Redefining education – Online Course Or University?
In this video, I want to talk about redefining education – online course or university? Now, as we know, things have changed a lot in the last few years with the internet and technology. We’re able to do so much from our home, whereas just a few years ago, we used to have to go out to book a holiday, go to the travel agent, and so forth. But now, we can be educated online from the comfort of our own homes. In fact, I always recommend that people don’t go to university but instead get an education at home from an online course.
Now, I appreciate there may be some people who can’t do this, and it’s just not possible for them. But there are a lot of courses now where you can really educate yourself well for a lot less money and not get yourself into debt. You know, you can come out with something better than what you would have come out with if you spent three or four years at University. You can see my getting started blog post here.
I think one of the issues is that young people just want to experience being away from home and meeting lots of new people. Which I do understand; however, realistically, you could save huge amounts of money and create a better business by carrying out a home study course like Wealthy Affiliate.
The Cost Of University Education
I was looking at the University fees here in the UK, and I just put in ‘university fees UK 2023,’ and it says the average price would remain at £9,250. And just scrolling down, we keep seeing this price, £9,250. And for the USA, which I hadn’t got a clue what it would be, it’s similar, around $20,230 for State residents and $26,290 for visitors. Further down, there’s a price range from $5,000 to $50,000. Certainly a lot more than what an online course would cost.
This Is A Genuine Training Platform
So, I want to introduce you to a platform here that I’m part of called the Wealthy Affiliate platform. I’ve been a member since November 2014, so I’m coming up to starting my 10th year soon. Basically, it’s a platform that teaches you how to build an online business. First of all, this is not a get-rich-quick scheme. It is a proper training platform. The training works, but like any business, you have to work. It’s not like a few clicks and you’re making money. You have to work, and I think this is where some people get disappointed. They think they can build an online business in just a few minutes, but like everything and like every business, you do have to work.
Success Stories
The great thing is that there have been many success stories and still are. Let me introduce you to this young man, Robert. I made a video about him the other day. He joined in July 2015, and within about two and a half years, he became full-time online. Now, if we go to his latest post, it’s got $40,051 from two websites. Affiliate marketing works. So, just from two websites, this man has made that much in one month. And obviously, like I said, it didn’t happen in 5 minutes. He has grown his business.
And there are more people on the platform who have grown a business. There are people who are beginners, there are people who are mediocre, and there are people who are highly successful. Robert came to the platform with no knowledge whatsoever, but he was willing to go through the training step size step. However, let me give you a tour of the platform.
Training Classes
So, here’s my profile, the platform allows me to write a bio about myself, so other members can get to know me etc. If we go to another tab, and if we go to the training section here, there’s all sorts of different levels, for example. Getting started, building your own traffic-producing website, making money, mastering social engagement, and achieving maximum success through content creation. And then, if we come down here, there are all sorts of classes available: website development and programming, getting started, keyword niche and market research, everything WordPress, social engagement and marketing, and so forth.
I won’t go through them all as there is a terrific amount of content on the platform. You can create a free account, which enables you to see what the platform has to offer. I always recommend that people start with a free account. The free account gives you enough access to the site to know if it’s for you or not. You do not need a credit card to create a free account.
You Need To Be Serious To Start An Online Business
If you’re really serious about starting an online business, then you need to go upgrade to the paid version. But the good thing is with a free account, it does enable you to see if it’s something you’re interested in without spending a penny. So, I always recommend people start with a free account. I started with a free account, and within a few moments, I upgraded because I could see the potential of it, and it was a good website. But it’s good to see for yourself to check it out before you spend money.
So let me go to getting started, the place where everyone should begin. One of the great things about the courses is that you don’t have to go through every piece of training to be successful. There are lots of different classes in here for various things, but they do take you through a specific course to get you started, and you can just go through the process step by step. For example, Robert here, he knew nothing about affiliate marketing or an online business when he came, but he just went through the training step by step, and he learned.
Getting Rolling
So here, this is the very first course, ‘Let’s Get Rolling.’ It’s also written out on the webpage, and there’s a video here which you can open out into full screen if you want to. Then, the good part is that, at the foot of the page, it says, ‘Watch the walkthrough video from above.’ Then you check the box, jump into live chat, which let me show you where live chat is. It’s actually on the home page on the right-hand side.
Live Chat
So, live chat’s here. Now, it’s probably a bit quieter today because of Thanksgiving in America, but you can see there are people who have been active. I was active on here earlier this morning, talking to someone quite a few hours ago. If I scroll down far enough, I should be able to find my previous chat. You can go on to live chat at any time of the day, you normally find someone of interest, or you can ask a question or just have friendly banter, which is great.
