Great post, Nev! I'm just about to launch a course, so this was incredibly timely. I've seen (and used) most of the platforms above (and am a paid member of 3 of the courses :), but chose to go with SmartMember as our back-end due to its native support desk and affiliate capabilities, as well as some killer 3rd party integration capabilities (autoresponder integration, Facebook group integration, JVzoo integration, etc).

Although the course isn't yet fully populated into the back-end... if you're interested, I'll set you up with an account (for free, you've taught me tons!) as soon as it's ready! :)

Awesome post Neville! The Nevbox sounds amazing. I'm an informational product addict so I've tried a veritable asston of online courses. What usually happens is:

1)Information overload

2)"No Time" and procrastination

3)Discouragement at lack of progress

The end result is there's so much stuff going on that nothing happens.

One of the best online courses I've taken is Bryan Harris's 10ksubs. He teaches you how to get 10ksubs(duh) on your email list. Why it's awesome:

1) Clear focus

You have a defined goal, and a road map to getting there. It's broken down into milestones so that you don't get overwhelmed. "Get your first sub." "Get your first 100 subs." "Here's how." Write it on your wall, forget 10k, forget SEO and CIA and giving out free puppies in exchange for email addresses. Just do this first and the rest will come.

2)Actionable Content

Each lesson brings something tangible to put you closer to your goal, and it's sequential.

You can't move on without completing an assignment per lesson.

3) Schedules

There's a lesson on scheduling lessons to specific parts of your day.

Helps stop excuses and procrastination. "What's scheduled, gets done."

4) Accountability and Community

The biggest thing I gotta say is the fact that you gotta submit an assignment for some lessons to the community group. It forces you to be active in the community. Usually when I see community groups on courses, the achievers are the ones posting and half the others lurk around and watch. By having everyone participate, it gives encouragement to keep going and makes you feel comfortable enough to ask for help--

--And too many people fail because they didn't ask for help.

Can't wait for your next post!

DISCLAIMER: Not affiliated with the course or Bryan, just a fan.

Hi Neville,

Thanks so much for this e-mail. It is fantastic because for someone like me, who is only just beginning to find out about what is available on-line, it is like taking a course all by itself. I'm going to favourite this e-mail and all the replies because there is so much information here that it will take me a couple of weeks of research to find out everything I need to know.

Why do I need to know all this stuff? I've written a book called 'Hack Your Diet' and I know that if I do nothing but publish this on Kindle then it will sink like a stone. I have to get serious about marketing and write myself a website and interact with my clients/readers in every way possible in order to make my writing a success. Your e-mails, your technical know-how and the way you let all of us share in each others' knowledge is just invaluable.

I am an auditory learner first so I like the written word or to hear a personable voice speaking to me. Secondly I'm kinaesthetic so I like to learn by doing. On-line that necessarily involves watching the experts demonstrate for me and then following along step by step. I do need personal access to the teacher, even if it's just via e-mail, because what can be easy to the expert is sometimes completely baffling to the beginner (me!) so I need to be able to clarify details. I also think that Sara has a good point because a readable transcript is a great idea for people who struggle with someone's speech or accent or who need to think carefully about something the teacher has said.

I like being able to stop a video, work through the points it illustrates and check it's right before I carry on. For me webinars and phone-ins and attending workshops are great but they don't give me opportunity to practice and check I've really 'got' an idea before they move on to the next point. I only attend 'live' events once I know I've got the basics of an idea well and truly nailed.

I enjoy the courses from www.futurelearn.com They are free on-line courses from top universities in many different interest categories. I've taken one on writing and one on marketing.

If a NevBox should find itself coming my way I'm sure I'd find it as well-rounded and shapely as the backends you've already shown us. :)

Thanks Jax! Great write up of how you like to learn, really appreciate it.

I published one book on Kindle a long time ago, and didn't promote it whatsoever. It just kind of sat there, with a few random sales here and there.

I did another experiment a few years later, wrote small book really quickly, then published it, then did a promo to my audience. It definitely was a dramatically different result.

You need that first "boost" of people for your book when it's published, then Amazon (or whatever platform) will recognize it's selling and push it even more. Best of luck Jax!

Yup, I agree.....the three things you need to complete a course are:

-Financial Pressure

-Social Pressure

-Concrete Deadlines

Oh cool, glad you're almost off the ground!

I'm good on the logins now, I've seen enough for the moment, but thank you for the offer. Your present to me would be kicking ass with the course!

Thanks Mat! I too am learning more and more about how people learn the best (I think it varies dramatically between different people).

Bite-sized chunks are very important, and I agree that the 3MimnuteRelief course was pretty well laid out and logical. I liked the look/feel/value a lot!

Well it makes sense why it happens:

--The creators of a course are incentivized to talk about the end benefits of the course, not the course delivery mechanism itself.

--The creators of a course (sometimes) don't spend a lot of time on the course itself, and instead spend more time making the marketing materials.

--The creators of a course (especially in some scammy affiliate circles) often promise outlandish claims, then the "solution" they provide is pretty dumb. If they TOLD YOU what their solution was in advance, you'd probably never buy the product.

With something like software, the creators are incentivized to show the thing in action, and maybe even let you use it for free....because if it solves a problem you're looking to solve, in the way you want it solved, you're likely to buy it.

Thank Tylor! I think I learn much like you: Bite-sized lesson + some text/graphs....repeat.

I find that format very useful too.

Thanks Mark! It was kind of a pain in the ass to make everything in this post.....published it at 2:20am on a Monday night :-/

I actually don't think this topic is SUPER INTERESTING to people, but I was genuinely curious about courses, so this satisfied an itch I had in my head. There are now probably more tools online to MAKE online courses than actual courses! I guess people are selling the shovels now instead of digging for gold.

Good advice. When I was making a lot of courses each year, I would have the formula: For $___, and ___ time, they will learn how to do ____. It had to be very specific. No "I will teach you marketing" kind of things. It would be like "I will teach you how to write a sales page in Google Docs in 2 hours."

This is awesome stuff Rafael, very NevBox-worthy!

I agree that seeing the teacher is great! It's interesting that some people actually don't mind the PowerPoint + narration method. I find that interesting.

Practical examples are going to become more and more common I hope. It's funny how often you see someone giving "marketing advice" about getting a website big, but their own website is really small. Maybe some practical examples of real projects they did would help!

Hmmm interesting, I will have to check the Shaw and Steve thing out.

I never really thought transcripts were helpful, but I guess I'm lucky living in the US Central Time Zone, so pretty much every webinar and live event is always a good time for me.

I "sort of" like Udemy's way of presenting a course. I find it a little dry and not very engaging, but it must be working for some people. I've never gone completely through any Udemy course I've ever bought.

Possibly a NevBox-worthy suggestion Mary!!

Now THAT is interesting! I think with bandwidth rates across the world, tech where it is, and the massive rise of awesome team collaboration tools, this will be very possible in the very near future.

You can already sort of setup a Slack Community that is a bit peer-to-peer. Great suggestion Jaime!

Great work!

By the way, from the looks of the icons I can see in your screenshot I'm pretty sure Curt's Social Media Ad Genius runs on Optimizepress2.

I always heard that it's a good thing to show screenshots of what it's like on the inside of your course in your sales page - or do an actual walkthrough in a video/webinar.

Ian