Ep 3 - How to Turn Your Professional Expertise into an Online Course: A Guide for Healthcare Professionals

Are you feeling overworked and wondering how you can help more people without sacrificing all your time and energy? 

Or perhaps you dream of scaling your impact and income without adding more hours to your already packed schedule?

Then I’ve got great news for you. Creating an online course might be exactly the solution you’re looking for!

Imagine waking up to find you've made money overnight… 

Or taking a two-week holiday without worrying about client appointments – but still bringing in income. 

Sounds amazing, right? Let’s find out how!

In this blog, we’ll explore:

1. When it’s the right time to create your online course
2. What makes a course highly profitable (and what doesn’t!)
3. How to turn your expertise into a strong course framework

By the end, you'll have a clear roadmap to start transforming your professional knowledge into a scalable product that works for you – even when you’re not working.

1. When Is It the Right Time to Create an Online Course?

Many healthcare professionals think they need to be fully booked or have years of experience to start creating an online course. 

Let me reassure you – that’s not true!

The right time to consider creating a course depends on your goals and circumstances. 

Shall we explore two common scenarios?

Scenario 1: You’re Fully Booked

Fully booked is great – but can’t it be exhausting?

If you’ve set up your private practice to escape the 9-to-5 grind, only to find yourself overwhelmed with clients – this is where an online course could help you reclaim your time (and actually help even more people!)

Let’s take Chloe, as an example. 

Chloe is a clinical child psychologist who left the NHS to start her own practice, hoping to spend more time with her teenage children. 

But when COVID-19 hit, demand for her services skyrocketed. Chloe was quickly fully booked and struggling to balance her workload and family life.

That’s when she decided to create an online course – with my help. 

The course allowed her to support more families without being tied to 1:1 sessions, giving her the flexibility she craved.

(And an extra stream of income too.)

Scenario 2: You’re Passionate About Sharing Your Expertise

You don’t need to be sinking under 1:1 clients to branch out into creating your first course. 

If you’re passionate about a particular topic and want to make a bigger impact, course creation could be your perfect plan.

This was my journey. Alongside my NHS role, I ran a private practice and worked with baby and toddler food brands. 

I quickly realised that my expertise in weaning and paediatric nutrition could help more families than I could reach in 1:1 sessions. 

So I turned that knowledge into an online course – and for me, it opened up an incredible new way of working!

Less hours. More income and impact. What’s not to love?

Signs You’re Ready to Create a Course

• You frequently answer the same questions from clients
• You specialise in a niche area with high demand
• You’re eager to reach more people and scale your impact
• You’re drawn to the idea of earning passive income

If any of these resonate with you, it might be time to explore course creation.

So let’s take a look…

2. What Makes a Course Highly Profitable?

Not all courses are created equal. 

For your course to be successful, it must solve a specific and pressing problem for your audience.

The “Bleeding Neck” Problem

Perry Marshall, a business consultant, explains that successful courses solve “bleeding neck” problems – urgent issues that people are desperate to fix. 

This is in contrast to “stubbed toe” problems – which are kind of inconvenient but can easily be delayed or ignored.

And if you want your course to be a “must-buy” – make sure you’re looking to solve those bleeding necks!

Your course needs to take your clients from:

• Point A: Their burning problem or pain point
• Point B: Their desired outcome or solution

Understanding What Clients Want (Not Just What They Need)

Here’s a lesson I learned the hard way. 

Back in 2017, I created my first course, Baby Nutrition. I was convinced it would be a hit because the topic was so important. 

However, I hadn’t done enough market research to understand what parents actually wanted to learn.

The course bombed. 

No one bought it at full price, and I eventually reduced it to £24, selling just three spots. 

That experience taught me a critical lesson: People don’t buy what they need; they buy what they want.

To create a course that sells (and doesn’t bomb) make sure you:

1. Identify your ideal clients’ BIGGEST struggles and desires
2. Validate your course idea through market research. (Don’t skip this bit!)

If you’re not sure how to do this, read my blog on “How to Do Market Research Effectively So That People Buy Your Stuff” for a detailed guide.

3. Turning Your Expertise into a Course Framework

Once you’ve identified your course topic and validated your idea, it’s time to structure your content.

(Keep reading – because I promise there’s a way to make this more fun!)

Step 1: Identify Your Process

Even if your work feels highly individualised, it’s likely you follow a consistent process with your clients. Am I right?

Then hooray! Because this process can become the foundation of your course. You’re already on your way.

