Finding Your Profitable Niche: What Online Course Should I Create?

Table of Contents

1. Introduction
2. The Strategic Advantage of Selling Courses on Shopify
3. Assessing Your Expertise and Market Demand
4. High-Demand Online Course Categories
5. Identifying Your Specific "Profitable Problem"
6. Validating Your Idea with a Landing Page
7. Structuring Your Curriculum for Maximum Engagement
8. The Economics of a Digital Course: $29.99 vs. Transaction Fees
9. Maximizing Customer Lifetime Value (LTV)
10. Creating Your Content: Quality vs. Speed
11. Marketing Your Course to Your Existing Audience
12. Overcoming Imposter Syndrome
13. The Power of Recurring Revenue
14. Conclusion: Start Building Your Digital Powerhouse
15. Frequently Asked Questions

Introduction

Did you know that the global e-learning market is projected to skyrocket to over $465 billion by 2028? We are currently witnessing a massive shift in how the world consumes information. For Shopify merchants, this isn’t just a trend—it’s a revolutionary opportunity to diversify revenue and build deeper connections with their audience. If you have ever felt limited by the thin margins of physical products or the endless cycle of shipping logistics, you have likely asked yourself: what online course should i create?

The beauty of the digital product model lies in its scalability. Unlike physical inventory, a digital course is created once and sold thousands of times without incremental costs. At Tevello, our mission is to turn any Shopify store into a digital learning powerhouse. We believe that you should own your customer data and your brand experience. This means keeping your students on your own URL, using the Shopify environment they already trust, rather than sending them away to a third-party marketplace where they might get distracted by a competitor’s ad.

In this guide, we will explore the strategic process of identifying a profitable course topic that aligns with your expertise. We will break down high-demand categories, look at real-world success stories, and show you how to validate your idea before you spend a single minute recording video. By the end of this article, you will have a clear roadmap for launching a digital product that increases your Customer Lifetime Value (LTV) and provides the recurring revenue stability every business owner craves.

The Strategic Advantage of Selling Courses on Shopify

When most people think about selling digital content, they often look at external marketplaces. However, for a serious brand owner, that is a tactical mistake. When you use a native solution, you ensure a seamless checkout experience using the payment gateways you already trust. This means no fragmented customer journeys and, most importantly, you keep 100% of your data.

By integrating your educational content directly into your Shopify store, you create a unified ecosystem. Imagine a customer buying a yoga mat and immediately seeing an offer for a "14-Day Morning Flow" video series on the order confirmation page. This kind of synergy is what drives high-margin growth. Furthermore, we believe in transparency, which is why we offer a simple, all-in-one price for unlimited courses. This allows you to scale without the fear of being penalized for your success.

Assessing Your Expertise and Market Demand

The first step in answering the question of what online course should i create is to look at the intersection of three things: your skills, your passions, and what people are actually willing to pay for.

Identifying Your Unique Value Proposition

You don't need to be the world's leading expert to teach a successful course; you just need to be two steps ahead of your student. Think about the questions you get asked most often. If you run a Shopify store selling gardening tools, do customers frequently email you asking how to keep their hydrangeas alive? If so, you have found your course topic.

Consider your:

• Professional Background: What do you do for a living? Skills like project management, coding, or accounting are highly sought after.
• Hobbies: Are you a master at sourdough? Do you know how to restore vintage watches?
• Overcome Struggles: Have you lost 50 pounds, mastered a second language, or successfully navigated a career change? Your journey is your curriculum.

Market Research Techniques

Before you build, you must validate. Use tools like Google Trends to see if interest in your topic is rising. Dive into Reddit and Quora to see what specific problems people are complaining about in your niche. If you see a common "pain point" that isn't being addressed by existing products, you have found a gap in the market.

For example, look at how one brand sold $112K+ by bundling courses with their physical products. They didn't just guess; they looked at what their community wanted and delivered a solution that lived natively on their store.

High-Demand Online Course Categories

While you can teach almost anything, some categories consistently outperform others in terms of sales volume and student engagement. Here are the top niches for 2024.

1. Technology and Software Mastery

As the digital landscape evolves, the demand for technical literacy grows. Courses on coding (Python, JavaScript, HTML/CSS) remain evergreen. However, you can also niche down into software-specific training. Many professionals are desperate to master tools like Salesforce, Adobe Photoshop, or advanced Microsoft Excel. If you can help someone save five hours a week by mastering a software tool, that course is worth its weight in gold.

2. Business and Entrepreneurship

Helping others make money is one of the most profitable paths you can take. This includes teaching people how to start a freelance business, how to manage a remote team, or even how to scale an e-commerce brand. Because these courses have a direct Return on Investment (ROI) for the student, you can often price them higher than hobby-based courses.

