Teach on Skillshare: Plan, Publish, and Promote an Engaging Class

1. Welcome and Introduction: Hi, my name is Tiffany Chow and I look after teacher success here at Skillshare. On behalf of the entire Skillshare community team, welcome to plan, publish, and promote an engaging class on Skillshare. Creating a class on Skillshare isn't hard, but we want to help set you up for success as a Skillshare teacher by breaking down what Skillshare members, AKA your future students love. We created this class to help you get there. Plus, we're going to be joined along the way by some of our most successful teachers. Who are going to share their top tips for making Skillshare's most watched and beloved classes. Keep in mind, we're not going to focus on the technical aspects of filming and editing a class. Although we will share some tips you can apply to your workflow. Instead, we'll dive deep into class planning from start to finish, which is integral to making a high-quality class that your future students will love. We'll start with some tips for choosing a class topic and crafting an engaging project for your class. Then we'll cover what goes into a class description, so you are crystal clear with your future students on what your class is about. We'll talk about strategies for outlining your class so you're fully prepared to film it. Also we'll share tips for choosing a space to film your class, lighting your set, and ensuring you're capturing high-quality audio in your lessons. As you prepare your material for launch, we'll talk about polishing all of the public-facing elements of the class. This is what we call merchandising. Your class can be more easily discovered in our catalog and on search engines. We'll also share our top tips for class marketing. So you're getting the word out to the right students about your class. Finally, we'll talk about student engagement and how it benefits not only your students, but also your teaching, your project in this class will be no surprise here, creating your own class on Skillshare. While creating a class consists of several stages, we've broken the project down into key milestones and deliverables, so you're very clear on what's expected. Need help? We're here for you along the way, our Teacher Help Center offers tons of additional information to support you as you create a high-quality class with us. We'll be referencing specific articles as you move through each lesson here. Feel free to drop questions on the class discussion board or email our teacher support team directly at teach@skillshare.com. We're so thrilled that you're here and we can't wait to see your class come to life. Now let's get started. 2. Project Overview: Create Your First Class: We designed this class to walk you through the process of creating your own Skillshare class, step-by-step. So, your project here will be to create your own class on Skillshare. Just like any class in our community, completing and sharing a project is a way for you to practice what you've learned. It's also a great opportunity to get feedback on your class idea from Skillshare staff and fellow teachers. We'll provide you with lots of resources and tips to guide you along the way. While creating a Skillshare class consists of several stages, for this project, we've broken it down into key milestones and specific deliverables for each one. In other words, for the project in this class, we encourage you to share those specific deliverables towards creating a finished class while you create your actual class right on the platform. Click on the ''Projects and Resources'' tab below to read the project description, learn more about each milestone and what's expected of you. You might want to download your own copy of the class planning template from this page so you have it handy, not just for this class project, but for your future classes too. Then when you're ready, click ''Create Project'' to start your project submission for this class. You'll be updating this project as you complete each milestone. The class that you will eventually create after taking this one will be built using the class creator tool right here on the platform. You can start a class draft at anytime. Just head to skillshare.com/teach on your desktop computer and click the green ''Start a Class'' button. Creating a Skillshare class is a very exciting and rewarding journey, but it can also be tough. I'm not going to lie, especially if it's your first class. You might find yourself, or at least I did battling with technical and personal barriers along the way. Thoughts such as am I being clear enough or oh my god, I look awful in that shirt, or well, this audio is distorted and I'm going to have to record it again. They so well-known imposter syndrome might stand right in front of you whilst creating your class. Thoughts such as, am I good enough or do I really have enough experience to be teaching a class on this subject, will come up. Don't worry, I've been there too. One thing which really helped me to finish my first-class was to think about the people who would benefit from what I had to teach. By sharing my knowledge, I could make a difference into someone else's life. When these problems appeared, I would remind myself of that someone in the world will benefit from this class and suddenly my struggles would seem meaningful and less about me. You're in the right track by taking this class. As you work through this class, we've linked to various articles in our teacher help center. They give further information on what we're covering in the lessons. Don't forget that you can reach out at anytime to teacher support at teach@skillshare.com for feedback either for this project or for help on planning, producing, and promoting any of your classes. We look forward to seeing your projects. 