The Art of Selling Online Courses

Meet the Woman Who Built 60 Courses & 90K Students

• John Ainsworth

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Meet Alexandra Fintova - the Skillshare Top Teacher who built 60 courses, taught 90,000+ students worldwide, and did it all while raising two kids as a single mom with ADHD.

In this episode, Alexandra (The Art Mother) shares her unconventional journey from art teacher to course creator, why she refuses to do "guerrilla marketing," and how being authentic is her secret weapon.

Alexandra reveals why her "overly salesy" approach failed and what actually works instead. She explains how to sell courses without being pushy or aggressive, and why students are now "collecting her classes like Pokemon cards." We dig into the power of confirmation page offers and why Alexandra's currently leaving money on the table with this simple strategy. She also shares the truth about managing a course business with ADHD and how to use platforms like Skillshare and Udemy to build passive income.

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Connect with Alexandra:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theartmother/

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Drop a comment: What's your biggest challenge with selling courses?

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If you'd like to talk more about how you can grow your course business, email me at john@datadrivenmarketing.

SPEAKER_02:

I always thought that I'd need some kind of a superpower to become an artist or some kind of an external permission from someone that I can't even name. Art is basically a such um natural thing to everyone be. When we are kids, we all draw into way of communication, way of express ourselves, and kind of get when we have pictures and we just turn basically uh I was overly stealthy and I just like you know fight it, fight it, fight it, they were fighting the fast classes over uh when I just sat down and resonated and like this page is very valuable.

SPEAKER_00:

This is a point that someone said I've heard you on the online phone. Alright, I really like it. Instead, you've got free link and free resources. Let's signed up to those that have given you their email. These are like your.

SPEAKER_01:

I know that I'm not following the formula at all.

SPEAKER_00:

Well most people aren't doing it. You're following the formula that most people are doing, it's just not doing any of those things. Hello and welcome to the Art of Selling Online Courses. We are here to share winning strategies and super at performers in the online course industry. My name is John Antwerp, and today's guest is Alexandra Fintifer. Alexandra is known by the name The Art Mother. She's originally an English art teacher with a master's degree. Then she's become a Skillshare top teacher. She's worked with brands like Facebook, Procreate, Paperlike, and more. She's published 60 classes in all kinds of topics like drawing and watercolors and digital illustration. And her classes can be found on Skillshare and Udemy, and she's taught over 90,000 students worldwide. Now, today we're going to talk about how to give yourself permission to be an authority, why and how to be authentic, and one of my favorite topics we're going to get into upsells and order bumps as well. Alexandra, welcome to the show.

SPEAKER_02:

Thank you so much for being invite. I'm really happy to be here.

SPEAKER_00:

So tell me a little bit about who do you help with your courses, what kind of problem are you solving for?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, so um I would start at um my journey, like how I started, okay?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

So I always wanted to become an artist, but I didn't believe in myself, and I was like, okay, I will become an art teacher. And while I was going through the educational system, I noticed that actually uh how they are teaching art to people is like not helping to people. They are like, you know, sit down and draw this, and then you will just know it, like some somehow in an extraordinary way. I always thought that I need some kind of a superpower to become an artist or some kind of an external permission from someone uh that I can't even name. And uh actually I started after finishing the university, I started to teach myself how to draw and how to do things, even though I had a master's degree, you know. I didn't have the confidence, I didn't have the permission. Uh, but I I knew inside of me that I wanted to like become an artist and and and make it my life, I don't know, a part of my life, something like that. And during this process, I realized uh that there is a special way to explain things to people who are not privileged in a way that they don't have a family with artistic background, or they don't live in a place that is full of culture, or they are not surrounded by artists, and they are isolated kinda, but they have this deep craving to create art, but they think that you know, I'm I'm sure that you know people who are saying, I just can't draw, I I don't have talent, and that's just not for me, but I would love to, but I don't know. And art is basically uh such um natural thing to every human being. And when we are kids, you know, we all draw, it's a way of communication, way of expressing ourselves, and it kind of gets lost when we are teenagers and when it is not nurtured, but I still think it has to be, I don't know, part of everyone's life, just like exercise, physical exercise. I think art is like uh spiritual and mental exercise. And um, so this is what I help people with to find this connection to this original, you know, um natural expression through art through my teachings. Because I I make complicated art topics really easy for beginners and I I give them permission. You can do this, and you can just enjoy it. You don't need to uh make something uh extraordinary, you don't need to end up in Louvre or in a gallery, you can just do it for fun, and people love this because they are craving expression, it helps with mental health, it helps with you know self-discovery, and uh yeah, that's what I give to people with.

