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So you’re building a cohort-based course (CBC). That’s great!
If you’ve started sorting through potential tools to manage your program, you might be feeling overwhelmed.
There are tons of tools out there and it can be pretty tricky to determine which ones are right for you (especially since testing out multiple tools can be time consuming, not to mention difficult to determine the true student experience).
It’s likely that if you’ve started this process, your head is swirling with questions:
Where can I host learning content? How will students interact with each other? How can I collect payments? Where can I keep student data?
To help you tackle these questions, we’ve shared some of the most popular tools being used to build cohort-based courses in 2022 below.
Running a cohort-based course involves a lot more than simply building out a curriculum. Here are 5 essential components you’ll need:
One of the main benefits of cohort-based learning is that it offers your learners an opportunity to connect with like-minded people focused on improving in similar ways. These days, community platforms can also double as a Learning Management System (LMS)/Content Hosting Tool for your learning materials.
One of the fastest growing community tools is Circle. This is likely due to its intuitive interface and extensive customization options.
Synchronous chat tools like Slack and Discord continue to be popular as well, as you can easily create private and public channels based on specific topics.
If your audience already lives on Facebook, Facebook Groups are a great community option, although it can be more challenging to divide your learners into subgroups.
If you’re running a cohort-based course, you’ll likely need a place to host all of your asynchronous content - videos, readings, etc.
One of the most common LMS’s in the CBC space is Thinkfic. This tool boasts a host of features including content locking, quizzes, customizable course landing pages and course templates, not to mention there’s a free starter plan.
Circle, while not quite an LMS, has light content hosting capabilities and is being used by course creators to have their community and content in one place.
Teachable continues to be a popular LMS option best-suited for solopreneurs and/or small teams.
Memberstack is our top recommended tool for collecting payments. It easily plugs in to a host of website builders and offers a variety of payment options (including recurring memberships).
If you’re already using Circle, using Circle’s native paywall feature is your next best option. By allowing you to charge for access to your community, private spaces, or exclusive content, you can easily have a free community and upsell to your CBC all from within Circle.
Live online events are the lifeblood of any online cohort based course.
If your program has 50+ members, multiple cohorts, or a variety of subgroups, Virtually is the best way to make sure your members know exactly where to go and when. Virtually’s Virtual Event Manager (VEM) automates the hairy logistics of running live online events, allowing you to schedule live sessions, send reminders, and track attendance and feedback from one place.
For smaller programs with fewer live online sessions, you can use Google Calendar, Airtable, and Zapier to automate calendar invites. When a learner signs up, you can create a Zap to auto-send calendar invites. While this option doesn’t allow for segmenting your learners into groups or tracking attendance, it’s great for CBCs that are just getting started (and that are at least a little tech savvy).
Read why you shouldn’t use Google Calendar alone to manage live online events here.
When you’re running a CBC, it’s important to keep track of your learners - who they are, their progress in your program, etc.
That’s why having a database is essential.
Our top recommendation here is Airtable. Use Airtable forms to collect learner data and leverage any one of a host of Airtable integrations or Zapier triggers to import learner data from other tools (i.e. your LMS or Virtual Event Manager (VEM)) right into Airtable. This allows you to learn about your learner behavior from one place and use insights to iterate and improve on your CBC.
More established organizations tend to prefer a traditional Client Relationship Manager (CRM) for their learner tracking - such as Hubspot or Salesforce. While these tend to be more robust (and pricier), they offer a great way to track your learners throughout the sales cycle and beyond.
While building out a no-code stack for your cohort-based course is a great option (used by some of the top CBCs out there), you may be more interested in finding one tool that does it all.
Tune in next week where we’ll tackle the pros and cons of using all-in-one tools to manage your CBC!
Want to see how using a Virtual Event Manager (VEM) can help supercharge your live online events? Schedule a demo call with a Virtually team member to learn how to simplify your event management or get started for free.
Read next: What’s a Virtual Event Manager (VEM) and Why Do I Need One?
Laura Marks is Head of Customer Experience at Virtually