Have you noticed how many more entrepreneurs and influencers are building online courses than ever before, all in hopes to reach larger audiences and teach others what they know?
You might be wondering if this growing trend means the market is too saturated for you to launch your own online course. Actually, the opposite is true.
There has never been a better time to create an online course.
It’s estimated that the online learning industry will grow to a $325 billion dollar industry by the year 2025. Yes, that’s billion with a “b.”
Course creators have the unique opportunity to monetize their knowledge.
Some business owners now make their full-time living by selling online courses. Others add online courses to their business model for more passive income, meaning they can earn exponentially more money no matter how many people buy their product because it’s not solely tied to their input of time.
Generating passive income might sound dreamy, and sometimes it can be, but there are obstacles to creating and selling courses. One of the common hurdles entrepreneurs experience is trying to come up with a way to generate consistent sales from your online marketing efforts.
With a quiz, you can attract new leads who are interested in your online course by investing your time upfront into building a quiz that runs automatically. Then you can reap the benefits of your work for years to come.
Here are a few more benefits of building an online quiz as a course creator.
Generate leads on autopilot
No matter if you decide to sell your online course with a limited time or evergreen launch model, you’ll need a way to drive traffic to your website and capture leads who are interested in your online course.
One of the greatest ways to do this is to offer a personality quiz that teaches your audience about the course’s topic and builds a more personal connection with each person. With a quiz-taking experience that is highly interactive and almost addictive, personality quizzes have the power to generate quality leads who can’t wait to hear from you.
Turning quiz takers into loyal email subscribers, your Interact quiz could quickly become not just a lead generator but your biggest one! It has been for people like brand strategist Kaye Putnam, influencer Jenna Kutcher, and designer Elizabeth McCravy.
We’ll teach you how to have similar success with your course-related quiz in just a moment, but there are other benefits to using quizzes as a course creator.
Share your teaching style
Before someone in your audience decides to purchase your online course, they may have a few questions before making the investment. This is especially true when you set a premium price for your course. Some of these questions might be based on your teaching style or philosophy.
People learn in different ways, and thus, they connect with different educators. As an online course creator, you’ll want to use your quiz to show what teaching style you specifically offer in your quiz content.
For example, let’s say you’re an educator who likes to use a lot of step-by-step instructions to help course students duplicate your process from start to finish. These instructions will show students how to get from point A to point B in a logical fashion, giving them ample imagery and examples to follow along with.
When creating a quiz based on this teaching style, you might want to enhance your quiz content by sharing video tutorials or creating a simple PDF guide with written instructions. You can get creative with these ideas.
Now, it’s your turn! Think about how you might infuse more of your teaching philosophy or style into your quiz content.
Could you offer audio recordings if your audience connects with lectures, or give them a downloadable PDF version of your presentation slides so people can print them out as they follow along? Give your audience members a taste of what they can expect in the course by leading with it through your quiz.
Educate before you sell
At networking events, most people would say that passing out business cards within the first few seconds of meeting someone new is a big turnoff. That’s because people want to get to know you before they trust you enough to do business together.
The same is true when selling your online course. You don’t want to lead with a sales pitch right away. Instead, you’ll want to give valuable content that educates your audience and shows them how much you know about a topic that’s related to your online course.
If you’re willing to give something of value away for free, your potential customers may be wondering “Wow, I wonder how much more value they’re giving away in a paid course!” When your quiz gives your audience tips and recommendations they can implement into their life or business, they’ll be more likely to check out what your full-length course can offer them.
We believe in using quizzes to give immense value to your audience, and here are a few ways that other course creators have done the same with their Interact quizzes.
Click here to create your own Interact quiz!
Learn how to build a quiz from 6 course creators
Have you noticed it’s easier to learn from someone else’s example than to come up with something from scratch? The same can be true when you build your first quiz.
We’ll soon teach you how to sell your online course through an interactive quiz, but first, we’ll break down a few quiz examples you can pull inspiration from.
As we highlight online course creators who teach brand strategy, podcasting, and even sleep training, you’ll find examples that could lead to your next big idea, no matter what industry you’re in.
What’s your core purpose?
Amber Lilyestrom, an influential entrepreneur and brand marketer, wanted to sell more seats to her online course Brand You Breakthrough while putting the whole funnel on autopilot. She was looking for a way to generate ongoing leads for the course without having taking time away from her other business tasks.
