The current trend of consumer behavior moving into online media is fast becoming the new standard 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 outside the classroom setting, and has empowered nearly anyone with an idea to share 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) that can help you get started. Some OCPs will offer services from scratch, like making your site, while others focus mainly on assisting you to achieve your target audience. The 1st step is discovering which one can move your ideas seamlessly onto the screens of your potential students.
With all these LMS to choose from, there’s one firm 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 rivals, it is clear why.
Teachable vs Udemy Teachable vs Schoology
Udemy was among the pioneers of LMS, which explains why and how their audience remains among the largest markets in the industry: they were there . Udemy and Teachable are currently two of the most popular choices 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 merely a market for course creators that have existing classes. At the surface, this means that Teachable lets you use your custom domain while Udemy will have your clients keep coming back 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 are not 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 student’s data and information; but as soon as you’re on Udemy’s platform, your students’ data is theirs exclusively for whatever other purpose it might serve them. And in line with that, Udemy seems to care about selling courses, period; so it’s not just your classes, but every other course in their listing. There have been testimonials that mentioned 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 might 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 is Udemy’s cut-throat policies which have turned off several former or potential users. They seem to know the very value of their following, and have taken advantage of it, much to the detriment of the lecturer. True, Teachable does not promote the courses for its own users, that responsibility is left entirely to them. In an extreme fashion, Udemy markets their user’s courses aggressively, but with a significant price. That price is a massive chunk of control and earnings.
Udemy started 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 reasonable to others, particularly to those whose courses were previously created for other purposes and were merely shared more openly on Udemy, but that hurt a number of the instructors that were selling solely from the corporation’s site. On top of that, what have driven people over the edge are the restrictions on pricing. In 2016, Udemy put a cap on its prices, and all courses on the system needed to be within the $20-$50 range. This is regardless of the uniqueness or skillfulness of a course, and it is natural for some to turn away and look for better outlets for their thoughts. If you combine these two policies, and have a course priced at $20 and a 50% creator revenue, selling on Udemy becomes almost impossible as a dependable source of primary income.
So while it is true that Udemy has a massive audience which you may want to tap into, the majority of the topics that they offer are really very limited to largely Technology and Personal Development. Consider that and their dog-eat-dog advertising 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, there is nothing more satisfying than creating your own following.
Teachable vs Thinkific
Pricing Teachable vs Schoology
If you’re searching for an LMS that is comparable to Teachable’s cost, Thinkific is another terrific company that offers a great deal 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 any of its plans; but a closer look at the fine print will show that it costs extra for certain options which 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 two.
Beginner-Friendly
But pricing isn’t 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 have a tendency to gravitate toward these companies for their easy-to-use interface which allows nearly all formats of content, such as audio, video, PDFs, and other multimedia. The majority of these can be uploaded into the site with a simple drag and drop builder. They can host unlimited videos, create quizzes, send certificates, and track the progress of their students.
Teachable vs Schoology
Convenience
Among the benefits of Teachable over Thinkific is the former’s class 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; and it allows multi-format content in one lecture. What’s more is it can be linked to cloud services, such as 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
After the content production comes the selling and marketing of your classes. This is where Teachable wins by a landslide. Both give the freedom 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 procedure, which reduces customer fallout (which occurs more during outdated, 2-step processes like Thinkific’s). It also comes with a 1-click upsell upon checkout, raising transactions per client. Another major benefit is Teachable’s payment gateway that accepts credit card, PayPal, Apple Pay, and Google Pay payments. Another service included is the automated payout to affiliates and writers (when applicable), focusing on 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 for your own content. Click here to check out pricing for Teachable.
Teachable vs Podia Teachable vs Schoology
One of the online class platforms with the cheapest top tier is Podia. Though it does not 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 focus on Online Course Hosting, Membership or Email Marketing, and Digital Downloads. Those will instantly help you narrow down your choice to what’s best suited for you.
Podia’s compact categories lets users filter out other aspects which they might not need to dip into, such as e-commerce. Its interface is easy, clean, and pretty good for novice instructors. Having said that, this is also why it may not meet the needs of instructors who wish to do more with their site. Since the variety isn’t 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. The ones that dabble in code can also experiment with that within Teachable. Users can easily get the slick look of a professional site by selecting from default themes that can be customized to liking. Teachable’s editor makes it easy to create changes and push upsells, maximizing both user’s time and profitability.
Both have a trickle content attribute for those that want to space the lessons offered to their clients, and avoid cramming modules in one go. What is unique to Teachable is advanced 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 clients at the end of the lessons. Concerning integrations, Teachable has improved autoresponders and analytics, both of which are extremely important to sales and marketing.
Recommendation Teachable vs Schoology
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 attributes that reduce time and effort on backend paperwork, and provides the best value for money. With more updates and user feedback, they’re guaranteed to be a reliable choice for years to come.
