When brainstorming your course content and marketing strategy, you have probably run into the age-old question of what you should name it. A good online course name won’t just attract your ideal audience. It will explain what benefits they’ll receive from your course. It will solve a problem for them instantly. It will direct them to what they need to make progress on their goal.
So, how do you decide on the best course name? How do you make sure it converts leads into learners? In this article, we’ll answer both of those questions, and we’ll uncover the one thing that increases your conversion rate.
Keep your niche in mind
In his Write Bites Podcast, Jacob McMillen, a well-known copywriting course creator, shares that the number one thing that sells is product-market fit. Writing to an audience that wants your products is the one thing that increases your odds of conversion the most. Couple this with a sizeable audience, and you are almost guaranteed sales.
But most course creators don’t start with a large following. It can take years to build a following that would guarantee these results. What you can do instead is to make sure you have a niche following.
If you invest in learning about your audience and your niche, you will increase your conversion rate because you can speak to a targeted group of people. Go deeper than surface-level demographics and learn about the values people in your niche have. What are their habits like? What other aspects do they have in common with members of your community? Finding these pockets of overlap and learning more about the physiographic of your niche will aid you in building a community that shares similar desires.
Your online course is meant to solve a problem your audience has. So, when you choose your course name, narrow in on the niche you’re part of and how you can benefit them. Draw from the buyer persona you’ve created, and choose a course name with it at the forefront of your mind. Remember, if you have a strong product market fit, you’re already one step closer to making your first sale.
Read more: 10 Tips on finding your niche in the knowledge commerce industry
How to create the best online course name
If you’re using the power of words to persuade or convince, then you’re using copywriting. Copywriting is a key part of selling your online course. Your course name will be the first touch point for some learners, so it’s important that it accurately sells your product.
The best copy is clear and concise. There’s some debate about whether the clever copy is better, but to be safe, keep it simple. Here are some tips to help guide your copywriting for your course name:
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Incorporate a description and an action
Great online course names involve a combination of description and action. This means that the course name will include who your learner is and what they’re hoping to achieve.
If you’re a web design instructor for teens, your course name may sound like this: Teens for Coding: Build Your First Website in One Weekend.
If you’re a personal development coach for women, your course name example may sound like: Women Called to Lead: 30 Days of Journaling to Build Self-Confidence.
Each title has one thing in common: they include who they are speaking to and a tangible goal their learners will reach. This is a form of copywriting that appeals to the desires of online learners. By emphasizing both the learner’s identity and the practicality of your course, you encourage them to be proactive in reaching their goals.
Read more: How to create product descriptions that attract more learners
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Keep it sixty-five characters or less
Copy should be concise. So, keep your course name under 65 characters. Not only will this help it be more memorable, but it will also help it be searchable.
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Optimize your course name for SEO
Search engine optimization (SEO) is a great strategy to add to your digital marketing plan. It can help to bring in organic growth for your content and brand.
Imagine creating a course that sells on autopilot because it ranks well on Google. Imagine the impact your course can have if it's easy to find for new learners.
Optimizing for SEO in your course name means using keywords that are commonly searched in your niche within your course name. You can also add these keywords to subheadings and taglines within the content to increase your odds of being found online. You can use a search tool like Ahrefs or Semrush to research keywords that are easy to rank for in your content.
Keywords strategy can be difficult to nail down if you’re new to it. INDIE LMS has built-in SEO tools as well. We’ve created a platform geared toward creators who want to maximize both organic traffic by adding meta descriptions and keywords to your catalog items, including online courses. So, if you’re on our platform, you can use a similar strategy to help guide learners to you.
Read more: Don’t forget about SEO when creating your online course
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Add the results to the title
Online course names with specific goals market better because it narrows down the intended audience. Don’t shy away from adding a timeline to your course name as well. For example, if you’re a copywriting course creator, common course name examples include:
- Reach 10k Per Month in 90 Days
- Land Your First Client in 30 Days or Less
- Make Your First 1K Within 30 Days or Less
The possibilities are endless when you focus on the benefits for your learners and include results in the title. If you have testimonials from a previous mini-course you created to validate your online course idea or even from an early version of the course you are naming now, add them to the promotional content of the course to highlight the timeline. Prior student success is a great way to encourage new learners, and landing pages with testimonials can increase revenue by up to 62%.
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Brainstorm as much as you need to
It can feel like a lot of pressure to choose the perfect course name, but it doesn't have to be that way. Take your time brainstorming multiple options and as you develop more titles, lean into the ones that are actionable and clear.
Your first idea may not be your favorite, and that’s OK. To help the process along, consider incorporating powerful words and elements of your branding when you think of possible course name examples.
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Take inspiration from other course creators
Though every product is unique, chances are someone in your niche has created a course similar to yours and successfully converted leads into sales. Taking time to study course name examples in your niche has multiple advantages. Some of these include:
- You’ll have a better picture of what is considered helpful content in your niche;
- You’ll gain insight into buyer trends;
- You’ll be able to see with keywords have high search volume for SEO;
- You’ll have examples to reference as you choose your course name.
You can browse e-learning platforms to see what’s trending, as well as social media sites like Twitter and Instagram to see what’s relevant.
Read more: How to research your competition as a knowledge entrepreneur
Key takeaways
To recap, product-market fit is your key to course sales, and landing on a great online course name is the way to engage your ideal audience. It can be difficult to decide on the best course name that converts leads to learners, but if you focus on the benefit for your learners, optimize for SEO, and keep messaging plain and simple, you’re sure to find a viable option.
Invest time to get to know your audience's deeper qualities. What are their thoughts? How do they engage with your content? What do they need to meet their goals? These are all questions you can ask as your brainstorm your course name. They will help you dive into the mind of your learners so that you can draw out the desires that most appeal to them with your content.