For example, when I work with families dealing with fussy eating, I use my FEASTS Framework:

• F: Find out why
• E: Educate
• A: Adjust mealtimes
• S: Supportive parenting
• T: Teaching children
• S: Success

Your framework might look like:

• A series of steps you guide every client through
• Key themes or pillars you address with all clients

Step 2: Host a Post-It Party

This is where the magic happens! AKA the fun bit.

A Post-It Party is a brainstorming session to map out your course content. 

Here’s how you can create yours:

1. Set up your space: Find a blank wall or whiteboard and grab some Post-It notes
2. Define your start and end points: Write down your clients’ Point A (problem) on one side and Point B (desired outcome) on the other
3. List your modules: Stick notes in between Point A and Point B for each major step or module in your course
4. Add subtopics: Under each module, brainstorm the lessons or topics you’ll cover to help clients progress to the next step

For example, a weight management course might include:

• Module: Nutrition Basics
• Lessons: Portion sizes, meal planning, adapting recipes
• Module: Exercise Strategies
• Lessons: Building a routine, setting realistic goals

Step 3: Refine Your Framework

Leave your Post-It wall up for a few days. As new ideas come to you, add or rearrange notes. 

Over time, you’ll see your course structure take shape. (I’m excited for you!)

What’s Next?

Creating an online course might seem daunting, but the benefits are absolutely worth it. 

With a clear process and a pinch of creativity, you can:

• Reach and help more people than you ever could in 1:1 sessions
• Earn passive income (money flowing to you, while you sleep or nip off on holiday)
• Free up time for the things that matter most to you

Action Step: Host Your Post-It Party

Set aside half a day to brainstorm your course framework. Go on. Add an entry to your calendar now!

When the time comes, light a candle, put on some music, and get creative.

Settle in and enjoy creating the freedom you deserve

In the next blog, we’ll dive into “How to Do Market Research Effectively So That People Buy Your Stuff” – a must-read if you want to make sure your course is a winning success.

With these steps, you’re on your way to creating an online course that transforms lives – yours included. 

Let’s get started!

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This guide really is your master plan to business success! Grab your free copy, right here…https://www.sarahalmondbushell.com/master-plan

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Episode transcription:

[00:00:00] Sarah Almond Bushell: Welcome back. Today we are diving into my most favourite way of helping clients beyond the clinic and that is through packaging up your professional expertise and turning it into an online course. Now one of the reasons why I love online courses is that it means that you can make money while you're not at work.

[00:00:22] Sarah Almond Bushell: Can you imagine waking up in the morning and checking your online banking and finding that you've made money overnight? Or going on holiday for two weeks and not seeing any clients, but being safe in the knowledge that you've still got some money coming in. That would be amazing, wouldn't it? In this episode, you are going to learn when it's a good time in your career to create an online course.

[00:00:48] Sarah Almond Bushell: What makes a highly profitable course. And how to turn your expertise into an online course framework. Let's dive in. First of all, when is it a good time to create an online course? Let's start by understanding. Probably the best time to start an online course is if you're a clinician who is Fully booked.

[00:01:13] Sarah Almond Bushell: Now is the time that you want to be taking that expertise you've got and moving it into a one to many model. So you may have set up your own business to break free of that 9 to 5, only to end up creating a job for yourself. And after all, there's only a finite number of hours in the day. You can only make so much money because there's only one of you.

[00:01:37] Sarah Almond Bushell: And this is exactly what happened with my client Chloe. Now, she's a clinical child psychologist and she'd left the NHS CAMHS team and she had set up on her own. She wanted to be her own boss because she wanted to spend more time with her teenage children before they grew up and they left for university.

[00:02:00] Sarah Almond Bushell: And then, of course, COVID happened and the demand for children's psychology services was so high, she found that her business just exploded with families who were really struggling with their children's mental health, and she quickly became fully booked. She started working with me because she wanted to turn her expertise into an online course so that she could support more families, but importantly for her, to help them.

[00:02:28] Sarah Almond Bushell: To buy back more time. But you don't need to be a fully booked business owner in order to create a course. A second indication might be someone, perhaps a doctor or an occupational therapist or a dietitian like me, who is a specialist in their field. But has that little bit of an entrepreneurial spirit and wants to just reach more people and have a greater impact than their current role allows.

[00:02:56] Sarah Almond Bushell: And actually, this is how I got started. I'd always had a pediatric nutrition business. I ran alongside my NHS work. Part of it was a private practice. But part of it was offering consultancy to baby and toddler food brands. And I ended up writing three baby weaning books for three different brands in the space of about 18 months, two years.

[00:03:21] Sarah Almond Bushell: And I thought, you know what, this could be perfect online course material. So that's exactly what I did. What I'm getting at here is, if you find yourself working with one particular client type or talking about one particular topic on repeat, you know there's a demand for that information. And like me, you couldn't be more up to date on the topic and you feel like you've got a lot of expertise in this area.

[00:03:49] Sarah Almond Bushell: That is a really good indication that a course might be for you. What makes a course highly profitable? Courses need to provide a solution to a very specific problem. If they don't, you will struggle to sell it. A good course will take someone from point A, which is their problem, to point B, which is their problem solved or their desire met.

[00:04:17] Sarah Almond Bushell: You must have a really clear transformation that the person experiences when they're going from point A to point B via your online course. People won't buy nice to haves, but they will buy a must have, and so your course topic really needs to be something highly valuable. Perry Marshall, who is a, quite a famous business consultant and author, he's got a brilliant metaphor that I think explains this so well.

[00:04:45] Sarah Almond Bushell: He says, The problem that you need to solve needs to be a bleeding neck problem and not a stubbed toe. A bleeding neck needs sorting now, but a stubbed toe, although it's painful and inconvenient, you can put it off until tomorrow. And, unfortunately, in the world of business, tomorrow rarely comes. So you need to start by understanding what your ideal client's biggest struggles or problems or pain points are.

[00:05:16] Sarah Almond Bushell: And if you don't know what this is, you need to go and do some market research and find out directly from them. If you tune into episode four, called how to do market research effectively so that people buy your stuff, I'll walk you through exactly how to do this. Because here's what I want you to know.

[00:05:35] Sarah Almond Bushell: The worst thing that anyone can do is create a course that you think is brilliant and absolutely something that your clients need, only to find that no one buys it. And that's because people don't buy what they need. They buy what they want. I learned the hard way. Back in 2017, I created my first course, Baby Nutrition.

[00:06:01] Sarah Almond Bushell: I thought this was gonna be brilliant. No one was talking about baby nutrition and yet I believed it was such an important topic. that all new parents needed to know all about it. I had been writing these weaning books over the last couple of years and so I decided that I was going to dive deeper into the nutrition section and create this epic course.

[00:06:26] Sarah Almond Bushell: Now, this was before I had any qualifications in business. In fact, it was before I ever worked with a business coach, but I was an avid listener of all of the business podcasts and some huge names in the online business world had these amazing podcasts that I would consume. And so I. Honestly thought I knew exactly what to do.

[00:06:50] Sarah Almond Bushell: So I went ahead and I created this course and it bombed. Not a single person bought it at its full price of 197. And so I ended up reducing the price several times and eventually I sold three spots at 24 each. Earning me a grand total of 72 quid. The lesson here is don't create something that you think is great until your ideal customers have truly validated your idea, first of all.

[00:07:23] Sarah Almond Bushell: Okay, so once you know your course topic, your ideal customer's point A or problem, and point B or desired end state, then you need to map out all of the stepping stones that they need to take in order to get there. So at this point, many of my clients will say actually, Sarah, everything I do is personalized, or there isn't actually one single way of achieving that goal.

[00:07:49] Sarah Almond Bushell: And I understand, we are clinicians after all, and we take a highly individualised approach when we're working with our clients one to one. But you will likely follow a process and it will be the same process for each client who has the same problem that you're helping them with. Now, almost all professions have a process, whether you're a doctor or a chef or even an artist.

[00:08:16] Sarah Almond Bushell: It might look like a set of steps that you take with all of your clients, or it may be that there's some common themes that you go through with everyone. If you're a weight management dietitian, for example, you might always cover nutrition and exercise and getting enough sleep and managing stress, etc.

[00:08:38] Sarah Almond Bushell: If you are an occupational therapist and you're working in sensory, it might be that the first thing you do is identify those sensory needs. Then it's giving the sensory input. Then it's checking the impact of those results and making adjustments for next time. I'll give you an example. When I'm working with my Fussy Eater clients in the Children's Nutritionist, I take them through my process, which is called the Feast.

[00:09:07] Sarah Almond Bushell: And Feasts is an acronym. Where F is finding out why. Why they're not eating in the first place. E is educate. I'm teaching them what they need to know. A is adjusting the meal times. We're making those adjustments. S is supportive parenting, so I'm teaching them the positive parenting strategies that they need to implement with their children around eating.

[00:09:32] Sarah Almond Bushell: T is actually teaching the children, and then S is success, so we're celebrating the success. I hope you can see that this is still a very much individualized approach if I was working with somebody on a one to one basis, but I will use the exact same process in my online course. So this framework that you've created, these become your modules within your course.

