Episode 77: What type of class should you teach?

Happy world doula week. It's so great to be here. I'm so excited to talk to you today. Before we get started.

Um, talking about what kind of online class should you teach in your birth business? I want to introduce myself. I'm Nicole joy.

I am a digital doula, a childbirth educator, and I also help other birth professionals bring their businesses online and grow their businesses.

Using the online space. I have an entire suite of online classes, both for pregnant people and for birth professionals that want to grow their business.

I'm also the host of the doulas going digital podcast. So I really hope you go subscribe because it is truly a labor of love.

Get it. Okay. Let's dive in. So what to expect in the next 10, 15 minutes first, I'm going to explain to you a couple of different types of online classes that you might formats that you might consider for yours.

And then I'm going to give you some examples to think beyond birth, you know, and hopefully that will stir up the creative juices for you before we get into all of that, though, I want to remind you that you are an educator, whether you're a doula or a placenta encapsulation specialist or an acupuncturist, you're probably educating your community.

I have been educated on the chiropractors adjustment table. I've been educated during my second birth by my doula. I've been educated while getting acupuncture about the benefits.

So whether or not you're putting on a hat that says, I teach it's part of the business, it's just part of what we do.

So yes, you are an educator and yes, you can teach an online class. Okay? Having said all of that, there are two main types of classes that I want to explain to you.

There are different formats. So there's loads that I'm not going to get into for the sake of time. But the two that I think are most common that people start out with are one, an online workshop.

Now, if you're watching this, you've probably attended workshops before and in the last year or so, you've probably attended more online workshops than you ever thought you would.

Some workshops can be a few days long. I know now they're doing online doula workshops. For example, that might be three days.

Uh, what I'm talking about here is a shorter workshop and generally digital marketing experts have varying opinions, opinions on the length.

I usually think of an online workshop that lasts about an hour, two hours. There have been some that I've been on that are like three hours, but usually it's within that one to two hour range.

An online workshop is usually one topic, one main topic that you're really going to go deep in. And one main takeaway, one thing that people can digest, right?

The goal being make it digestible. This class is a 15 minute workshop, right? So it's much shorter, but still it's one main topic that you can walk away with.

Um, no that online workshops can be taught live or on demand. I'm going to explain more about that part in just a minute.

The second category that I want to share with you, that's most common is a class slash course. So in a course or a bigger class, you might have multiple modules or multiple videos or multiple sessions.

So that makes it more digestible, right? So I know that some people do those all day intensive childbirth education classes, which can be a little tricky for some people to digest all of the information that they learn and that full day class.

So in this model, you're taking that and breaking it into smaller pieces so that people can digest a little bit at a time.

Now there's usually one main category or topic and then multiple like smaller several sub topics, right? So an example is my VBAC prep birth course it's online.

There's I want to say like 10 modules. I can't remember there's 10 or 11 modules. And so there's separate subtopics for each module, right?

Because otherwise it would have been this nine hour course, and that's just way too much. So that's something I consider a course or a bigger class.

Now those can also be taught online on demand or live. So let me explain the difference and then add one more layer to that.

The difference between online live and online on demand live, meaning you have a schedule, you have a live scheduled class workshop that you're going to show up Tuesday night at 7:00 PM.

And that's when everybody will log on and join you on demand is either it's self paced, right? So it's either prerecorded classes.

So like what I'm doing right now, I'm recording this. Nobody's here with me. It's just me talking to the computer.

Right? And then you're going to watch it later on demand. So you could do that where you prerecord and have the videos where people can watch them later, or you can record your live classes and then edit them to remove, you know, cut out people's personal questions times where you might say, um, um, um, cause we all do, uh, there you go.

Uh, so you might clip out those things and those edited versions of your classes can become the on-demand course, the third type, which is not really a category, but it's more a type of like, um, deliverable, right?

So live on demand or hybrid. So I want to explain hybrid to you. A hybrid is something that I find a lot of birth professionals really like because generally doulas and other birth professionals tend to be a lot of energy workers, which makes sense, right?

Because you are, that's the whole nature of the business, right? And so energy workers like to have more of a connection with your clients.

So sometimes those on-demand courses can feel a little too cold and separate for you. So my suggestion would be to consider a hybrid course to save you time, money, all the things make more money, save time, the things.

And so a hybrid course might mean it could be anything you want really, but in my head, it's a combination of maybe some live lessons, maybe some prerecorded or edited replays of live classes and workshops and connection calls.

That's I think we're both professionals would really enjoy that's the piece. I think that a lot of birth professionals need to incorporate to really enjoy teaching online is that live connection.

So let me give you an example. Let's say you have a six week course and you have four videos week one, and week two, they watch a prerecorded video week three, you have a connection call where you get together somewhere like zoom or Google Hangouts, or, you know, wherever FaceTime, even a whatever works for you.

If it's a small group though, I don't think FaceTime works and you ask questions, you connect, you go deeper, right.

With what they learned in the material. And then maybe weeks, what did we say? One, two, three, four, and five are videos three and four.

So you have those last two videos and then maybe week six is a final connection call that you get together.

So that's a hybrid. Okay. Now that we've explained the most common styles that I see birth professionals using and that I use, um, let's dive into some examples so that you can think beyond birth.