SPEAKER_00:

That's really interesting. I so I started playing bass a couple of years ago, and I never played any musical instruments before that. But uh everybody asks me, oh, so uh are you in a band or do you want to be in a band? And I'm like, no, no, I have no interest in that at all. Like, because there's a whole thing with being in a band that is mostly uh making no money, playing in small pubs at gigs where there's only three people and the dog and traveling around in a van and whatever. I'm like, I have no interest. Now, if it was possible to just go, right, I'm just gonna go straight to the famous and playing on big stages thing, but it's not. Plus, I just don't I don't want to play it, or I don't want to put enough time into it to be able to play it that well. You know, if you could magically be amazing, then great, you know. But I like playing it. Yeah, like I just really enjoy it. It's like when there is I I've got certain songs that I really like and I know how to play them, and I play along with them at sat at home, I'm just like, yes, it's cool, I like this. And it's like that's that's allowed. You know, you could just enjoy that.

SPEAKER_02:

But there does seem kind of a I have a drum set in my living room, actually, because I'm a drummer. Yes, but I never played in a band. I just love to, you know, hit the things when I have. How do your neighbors feel?

SPEAKER_00:

Do your neighbors like that? I always feel like I don't have neighbors. Oh, okay, that's all right then. They moved out.

SPEAKER_02:

I thought there's an empty building next to my house, but not because of that.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay. There's another thing you'd said before that I wanted to dig into. Why do you think authenticity is so important?

SPEAKER_02:

Authenticity is important in every part of our lives, I think. Like that's our truth. And uh we can only resonate with people if we are showing up authentically. And this is the hardest thing we can ever do in our lives, too. Because we at first need to discover in ourselves who are we when we are open, you know. And this is a self-discovery journey, and um basically creating art is also a self-dis-discovery journey, and uh and there are so many people asking me, you know, how do you find your style or artistic voice? And it is just finding yourself through art. So I think um that's healing if you have a person, you know, if you are if I'm looking at this uh through the eyes of a student of mine, um, if I'm going to follow someone, I I want that person to be authentic and authentically showing up and representing their values and and um thoughts and morals and stuff like that.

SPEAKER_00:

And do you think that helps people to find you then that you're showing up authentically and like helps people to kind of connect with you or resonate with you or anything like that?

SPEAKER_02:

Yes, I think that's the most important part. I'm doing this now for eight years, and I tried so many things, you know, following strategies and mimicking other people, how they are doing things, and even in production, you know, I I um experimented with you know shooting classes with two cameras and editing like this and audio like that and everything. And the best classes or most performing classes were uh when I just sat down and just enjoyed the process and had excitement and you know people resonated with that, and uh they can feel when you are enjoying what you're doing. So I I'd say definitely it helps with finding your tribe.

SPEAKER_00:

Nice. From a business point of view, what's your if uh just share whatever you're kind of happy, happy to? What's your average monthly revenue at the moment? What kind of level are you at?

SPEAKER_02:

Uh four figures.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay. And is that mostly from in Skillshare, or is that Skillshare and Udemy, or do you have many customers who come through your website, or how does that kind of split up?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, well, uh Skillshare and Udemy and collaborations. So I'm collaborating um with companies. If, for example, did I don't know, reels, you know, for uh companies, and I also helped for a company to develop a drawing app for for iPads, and there are lots of opportunities that are coming my way uh through social media, basically. Yeah, yeah, and that adds up for four figures. Uh, I know that it is not the most successful online course business that's out there, um, but I'm living in Eastern Europe, so for me it is lines of money.

SPEAKER_00:

I'm good.

SPEAKER_02:

I wouldn't be successful in America, or I don't know, you know.

SPEAKER_00:

What about your email list? Do you do much of selling to your email list?