3. Health and Wellness

From "Yoga for Busy Executives" to "Keto Meal Prep for Families," health and wellness is a trillion-dollar industry. People are increasingly looking for specialized programs that fit their specific lifestyle. At Tevello, we provide all the key features for courses and communities, which allows wellness instructors to not just sell a course, but to build a supportive group where members can share their progress.

4. Arts, Crafts, and Creative Hobbies

During the pandemic, the world rediscovered the joy of making things by hand. This interest hasn't faded. Courses on watercolor painting, crocheting, woodworking, or photography allow creators to monetize their talent. We have seen incredible results from brands generating revenue from both physical and digital goods by selling the supplies alongside the instructional content.

5. Personal Finance and Investing

Budgeting, debt management, and stock market basics are critical life skills that aren't always taught in school. If you have a background in finance, creating a course that helps people secure their future is both impactful and profitable.

Identifying Your Specific "Profitable Problem"

To find the right answer to what online course should i create, you must think about the "transformation" you are offering. People don't buy courses; they buy the person they become after the course.

Consider a merchant selling premium coffee beans. They could sell more beans by offering a "Barista Basics" video course. The student starts as someone who makes mediocre coffee and ends as a home barista who can craft a perfect latte. This adds a high-margin upsell to the cart that requires zero extra shipping or warehouse space.

If unifying your stack is a priority, start by a simple, all-in-one price for unlimited courses. By securing a fixed cost structure for digital products, you can focus on the content rather than worrying about tiered pricing plans that take a bigger cut as you grow.

Validating Your Idea with a Landing Page

Don't spend months filming high-production videos for a course that nobody wants. Instead, use a "Minimum Viable Product" (MVP) approach.

1. Create a Landing Page: Use your Shopify store to create a page describing the course.
2. Outline the Transformation: Clearly state what the student will learn.
3. Collect Leads: Ask for an email address or offer a "Pre-Order" discount.
4. Analyze the Data: If 100 people visit the page and 20 sign up for the waitlist, you have a winner. If zero people sign up, you've saved yourself months of wasted effort.

This strategy is part of why we focus on keeping customers at home on the brand website. You can test these ideas directly where your customers already shop.

Structuring Your Curriculum for Maximum Engagement

Once you’ve validated your topic, it’s time to build. A great course is more than just a series of videos; it’s a structured journey.

Break It Down into Modules

Avoid overwhelming your students. Break your broad topic into 5-7 manageable modules. For example, if you are teaching "Digital Photography," your modules might be:

• Module 1: Understanding Your Camera Settings
• Module 2: The Rules of Composition
• Module 3: Mastering Natural Light
• Module 4: Introduction to Photo Editing
• Module 5: Building Your Professional Portfolio

Use Diverse Content Types

Different people learn in different ways. We recommend mixing video lessons with downloadable PDF worksheets, checklists, and interactive quizzes. Tevello’s Unlimited Plan includes everything you need for this, from unlimited video hosting to drip content scheduling, which releases lessons over time to prevent student burnout.

Building a Community

Learning is often a social experience. By including a community feature—profiles, member directories, and social feeds—you increase the stickiness of your product. Students are less likely to cancel a subscription or lose interest if they are part of a thriving group of like-minded individuals.

The Economics of a Digital Course: $29.99 vs. Transaction Fees

One of the biggest hurdles for growing creators is the "success tax." Many platforms take a percentage of every sale (3%, 5%, or even 10%). This might not seem like much when you are making $500 a month, but as you scale, it becomes a massive drain on your resources.

At Tevello, we reject this model. Our Unlimited Plan is a flat $29.99 per month. We charge 0% transaction fees. Whether you sell 10 courses or 10,000, your software cost remains the same. This is essential for predictable pricing without hidden transaction fees.

Think about the math: If you sell €100,000 worth of courses on a platform that takes 5%, you are losing €5,000. On Tevello, you would have paid roughly $360 for the entire year. This allows you to reinvest that capital into marketing or better content. This is exactly how we help merchants with retention strategies that drive repeat digital purchases.

Maximizing Customer Lifetime Value (LTV)

Selling a course isn't just a one-time transaction; it's a gateway to a long-term relationship. Many of our most successful merchants use courses as an upsell for existing customers.

For instance, a brand selling photography equipment can see massive growth by generating over €243,000 by upselling existing customers into high-value educational content. When a customer buys a camera, they are most likely to buy a course on how to use it within the first 48 hours. By having your digital products live side-by-side with your physical stock, you make that purchase frictionless.

Our "Native Shopify Integration" ensures that your customers use their existing Shopify account to access their courses. There is no second login to remember, no third-party site to navigate, and no "where is my course?" support tickets to answer. This unified login reduces friction and builds brand loyalty.