3. How Teaching on Skillshare Works: Skillshare is an online learning community where anyone can discover, take, or even teach a class. Our members, aka your future students, pay an annual fee to have unlimited access to Skillshare's catalog of online classes, all of which are pre-recorded so students can watch them in their own time. These classes are taught by creators, entrepreneurs, and professionals from around the world, just like you. Skillshare classes on average include about 22-60 minutes of pre-recorded video content that is broken down into a series of short, 2-8 minute video lessons. Each class also includes a hands-on project so students can practice their skills, get feedback, and collaborate with our vibrant global community. Our classes are demystifying, actionable, personal, and designed to help students bring what they learn into the real-world. I decided to start teaching on Skillshare when I was introduced to the Skillshare team through our scholarship I had with Adobe. I was already a student back then. I really enjoyed watching classes on Skillshare, but I honestly never really thought about teaching myself, especially as I'm not a native English speaker, and I felt really insecure in front of the camera. Also, I didn't really have the feeling that I had anything to offer, boy, was I wrong? After getting rid of all of my doubts by a lot of encouragement from the Skillshare team, I finally decided to go for it, and what can I say? Starting teaching on Skillshare honestly was one of the best decisions I did in my professional life so far. Not only did I meet a lot of really awesome like-minded people who support my work. I was also able to create a monthly income. Earning money through Skillshare really makes it possible to plan forward and gives me so much more security than just doing freelance jobs would. Since I started Skillshare, it's actually impacted my life more than I ever would have thought. I realized how much knowledge I really have, especially as a working professional. When you're working in a professional environment, you don't realize how much you really know and you don't realize how many beginners there are out there. When you start publishing and people just start sucking up your knowledge and asking you questions, and you start becoming part of this community of people who are learning and other teachers, that is just going to impact your life in so many ways. Teaching on Skillshare has been very rewarding. As a teacher on Skillshare, you too can be a part of this learning community and earn revenue from the classes you teach. Each month, you'll earn revenue based on the number of minutes watched in your classes. The more video content of yours that your students watch, the more you'll earn. You can earn additional revenue by referring new members to Skillshare. We're committed to growing our community and are here to help if you're committed to teaching with us. Our class quality guidelines provide an overview of what makes a great class. As a teacher, you should also be aware of all of our teacher policies to ensure the content you create for our community adheres to our guidelines. 4. Get Focused: Choose Your Class Topic: On Skillshare, you can teach which you're truly passionate about. Since you're going to be teaching a creative community, of some of the most popular topics are illustration, graphic design, productivity, and photography. There are some topics that are not allowed on Skillshare, so make sure you check the Help Center for the full list of restricted topics. Now, you might be asking yourself, how do I even choose a topic for my class? Let me give you an example. When I was creating my first class on Skillshare, I knew it had to be about drawing, but I didn't know what about drawing was I going to teach. To narrow it down, I asked myself, why do I like drawing? What's my favorite part of it? What materials do I like to use? What was something I was struggling with in the beginning that I wish someone had taught me? I remember that one of my biggest struggles when I was in the beginning of my drawing career was to really find my own voice and my own ideas. Now that I have that more figured out, I understood that the class wasn't going to be about drawing techniques or how to draw better, it was about how to come up with your own creative idea for a drawing. On top of it, I was going to use my favorite technique to draw, which is using ink pens. This is how my first drawing class was born on Skillshare. To come up with your own class topic, first, think about what you're good at. What are you skilled at? What do you have experience with? Even if you've never taught this before. Second, ask yourself, what are you most passionate about this topic? What truly motivates you and what made you fall in love with this practice? Third, just put yourself in your student's shoes. Think about when you are just starting out, and this is how you're