SPEAKER_02:

Um yeah, I also experimented with that. When I was overly salesy and I was like, you know, buy this, buy this, buy this, they were not buying. So I started to um once a month send out a newsletter with um coupons from Udemy for my classes. Um basically, most of my students are from Skillshare. Uh I'm a top teacher there, they have the subscriptions, and they, you know, you don't they don't need to buy things. But there are people who don't like subscriptions. And I was thinking about, you know, creating my own website and putting my classes up there so that they can buy it in a bundle and stuff like that. But it was always easier to put it up on Udemy. It is, it has also organic traffic and and it is very user-friendly. Um and I just I have like 60 classes. I don't have all of them on Udemy. I I think 30 or 30 or five I have on Udemy. But I'm selecting five classes every month that I put on sale, and I stand it out. And my students love that. They are like collecting my classes now, like Pokemon cards, you know, and they're looking for these coupons and stuff like that. And they are, I think they appreciate that I don't do this very garilla marketing, you know, that every day five emails like this is what you need, this is, I don't know, I'm solving your whole life with my courses, because that's just not true for me. And this is where my authenticity also shows up. That I try to be fair, kinda.

SPEAKER_00:

And with your your email list, and most of those people from Skillshare and Udemy as well, then, or do you have a lot from Instagram too?

SPEAKER_02:

Yes, from Instagram, and I also take uh part in online events in different platforms where we are offering free workshops, and that's where I have that funnel. I have um procreate art create kit with brush set and color palettes that students can get, you know, when they are signing up for my newsletter. And uh there are like three events a year, and I get a lot of subscribers from those events, actually.

SPEAKER_00:

So what's then what's the funnel? So they sign up for that free that free kit, those brushes and what have you, and then what what happens next?

SPEAKER_02:

Um I send them emails once a month.

SPEAKER_00:

Oh, okay, right. Okay, got it.

SPEAKER_02:

And I think I set up one email where uh after they, you know, sign up, there is a thanking email and just with a link uh to my signature brush set because there is what they can buy in my ATI shop. And now it is also on Skillshare because they're starting to offer digital products as well. So something like that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay. And do you have any like higher ticket offerings? Do you do like any coaching with people or group coaching or anything like that?

SPEAKER_02:

Yes, there there are one-on-one sessions also through Skillshare. They're offering that as well. Um I didn't have many, actually. Uh that. But now I'm going to have a live retreat in Barcelona. That's high ticket.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, that's cool. How much are you charging people for that?

SPEAKER_02:

I'm sorry?

SPEAKER_00:

How much are you charging people to?

SPEAKER_02:

Uh almost three thousand dollars.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay. Okay. And you're promoting that to your email list?

SPEAKER_02:

Yes, yes. And also in the list. I just started.

SPEAKER_00:

You just started promoting it?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, like a few weeks ago, so it's at the beginning. It's going to be next uh May.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, in May. Okay. That's exciting. How many people are you gonna have?

SPEAKER_02:

There is there are limited C is like 10 people for 10 people, I guess.

SPEAKER_00:

Ten people? Cool. All right, nice. So if you're doing everything, if you're kind of selling those things through Skillshare and Udemy, then there's probably no way on there to do any like order bumps or upsells within that. Is there? I don't know. I don't use those often very much of my clients. No. Okay. Okay.

SPEAKER_02:

What's the Yeah, I know that I'm not following the formula that most online course businesses do with these upsells and stuff. Like I'm aware of that.

SPEAKER_00:

Well, most people aren't doing them. That's the you're not you're following the formula that most people are doing, which is just not doing any of those things. But what you're doing that's a little different to a lot of people is you're doing it mostly through Skillshare and Udemy, which is a that's a there's a different kind of model there. There's pros and cons, right? It's much easier in that they've got an audience for you. And if you become a top creator, you get shown in front of a lot of people, and it's great, and it all kind of runs very smoothly. The potential downside is if they ever change their models and you're kind of under their control.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I'm on yes, it happened um two years ago.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

Uh we can share numbers, kinda, right? Here. Uh so there was a change also in the economy, but basically uh Skillshare cut our income to half.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

So it was not very pleasant, but they are compensating uh and they are I I love them, you know. Uh the whole community on the platform, people are really nice and they are there because they want to learn. And uh the whole uh company is very supportive. And um I had moments when I was like, okay, I'm taking all my classes on my uh website and everything, but um I'm really doing this alone. I don't have a team, you know. And I know myself I have ADHD and I'm pretty um, you know, ad hoc, very impulsive and stuff like that. So I wouldn't trust myself in being very consistent and very good with marketing and and stuff like that. So I'm kind of relying on these platforms, yes.