The first, obviously I'm going to give you nine examples. Okay. I have a list. So I don't lose track because I'm limited with time here.

All right. Number one is birth obvious you can teach birth online. Number two, VBAC prep. So if the back people and C-section people that have had a cesarean and are considering having a VBAC, is that if that's kind of where your heart is, you could teach a VBAC prep course.

Number three, one, two, three, um, a class or a course, or a workshop guiding people through healing from pregnancy loss.

If you're a pregnancy loss doula, this might be really suited for a hybrid where you have a lot of connection time and you're really working together.

And then perhaps there's modules in between where you can guide them through some other things, right? Number four, postpartum prep.

So raise your hand, postpartum doulas, even birth doulas, right? You don't have to be a birth. I'm sorry. A postpartum doula to teach about post-partum preparation.

So postpartum prep courses, number four, number five, any of the above for partners or other family members like grandparents. You know, so often I have pregnant people that are reach out, reaching out to me that are looking for support for their partners.

Their partners want to learn about VBAC or their mother wants to learn about postpartum prep so she can best help the birthing person, right?

Number six, newborn care, number seven, breastfeeding number eight mindful pregnancy type classes. Okay. So let me explain. This might be for you, if you are a prenatal misuse, if you do pursue prenatal massages, or if you teach prenatal yoga, or if you do meditation or energy healing work, if you do things that are more, you know, mindful based, uh, that aren't necessarily doula work.

This could be something that you have a class or a workshop that talks about mindful pregnancy, and you can title it something else, obviously mindfulness or connected, and maybe think of the words that really resonate with you.

And you can list all the different ways that your ideal client can have the type of pregnancy and birth that they desire, the experience that they desire and tapping into their mindfulness and of those examples, probably at least one is going to be a service that you provide.

So even if you don't do all of the above, you can still touch on them and explain how they can be beneficial that's of high service to your community.

And then in one or more, that will be your thing. So if you are the prenatal yoga instructor and you do streaming online, prenatal yoga, by the way, that's super cool.

You can mention that as part of your course, right? And then number nine, this is our last one is a holistic care during pregnancy postpartum type of class, comparable to mindfulness, but a little bit different.

So this might be for you, if you are a Webster certified chiropractor, if you're a pelvic floor, physical therapist, if you, um, do prenatal acupuncture or acupuncture for pregnant people, or if you're a fertility specialist that does more holistic options.

So again, that same concept that you could teach about the general umbrella of holistic support during pregnancy birth and beyond, and then one or more of those will be the thing that you can offer support in.

Okay. So those were the nine examples, hopefully that got some ideas and your creative energy flowing. My suggestion after you watch this is to go for a walk, get outside, go for a walk.

Don't put in your headphones, just walk with nothing going on and listen inward and start to get your creativity flowing or whatever, you know, however, moving your energy works for you, taking a shower, exercising, whatever you can do to kind of, you know, get your ideas flowing.

Now, the last thing I want to mention, this is kind of a last bonus tip is how might you use some of these classes in your business?

So there's the obvious that you could sell online courses. That's part of it, but if you're not quite there yet, or it doesn't, you can't see that part yet.

What I want to share with you is an idea on having a welcome video or an introduction educational style video, or workshop class, even that you provide maybe for free, or maybe in return for somebody's email address, that explains to them the what and the why of what you do.

For example, if you are a Webster certified chiropractor and a pregnant person is like, Hey, my name's Nicole, I'm this many weeks pregnant.

And I'm just wondering how, how this work and why would I, you know, can you tell me more about what you do with clients?

So if you often spend a lot of time on the phone with potential clients talking about what this process is like, this is something that you might consider turning into a welcome video.

It's probably going to be a little bit shorter, but you can explain what the process is like, right? What is it, why is it important?

That's it because the how and the service and support is where they can come and meet you and work with you and become a client.

Same thing goes for, um, a great example that pops in my head is placenta encapsulation specialist. I remember having a very long conversation.

The first time I had my placenta encapsulated in like 2013. I remember thinking like, what is this? I don't really know much about it.

I don't know anybody who's done this. So she had to sit on the phone and explain a lot of this process to me.

And it was probably a 30, 45 minute conversation, which she was incredible to do. And you might feel like, of course I'm willing to do that.

And she also could have said, I have a video that I think you'll find really helpful. And maybe I even landed on her website and saw the video.

And it was like, click here. If you want to learn what placenta encapsulation is and why people do it. I could have watched a video and save time, right.

Saved her time because watching the video, I would have learned if it was something that I may be considering doing, and I want to take the next step and I would have learned if she's the right person, if we have that connection and I want to work more closely with her, right?

And so sometimes when we're on the phone with people, you can just feel the vibe through the phone that you're like, Hmm, not my person.

Right. And you know, the same thing happens on video. It's actually a stronger, energetic connection when we're talking virtual stuff, seeing somebody talking on video is the strongest online connection way, right?

It's the strongest, energetic way to connect. You can really get a feel for my energy in this video. And same thing goes for you.

So having that video will save you a load of time and it can be a great way for you to help you position yourself as the authority that you are in your specific niche, niche, niche, forever.

A word that I do not use properly. Okay. I hope this has been super helpful. I look forward to hanging out with you on Instagram and for you enjoying my podcast, doulas going digital, and I will see you all soon