Two years ago this month I started my journey into social media relationship building. I have learned so much and want to share it, with you. Today, I’m chatting about my first six months when I moved my course online and developed a virtual coaching and technical support team.
Lesson 1: Get the Right People on Your Bus! Don’t settle. They should be both knowledgeable and passionate about what they do. (Quick Tip: The Energy Bus is an easy read about how to fuel your team with energy!)
The first person I brought onto my bus – let’s call it “my ship” (better metaphor) was a coach who helped to develop my online training program. After all, I needed something to market. I researched numerous professionals online and focused on what each coach had done in the online training industry. In the end, I hired Lori Kennedy from the Wellness Business Academy. The Academy supports small businesses involved in the wellness industry. Though I didn’t fit her niche, I found her programming and promoting to be exceptional. She took me on and I am grateful for it. She is an amazing person who juggles entrepreneurship and single motherhood with poise. Can you guess where I found her? An ad on Facebook!
Lesson 2: You can search online until you are immobilized. Nonprofits often talk their way out of doing something because of the compulsion to make the perfect decision. Experience in business has taught me to act quickly, make mistakes, learn from them and move on.
Lori guided me through a year-long course creation process. As a result, Great Supervision: Building Confident Supervisors Online now features 40 videos and is accompanied by a 100-page manual that is filled with practical information, articles and exercises. To begin with, I was really nervous about the process of creating the videos and felt that they needed to be perfect. So, I redid them several times over. Before I knew it, the recording process was over and the nerves were gone. I had discovered and experienced the flow of teaching onscreen. (Quick Tip: Want to know Lori’s secret for being engaging on video? Smile Talk. Imagine that your best friend is sitting across from you and smile at them. If it helps, put her picture on your screen).
Curious about which programs I used to create Great Supervision: Building Confident Supervisors Online? I used QuickTime for Mac (Windows Media Player if you have Windows) to record each video, TalentLMS to host the course, Vimeo for video storage and I moved from Microsoft Office to Google Drive for document creation and sharing. Why Google Drive? I am working with a virtual team that lives across Canada. We use cost-effective tools that can be accessed from anywhere. Google Drive fits the bill.
Was I overwhelmed by all of this technology? Oh, yes. I often confused programs and passwords. To lessen the confusion, I used cheat sheets that I found online for each program. (Quick Tip: LastPass is fabulous for securely storing passwords and sharing login information with others without revealing your passwords.
Lesson 3: Be prepared for a steep learning curve and focus on one thing at a time. Learn it when you need it because it won’t make sense until then.
Even though it took me six months at about 15 hours per week to get the first course ready for delivery, Great Supervision Online Course 2: Nurturing Collaborative Teams will go much more smoothly. Presently, the draft handout is already complete.
Let me know what you thought of the beginning of my journey. I hope it was informative and useful to you.
With gratitude and warm wishes,
Karin
P.S After 15 years, I’m changing the look and feel of Naslund Consulting. Shortly, I will tell you how to get a behind-the-scenes look at what I’m changing. You see, when operating in a dynamic online environment, creative innovation is a must.