No, You Shouldn't Change Your Course Platform Like You Change Your Socks...

Hey everybody, it's Tara Bryan, and you are listening to the

course building secrets podcast. Whether you're a coach or a CEO,

the success of your team and clients is based on your ability

to deliver a consistent experience and guide them on the

fastest path to results. This podcast will give you practical

real life tips that you can use today to build your online

experiences that get results and create raving fans. Why? So you

can monetize your expertise and serve more people without adding

more time or team to your business? If you're looking to

uncover your million dollar framework, package it and use it

to scale you're in the right place. Let's dive in. Hey,

course launchers. Welcome to today's episode. In today's

episode, I want to talk about something that I see all of the

time. And here's the deal. And maybe this is a little bit of a

soapbox moment for me, but I'm gonna say it anyway, is that

your tool, your platform, your system for your where your

course or your program lives is not the problem. Right? And so I

had a client, send me an email yesterday that said, hey, what

about this new tool looks really cool. Should I move my stuff to

this tool? And I my response was why? Why do you want to move to

a new tool? Is it because there's something around the

tool that you're using or the platform that you're using?

That's not working for you? Is it because there's something

that you want to include in your customer experience that the

platform that you're using doesn't do? Or is it because one

the it's the shiny new object that everybody's talking about?

Or is it something that you want to try and fix a gap that you

have in one of your goals? Right. So most of the time, this

is in sales and marketing, where it's like, changing your

platform is not going to sell your course or your program for

you, right a platform is is the foundation that allows you to

launch and package your program in a way that allows you to

serve your people at the highest level and give them an

experience where they're able to get your material on demand.

They're able to interact with you in different ways. And

you're able to build something that can be automated and can be

created as an experience. It has nothing to do with the sales,

the marketing, the shiny new object, all of the bells and

whistles and all of the things now I will say the caveat to

this is if you're using 52 million tools, instead of one

system that actually helps you to fulfill on your on the

promise that you've made your customers, then yes, you're not

on the right platform, right, you need to really consider what

your needs are and get on the right platform. But if you're on

the right platform, and everything is operating, how you

want it to from a customer experience perspective, just

changing platforms, because somebody's talking about it,

it's the new shiny thing, or there's one or two things that

it will do it, your system won't do. It's not necessarily a slam

dunk in terms of well, you need to change, right. And so one of

the things I'm working with my clients on all the time is let's

start with the right foundation. Let's start with the platform

that makes sense for what your bigger and broader goals are. If

you're trying to build a certification program, if you're

trying to build a school, right, like a university or Academy

where it's more than one course or program, then yes, there's a

lot of thought that needs to go into that before you just like

willy nilly grab a platform that somebody is selling, right? You

need to really think about what you need from a business

perspective, in terms of the requirements. That's one of the

things that I help people do is like, let's get you on the right

platform that makes sense for you. But it's a very strategic

conversation. It's not a Oh, somebody sent me an email about

a cool new tool. Like, there's got to be a compelling business

reason why you would change platforms. So often people who

aren't getting traction are focused on that, like, I'm just

gonna, you know, add this platform or add this one or

change to this one or change to that one, or I'm on 52 million

ones because somebody has been talking about them. Anytime

somebody's making a buying decision around what they need

for their business based on a suggestion from someone else.

They're not looking at it from a strategic you know, sort of from

an ownership or strategic perspective. So I always help

people kind of dial that back. So you're starting with the

right foundation, when I recommend a foundation for a

customer, it is very, like well thought out, right? It's not,

I'm not picking a shiny tool, I'm not picking something that

somebody is just has determined that this is the next best tool.

So I have, I have another client that I work with who is moving

to, to a different platform. And it's a well thought out

transition from, you know, sort of the infancy or the beta

program of where they were in their business to what they need

now, right. And so she came in, she has built an enterprise, an

empire, and now the than the needs she have, has, are totally

different than when she started, right, she started with one

program, and then now it's morphed into something that's,

that's broader and bigger. So that is the time to change. It's

not like I'm not getting enough sales. So therefore, I'm going

to change all of my platforms to get more sales. That doesn't

make sense, right? If there's a tool that helps you increase

your awareness, or your visibility and your authority in

the marketplace, that could be a great enhancement to your, your,

your system toolkit. But it's not just like somebody sent an

email, and there's a cool new product out there that you want,

want to try. I really discourage people from doing that, because

what happens then is, that's when you kind of get the

disjointed tech stack, that becomes the thing that you're

spending all of your time dealing with, instead of

actually getting those customers and getting them in the door. So

if you have that sort of tendency where you're just,

you're like out an app sumo or you're out, you know, paying

attention to what everyone's doing in the market, and you

want to just grab the new thing, awesome. But do it in a way that

serves your business, that doesn't dilute what you're

trying to do, or just like, allow you to stay in the swirl.