Her sustainable marketing strategy for the online course came in the form of, you guessed it, a quiz! Helping her audience find what she calls their “core purpose,” Amber is able to connect with people who need affirmation and encouragement as they create their business and brand marketing plan.
Amber sells multiple offerings on her website including online courses, mastermind programs, and one-on-one consultation calls. With so many services and products, she needed a simpler way to offer one lower-tier offering that could lead to her higher-priced offerings. This is a common sales strategy many personal brands take when selling online courses.
With this in mind, the Core Purpose themed quiz was created as an introduction to Amber’s business, giving her audience an opportunity to learn more about Amber’s story and mission to build a stronger personal connection. While it eventually leads to a sales pitch for the course, there’s a comprehensive funnel that follows after the quiz that gives more offers and ways to work with Amber.
The quiz has grown her email list by over 4,000 subscribers, helping her sell more online course seats with very low-cost Facebook ad leads.
You can read a step-by-step guide from Amber on how how she built her quiz here, but here’s what she had to say about using Interact:
| “I initially launched my quiz with a different provider but just couldn’t get excited about the limited ability to use our own branding…or the lack of options we had in following up with people who took the quiz. Switching over to Interact was a no-brainer in the end. It was so user-friendly. I was able to customize and use my own branding while easily following up with new leads… to offer them value based on their individual results.” – Amber Lilyestrom |
What we love about Amber’s quiz:
As a course creator, Amber knows it is important to promote her quiz virtually everywhere! She posts about it on social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Pinterest while featuring it on the homepage of her website. To consistently drive traffic to her quiz, Amber also mentions it from time to time on her podcast. She makes the quiz impossible to miss, making it easier for new visitors to jump right into taking her quiz.
We also like that Amber inspired others to share the quiz and their results. This helps her quiz get in front of people she may not have been able to reach on her own. Even if you have a relatively small audience right now, think about how many people each audience member in your community is connected to. That’s the power of creating a share-worthy quiz!
Lastly, since Amber is building a personal brand, it’s smart for her to use personal headshots throughout the quiz. She uses these branded photos in her quiz result landing pages (like this), quiz cover page, and more. After all, people often connect more with faces than logos.
What are the next right steps for your business?
Working as a business coach, Karem Mieses uses her organizational skills to help others create a step-by-step plan to improve the systems in their business. Karem is all about helping her audience members take action rather than letting them sit and get comfortable in the ideation phase.
After building her Idea2Profit Academy, a course for creative entrepreneurs and parents who need a time-saving way to run their business effectively, she wanted to find a way to guide people toward the quiz while showing how strategic her recommendations are.
She did this, of course, through a quiz!
Unlike Amber Lilyestrom’s example above, the Idea2Profit Academy is Karem’s signature offering. As such, it comes with a higher investment of $1,249. Since her online course sells for a higher price, Karem knew she needed to give more educational value through her quiz results.
That’s why every quiz result type comes with a custom business roadmap with eight to ten phases her audience needs to focus on.
Did you notice Karem mentioned the “Idea2Profit Method” as its own phase? This is a great way to introduce the online course without distracting from the educational value of this content. It’s woven into the content naturally so her audience becomes more familiar with what the method is and why they should invest in the online course later on.
She also includes a list of things to consider when her audience tackles each next step. This includes helpful recommendations on building great habits, preparing to pivot, keeping an eye on money mindsets, and more.
Karem covers a lot of topics in each custom business roadmap, but the descriptions for each phase are in shortened paragraphs so she doesn’t run the risk of overwhelming quiz takers. Think about how you might want to include more educational value into your quiz, especially if you are selling a high-ticket offer.
What we love about Karem’s quiz:
With her signature offering, Karem does a great job as a course creator ensuring that the topic of her online course is reflected in the quiz. The course teaches students about how to confidently select their best business offer and create a plan to grow it into a profitable business without the stress and hassle. Karem uses similar language when highlighting the quiz, making sure that her messaging is consistent on her website, social media, and more.
Karem also uses the same button colors, backgrounds, and font styles in order to keep her visual branding consistent. Presenting a brand consistently across all platforms can increase revenue by up to 23% so it’s important to use cohesive visuals.
We also really like Karem’s informational email sign-up form! Even though the topic of the quiz is relatively serious, she mentions that by signing up for her list, subscribers will receive “fun and infrequent updates.” This is good news for people who might be on the fence about signing up because they don’t want to receive too many emails.
