I won't create another course again without this

Have you ever had this happen to you?

You’re moving along, getting work done, feeling great about your progress, and then you watch one video from someone you trust, and it smacks you so hard with big ideas you see stars.

That was me this weekend when I watched Pat Flynn’s latest video, and that video totally upended my entire belief system.

The gist of the video is that humans are tired of courses and training. There was a big push and accelerant during the pandemic but a total crash afterward. Based on his data, Flynn says it’s because people crave a sense of community that they can’t get just from watching a bunch of course videos.

In his video, Flynn discusses the average course completion rate of 5-15%, which is abysmal and disturbing for a course creator who really cares about people learning and taking action. It honestly makes me not want to create courses anymore, at least not in the traditional sense.

Part of Something Bigger

Flynn goes on to share how information isn’t enough anymore. To keep people engaged with our information, we need to add implementation strategies to help them learn and grow, and there are three ways to do that.

• Services (Do it for them)

• Coaching/Consulting (Do it with them)

• Community/Cohorts (Do it with others)

I’ll explain my thoughts on those in a moment, but when Flynn shared these ideas, I couldn’t help but think of my own goals and realize I was thinking about them all wrong.

Recently, I announced that I’m slowly turning my book, Selling Art Online (SAO), into a more comprehensive online resource. It will be chock full of great content, and I plan to share it for a reasonable annual fee.

SAO will be a fantastic resource for people to read and reference, but I deeply dreaded that some would pay the fee and never use the resource. I don’t want to work that hard on something people pay for and not use.

Last week, before I even watched that video, I’d been thinking of different ways to implement SAO, and this one thought kept coming back to mind. Instead of being just a resource, what if SAO was the foundation of a community where people could interact with me and each other?

I took what was already a huge idea and stuck it in the ass with a double load of Anadrol, and the idea was so overwhelming I almost shut down from the overdose.

Then I watched Pat’s video and knew I had to scratch my original idea and go all in on a community project.

The Supper Club (a working title)

Getting back to those three implementation strategies above, this is the vision for a Hungry community (at least until I stumble my way through and find a better way to work it).

Group Think

Start by gathering a small group (6-10) of creative business operators I trust. We chat, work through our challenges, and share successful strategies. This alpha group helps set the foundation for what the future community will look like.

From there, I will expand on the valuable things the Alphas found and then open the doors to a larger yet limited community for a reasonable monthly or annual membership price. I still want to keep things simple at this stage, bringing substantial value with articles, instruction, organized discussions, and live calls.

After six months or so, I offer a pro-level where members are grouped into small cohorts (these used to be called masterminds, but the business world loves their nomenclature) managed by a community leader. These groups would be hand-selected to bring together people with different experiences with similar objectives, allowing for a more concentrated learning experience.

I don’t plan on offering services for anything yet, but because I get so many questions from people about marketing and growth, I’ll be adding consultation to my list of offerings on The Hungry. Expect that page to be up and running by the next time you hear from me.

Here’s Pat’s video if you want to see more: