eLearning is a rapidly growing business, it’s even a sector brick and mortar training establishments are starting to expand into.

Does that mean there’s no room for you and your startup?

Absolutely not.

Over the course of your career you have spent time building a name and reputation, and now you have decided that you’re going to stick it to the man and launch your own eLearning business.

Good for you!

Below we’ve compiled 7 realistic tips to help get your eLearning start up off the ground.

1)      Get Social Media Savvy

You’ve probably got some form of social media of your own, so it should be fairly easy to transplant all of this prior knowledge onto creating professional profiles for your startup.

When people have a need, like training requirements for example, the first place they go to is the internet – and this includes social media.

That’s why it’s vital at this early stage of your business to focus on building an online presence that is helpful and consistent.

When a potential customer Googles what you do, you want your business to rank as high as possible in those results. And not just one hit, either. Your Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and company website should all be featuring on those searches to maximise your chances of getting seen.

2)      Set out your marketing budget

As much as you probably don’t want to at such an early stage, it’s important to carve out a budget for marketing.

Yes, social media is free, to a point, but your competitors will already have rigorous paid for marketing campaigns in place that you need to compete against.

Having a pot of money at the ready to deploy a creative marketing campaign can be just the thing to get your business off the ground.

3)      Define your USPs

eLearning is a growing market that’s filling up quickly, so your biggest challenge as a startup is defining your USPs and communicating that to your audience.

To do that, it’s time to take a look at your competition.

Lots of new businesses fall into the trap of doing exactly the same thing as the companies they’re competing against. This doesn’t work.

The most effective strategy is to pinpoint the areas or features that are lacking within your competition and then go after that.

When you’ve identified and defined your USP, this will be the core of your marketing campaigns and sales literature, so make it sustainable, viable and honest for maximum results.

4)      Be open to learning opportunities

Just because you’re the new eLearning wizard on the market doesn’t really mean you know it all.

Life and business is all about learning, so take the time to say yes to new experiences that may arise. This may be in the form of training for you, workshops, trader shows, or networking meetings.

Everything you do at this stage contributes to your brand image and gets you seen in the big bad world of business, so put yourself out there and listen to what is going on around you.

Being at the centre of a startup can be a hard and scary thing to do. Even with all of the expertise and knowledge in your industry, when you’re flying solo with no other backing than your own, things that came easily to you previously can suddenly seem 100x more terrifying.

That’s alright. It’s natural. But the key at this stage is to plan out a strategy that can be implemented in a timely manner. When you’ve got all the basics in place and your face and name begins to get recognised, you’ll start to see your pipeline build and your revenue start to increase. And that’s when the heard work will seem worth it.