other title: How to generate a passive income on Udemy Presentation by Mark Farragher on Nomad Talks on Apr 4, 2016 - CODINO - Community of Digital Nomads

1. How To Earn A Living
Selling Knowledge

2. The world today
• Very expensive education system in the
US: $18,943 - $42,419 /y in ’14-’15
• Education costs is outpacing household
income
• Total student debt is growing fast
• Traditional education is becoming
unaffordable
• This creates a new market for cheap
educational content

3. The world today
• High unemployment
• Financial experts predict the
next recession is imminent
• Automation removes more jobs
than it creates
• In 9 years 30% of all jobs will
be done by robots/computers
• Lifelong learning needed to
stay employed

4. The world today
Ideal market for low-cost online education

5. Why am I doing this?
• I want to reach Financial
Independence (FI)
• This is when passive income
covers all my expenses
• I would no longer need to work
- all work is for fun only
• Requires 0.8M$ - 1.5M$
• Essentially an unconditional
basic income

6. Active income
• What I had from 1995-2015
• I get paid for the hours I work
• I receive (almost) nothing when
I’m not working
• Income maxes out at 176 hr/m
• Impossible to reach FI
(requires 15 yrs at $100/m)

7. Passive income
• What I have from 2015-today
• Requires unpaid up-front
investment
• Income starts when I publish
• Small time investment needed to
keep going
• No upper limit on income
• FI usually attainable in
2-5 years by scaling out

8. Online teaching
• This is passive income
• It takes about 3-4 weeks to
produce a course
• $250-$500 per month
• 15 minutes per week aftercare
• Course survives for 2-5 years
• FI in 3 years (best case)

9. What to teach?
• Deep knowledge
• Wide knowledge
• Reframing existing knowledge
• Making knowledge accessible
• Summarise knowledge
• Compact How To’s

10. The market
Blue ocean:
• Empty market
• No competitors
• No content or quality
requirements - anything goes
• Untested market
Red ocean: <— I am in here
• Crowded market
• Fierce competition
• Content and quality needs
USP’s to be noticed
• Proven market

11. My USP’s
• 20 years IT experience
• 5 years teaching experience
• Lots of interests: IT, Marketing,
Finance, Self-development…
• Deep & wide knowledge
• Make complicated topics
accessible to beginners
• I can monetise my knowledge!

12. My Udemy strategy
• I go for volume: 9 courses in 12 months
• Every course is about an aspect of C# programming
• Each topic will stay in fashion for years
• Each course explains a complex topic to beginners and experts
• There will always be C# developers interested in these topics

13. My recording studio
Macbook Pro, a towel to cancel echo, Quicktime Pro,
Audacity, Keynote, iMovie

14. But this is much better
Studio Lighting, Blue Yeti microphone with pop filter,
iPhone on a tripod

15. My production workflow
• I start by writing a full transcript
in Evernote
• I record audio with Quicktime
Pro and clean with Audacity
• I play back the audio and
record the screen with
Quicktime Pro
• I mix everything together in
iMovie
• I export in 720p mp4
write
transcript
record
audio
record
screen
mix in
iMovie

16. Why so elaborate?
• I never appear on camera!
• Reading from a transcript
removes all “uuhs” and “ahhs”
• Ideal if you do not have a
recording studio
• Very easy to add subtitles or
translate a course
• Very easy to turn transcripts
into blog/social media posts
write
transcript
record
audio
record
screen
mix in
iMovie

17. How profitable is online teaching?

18. My income
€2000-€4000 per month, but growth has
stalled since 02-2016

19. Course income
€250-€300 per course per month, with big
spikes in November and December

20. Cross-selling
Sell new courses to existing students
Good strategy if overall topic stays the same

21. Student loyalty
• 4 out of 5 are loyal students
• 9% in all courses
• 68% in 3+ courses
• 82% in 2+ courses
• 18% in only 1 course

22. Course price
• I sell at €100
• Almost no one on Udemy
pays full price
• Mostly $9 and $10
discounts
• Slow shift to $14 - $24
full price

23. Sales channels
• Commission is 3% - 75%
depending on channel
• My best channels are
instructor and organic
• 52.3% average commission
• Udemy is an expensive
platform!
50%
97%
25%
25%

24. Sales commission
My target: keep it below 50%

25. So why Udemy?
• Ideal when you’re starting with
no clients, reputation & list
• Huge market: 10M+ students
• They do hosting, sales and
marketing for you
• You can do profitable cross-
selling campaigns

26. Why not Udemy?
• Very expensive: commission
can go up to 75%
• No control over marketing &
sales campaigns
• No squeeze page
• You don’t own the student
• Big restrictions on e-mail
marketing

27. and this month…
• All prices are now $20-$50
• Maximum allowed discount is
now 50%
• Organic sales and PPC has
dropped significantly
• “Superstar” instructors are
leaving the platform
• Unclear what the future
revenue will be

28. What about Lynda?
• 4M students
• Students pay a $15-$30 flat fee
per month
• Instructors get revenue share
per viewed lecture
• Lynda determines what topics
you’re allowed to teach
• They broke off all contact with
me without explanation

29. What about Teachable?
• 10K instructors, 40K courses
• Instructors pay $0-$300 per
month
• Teachable does hosting and e-
commerce
• Instructor responsible for all
marketing and sales
• 0%-10% commission on credit
card transactions

30. My business strategy
• Use Udemy to build reputation
and experiment with topics
• Put courses on other non-
Udemy platforms
• Allow 3rd parties to resell
courses
• Advertise on social media,
blogs and Youtube
• Collect e-mail addresses
• Build a sales funnel
social
media
Youtube
blogs
free micro
course
master
class
reseller
course
Udemy
course

31. My business strategy
• I use Edgar to automatically post
on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook
• Edgar is $49 per month but totally
worth it
• Posts refer to blog articles and
free micro course
• Youtube channel videos refer to
blog and micro-course
• Zero effort!
social
media
Youtube
blogs
free micro
course
master
class
reseller
course
Udemy
course

32. My business strategy
• I host a Ghost blog on Digital
Ocean for $5 per month
• Each blog post is about a single
course lecture
• Each blog post ends with an invite
for the free micro-course
• Also a newsletter registration form
for e-mail capture
social
media
Youtube
blogs
free micro
course
master
class
reseller
course
Udemy
course

33. My business strategy
• I host free micro-courses on
Teachable on their free plan
• Each micro-course has 5 lectures
from a popular Udemy course
• The course ends with a 50%
discount for the masterclass
• E-mail capture at enrolment
• Zero effort & free hosting
social
media
Youtube
blogs
free micro
course
master
class
reseller
course
Udemy
course

34. My business strategy
• I host paid masterclasses on
Teachable on their free plan
• Each masterclass is 2-3 Udemy
courses combined
• I offer extra services
• E-mail capture at enrolment
• Zero effort & free hosting
social
media
Youtube
blogs
free micro
course
master
class
reseller
course
Udemy
course

35. My goals
• Continue using Udemy to test
course topics
• Automate everything as much
as I can
• Build a mailing list
• Start my own PPC campaigns
to boost sales
• Get my monthly income to a
comfortable point
• Reach FI in a few years

36. Thank you!
Mark Farragher
http://www.bitesizedcsharp.com/
https://csharp.teachable.com/
https://www.udemy.com/user/markfarragher/