The present trend of consumer behaviour moving into online media is fast becoming the new standard for many businesses. It’s not surprising that the same is true for unconventional education through the multitude of online courses now available on the Internet. This has opened more avenues of learning beyond the classroom setting, and has enabled nearly anyone with an idea to talk about their knowledge.
Whether you wish to teach your hobbies, or something related to your expertise, there are lots of online course platforms (OCP) or learning management systems (LMS) which can help you get started. Some OCPs will offer services from scratch, like making your site, while others focus mainly on helping you achieve your target audience. The 1st step is discovering which one can move your ideas seamlessly onto the screens of your potential students.
With so many LMS to choose from, there’s one company that has stood out for its balance of reasonable pricing, customizability, ease of use, and marketing control. Teachable is the top choice of instructors, and after pitting it against its competitors, it is clear why.
Teachable vs Udemy Being Teachable
Udemy was among the leaders of LMS, which explains how and why their audience remains among the biggest markets in the business: they were there . Udemy and Teachable are now two of the most popular options in selling online courses, but they’re extremely distinct in nature and progressiveness.
Differences
Teachable allows users to construct their own course website and sell their brand, while Udemy is merely a marketplace for class creators that have existing classes. At the very surface, this means that Teachable allows you to use your custom domain while Udemy will have your clients return to Udemy.com. On another level, Teachable gives you tools to create and personalize the entirety of your course, from content building and editing to sales, which aren’t at all possible on Udemy. One of the more immediate consequences of this is that Teachable allows you to communicate more directly with your clientele, by giving you access to pupil’s data and information; but as soon as you’re on Udemy’s platform, your students’ data is theirs alone for whatever other purpose it might serve them. And in line with that, Udemy seems to care about selling classes, period; therefore it’s not just your courses, but every other course on their listing. There have been testimonials that said this, when even competitor’s courses have been promoted to clients that the instructor brought in. Sure, that may work in favor of newer users who could use the marketing, but from the point of view of a loyal user, that business sense could seem too self-serving and unnecessary.
Marketing at a Price
It’s Udemy’s cut-throat policies which have turned off many former or potential users. They appear to know the very value of their following, and have taken advantage of it, much to the detriment of the lecturer. True, Teachable doesn’t promote the courses for its users, that responsibility is left entirely to them. In an extreme manner, Udemy markets their user’s courses aggressively, but with a substantial price. That price is a huge chunk of control and earnings.
Udemy began with a 90% instructor revenue share, but they slashed those percentages to 70%, and then again quite suddenly to 50% throughout the years. A 50% share of the course revenues may still look sensible to others, especially to those whose courses were previously created for different purposes and were only shared more openly on Udemy, but that hurt many of the instructors that were selling solely in the company’s site. On top of that, what have driven people over the edge are the restrictions on pricing. In 2016, Udemy set a cap on its costs, and all classes on the system had to be within the $20-$50 range. That is regardless of the uniqueness or skillfulness of a program, and it’s natural for some to turn away and look for better outlets for their thoughts. If you combine these two policies, and have a class priced at $20 and a 50% creator revenue, selling on Udemy becomes almost impossible as a dependable source of primary income.
So while it’s true that Udemy has a massive audience that you may choose to tap into, most of the topics which they offer are actually very limited to largely Technology and Personal Development. Consider that and their dog-eat-dog marketing strategies and absorption of your brand’s identity, I’d say Teachable is the answer to many of Udemy’s shortcomings. In the end, there is nothing more satisfying than building your own following.
Teachable vs Thinkific
Pricing Being Teachable
If you’re looking for an LMS that is comparable to Teachable’s cost, Thinkific is another terrific company that offers a lot for less. Both offer their first tier programs at no cost, and start charging for every higher tier thereafter. Many beginners choose Thinkific because of its generous waiving of transaction fees on all of its plans; however a closer look at the fine print will reveal that it costs extra for certain options that are already included in Teachable’s monthly flat prices. But, those deviations are somewhat negligible, and with a range from $0-$499 per month, you really can’t go wrong with either of these.
Beginner-Friendly
But pricing is not all that they have in common. Both allow their users to create and sell personalized classes on their hosted platforms, without the hassle of handling the technical aspects like website maintenance, hosting, and security.
Newbies to the biz tend to gravitate toward these companies for their easy-to-use interface that allows nearly all formats of content, such as video, audio, PDFs, and other multimedia. Most of these can be uploaded to the courses by a simple drag and drop builder. They can host unlimited videos, create quizzes, send certificates, and track the progress of their pupils.
Being Teachable
Convenience
Among the advantages of Teachable over Thinkific is the former’s class builder: it allows bulk changes to classes, which may be a huge time-saver, especially for the ones that have built quite a number on their system; also it allows multi-format content in 1 lecture. What’s more is it can be connected to cloud providers, like Dropbox and Google Drive, for faster uploads from your PC.
In terms of course delivery, Teachable has an iOS application that enables students to learn on their mobile devices, which is something which Thinkific doesn’t have.
Sales and Marketing
Following the content production comes the selling and marketing of your courses. This is where Teachable wins by a landslide. Both give the freedom to sell one time or recurring products, offer discounts and packages, or add affiliate programs, but Teachable has more choices. The real clincher is Teachable’s 1-step checkout process, which reduces customer fallout (which happens more during obsolete, 2-step processes like Thinkific’s). It also comes with a 1-click upsell upon checkout, increasing transactions per customer. Another significant benefit is Teachable’s payment gateway which accepts credit card, PayPal, Apple Pay, and Google Pay payments. Another service included is the automated payout to affiliates and writers (when applicable), taking care of tax forms and similar documentation. For those who have users from the EU, it even goes as far as including EU VAT on top of course rates. That definitely gives you more value to your own content. Click here to check out pricing for Teachable.
Teachable vs Podia Being Teachable
One of the online course platforms with the most affordable top tier is Podia. Though it doesn’t have a free plan, and its basic plan comes at $39/month (with Teachable at $29/month), its top and only remaining plan is provided at $79 (with Teachable at $399). This price gap could be a result of the vastly different things they each offer. On the one hand, Teachable is a fully customizable class creator and vendor, and on the other, Podia decided to focus on Online Course Hosting, Membership or Email Marketing, and Digital Downloads. Those will instantly help you narrow down your choice to what is best suited for you.
Podia’s compact classes lets users filter out other aspects that they might not have to dip into, such as e-commerce. Its interface is simple, clean, and pretty good for novice instructors. That said, this is why it may not satisfy the needs of instructors who want to do more with their site. Since the variety isn’t much, more advanced users may find it lacking.
Course Creation and Control
Teachable defeats Podia in design and customization tools, with choices for simple uploads of files, texts, and quizzes. The ones that dabble in code can also experiment with that within Teachable. Users can easily get the slick look of a professional website by selecting from default themes that can be customized to satisfaction. Teachable’s editor makes it effortless to create changes and push upsells, maximizing both user’s time and profitability.
Both have a trickle content attribute for those that would like to space the lessons provided to their clients, and prevent cramming modules in 1 go. What is unique to Teachable is advanced control over course compliance, such as keeping tabs on students’ completion of lessons and quizzes. It also has built-in certification that users can create and send to their students at the end of the course. Concerning integrations, Teachable has better autoresponders and analytics, both of which are very important to marketing and sales.
Recommendation Being Teachable
To summarize, Teachable‘s interface is approachable even to the most inexperienced users, has exceptional creation and builder tools for designing a slick course website, gives you control over your marketing and sales, has attributes that cut time and effort on backend paperwork, and provides the best value for money. With more upgrades and user feedback, they’re certain to be a trusted company for years to come.