Creating Your Content: Quality vs. Speed

A common myth is that you need a professional film crew to create an online course. In reality, your students care more about the value of the information than the cinema-quality lighting.

• Audio is King: People will forgive mediocre video, but they will not tolerate bad audio. Invest $50-$100 in a decent USB microphone.
• Use What You Have: Most modern smartphones have incredible cameras. Use a tripod and natural light from a window, and you are ready to go.
• Screen Recording: If you are teaching software or coding, tools like Loom or Zoom are perfect for recording your screen while you explain concepts.

Remember, you can always re-record your lessons later. The goal is to get your knowledge into the hands of your students as quickly as possible. When you install Tevello from the Shopify App Store today, you can start building your curriculum during your 14-day free trial before you even think about your final production quality.

Marketing Your Course to Your Existing Audience

If you already have a Shopify store, you are sitting on a goldmine of potential students. You don't need to find "new" people; you just need to offer more value to the people who already know, like, and trust you.

1. Email Marketing

Your email list is your most valuable asset. Send a "teaser" series explaining the benefits of your upcoming course. Offer an early-bird discount to your most loyal customers.

2. Post-Purchase Upsells

As mentioned earlier, use your thank-you page to offer a relevant digital product. If they just bought a cookbook, offer them a "Mastering Knife Skills" video series.

3. Content Marketing

Write blog posts (like this one!) that address the problems your course solves. If you provide enough value for free, people will be much more likely to pay for your structured, in-depth curriculum.

4. Social Proof

Once you have your first few students, ask for testimonials. Highlighting the success of others is the most effective way to sell. We recommend seeing how the app natively integrates with Shopify to see how easy it is to manage these customer relationships and gather feedback.

Overcoming Imposter Syndrome

Many potential creators stop before they start because they think, "Who am I to teach this?" This is known as imposter syndrome, and it affects almost everyone.

The truth is, there are people out there who are exactly where you were two or three years ago. They are struggling with the same problems you have already solved. To them, you are an expert. You don't need to know everything; you just need to provide a clear path from Point A to Point B. Your unique perspective and teaching style will resonate with some people in a way that others won't.

The Power of Recurring Revenue

While a one-time course sale is great, the holy grail of e-commerce is recurring revenue. With Tevello, you can easily turn your course into a membership site. Instead of charging $100 once, you can charge $20 a month for ongoing access to new lessons, a community forum, and monthly live Q&A sessions.

This provides your business with a stable, predictable floor of income. It makes planning, hiring, and scaling much less stressful. By using a platform with 0% transaction fees, you ensure that as your membership grows from 100 to 1,000 members, your profits grow exponentially rather than being eaten up by platform costs.

Conclusion: Start Building Your Digital Powerhouse

Choosing what online course to create is the first step toward a more scalable, profitable, and impactful business. Whether you are teaching coding, cooking, or career growth, your expertise has value. By keeping your learning environment native to Shopify, you protect your brand, own your data, and provide a superior experience for your students.

The transition from physical products alone to a hybrid model of physical and digital goods is the smartest move a modern merchant can make. It diversifies your income and increases your brand's authority in your niche. With Tevello, you have a partner dedicated to helping you succeed with a robust, all-in-one ecosystem.

Stop overthinking and start building. You can install our app and take advantage of a 14-day free trial to build your entire curriculum before you pay a cent. With our flat-rate Unlimited Plan and 0% transaction fees, you keep 100% of what you earn. To build your community without leaving Shopify, start by reviewing the Shopify App Store listing merchants install from.

Frequently Asked Questions

What online course should I create if I don't have a specific skill?

Start by looking at your hobbies or the problems you’ve solved in your own life. Even "soft skills" like time management, organizing a home, or navigating a specific life stage (like becoming a new parent) are highly valuable. You can also interview experts and package their knowledge into a course where you act as the curator.

Can I sell digital courses alongside my physical Shopify products?

Absolutely. This is one of the core strengths of our platform. You can bundle a digital course with a physical product (e.g., a "Learn to Knit" video series with a yarn kit). This creates a unique value proposition that is very difficult for competitors to copy and significantly boosts your average order value.

Do I need a separate website to host my online course?

No. At Tevello, we believe in keeping everything under one roof. Your course lives on your own Shopify URL. This ensures that your brand remains consistent, your customers don't have to manage multiple logins, and you maintain full control over the user experience and customer data.

How much should I charge for my first online course?

Pricing depends on the "transformation" you offer. A hobby-based course might be priced between $20 and $97, while a professional business or career-focused course can easily sell for $297 to $997+. A good strategy is to start with a lower "beta" price to gather testimonials, then increase the price as you add more content and social proof.