How to Start an Online Course Business: 5 Steps

If you want to know how to start an online course business, the answer is that it comes down to five strategic steps. Pick a topic you know inside out, verify that people will pay for it, build your course around expert support, choose your platform, and launch with a plan.

But what does that look like in practice?

I'm Sierra, a Kajabi expert and designer. I help course creators build and launch their businesses on Kajabi, and I've seen how much the right platform affects whether a course sells and keeps students coming back.

This guide walks you through how to start an online course business so you build something people buy, finish, and recommend.

What Is an Online Course Business?

An online course business sells educational content that people buy and access online. You teach a skill or solve a problem and sell it to people who want that result.

You can start your online business with just one course. Over time, many grow into a wider set of offers, such as memberships, coaching programs, communities, and digital downloads.

What turns a course into a business is the system around the content. That includes your website, sales pages, email marketing, checkout, and the support students get once they're inside.

In other words, it's not enough to just create a course. You also need to market and sell it.

Is Selling Online Courses Profitable?

Yes, it has high potential to be.

Demand for online learning keeps climbing and is on track to reach $279.30 billion by 2029. In a recent survey, 93% of course creators said they earn income from their online courses.

That said, simply creating a course doesn't make it profitable. Without a good strategy in place, you may build your content around a topic nobody asked for, set your price too high or too low, or choose the wrong platform for your sales page and marketing.

How to Start an Online Course Business in 5 Steps

1. Choose a Course Topic Rooted in Your Expertise

Start with what you know well enough to teach, and what you've already helped people do. Strong course topics often come from problems your clients, followers, or customers already bring to you.

Ask yourself these questions:

• What do people ask me for help with again and again?
• What result have I gotten for myself or others that someone would pay to reach better or faster?
• What do I know now that took me years to learn?

Then, you need to narrow it down to one clear outcome. For example, "Bake and sell sourdough from your home kitchen" or “sew your own wardrobe of fashionable items that fit just right” clearly tells a buyer what they'll walk away with. A specific promise like that makes your marketing clearer and gives you a natural order for your lessons.

2. Validate Demand

Before you spend time on filming and creating the course content, research whether people will pay.

Here are a few ways to test your idea:

• Survey your email list or social following about what they're struggling with right now.
• Read the questions people post in forums, Facebook groups, and Reddit threads in your niche.
• Presell the course with a waitlist or a discounted founding-member offer before you build it.
• Run a live workshop or beta round with a small group and use their feedback to refine the full course.

Preselling gives you the strongest signal. If people pay for a course that doesn't exist yet, you've found demand. Now, all you need to do is create high-quality content to satisfy it and market it well.

3. Structure Your Course Around Expert Support

In 2026 and beyond, a self-paced course made only of prerecorded videos is a tough sell. People can ask AI to explain almost any topic for free, in seconds.

However, what AI can't offer is your judgment on their specific situation, or the perspective of someone who has your unique experience. When you include your own expert support in a course, it raises the value of what you sell and what you can charge for it.

This doesn't necessarily mean that you have to offer live coaching calls. If you don't want to, you don't have to. My clients add hands-on support in different ways, including:

• A membership or community where students get ongoing access to you and each other.
• Asynchronous messaging, where students send questions, and you reply on your own schedule.
• Live group coaching calls or Q&A sessions on a regular calendar.
• One-to-one sessions as a premium tier for students who want personal guidance.

Once you've picked your support model, map the rest of the course around the outcome you promised. Break the path into modules that move students from where they start to that result, with each lesson covering a short, digestible step.

4. Pick Your Platform and Build Your Course

The platform that you choose for your online course business is extremely important. It determines how well you can market your course, your students' client experience, and how much you can do without bolting on extra tools.

Look for a platform that handles:

• Course hosting with a clean student experience on desktop and mobile.
• Sales pages, checkout, and payment processing.
• Email marketing and automations.
• Community, coaching, or membership features for support.

