Are you in the business of creating and selling courses? If so, what are you doing to keep your course offerings relevant?

Over the years I have had the pleasure to see many people and organizations create successful online learning programs. They spent time researching, developing, launching, and nurturing their program to the point where it hums along without a hitch.

But at the same time I have also witnessed learning programs launch well then fall flat.

There are many factors that can contribute to this unfortunate reality, some of which are outside of our control. For example, in the case where someone is selling courses related to a piece of software. If that software goes out of business then so will the business selling courses.

There are also circumstances which can be avoided.

When online course businesses start to fail, it’s often because the program itself has been neglected for too long. Don’t get me wrong, I fully understand that new projects come along that take precedent. The issues begin to arise when these new projects prevent business owners from “taking a look back”.

That said, I have good news! Keeping your business relevant is pretty easy to do and doesn’t require too much extra effort.

First (and probably easiest) is to make sure that the content you cover in the course actually still makes sense. I can recall an online course I once took that covered Goolge Adwords. It was very relevant at the time but when I revisited it out of curiosity I noticed that it hadn’t been updated. The screenshots were old and the terminology was dated. It was useless.

Simply updating the screenshots and making sure the text still made sense would have giving the course a longer shelf-life.

The other thing you can do is a bit more involved but will provide you with the most actionable insight: ask your learners for input.

Your learners have invested in your business and have taken your course. Inquire if they still find the content useful and what changes they would like to see. It may lead you to modify your current course or even create a new one.

Creating (and selling) online courses is not a one-time event. Continued success means that you have to keep your finger on the pulse of your industry. Make changes where necessary and adapt to the demands and you will be around for some time to come.