So, coming back to the first lesson, once you’ve gone through the lesson, you just go on to the next lesson and so forth. So, it explains it step by step how it works, and it’s important not to jump through hoops. I understand that people want to progress quickly, but it’s important to follow the training and carried out in an organised way. Occasionally, I see people trying to jump through, but if you just go through the course step by step, then you won’t miss anything out. And at the end of each training module, check these boxes and take action after every training module, it’s the best way to learn.
Classes
So, moving on here, we’ve also got a section here for classes. If I click on that, you can see all the types of classes there are: artificial intelligence, search engine optimization, WordPress, niche research, pay-per-click marketing, and so forth. Every subject you can think of, and new lessons are being added almost daily. So here, you can see there are 1.2k classes available.
There are three levels. There are five courses available for the free account. With the premium, which is the cheaper level, it’s 612. The premium level is actually fine for you to be successful. However, the premium plus has probably only been with us for two or three years, and it’s just like a bonus.
Sometimes I think members are better off with the premium membership. Especially if you’re a beginner, because it’s not quite so overwhelming. And like I say, you don’t need the premium plus to be successful, but it is there if you want it, and you do get some great training on the premium plus, but it’s not absolutely necessary.
Weekly Live Training Classes
So, just going over here, we have the page where it’s got… It just happens I’m doing this video in their Black Friday offer, so there are some discounts. But let me take you to the education, and it says 52 live classes a year. There’s actually a lot more than that, but there are at least 52. There’s a chat with Jay every week, and so forth. You can host your website here. There’s free website hosting, and it’s absolutely fine for getting started. I believe you can host up to 10 websites, which is enough for most people. And probably, if you had ten websites by that time, you would probably need a dedicated server to look after them.
The Community
So, let’s move on to the Community now. Something I like about the Community let me just go back to my profile. On my profile page, there is blog training. I’ve actually created some training. You can ask a question at any time and here you can see that I have various blog posts that I have written over the past nine years. The last one was November 20th, ‘Camtasia: Is it the Best Video Creation and Editing Tool?’
So, you can create conversation, and if we look at this, I’ve got 52 comments on there. Alright, admit some of them are my replies, but it’s interesting. If you want to learn something, let’s just go back to another blog post. All sorts of things. And another one here, 51 comments. So you can get involved, and then, if we go to the homepage, you can see there are lots of blog posts here. This is the top 10. Due to Black Friday, there are a lot of Black Friday blog posts here. However, normally there would be a selection of different topics which we can all learn from.
Ask A Question
Then I go, “If you want to ask a question, let’s go to new questions. What does your business need help with? FTP details?” So, there are all sorts of replies. “My videos are not indexed,” more replies, all sorts of questions. You can just come in here and ask a question at any time. You can see that some questions just got one reply, but most of them got several replies. Sometimes, let’s have a look at this one. Oh, so it actually has more than one reply. People have replied and helped. So, if you have a problem, you have help at hand. Also, if you have a website problem, can contact support 24 hours a day, which is great. So, let’s come back to this page.
Surround Yourself With Successful People
As I said, there are many success stories. It says, “Surround yourself with successful people.” One of the reasons I like being part of the platform, although I was making money before I came to the platform. It is good to be around like-minded people. I recognize these faces here. All these members are successful. So, we can learn a great deal from these members. Some of these members also create the training as well, which is great. Let’s go to the ‘About Us’ page.
A Few Statistics
Eighteen years of helping people, 18 years of progress, and training updates of 750 plus per year, system improvements of 155 in the past year. The platform is growing all the time, which is great. So, let’s have a look at the pricing. Forgetting the Black Friday offer, this is monthly billing. Starter package: You can start for no cost and no credit card. I always suggest people go for premium, which is £49 a month for monthly billing. Premium Plus, which I have, is £99. However, if we go for yearly billing, it’s £697 a year for Premium Plus and £497 for Premium, so considerably cheaper.
But, if we go here, if we go to get the offer for the Black Friday offer, which is only on for a few days. So, for the premium plus it is £497, and if you want to go premium, it’s £249 with a Black Friday offer. Now, they do offer Premium Plus with a dedicated server, which is £332 per month. However, not many people require a dedicated server, just a few people. I have my own dedicated server for some of my websites. However, that’s not something a beginner would be looking at, so ignore that.
Redefining Education
So, coming back to my question regarding redefining education, when I hear someone’s going to university. I always suggest that they do an online course because I know that online courses work and it’s far cheaper than going to university. If we come to these prices, for example, UK prices are £9,250 against the Black Friday offer for the premium plus, which is almost 1,000% cheaper. So, there is a considerable difference, no expenses, and you can live at home. And if you study and focus, you could really have something good. You could end up like Robert here, who’s done extremely well, along with other people as well. I didn’t want to give you loads of examples because it would make the video too long, but I have plenty of examples of people who are successful.
So, if you have any questions about this video, please feel free to reach out to me and leave a comment on the YouTube video. I’m here to help, and thanks very much for watching.