If you spread these features across different platforms or apps, you'll have to pay several subscriptions and make sure that they all work smoothly together. An all-in-one platform keeps your business in one place, which is why I highly recommend Kajabi for selling online courses.

Once you've selected your platform, it's time to record your lessons, upload your materials, and build your welcome flow. Typically, I recommend setting up a purchase confirmation email with clear login steps and links to help your new students get started.

5. Price, Launch, and Market Your Course

Research your market, but I always advise my clients to set your price based on the result your course delivers and how much access students get to you, instead of what other creators charge.

As your course launch date approaches, warm up your audience with free content tied to your course topic and open a waitlist to send emails explaining who the course is for and what it can do for them.

Why Kajabi as Your Online Course Business Platform

As someone who's been helping clients launch their online businesses for 7+ years, Kajabi is THE one platform I recommend to course creators. It's a robust and powerful all-in-one tool that allows you to keep everything your business needs in one place.

With Kajabi, you get:

• Courses, coaching, memberships, communities, and podcasts.
• Your website, landing pages, and sales pages.
• Email marketing and automations.
• Sales funnels for lead magnets, webinars, and launches.
• Checkout and payments.

Kajabi doesn't take a percentage of your course sales beyond standard payment processing fees, so the only thing you have to pay is the subscription. No matter how much money you make, the cost of being on Kajabi is always the same for you.

Learn more about Kajabi course creator features.

Benefits of Starting an Online Course Business on Kajabi

It Makes Expert Support Easy to Add

You can bundle a course with a community, offer group coaching or one-to-one sessions as an upsell, or run a membership with recurring payments. Students can get everything from the same login.

Your Students Get Mobile Access

Every Kajabi plan includes a free member app, so students can watch lessons and join your community from their phone. If you want your own app in the Apple App Store and Google Play under your brand, Kajabi offers a branded app as a paid add-on.

I break down the options in my guide to the Kajabi app.

You Get Room to Grow

You can start with just one online course and later add a membership, a coaching tier, or digital downloads. Kajabi gives you the option to do all of these formats, so you won't need to move or add platforms as your business grows.

Get 30 Days Free on Kajabi

If you're ready to try Kajabi, sign up through my referral link, and you'll get 30 days free. That gives you a full month to set up your course, build your sales page, and test out the platform.

You'll also get an invitation to book a Kajabi Power Hour with me, which is a one-to-one session that you can use however it helps your business most, whether that's a Kajabi training, deciding how to set up your course and support, or planning your first launch.

FAQs

Do I Need a Large Audience to Sell an Online Course?

Not at all. A small audience that trusts you often sells better than a big one that's not engaged. A few hundred engaged email subscribers can fill a first course, especially if you presell to them before you build. You can grow your audience alongside your course.

Is Kajabi good for beginners?

Yes. Kajabi keeps your website, courses, emails, and payments in one place, so you don't need technical skills to connect separate tools. It's user-friendly. If you'd like help setting it up, signing up through my referral link also gets you an invitation to set up a Kajabi Power Hour with me, where I can teach you more about the platform.

Can I still sell online courses now that people use AI to learn?

Yes, as long as your course offers more than information. AI can explain a topic, but it can't give expert support or share your unique perspective. When you include expert support, such as a community, messaging access, or live calls, your students get something AI can't offer.

Build Your Online Course Business With Sierra Lin Design

Starting an online course business involves a lot of decisions, and your platform choice is something that should set your business up for success for years to come.

I'm Sierra, a Kajabi expert and designer. At Sierra Lin Design, I build custom Kajabi websites that bring your brand design, messaging, strategy, and technology together in a strategic way.

I also set up the systems behind your website, including sales funnels, lead magnet funnels, courses, communities, and email series, so your Kajabi runs as one connected business.

Ready to turn your expertise into a course that sells? Book a free call, and let's plan the Kajabi setup that gets you there.