[00:09:58] Sarah Almond Bushell: So next you need to flesh out the content, and so I want to invite you to my post it party. Hands up, post it party is not my phrase. I learned it from Amy Porterfield, who's one of the best course creation and marketing coaches that I've learned a lot from over the years. But essentially, a post it party is where you brain dump.

[00:10:20] Sarah Almond Bushell: You know how your ideal client feels. at point A before they take your course, and you also know how they want to feel after they take your course at point B. And you have your modules, which are the steps that they need to take in order to get there. So what I want you to do now is find a blank wall somewhere in your home where you can stick up your post it notes.

[00:10:48] Sarah Almond Bushell: You can use a whiteboard if you've got one, but it needs to be somewhere where people won't brush past and knock them on the floor, or little people won't come along and decide to move things around. So take a stack of post it notes and under each of the modules or stepping stones from point A on the left to point B on the right, you want to list out what each one needs to include.

[00:11:11] Sarah Almond Bushell: Spend some time here and identify what those core topics are that your client needs to know in order to move forwards and get the results that they want to achieve. Because you already work with clients one to one or you've got a huge amount of expertise in a specific area, you will likely know that there are certain key topics that they need to fully grasp in order to succeed.

[00:11:37] Sarah Almond Bushell: So going back to that weight management example, in that nutrition module, you may be adapting recipes, you may have portion sizes, and then reading food labels, and then time restricted eating, and then satiating nutrients, and then meal planning, and then meal preparation etc. I could go on here. And now, what I want you to do after you've done this for all of your modules, is just walk away.

[00:12:05] Sarah Almond Bushell: Go and do something else, but keep those post it notes up on your wall. Because if you're anything like me, you'll likely find that new ideas come to you in the middle of the night, or when you're in the shower, or when you're walking the dog, and you'll want to add those to your wall. You might spot that some lessons That you originally put in one place actually fit better under another topic than you originally planned for, and so you'll move things around, which is the beauty of using post it notes.

[00:12:36] Sarah Almond Bushell: And then suddenly you might realize that actually you don't need to talk about that topic, and so you might take a post it note away. So give yourself a good few days just to let your course outline settle. And once you find that no more ideas are coming and you've done enough pruning and adding things in and you're happy with it, then you are ready to go.

[00:12:59] Sarah Almond Bushell: Now, It's fair to say that there is a lot more that goes into creating and of course, selling an online course, but I hope this episode has given you a flavour for what's achievable and how to take those initial steps in turning your expertise into an online course. We have covered when it's a good time in your career to create an online course, what makes a course profitable and something that people actually want to buy, and a step by step method for how to turn your expertise into an actual course framework.

[00:13:35] Sarah Almond Bushell: My action step for you as we draw to a close is to have that post it party. Put aside half a day, light a candle, put some music on and get creative and just see what course you might be able to create in order to help more people than you can one to one and of course have a greater impact. Join me next time where we are going to be diving into how to do market research effectively so that people buy your stuff.

[00:14:06] Sarah Almond Bushell: Absolutely essential if you sell anything in your business like an online course and critical if client inquiries and sales are slow. So join me next time.

[00:14:17] Sarah Almond Bushell: Before we wrap up today's episode, I've got something extra special for you. If you're a healthcare professional, like me, and you love helping clients, but perhaps something is niggling away at the back of your mind, making you wonder whether you're actually working on the right parts of your business at the right time and in the right order.

[00:14:39] Sarah Almond Bushell: When you set yourself up in business, you probably quickly realise that we never got trained in marketing. And so you're likely struggling to be 100 percent sure about what to work on a day to day basis to make sure that your business grows. And if this continues, you might find that you spend too much time on social media or blogging and actually it doesn't have the impact that you really hoped it would have, and you might end up wasting a lot of time hunting and pecking around the internet looking for guidance.

[00:15:10] Sarah Almond Bushell: And in the long run, it means your business doesn't grow. But it really doesn't have to be this way. So to help you overcome the indecision and get certainty and take decisive action, you can download my free resource called the Master Plan. This step by step Sequential workbook is designed to walk you through exactly what you need to focus on and when so that you can build a business that you've always dreamed of.

[00:15:40] Sarah Almond Bushell: You'll get my expert knowledge as a health business strategist from the foundational steps so you can check you haven't missed any to the advanced strategies for when you're optimizing and scaling. This guide really is your master plan to business success. So if you're ready to take your expertise to the next level and build your dream business, head over to sarahalmondbushell.com/master-plan and you can download your free copy. Thanks for tuning in. Bye for now.