She also gives people a “skip this step” button option, allowing her to collect email addresses only from people who are really interested. This will increase her email engagement analytics for metrics like email open rates, click rates, and even conversion rates. We recommend using the “skip this step” opt-out option when growing your email list with a quiz.
Which program is right for me?
For course creators who want to create a quiz that directly gives online course recommendations to your audience, you’ll love this quiz example from Becca of Little Z Sleep.
While the quiz topic itself may not seem as intriguing as some of the others you’ve seen in this article, it does build confidence since her audience members will know exactly what they’ll receive after taking the quiz.
Since Becca offers multiple sleep trainings for families, using a quiz to personally recommend offerings cuts down on back-and-forth customer service emails she might have with potential customers. It also makes sure people are enrolled in the right sleep training program.
By recommending a course that’s best for each parent, Becca has found a way to take her audience member’s initial interest in her programs and turn it into a conversion. Using the quiz topic of sleep training also hits on a strong pain point that many parents have with young kids, making it easier to work it into her course marketing.
What we love about Becca’s quiz:
From the very first quiz question, Becca is already focused on recommending the right sleep training course. Since her courses are based on the child’s age, it makes sense to lead with this question. It is straightforward, simple to answer, and ensures Becca can gather data upfront to see which ages are the most popular. This will only enhance her online course creation and marketing strategy.
She also adds images to each answer option to further illustrate every age range. You might also notice from looking at her website and quiz that she’s mindful of including ethnically diverse stock images. This makes her brand look more inclusive.
We like how Becca uses the quiz question below to identify what each child struggles with in relation to sleeping, but she gives an option that states “some or all of these” struggles are true. This makes sure that parents can choose multiple options if many are true.
Did you notice these lifestyle-based stock photos are all edited in a similar way with a clean, crisp aesthetic? This screenshot almost looks like it could be a beautiful Instagram grid! We already talked about how important it is to create a consistent and cohesive brand identity through your visuals, so Becca shows us how to do this with her quiz.
Lastly, to sweeten the deal, Becca offers a 15% discount code that is exclusive to quiz takers. This makes the deal entices more people to sign up for her email list.
When someone signs up with their email address, they deliver the code through email. However, there’s another way to take advantage of the discount. When someone clicks on the call-to-action button on the quiz result page, it also shows, as you can see below.
In addition, the code offer is displayed at the bottom of the course sales page in an announcement bar that grabs the audience member’s attention so they don’t miss out on the deal.
Since the course is priced at $99, the 15% code makes it even more affordable for new parents. We love this entire online course shopping experience from start to finish!
What is your Enneagram leadership type?
Fusing best practices from the Enneagram test with her own leadership philosophy, Tianna Tye created a quiz that helps her audience identify their best business leadership strengths.
Through a series of thoughtful and easy-to-answer questions, Tianna helps others discover ways to double down on their strengths and ultimately hire out work that’s related to their weaknesses.
Developing new leaders through the quiz is essential to Tianna’s business because then she’ll be able to sell more seats to her online course, Dream Hire Bootcamp.
At a mid-level price of $597, her online course aims to help virtual-based entrepreneurs find their next hires without wasting time and money. It’s easy to see how the Enneagram-based leadership quiz topic fits into her marketing strategy.
Even though Tianna’s quiz is available for audience members to take 24/7, her online course is only open a few times throughout the year. Many well-known course creators like Jenna Kutcher, Marie Forleo, and Stu McLaren use this same technique.
By using time-sensitive launches, course creators like Tianna can offer quizzes to generate leads through a waitlist form. Then, when it becomes time for the course to relaunch, Tianna is able to send launch emails directly to email subscribers who originally came from the quiz.
Nearly 50% of people who take Tianna’s quiz become an email subscriber, so think about how much more opportunity she has to sell her online course each time it launches!
What we love about Tianna’s quiz:
Instead of giving several answer options for each question, Tianna keeps it simple with just two options. Since her quiz features 21 total questions (which is higher than the amount we typically recommend), the lower number of answer options makes it easy for audience members to quickly move through the quiz.
She also writes each quiz question and answer in a very direct and straightforward way. Personality tests can sometimes trip people up if the answers feel too broad, but Tianna does a great job of ensuring her audience can clearly identify which answer is the best fit for them.
Once someone completes the quiz, they’ll see custom illustrations for each of the quiz result types that correspond with the nine Enneagram numbers. This feels like a special and unique addition to a quiz that is unlike any other quizzes in her industry.