SPEAKER_00:

So do you promote the Skillshare membership to your email list at all?

SPEAKER_02:

Yes.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay. How do you do that? Because you mentioned before once a month you've got the coupons for the for Udemy. How are you doing it for promoting Skillshare?

SPEAKER_02:

Uh like that's a um a regular thing that I'm sending these emails uh like once a month. And uh sometimes I send an extra. So I I also share with you uh when we were preparing that one, two emails a month. Sometimes three if there is an extra event that I'm you know just uh sharing um or announcing. And um Yeah, I know, I know. Uh there is a referral link in the in the PDF of the brush set that they can download, if I'm right. Yes. So so when they are downloading a brow set, they get oh I you also got a one month free on Skillshare, here is the referral link. And I'm I'm kinda including it in my communication when I'm sharing um for example, if I'm uh publishing a new class, I always put it up first at uh Skillshare. And then when I put it up on Udemy, it's uh sometimes a month later. Uh I share it with my email list and I also share the the Skillshare button there that you can buy it on Udemy, but if you are on Skillshare, here how you can get it on Skillshare.

SPEAKER_00:

Got it. Do you do anything with the confirmation page after someone signs up for your lead magnet? The page, if someone signs up for your lead magnet, you know, your free brushes from an online event or from Instagram or something like that, the next page they see, is there anything there? No. Okay.

SPEAKER_01:

They just get them from the ones.

SPEAKER_00:

Regular listeners of the podcast will have heard me talk about the importance of this page, so I'm gonna do it again. Um so what's the so is this page is very valuable. This is a point where someone, so they've heard you on the online event, right? They really liked you, you've shared that you've got a free link, some free resources, they've signed up for those, they've given you their email address. These are like your hottest prospects. And at that exact moment, if you had something available for them to buy, even if it was go sign up for my Skillshare with this discount code or buy these courses on Udemy, even if you are not selling it separately yourself, you're just still promoting in one of those places, a bunch of those people would go buy something straight away. And one of the things that you'll find is not only then do you make sales right away, which would be on autopilot effectively, because once you set this up once and then it would just be there behind your lead magnet forever. But also you'll find that people who buy from you, because they'll like your classes, are then more likely to buy from you in the future. So if someone hears you on the online course, on the online event, downloads your free brushes, and then gets onto your email list, they may or may not buy later on. But if they buy something straight away and they take one of those classes and they like it, they're what they're like 20 times, 21, 22 times more likely from our data to buy after that. So therefore, you'll have more people who are like not only buying that first thing, but they'll buy they'll buy everything or they'll sign up for Skillshare or what have you as well. Does it make sense?

SPEAKER_02:

That that is going to be the next thing I'm doing.

SPEAKER_00:

And the structure of that generally is we typically do something that is between maybe 20 and 30, maybe 40 dollars, something like that. So like a really good deal. So you know, like you've got your your Udemy discount codes you're giving people. It might be something along those lines. Or it might be uh, you know, I don't know if Skillshare does this, but like get your first month at a discount on Skillshare or first month for free. Do they do anything like that?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

Perfect. Okay. Um something you want kind of something in the price range where people will be willing to give it a go when they don't really know you yet. Where it's like it's so cheap. Like Skillshare's general, I don't know. What's your Skillshare membership cost per month?

SPEAKER_02:

They have only annual now. It's like over a hundred dollars, something like that. Okay.

SPEAKER_00:

So that might be more than someone's willing to pay straight away. It might not. You know, they've heard you at the online event, they really liked you, that might be enough that they're willing to sign up for that. But some people will be like, oh no, I don't I don't know yet. I don't know about this Alexandra cat. I don't know, I'm not sure. But I would spend$30 to just kind of check her out or something. So it could be worth putting a bundle of your best best stuff on on Udemy that they can get with that code or something like that. What do you think? What do you think might make sense?

SPEAKER_02:

Um what popped up in my mind is um uh my signature brush set, definitely.

SPEAKER_00:

Um much did you charge for that?

SPEAKER_02:

Thirteen dollars.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay.

