You're listening to gift biz unwrapped episode 146 Attention gifters bakers, crafters, and makers pursuing your dream can be fun. Whether you have an established business or looking to start one. Now you are in the right place. This is gift to biz unwrapped, helping you turn your skill into a flourishing business. Join us for an episode, packed full of invaluable guidance, resources, and the support you need to grow your gift. This here is your host gift biz gal Sue Mon height. Hi there.
It's Sue and thank you for joining me on the podcast today. It's the start of 2018. If you're listening to the podcast, when it's going live and the beginning of the year is a good time to reflect back on what happened last year and what types of things you want to do differently for 2018. One of those I am hoping is investing in yourself and in the growth of your business.
That is why I wanted to bring up the topic of today, which is how do you decide on online courses, whether they're for you, whether you should open your wallet and pay money for these courses or not, how in the world do you know when it's online? Think about it. There are so many different ways that you can invest in yourself and your business. You can join networking groups, you can attend a conference, you can listen to podcasts and read books.
And of course, then you can also take online courses, but there are so many of them. How do you decide, I mean, just look at your Facebook feed, I'm sure you've experienced the same thing that I have there's courses on productivity. There are courses from every single expert of every social media platform of how to get the most out of the various platforms. There's photography. I mean, literally anything that you want, even on the personal end, weight loss, sleep, how to walk your dog.
Right? I don't know. Just so, so many different choices. How do you decide it's a lot more difficult when people are online because they're not right in front of you, you might have a less of a connection initially with some of these people. And how do you make sure that you're not spending money for nothing? Is it really worth laying out the cash that hard earned cash of all of ours to get the result that you're looking for?
And that you're so hopeful for when you first make the investment over the course of my professional career, I've taken my share of courses. For sure. I've taken courses that are $19 all the way up to several thousand dollars. I've gotten wiser and a little bit more when I'm trying to decide if this is something that I really want to invest my time and money in or not.
I want to share with you now for checkpoints that I put myself through to evaluate is this the right course that I should be taking, that's going to help me do something different. I'm going to be wiser. I'm going to be able to affect the business in a different way, because it's something that I didn't know before one way or another, there is going to be some type of an outcome based on the course that I'm taking here are the four checkpoints that I use when I'm analyzing.
If I should take a brand new online course that I've discovered you can put yourself through these same checkpoints as you're looking at a course. And you're just about to press that buy button. You can know with confidence that it's a good move for you because you've done your research and you've made a choice. That's right for you. Checkpoint number one, does it fit with what you need to know?
Now as business owners, we have goals that we're setting for our business revenue goals or activities, achievements like maybe putting up your website or doing Facebook ads, whatever it might be. But we have certain things that we are focusing on at any given point in time is the course that you're looking at, taking in alignment with one of the things that you are trying to achieve.
This is really important because if it isn't, if it's out of alignment with something that you're focusing on, it gets you completely off track. And if you start jumping from one thing to another and not stay in alignment with what you're currently focusing on right now, nothing's going to get accomplished a little bit, will be accomplished here a little bit will be accomplished there. And in the end, nothing really comes to completion.
So is the result that's promised from the course going to fit in with something that you are focused on that is going to advance you and your business further because it's something you're focusing on right now, then that is a good reason to stand up, take notice, and continue looking at that course. If the answer is no, that doesn't mean that you will never take that course. Make a note of it dot down who it is. Who's offering the course, what the name of the course is the website.
And that then is something that you can look at and readdress in the future. Now, a lot of online marketers, I'm sure you've seen use a strategy called scarcity. They're trying to prompt you to make the purchase right then and there, because they don't want you to forget about their offer. So scarcity could be carts, opening, and closing, or you can get it at a certain price, but only for a limited time. And that's not really bad because a lot of people I'm sure you're guilty.
I am will think, Oh yeah, this is something that I think I might want to look at, but I've got to do something else first and then I'll come back to it. And then you lose the website or it just slips your mind or whatever. So I don't think scarcity tactics are a negative thing. However, I don't want you guys to feel pressured if it's not in alignment with something that you really should be doing right now to have that scarcity make you think, Oh my gosh, if I don't take it now, it'll be never.
One of the phrases that I've been using more and more often today, you've probably already heard it from me is some day, but not today. And the behind that is, you really want to filter things that you're doing and make sure they're in alignment with your goals. And if they're not, you could take the course later when it's right and appropriate for you. It might just not be right now. So don't get distracted with the latest and the greatest. It's not necessary Siri for you to jump in right away.
If it's not correct for you at the D just the timing is not right right now. I know, I know FOMO, the fear of missing out. Just remember someday, but not today. Okay. So that was checkpoint. Number one. Does it fit in then with what you are currently focused on achieving within your business? Moving on to checkpoint number two, how quality fied is the person who put together and his team, Jean, the course, there are two different avenues. You can identify here.
There are many people who will gather information, they're teachers and instructors. So they will find all the information that is required for the topic that they're teaching. They'll bring it all together, which is really useful, right? You're not having to go out and capture all the information. They'll take all of the photos, facts, examples, and organize it into a neatly framed course.
And then they present that information and overlay their unique thoughts, comments, suggestions, and ideas for implementation. And they also may have students who've seen success. So they're able to use some of the experiences they've had from their students and share those with you to ensure that you get the best result possible. The thing that's missing here is that they haven't specifically done it themselves. And you just want to identify that and know that that is what you are getting in.
The person who's offering this course. So that's one way courses will get created. The second one would be the person who is offering the course has actually lived and learned through mistakes of their own created systems, to overcome challenges and actually done and gotten Results through what they're teaching. Some people might say these instructors are more credible because they've actually been in the trenches. And I don't mean to say that one is more credible than another.
The point is you want to really understand for yourself which camp, the course instructor falls under, did the creator of the course capture all the information and then overlay it with his enhancements, adding on student success stories, or were they one who actually did all of this themselves? And they're sharing with you what they've learned, things that they created to get the desired result that they
wanted. And most of the time those people are saying, I learned this and I'm sharing this with you. So you don't have to go through the stress, the heartache, the financial outlay that I did, because now I figured this out, I've locked it down and I want to share it with you. And I think I want to add in a little caveat here. I personally don't think that one way or another is better or worse, but yes, there are scammers out there.
There are people who will pretend like they've put something together, misrepresent themselves, take your money and really not have a process for you or are giving you bad direction. But overall, the majority of people who are out offering courses are like you and I they're business people. They're putting together programs with a genuine, sincere desire to help you see progress and see success based on whatever the topic is of the course.
So this checkpoint number two of understanding the instructor and how they've gotten to the information that they're presenting for you is again, just a level of evaluation. You want to identify which one they fall in and then how believable they are, how credible they are in your eyes. And in the end, honestly, it's your choice, but you want to make that choice from a position of evaluation and intuition and research and knowledge. And right now I want to make a choice.
And that is to take a short pause and thank our sponsor. This podcast is made possible. Thanks to the support of the ribbon print company, create custom ribbons, right in your store or craft studio in seconds, visit the ribbon print company.com for more information, Moving on to checkpoint number three. And that is a caution. I have a warning for everybody.
You want to be careful when you're looking at people online and looking at their social media platforms and not equate the number of followers that they have with the credibility of their stated qualifications, popularity online in any platform. Yes, it's social proof. And I would say in the vast majority of cases, it does align the higher number of followers. People have more likely the more successful, the more people who have endorsed that person are.
But remember too, there is the ability to buy followers out there, artificially inflate your numbers so that you look more credible than you actually are. So again, this is research and some thinking that you need to do as you're looking at somebody and investing in whatever they're offering online, do a little bit of research on them. Look at their website, look at a couple of other things.
If you're not familiar with them yet, maybe they've done some podcast interviews and you get a chance to hear and understand them a little bit more. Have you gotten a referral that this is a great course, but in that case, the question of the popularity online is a little bit mute, but just don't think just because somebody has 10,000, a hundred thousand followers on Facebook, that they are going to know how to teach you how to do Facebook advertising.
As an example, what are the other qualifications that they have that make you trust and believe that they're going to give you solid, incredible information. Finally, checkpoint number four is what is the style of the presentation? What format is the course going to be delivered in? Is it something that you just download as a PDF and follow along independently? Is there video attached? Do you get the entire course at once or is it dripped out to you week after week?
Will you be going through this with another group of people? So there'll be some conversation back and forth between all of you a community is being built around that course, or is it 100% independent now, again, none of this is right or wrong, but it's a good way for you to layer on top of that, how you learn best, do you learn best by seeing in which case videos are
good? Do you like to see everything and make notes and then also have a follow-up where you can go back and review everything in that case? Is there a replay, is there a download of the slide so that you're able to go back and review it again for yourself later? The other thing is, do you have lifetime access then to the course, or are you limited to a certain period of time maybe at six months or a year only?
And if that's the case that, Oh my gosh, you ought to do it right away and take that course right away, because you don't want to forget about it and push it off, thinking that you would do it later. And that brings up the idea of time. Do you have, then the time within all the things that you have going on to actually spend and take the course? So these are the four checkpoints that I want you to consider. Every time you are looking at an online course in review checkpoint.
Number one is the topic timely and relevant to something that you are trying to achieve an advance right now, checkpoint number two, how was the contents of the course obtained?
Did they gather all the information or did they actually experience and see these results themselves checkpoint number three, if someone is classifying themselves as an expert in their field, make sure to validate that, not just through social media numbers, but on website, through referrals, through other people who've taken the program and have shared their results. And finally check point number four is the style that the course is being delivered in a style of learning that works for you.
By going through these four checkpoints or filters, if you will, it will help you feel confident that the course is right for you. That it's worth the investment of your time and your money. Remember, it's just not a money play here. And then if everything is in alignment, if you're feeling comfortable and confident and excited about taking that course, then press that button, make the commitment and invest.
And when you do purchase that online course, I will be the first to congratulate you because investing in yourself, learning more, getting better from people who have already done it is a smart thing to do. As a business owner. There is no reason to waste money and time trying to figure things out yourself.
When there are resources out there to get you wherever you're trying to go faster, then once you've purchased the course, how do you make sure that you get the very most out of it that you possibly can? Do you know that the majority of people who buy online courses either never start the course or go through maybe halfway and then drop off. So they never actually take advantage of the investment that they made in the first place.
Next week, right here on the podcast, I'm going to walk you through how to get the very most out of any online course. You take, I've put together a six step process that helps, you know, regardless of what course you're taking to stay organized, work your way through, and even more importantly, be able to go back and resource the information that you need when you actually get to implementation stage. So that's all up next week on gift biz on wrapped.
And I look forward to seeing you then This episode is all wrapped up, but your gift biz journey continues. It's your time to experience the pride and satisfaction of turning your passion into a profitable business. Join the gift biz builder program and access valuable lessons or worksheets, and a live Q and a sessions. Addressing your specific challenges.
You also have the opportunity to connect with a community of gift biz builders, just like you head over to gift biz, unwrapped.com/gift biz builder, and get started today. And until next time happy.