Instead of giving her audience one quiz result, she lets people see their top three quiz results so they can explore each type on their own. This is an option you can utilize inside the Interact quiz building platform.
Once a quiz taker reads through all three quiz types, they can decide which one they resonate with most. This provides a whole new way for course creators like Tianna to provide insights for quiz takers who are in the middle of their own self-discovery process.
How kind is your family?
With only so many hours in a day, coaches and service providers are frequently turning their services into online courses they can sell for more passive income. The same is true for Meganne, the course creator behind Be Kind Coaching.
Meganne’s main purpose is to use her online courses and group coaching programs to help parents build kinder, stronger families through their parenting choices. While the mission may seem simple, she explores this subject through many teaching opportunities.
She has a whole collection of online courses for parents, ranging from $22 all the way up to $1,499 with most of her courses being priced around $199-299. With so many options to choose from, Meganne uses her quiz to better understand each parent’s needs.
Featuring the quiz on her homepage and throughout her website, Meganne makes it easy for parents to assess their current parenting habits. Then she offers a free guide through a separate landing page that allows them to access next steps and parenting strategies before they make an investment in one of her courses.
What we love about Meganne’s quiz:
Often course creators have difficulty condensing all their information into a few short quiz questions, but Meganne demonstrates how to do it with her quiz. Each question is simple and straightforward but also gets at the heart of each person’s unique parenting style.
Some of the answers are written in a lighthearted way and will immediately resonate with certain parents. This helps when you are navigating the difficulties and struggles of a more serious topic like parenting. Meganne’s brand voice definitely comes through in these examples.
That last stock photo is also a nice, humorous touch! Think about how you can also use stock imagery in your questions or answers to illustrate what you’re talking about. It will make it easier for your audience members to visualize the scenario.
Is podcasting right for you?
Since Stefanie Gass is the well-known podcaster behind the Mompreneur Mastermind Show, it only makes sense for her to create an online course on the same subject. But before she can offer her course, she leads with a quiz that helps people understand if podcasting is the right fit for them.
Stefanie uses more than one quiz on her homepage, but this podcast themed quiz relates to one of her core offerings. We say one offering because she has many, including an online course, private one-on-one mentorship calls, podcast sponsorship opportunities, and guided journals. Talk about diversified income streams!
Unsurprisingly, this quiz directs audience members to her course titled Podcast Pro University. Inside the course, her audience of mom entrepreneurs learn how to create, launch, and promote their own podcast show.
It makes sense, then, for her quiz to help others understand if podcasting is even a good fit for their business. Once they take the quiz, they’ll receive results that tell them whether or not they should start a podcast. If so, Stefanie sends more educational information and leads people to her online course.
What we love about Stefanie’s quiz:
Instead of giving a potentially boring “yes” or “no” result to the question of whether or not audience members should start a podcast, Stefanie gives different personality results that describe what kind of podcaster they could be. For example, if you received the personality result of a Casual Podcaster, you’ll read about what mindset you should have and what’s important to know before you launch your own podcast.
Stefanie also offers a free video training that covers the top ten steps you need to take when creating a podcast. This gives her audience a taste of her teaching style while showing how much value she’s giving away for free. It builds trust with her audience members and positions her as a clear expert.
You might notice the short “P.S.” message above the red call-to-action button that says “If you have questions or want to pick my brain on starting your own show, schedule a quick chat with me.” This invitation could be a great way for Stefanie to answer her audience’s questions and build even more trust through a quick call. She can offer the online course as a solution during the call, too.
Think outside the box in terms of how you can better promote your online course through a quiz.
Does it make sense for you to provide course recommendations? Do you want to offer a consultation call option like Stefanie? Maybe you’d rather create a list of next steps with your online course being the main call-to-action.
No matter which route you choose, make sure every piece of content you share ties back into your online course.
Build your own quiz as an online course creator
Are you inspired by these quiz examples and ready to build your own quiz?
That’s what we like to hear!
Your first step is to sign up for an Interact account and then follow these crucial steps:
- Create a solid quiz strategy with an online course sales goal in mind.
- Choose a quiz topic and title your potential students will love.
- Write personality-infused quiz results people can’t wait to share.
- Create quiz questions and answers that are inspired by your quiz results.
- Fully customize the branding of your quiz inside Interact.
- Write an email sequence that turns subscribers into paying course students.
- Embed your quiz on your website and a dedicated landing page.
- Continually promote your quiz on social media and beyond for consistent leads.
We can’t wait to hear your success story after using your quiz to attract new course students!