SPEAKER_02:

So not much.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

And uh maybe one beginner class on Udemy. I can also add that there. It is it is getting together in my head. There are okay if I have free offers. So for example, my Bryce Set, uh Udemy class, and the Skillshare membership link. That's much.

SPEAKER_00:

No, too much. Too confusing. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, confused customers never buy. So you want to just have one one thing, whatever you think is most likely to work and have one thing there. And what you'll find is if it's if you've got a good done a good job, it's a good offer that fits with the kind of people who just signed up, they want that kind of thing, it's at the right kind of price, you do a good sales page for it, then somewhere between about three and ten percent of people will sign up and buy that thing straight away. Let's say you do an event and you get, I don't know, how many people might sign up from an event? 500?

SPEAKER_01:

Like that.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, 500 times, let's say it was 10% and it was$13. 10% times 30. So you're gonna make like maybe$650 from it. If it's if it's really really, you know, if you've done a really good job. So it's not like a massive thing, but that would be six hundred and fifty dollars that you didn't have previously, and you didn't you only done the work once on it. But then that would happen every time that you do the event. So that's cool. And then those people are more likely to buy later on, so the whole thing kind of compounds afterwards. But I choose one. I choose one of those offers, whatever you think fits the best with the it's it should be ideally like a flow. So you have the lead magnet, your free your free brushes, and I forget what else you said was included in it. Yeah. What what else was in that? What else was in your colour palettes? Colour palettes. Okay. So the brushes is probably a really good uh next offer then, because if people have just signed up for brushes, then offering them more brushes is is likely to work. So we got a client who was selling uh her free giveaway, her lead magnet was five free meditations. And then her tripwire offer, this next offer, was the full bundle of all of the meditations. So 37 meditations for$37 or something like that. And that worked really well. That was a really good fit because you knew that everybody who was signing up for meditations is interested in meditations, so it's like it's a perfect kind of next step. So the brushes that you said you've got that might be a kind of good fit. Um if it's already at$13, you can't give much of a discount from that to tempt them to take action now. But you could just offer it for sale and see how it does, you know.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, great idea. I love that.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. And then you said you don't have um any any you've got one email that goes out automatically after that?

SPEAKER_02:

No, actually I think two.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay.

SPEAKER_02:

There is a thank you email.

SPEAKER_00:

Yep.

SPEAKER_02:

And there is I think three days later with the offer of the brushes.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay. So that fits really well. You're already offering the brushes in the emails, so it's just about adding in another step that offers them. Okay. Yeah. If you do that and that's working for you, message me and I'll tell you what's the next thing to add in. I'm really curious. I'm I'm like one of the things I say to people nearly all the time is if you've got an email list, like you've got 9,000 people, you should be able to make quite a lot of money off that by doing monthly promotions to them. When you're selling through you're kind of doing this this uh bundle of the um the you know, these Udemy discount codes. I kind of I'm wondering, I suspect it's still just the same. There's an approach that we use called nurture promos. And one of the things that you mentioned earlier is you didn't feel that your audience liked it when you were like, sell, sell, sell, buy this, buy this, buy this. And we find the same thing, especially with like a lot of our a lot of our clients are in the hobby kind of space, you know, art, music, um, uh spirituality is guess not a hobby, but like it's not a business thing, you know. Um and an audiences there, what we find works is to have these email promotions that are also nurturing, that are also giving value at the same time as they are promoting a thing. So you don't have to say, like you are you were mentioning earlier, you don't have to say doing this thing is going to completely change your life. But you can talk a bit more about why that topic is important. Like so maybe you tell me, right? So what's one of the what's one of the courses that you sell on on Udemy?

SPEAKER_02:

Um the drawing masterclass, for example, that's my oldest, I think. And it had the most students. Uh it is it focuses on very, very beginner drawing things. And uh character design classes are going well.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay. So tell tell us about the beginner master class. That was what it was called, right? So no, drawing classes.

SPEAKER_02:

Drawing, drawing master class.

SPEAKER_00:

Drawing master class. Why did you make that? Why was that needed?

SPEAKER_02:

For myself or my or or or for the people. To give back the confidence or to you know so people can um rediscover um the their joy in drawing that they had as a child.

