaged community.

4. Promote additional courses in the future: You can promote future products to your existing audience and get more online course sales from future customers.

5. Get new product ideas easily: Talking to your audience and hearing what problems they have as well as what they want to learn more about will help you generate more online course ideas faster.

1. Choose your platforms

Not all social media platforms are created equal.

The social media platform you pick will depend on what your online course is about and what your prospective learners are interested in.

Also, if you're sharing a video course, you'd want to pick social networks that support videos.

In any case, you'll want your content creation to align with what the users on each platform are used to.

Here are a few popular niches for profitable online courses that your digital content might fall into and suggestions for the best social networks to promote them.

Programming & Web Development

• Best Platform: GitHub, Reddit, LinkedIn

• Why: GitHub for code sharing and community contributions; Reddit has subreddits like r/learnprogramming; LinkedIn for professional connections and job opportunities.

Digital Marketing

• Best Platform: Twitter, LinkedIn

• Why: Twitter is buzzing with marketing tips and real-time news; LinkedIn is a hub for professionals and recruiters in the field.

Data Science

• Best Platform: LinkedIn Learning, Kaggle

• Why: LinkedIn for networking and Kaggle for data science competitions and community engagement.

Health & Wellness

• Best Platform: Instagram, Pinterest

• Why: Instagram is visual and great for fitness influencers; Pinterest is useful for sharing wellness tips and recipes.

Personal Finance

• Best Platform: Reddit, YouTube, Linkedin Learning

• Why: Subreddits like r/personalfinance offer practical advice; YouTube for in-depth tutorials and financial explainers.

Sign up for 2 to 3 of the social media platforms that are relevant to your target audience and create high-quality content for each platform.

2. Building a personal brand

Before you start promoting your courses, it's important to establish a strong personal brand on social networks.

Nobody listens to or buys from a blatant self-promoter. You'll need to build a reputation in whatever community to sell your course in.

Start by interacting with posts and content from other people in your target audience. Build relationships with them, make friends, get valuable feedback, share your expertise, and build a reputation in the community of your target market.

This doesn't just apply to social media. For other marketing channels like email marketing, and ads to be successful, you'll need to do this.

3. Create Engaging Content

Creating and sharing valuable content with your target audience is the key to success when it comes to selling your online course on social media. Your content should be targeted towards a specific audience and tailored to fit the platform you’re posting on.

A good example of someone who does this well is Justin Welsh. His content marketing is simply incredible.

Justin Welsh doesn't just post about his courses and online business. He shares advice, experiences, and ideas with his community.

Here are some types of content you might want to promote:

1. Share video and text snippets of your course

Sharing snippets of your course content is probably one of the most effective marketing strategies you can use for promoting your course on social media.

Show what future customers can learn and the types of topics you cover in your lessons. This will give potential customers an idea of what they can expect from your course and help them decide if it's something they would be interested in taking.

2. Share student testimonials

Testimonials are one of the best forms of social proof, so obviously your marketing efforts for your profitable online course will be incomplete without them.

By sharing successful student stories, you can provide potential customers with tangible proof of the value that your course offers.

Tools like Senja allow you to collect text and video testimonials from your happy students for free. With Senja, you can also turn valuable feedback from learners into sharable content that you can post on your social media platforms, or even include in your email marketing.

Senja also allows you to add your testimonials to your sales landing page with dozens of testimonial widgets. Show your prospective customers why your current students love your online business.

Senja also lets you manage all the feedback you get from happy students in one place. No more Google Sheets!

3. Create educational content

Online course creation is only the first piece of the puzzle. As a course creator, you need to go beyond and share engaging content related to your course. This is one of the biggest opportunities you'll have as a creator.

For example, if you're a course creator talking about building an online business, you can create content that talks about making money online or side hustles. In general, broad topics work really well as they appeal to a wider audience.

If you share them on YouTube, you can even create an additional revenue stream (sometimes even for passive revenue)

Whether it’s a series of tutorials or videos discussing course topics, incorporating video content is an effective strategy for boosting engagement and driving conversions.

4. Share exclusive discounts and offers

Some of the most successful online courses use this strategy.

Online courses can be expensive, so offering exclusive discounts and special offers can be a great way to get people to attend your online school on social networks.

Take advantage of seasonal periods like Black Friday and post limited-time offers to get a quick bump in sales.

4. Offer Freebies and Teasers

One effective way to generate interest in your online content is to offer digital content like freebies or teasers for free.

This could be a short video tutorial, an e-book, or a webinar that provides a glimpse of what your course offers.

By providing valuable content for free, you build trust and demonstrate the value of your expertise, encouraging potential customers to invest in your paid courses.

You can even create lead magnets - free online content in the form of a checklist, guide, ebook, or PDF that educates or helps potential students. You put these lead magnets behind a form that asks for an email address and sends people who sign up to your email list.

Once they're on your email list, you can even add them to your sales funnel so that you get lots of first-time students on autopilot.

5. Influencer marketing and Guest Posting

Influencer marketing is a powerful marketing tool a lot of successful online courses use.

Pay other influencers in your niche who have a large and engaged following, or build relationships and partner with them. That way both of you can gain mutual benefits from your collaboration.

They can help spread the word about your courses to their audience, increasing your reach and credibility.

You can even appear guest on podcasts or blog posts owned by people in your niche. A lot of the time, they'll share what you're working on with their community and email list.

6. Try Paid Ads

While organic reach on social media is valuable, it can also be limited. Consider investing in paid advertising to reach a larger audience.

Platforms like Facebook and Instagram offer targeted advertising options, allowing you to reach specific demographics or individuals with particular interests.

Set a budget, define your target audience, and create compelling ads that drive prospective customers to your online business.

YouTube ads are definitely worth considering. Create a short video talking about your course and target prospective customers with interests similar to what you talk about.

7. Word of mouth marketing

Make it easy for people to share your course on their social networks. Some online course platforms and membership site platforms have built-in features for this.

That way, happy students will be able to easily promote your course for you.

It's also crucial to provide excellent customer support. Great customer support is a marketing effort often underlooked.

Respond promptly to inquiries and address any issues or concerns that arise. When you do this, people are more likely to vouch for you on social media.