Because that is one of the key indicators of whether or not

you're going to be successful is it Are you focused on the right

activities at the right time, nine out of 10 times changing

your your platform, from one to the other in terms of kind of

your core business platform, right. So if you're creating

courses, and programs, you have one core platform that's holding

all of your assets, if you're just constantly changing that on

a regular basis, then you're probably spending time and money

and resources that you don't need to be worried about at this

moment. If you're ready to scale and you're ready to really dial

in that customer experience. And the platform that you have

doesn't do what you need it to do, then that's the that's the

reason to start moving in a different direction. Or if you

feel like your whole thing is like put together with duct tape

and paper clips, and you are looking to streamline how you're

delivering and fulfilling on your promise, then that's

another good good time to start looking at what your systems

are, what your tech stack is, and how it will support you. But

if your goal is sales, and you want to change your platform,

because you think it's going to give you more sales, the two are

do not have anything to do with each other, right? Like, if you

can't get sales, they're not even getting into your course.

And so it doesn't really matter what's in your course yet.

Right? What matters is how you're how you're talking about

it, how you're how you're able to fulfill on the promise that

you is that you are fulfilling on to get them in the door,

right, like two different problems you're trying to solve,

get customers first, and then worry about what the platform is

doing or not doing. And I'm going to tell you in this stage

of the game in 2023, most of the platforms are going to do what

you need them to do.

From a standard sort of mechanics perspective, there are

certain requirements that are that my clients sometimes need

because of the complexity of their their business or how

they're fulfilling on their products and they still want to

automate 100% Absolutely. There are specific reasons why you

would use one tool over the other. That's what we're experts

in helping people do is when they have a complex need,

fulfillment need, we help determine the right systems,

right but when you're first getting started when you're

creating kind of a basic customer experience in terms of

your course or program, most of the tools will do what you need

need them to do. And so it's just a matter of what your

appetite is for, you know, kind of four different components or

buckets of what you need in your tech stack. And I'm not going to

go through that detail today, if you are one of those people who

you want to make sure you're starting in the right

foundation, and you may have some complex needs that you want

to talk through, just give me a shout. And we'll talk through

with kind of what those four pillars are. But in most cases,

you're the you know, the rabbit that you're chasing when you're

early in your business, is you need to be able to get customers

to bring them into your program, once they're in your program,

then you can fulfill on that promise, then, you know, as

you're helping more and more people, you're dialing things in

more and more and more, right, you go from the MVP to the 1.0,

to the 2.0. to, to, you know, continuing to to add features

and functionality and different things. But starting starting

with the wrong foundation, or switching your foundation on a

regular basis is just it just like you're just sort of just

chasing, chasing your tail. So there you go. That is my sort of

rant or soapbox for today is and I'll tell I'll tell you like my

response to him was, you know, it's just a platform. And, and

it could be a great platform, there could be some super cool

things with it. But if you are working with somebody who is a

specialist in in the tools and platforms that are out there for

courses and programs, they should be able to make any

platform work with the right requirements, but you pick out

your requirements first, and then you choose a platform or

then you customize the platform. You don't just choose any random

platform because at this point, they're all sort of, they're all

sort of equal in terms of sort of that base experience. And so

it's it and so the I know that his objective was to get more

customers, and changing platforms is not going to get

more customers. So there you go, that is my lesson for you today.

I hope that serves you. If you are tempted by the shiny object,

like I need to change my whole tech stack, based on new systems

that come out, I encourage you to go through the activity of

determining what you actually need first, right outside of the

tool, and then determine the proper tool for you because

there's some awesome tools out there. There are some ways that

some operate better than others. But at the end of the day, it

needs to match your goals, not the other way around. So there