SPEAKER_00:

And what's any stories that you've got about where people lost their joy of drawing? Do you know anybody, any of your students who've told you about a time when something happened that took that away?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, yeah, it's basically the educational system that uh after, I don't know, 14 years old or maybe even less, 12, they're not nurturing it in the school and they don't um don't think it is important. And also culturally, our our um parents also. My parents told me that uh being an artist is like not a career and not it doesn't pay well, and uh they are alcoholics and in pain and stuff like that, you know. And and yeah, it's just not true.

SPEAKER_00:

So for anybody who's listening and not watching this, Alexandra at the moment has got like a bottle of vodka in her right hand, you know, like shooting up heroin, she's like, you know. She's in a drug den right now on her laptop, you know.

SPEAKER_02:

But I'm sure that you heard these things right. Yeah. Yeah, it's like common.

SPEAKER_00:

Starving artist is like the understanding of meme, right? Yeah. Um sorry, I took myself off tandem there. Right, so you've got these stories about so the educational system. Okay, so we've got the story about how they lost their love, right? Um, of drawing. What's any stories you've got about individuals who've then re-found their their love of drawing?

SPEAKER_02:

You mean uh like a personal story, for example?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, ideally.

SPEAKER_02:

This class was actually watched a lot in um how is it called where old people live? You know, these retirement homes.

SPEAKER_01:

Right.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. And they were watching it together, these ladies, and they were drawing together. In Florida, they were, I think. And they messaged me that they are having a drawing party for my class. It was so funny. And they said that they're having so much fun and joy, and you know, it's it just really makes them happy and helps them. The way I'm teaching is very easy for them because I don't have like big expectations, and I'm uh they say that I always transfer my excitement because I get very excited about topics and things that I'm doing while I'm drawing, and they get excited too, it makes them happy.

SPEAKER_00:

So and then so that's two stories, right? So this is how they lost their the people lost their joy. This is how people found the joy with you. Um what's the problem? If people lost their joy in drawing, why does it matter?

SPEAKER_02:

Why does it matter?

SPEAKER_00:

Why does it matter? Why should someone care? It's like, ah, it doesn't matter, it's just drawing. But you don't agree with that, right? So tell us why is it why is that wrong?

SPEAKER_02:

Why is it wrong?

SPEAKER_00:

You kind of answered that, I guess, towards the beginning. Sorry.

SPEAKER_02:

At the beginning, I I'm just thinking that it is a natural part of humanity to create. And that's um one way to do it. There are several ways you can create, right? Music or courses. That's how I'm creating, I'm creating basically the courses. But yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

And another part of it, you were saying earlier, was it gives you a way to discover who you are. It's like a journey of self-discovery, a way of expressing your authenticity. It's a thing that you f people find is fun. So that's kind of why it matters, right? So if you wrote those three emails, right? One about the the problem of people losing their joy, like how people lose their joy at school, if you told some stories about yourself or about any of your students, or just a general, like overall, this is what happened. At school, people lose their joy of drawing. And this is how it's not nurtured. Parents say you're going to be starving. This the school system expects you to be like, oh, if you're not going to be a great artist, then you shouldn't be doing it at all. All of those kind of things, right? You said that. And then you wrote an email. Email that was this is why that matters, you know, because you uh art is important, it's a way for you to express your authenticity, to find out who you are as a person, to express yourself. There's joy in it, there's fun, there's fun when you're a kid and you've lost that somewhere, but that's the thing you could have. And then you said in tomorrow's email, I'm gonna talk to you about there is a there is a solution to this. And then you talk about the solution being like finding the joy again, and you talk about the ladies in Florida and how found they found the joy and the authenticity and the the the expression through that. Now they're having this party, and the the fact that all of your your students have kind of re-found this this joy in it and how fun and great that is. And then you said in the next email, for the next week, there's a discount on my I forget what it was again, sorry, drawing masterclass, drawing masterclass uh on Udemy, um, if you go and get that now. And then towards the end of that week, you could do some other emails, but if you just did that, right? That's the that's the most within one week for emails. Huh?

SPEAKER_02:

Within one week or how?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, so if you sent those three emails over one week, so Monday, Wednesday, Friday, maybe, and then the next week on Monday, you said, My drawing masterclass is is on discount for five days. Because and then so, you know, then you refer back to the previous emails because it's like it's such I think it's such a big deal. And then towards the end of the week, you said, um that discount's going away. Uh here's a reminder of what's great about the class, why these things are important, all of that kind of stuff. I bet a load of people would buy out of your 9,000, much more than if you just put a link in one of your emails going it's on discount this week. Because you've told the story, you've brought it to life for people. But you've not done like a hard sale, you've done more storytelling and more like helping people understand the situation and their world.

