The present trend of consumer behavior moving into online media is quickly becoming the new normal for many industries. It’s not surprising that the same is true for unconventional education via the multitude of online courses now available online. 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 associated with your experience, 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 creating your site, while others focus mainly on assisting you to achieve your target audience. The 1st step is discovering which one can transfer your ideas seamlessly onto the screens of your prospective students.
With all these LMS to pick from, there is one firm that has stood out because of its balance of reasonable pricing, customizability, ease of use, and marketing control. Teachable is the top choice of creative entrpreneurs, and after pitting it against its rivals, it is clear why.
Teachable vs Udemy Teachable Mobile App
Udemy was one of the leaders of LMS, which explains why and how their audience is still among the largest markets in the business: they were there first. Udemy and Teachable are now two of the most popular options in selling online courses, but they are very different in nature and progressiveness.
Differences
Teachable allows users to build their own course website and sell their brand, while Udemy is simply a marketplace for course 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 customers return to Udemy.com. On another level, Teachable gives you tools to create and customize the entirety of your course, from content editing and building 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 providing you with access to pupil’s data and information; but as soon as you’re on Udemy’s platform, your students’ information is theirs exclusively for whatever other purpose it might serve them. And in line with this, Udemy seems to care most about selling classes, period; therefore it is not only your courses, but every other course on their listing. There have been testimonials that said this, when even competitor’s classes are promoted to clients that the user brought in. Sure, that may work in favor of newer users who could need the marketing, but from the viewpoint of a loyal user, that business sense could seem overly spammy and unnecessary.
Marketing at a Price
It is Udemy’s cut-throat policies which have turned off many former or potential users. They seem to be aware of the very value of their following, and have taken advantage of it, much to the detriment of the lecturer. True, Teachable does not market the courses for its users, that responsibility is left entirely to them. In an extreme manner, Udemy markets their consumer’s courses aggressively, but with a substantial price. That price is a huge chunk of control and revenue.
Udemy started with a 90% creator 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 earnings 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 a number of the instructors that were selling solely from the company’s site. In addition to this, what have driven people over the edge are the limitations on pricing. In 2016, Udemy put a cap on its prices, and all courses on the system had to be within the $20-$50 range. This 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 ideas. 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 large audience that you might choose to tap into, most of the topics that they offer are actually very limited to mostly Technology and Personal Development. Consider their dog-eat-dog marketing strategies and absorption of your brand’s identity, I would say Teachable is the response to many of Udemy’s shortcomings. In the long run, nothing is more satisfying than building your own following.
Teachable vs Thinkific
Pricing Teachable Mobile App
If you’re looking for an LMS that is comparable to Teachable’s price, Thinkific is another great company that offers a lot for less. Both provide their first tier programs for free, and start charging for each 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. However, 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 courses on their hosted platforms, without the bother of handling the technical aspects like site 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 audio, video, PDFs, and other multimedia. Most of these can be uploaded to the site by a simple drag and drop builder. They can host unlimited videos, create quizzes, send certificates, and track the progress of their students.
Teachable Mobile App
Convenience
Among the advantages of Teachable over Thinkific is the former’s course builder: it allows bulk changes to courses, which may be an enormous time-saver, especially for the ones that have built quite a number on their system; also it allows multi-format content in one lecture. What’s more is it can be linked to cloud services, like Dropbox and Google Drive, for faster uploads from your devices.
Concerning course delivery, Teachable has an iOS app that permits students to learn on their mobile devices, which is something which Thinkific does not have.
Sales and Marketing
After the content production comes the selling and marketing of your courses. This is where Teachable wins by a landslide. Both give the liberty to sell one-time or recurring goods, offer discounts and bundles, or affiliate programs, but Teachable has more options. The real clincher is Teachable’s 1-step checkout process, which decreases customer fallout (which happens more during obsolete, 2-step procedures 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 automatic payout to affiliates and writers (when applicable), taking care of tax forms and similar documentation. If you 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 Teachable Mobile App
Among 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 offered at $79 (with Teachable at $399). This price gap can 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 chose to concentrate 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 great for novice instructors. That said, this is also why it may not satisfy the needs of creators who want to do more with their website. Since the variety is not much, more advanced users may find it lacking.
Course Creation and Control
Teachable beats Podia in design and customization tools, with choices for easy uploads of files, texts, and quizzes. Those that dabble in code may also explore that within Teachable. Users can easily get the slick look of a professional site by selecting from default themes which can be customized to satisfaction. Teachable’s editor makes it easy to create changes and push upsells, maximizing both user’s time and profitability.
Both have a drip content feature for those that would like to space the lessons provided to their clients, and prevent cramming modules in one go. What is unique to Teachable is innovative control over course compliance, such as keeping tabs on students’ completion of quizzes and lessons. It also has built-in certification that users can create and send to their students at the end of the lessons. Concerning integrations, Teachable has improved autoresponders and analytics, both of which are extremely important to marketing and sales.
Recommendation Teachable Mobile App
To summarize, Teachable‘s interface is approachable even to the most inexperienced users, has excellent creation and builder resources for designing a slick course site, gives you control over your marketing and sales, has features that reduce time and effort on backend paperwork, and provides the best value for money. With more updates and user feedback, they are guaranteed to be a trusted company for years to come.
