Course Creators Weekly #72
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November 8th, 2021
- Earning $40k Per Month as a Creator
Jay Clouse and Marie Poulin talk about generousity, experiments, fun, consistency, and a whole lot more. Andrew Barry talks about activating prior knowledge in students, and Louis Grenier talks with Hiten Shah about choosing the right value proposition.
![Marie Poulin [Inconsistency] – Earning $40,000 per month as a course creator | Creative Elements #78](data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7)
Marie Poulin [Inconsistency] – Earning $40,000 per month as a course creator | Creative Elements #78
In Jay Clouse's own words, Marie Poulin is badass. I have to agree. She's incredible.
In this episode of the Creative Elements podcast, Marie talks about her early days as a designer, what drives her to share so generously, and how following her curiosity led her to becoming known as the "Notion Queen."
Here are some of my biggest takeaways:
Show more of who you are and your personal values—people buy from people
Offer 1:1 consulting + group coaching in the early days—it's how you find initial insights
Teach systems and workflows, not just the tools
Follow your interests and curiosity—make sure you're having fun by designing for it
Treat opportunities as experiments and chapters in you journey—nothing's permanent
Be consistent in serving your audience (doesn't have to mean publishing on a cadence)
As you experiment, be willing to let go of what's not working
I highly recommend listening to the full episode to learn about Marie's journey to becoming a full-time course creator! 
Random Picks from past editions
Activating Prior Knowledge
Understand Advance organisers, which help us make sense of and organise knowledge
Use relatable stories, or, if introducing entirely new concepts, explain how they relate
Start by presenting general ideas, from first principles, and gradually add complexity
4 techniques to activate prior knowledge:
Ask students to predict what you'll be teaching + justify their thinking
Ask questions to test your students' intuitive knowledge about unfamiliar concepts
Ask students to compare the new ideas that you present, with what they already know
Ask 'why' questions before introducing new material—prime them for new knowledge
Final takeaways:
Direct your students' attention to the most important ideas they must take away
Highlight relationships between concepts to help students connect the dots
Remind students of the existing knowledge they can use to grasp new ideas
Hiten Shah on Choosing the Right Value Proposition
Louis Grenier and Hiten Shah talk about choosing the right value proposition:
Think of value as what the customer is getting, not what you're offering
Avoid using buzzwords or analogies that may not make sense to everyone
Test your ideas to make sure people can understand them in 5 second or less
If you already have customers, use their own words to craft your messaging
Use a single value prop to bring people in, deliver it, then let them discover the rest