SPEAKER_02:

Amazing.

SPEAKER_00:

How do you feel about that?

SPEAKER_02:

I'm right. I'm afraid.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah? Okay, good. Cool.

SPEAKER_02:

I love telling stories.

SPEAKER_00:

There you go then. Like, so much of the there's so much of the thing that I do, that the point of this podcast, the point of my my uh agency for helping people with the stuff, is helping course creators to understand that you can sell in a way that is authentic and is not aggressive, and to find ways to do that that are serving your audience by helping them to find the right course to buy. And instead of feeling like, oh no, no, no, no, sales is that's a that's a nasty thing that's kind of you have to do, but I don't like it. I just want to make courses and make content. It's like you're allowed to sell in a way that is actually feels good. And it's not that there aren't marketers out there who are selling in a way that is gross and disgusting, like there obviously is, right? We all see it, but that isn't the only way to do it. There are ways that actually can feel good to you and make you more sales.

SPEAKER_02:

So cool. Yeah. Thank you for the perspective change.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, no worries. I think it's very important, you know. Because I think people like you are doing such a good service of helping people to learn a new skill, you know, by creating by by you're obviously passionate about art and you're passionate about helping people, and you've made 60 courses, which is like it's mind-blowing. That's so many.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I know. Like it's uh uh sometimes I'm you know thinking about my strategy, and every year I'm like sitting down in January, and I'm I'm going to do only one product, you know, one big product. I will put them together and create a one big, I don't know, academy of the art model or something like that. And this year I started with this again, and I was like, I'm gonna build my own site and put all those classes together and make it like you know, flowy and uh cohesive. Uh, because these last eight years I was like really improvising, to be honest. It's like this is what excites me, so I'm going to create a class about that. I shot the class, I created the class, and uh the last five years were I was changing so much. And in every class, sometimes I go back to classes that I shot like three years ago. I don't even recognize myself. I have like different hair, so different style, and stuff, something like this, you know. And um people can, and there are people who are with me for those eight years and they know me and these changes in my life, you know, and and yeah, but sometimes when I zoom out, I I see that I should, you know, have that high-ticket thing where everything is like together and and stuff like that. Yeah. Maybe after this podcast I will reconsider it again to somehow, you know, polish because I think I feel sometimes that I have everything everywhere. So it's it's a little bit chaotic.

SPEAKER_00:

Like well, if you really wanted to, I'm gonna go another step now, if that's alright. If you really wanted to do something higher ticket and make it kind of flow more and sell something on your own site, if you took your your drawing masterclass and you said not only can you get that masterclass, but we're actually going to be doing it live together over the next eight weeks, let's say. And you're going to be going through the course and then coming on to sessions with me live, and you're going to be able to answer me questions uh ask questions and I'll be answering them live, and I will do we'll actually be doing some of the sessions. Like, let's say, I don't know, right? Let's say at the end of the first module, there is a an exercise for people to do of drawing something. You're like, okay, we're all gonna go on to this session and we're all gonna do it together. We're gonna spend two hours.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, uh I I was daydreaming about this, but I'm not consistent enough.

SPEAKER_00:

You couldn't do eight weeks of the No, okay. ADHD would kick in and it would all go horribly wrong.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, you know, it's like I'm I'm raising two kids alone and life is always getting into my plans, so so uh unpredictable. I cannot I cannot do this commitment to people. Like I started a Patreon like three times and I'm going to post every month once. And I just failed. I just failed to provide provide content in that way that I have to do it.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, interesting. Well, I'm glad you know yourself well enough to know that that's if you were able to do that, you could make a load of money from doing that. Your audience would love it. I would bet you.

SPEAKER_02:

Maybe if I had a manager, you know, that is like no, you are going live, whatever.

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

I'm just trying to think through like, is there some in-between way of doing it? What if it wasn't live, but people could ask you all these questions and you give them feedback? Like they could submit stuff and get you'd give feedback on it.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, that's that's that's better.

