The current trend of consumer behavior moving into online media is fast becoming the new normal for many businesses. It’s not surprising that the exact same is true for non-traditional education through the multitude of online courses now available online. It 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 expertise, there are lots of online course platforms (OCP) or learning management systems (LMS) that may help you get started. Some OCPs will offer services from scratch, like making your site, while others focus mainly on helping you reach your target audience. The 1st step is finding which one can transfer your ideas seamlessly onto the screens of your prospective students.
With all these LMS to choose from, there is one firm that has stood out for its balance of reasonable pricing, customizability, ease of use, and marketing control. Teachable is the leading choice of instructors, and after pitting it against its competitors, it is clear why.
Teachable vs Udemy Teachable vs Wix
Udemy was among the leaders of LMS, which explains how and why their audience is still among the largest markets in the business: they were there . Udemy and Teachable are currently two of the most popular options in selling online classes, but they are extremely distinct in essence 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 courses. At the very surface, this means that Teachable lets you 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 editing and building to sales, which are not in any way possible on Udemy. Among the more immediate consequences of this is that Teachable lets you communicate more directly with your clientele, by giving you access to student’s data and information; but once you’re on Udemy’s platform, your students’ data is theirs exclusively for whatever other purpose it may serve them. And in line with that, Udemy seems to care most about selling courses, period; therefore it is not just your courses, but every other class in their listing. There have been testimonials that mentioned this, when even competitor’s classes are promoted to students that the user brought in. Sure, that may work in favor of newer users who might use the marketing, but from the viewpoint of a user, that business sense could seem overly spammy and unnecessary.
Marketing at a Price
It’s Udemy’s cut-throat policies that have turned off several former or potential users. They appear 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 fashion, Udemy markets their user’s courses aggressively, but with a substantial price. That price is a massive 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 seem reasonable to others, particularly to those whose courses were previously created for different purposes and were only shared more publicly 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 restrictions on pricing. In 2016, Udemy put a cap on its costs, and all courses on the system needed to be within the $20-$50 range. That 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 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 reliable source of primary income.
So while it’s true that Udemy has a large audience which you may choose to tap into, the majority of the topics which they offer are really quite limited to largely 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 end, nothing is more satisfying than building your own following.
Teachable vs Thinkific
Pricing Teachable vs Wix
If you’re searching for an LMS that’s comparable to Teachable’s cost, Thinkific is another great company that offers a lot for less. Both provide their first tier programs for free, and start charging for every 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 features which are already included in Teachable’s monthly flat rates. 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 website maintenance, hosting, and security.
Newbies to the biz have a tendency 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. The majority of these can be uploaded to the courses with a simple drag and drop builder. They can host unlimited videos, create quizzes, send certificates, and monitor the progress of their students.
Teachable vs Wix
Convenience
Among the benefits of Teachable over Thinkific is the former’s class builder: it allows bulk changes to courses, which can 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 connected to cloud services, like Dropbox and Google Drive, for faster uploads from your PC.
Concerning course delivery, Teachable has an iOS app that permits pupils to learn on their mobile devices, which is something that Thinkific doesn’t have.
Sales and Marketing
Following 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 packages, or affiliate programs, but Teachable has more choices. The real clincher is Teachable’s 1-step checkout procedure, which decreases customer fallout (which happens more during obsolete, 2-step processes like Thinkific’s). It also includes a 1-click upsell upon checkout, raising transactions per client. Another significant advantage 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 authors (when applicable), focusing on 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 prices. That definitely gives you more value for your content. Click here to check out pricing for Teachable.
Teachable vs Podia Teachable vs Wix
One of the online course 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 provided at $79 (with Teachable at $399). This price gap can be due to the vastly different things they each offer. On the one hand, Teachable is a fully customizable class creator and seller, and on the other, Podia decided to concentrate 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 that they might not have to dip into, like e-commerce. Its interface is simple, clean, and pretty great for novice instructors. Having said that, this is also why it may not satisfy the needs of creators who want to do more with their website. 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 options for easy uploads of files, texts, and quizzes. Those that dabble in code may also explore that within Teachable. Users can easily get the sleek 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 trickle content attribute for those that would like to space the lessons provided to their students, and prevent cramming modules in 1 go. What is unique to Teachable is innovative control over course compliance, such as keeping tabs on students’ completion of quizzes and lessons. Additionally, it has built-in certificates that users can create and send to their clients at the conclusion of the lessons. Concerning integrations, Teachable has better autoresponders and analytics, both of which are very important to marketing and sales.
Recommendation Teachable vs Wix
To summarize, Teachable‘s interface is approachable even to the most inexperienced users, has excellent creation and builder resources for designing a slick course website, gives you control over your marketing and sales, has attributes that reduce time and effort on backend paperwork, and gives the best value for money. With more upgrades and user feedback, they are guaranteed to be a trusted company for many years to come.