SPEAKER_00:

Would you be consistent? Would you be able to be consistent enough to do that?

SPEAKER_02:

I don't know. I need to try it. You'll have to, right?

SPEAKER_00:

I'm not trying to bully you into it. I'm just asking. You know, it's your you it's your business, your line. But I'm just sure.

SPEAKER_02:

I have it going on like for years. I wanted to do this. I don't know. I was thinking about six weeks, you know, and there would be like uh one class uh um a week and then a live session together and stuff like that, and Q ⁇ A's and and things like that, but it I I didn't put it together. You know, I was I'm on a limited um supply of energy, as I think everyone, yeah. Um and I'm like, you know, um if I put that energy into a new class that can perform on these platforms and they are bringing in the the the stable income that I'm used to have. You know so if I spend six weeks on on a on a learning program with the live Q ⁇ A's and stuff like that, it takes away all my energy from from the course creation thing that I know that works. So it is kind of I know it's my internal thing that I really need to rely on on something, you know, stable and stuff like that. And to be honest, I'm uh afraid a little bit to try out new new ways of doing things. However, I am craving it.

SPEAKER_00:

So well, if you ever decide to do it, it would do well. Like there's always a percentage of your audience who would be very happy to spend more money to get more support. Always. So I'll give you some examples. Got a there's a guy who's been on this podcast who teaches watercolour painting, um, and he charges people five thousand dollars for support with learning watercolour painting. We had Yeah, we've got uh a guy who uh has come on before, Jack from Banjo Skills. Oh, if anybody wants to go check out that episode, actually, let me see if I can find it quickly for you. You can search for Remy. Uh that's the name uh Remy's name. Um, but I'm gonna see if I can find the episode episode number as well. Uh it was July 31st, 2025. Meet the artist running a$600,000 online business with Remy. We had uh I've mentioned this a couple of times recently on the this podcast, is we've got a I've got a friend Jack who's been on, been on the podcast as well. He teaches banjo skills. And most of his courses are like, you know,$100,$150, something in that kind of price range. And recently he ran a promotion for$10,000 for a year for getting like all of his classes plus one-to-one support from him. So just to give you a perspective in terms of like how much more people, and I've got another other friends who are doing$10,000 offers like this, you know. So just to give you a perspective that like if you charged, I don't know, five hundred bucks or something like this, there's a bunch of people who would be happy to pay that. You don't have to, you know, if that doesn't fit with your lifestyle and your energy and whatever, but just so you know that it's that it's doable, right? You so you've got that kind of perspective on what's possible. Yeah. The tripwire one's easy. Just do that and then you don't have to, once you've done it, it's done and you're fine, you know. Um let me see if I can find we've got some podcast episodes about tripwires that might be useful for either you or or other people listening, where I'll kind of explain this whole thing in more detail. Um let's see. The highest converting funnel ever, the tripwire funnel, February 27th, 2024, episode 125. And how to optimize your tripwire funnel with Yosip Belina is episode 132, April 11th, 2024. So if anybody wants to go and learn more about tripwire funnels and setting that up, then those two episodes should should see you done pretty well. I don't know if I've got any. Oh, here we go. I've got a free download called the Tripwire Product Ideas, which is a guide with 15 proven profitable tripwire ideas that have been used to generate millions in revenue. And you can get that from data drivenmarketing.co slash tripwire. So if anybody's interested in doing that, then that is the thing to go check out. All right. Alexandra, this has been fabulous. You've been a wonderful guest. Thank you so much for coming on. If anybody wants to go check out everything that you're doing, where can they go? What's all your socials?

SPEAKER_02:

Um, I'm mostly active on Instagram, and they can find me as the artmother there.

SPEAKER_00:

So it's Instagram.com slash the artmother. T-H-E-A-R-T M-O-T-H-E-R, The Art Mother. Fabulous. So thank you very much, everyone, for listening. Um, Alexandra, thank you. Thanks so much for it. Yes, you're welcome. I'm glad to be able to help. That's great. Um, let me know if you implement that or the uh the the email promotion about the masterclass. I think they'll they'll both do great, and I think you'd you'd find them really comfortable. Um if you uh aren't subscribed already and you want to get future episodes, hit subscribe. If you're watching on on YouTube, then uh and you liked the video, then hit like. And we will see you guys next time. Thank you so much.