going to come up with an amazing class topic with your own voice. Even if Skillshare already has a ton of classes on your topic, don't worry, because each teacher teaches differently, each teacher has his own unique perspective and your class is going to be unique in its own way. Once you've picked your topic, it's important to get specific. Rather than teaching a broad sweeping skill set, most successful classes actually focus on one specific skill, concept or project, which is then taught for a series of shorter lessons. This core element of the class, it's what's called the value proposition. It's a lot more than just what you're going to teach your student. For example, you might want to think about, why is this class valuable in a larger context? Who is the class for or who is your intended audience? What is this intended audience going to get out of your guided lessons? For my very first class, Yes You Can Draw, I knew from the outset that I wanted to create a class that would leave people feeling creatively empowered, regardless of their skill level. I thought back to the time when I was a student and my job was to teach art to kids. I remembered how these kids never ever felt self-conscious about their drawings. They never spent any time questioning whether they were good or bad at it. They just had fun. But somewhere along the way, us adults tend to lose that childlike confidence. I knew I wanted to create a class that would be specifically designed to help people reconnect with their own creative, fearless, younger selves. Once I came up with the concept, the audience was actually pretty clear in my mind, primarily beginners who might have a deep yearning to create and draw, but just didn't feel confident enough to pick it up. While the exercises in the class are fun and a little bit silly, it doesn't mean that they're not packed with super important skills. For example, how to reframe what makes a good drawing, how to identify our strength and how to apply them in our own work. When it came time to film my lessons, I really wanted to make sure that all of this was super clearly outlined throughout the entire class. In my introduction, I mentioned how, as a professional illustrator, I never really lost touch with my four-year-old self and how that has helped me along the way. I also sprinkled little reminders of what the concept of the class really is about for each lesson, including the outro, because I really wanted students to leave feeling inspired and motivated by what they were able to achieve in the project. To recap, it's good to keep your value proposition in mind as you develop your class. Add it into your class description, connect it to your class project, and of course mention it into your class introduction. Now it's your turn. Start thinking about a class topic, focusing not just on what you're teaching, but who are you teaching to, who is your audience, and why would they benefit from learning this thing. Try really focusing on the why over what. Why are you teaching this? Why is this important to you? Why do you think, would anyone benefit from learning it opposed to just what you are teaching? Once you come up with an idea for a topic, I know you're going to start thinking about class titles, but don't worry about that just yet, because we're going to look into that a little bit later. 5. Get Busy: Craft Your Class Project: Every class on Skillshare has a project. Through class projects, students practice new skills as they learn and have an opportunity to share and receive feedback on their work, which contributes to a more engaged and rewarding class community. Projects come in many shapes and sizes, but there are four criteria that makes a project successful. It should be relevant to the class topic. It should be easy to start. It should promote independence and creative thinking. Lastly, it should encourage engagement in your class. Let me share an example here from one of my classes so that we can walk through some of the thinking behind the class project. This class is about drawing an illustrated boarding pass in Procreate iPad. This project is very easy to get started because the first couple of steps only involve dreaming up an ideal travel destination, which most of us already naturally do. This project also invite students to draw their own dream destination so that students are free to choose whatever, wherever they personally look forward to. In this way, we can promote independence and creative thinking. So instead of following just one tutorial on how to make one specific thing or copy whatever it has been demonstrated onscreen, students are encouraged to make the project their own. To encourage engagement, we want the final deliverable to be shareable, so there's something for students to upload to the project gallery. Now at this point, I do want to acknowledge that for teachers who teach around topics that are not inherently creative or visual, such as classes in productivity or entrepreneurship or business, sometimes it can be really hard to come up with an idea for a class project. But I teach marketing on Skillshare, so you can trust me when I say that there are still plenty of ways to include a valuable and hands-on project for these types of classes. In my class, digital marketing strategy, profitable sales funnel fundamentals, my students learn the fundamentals of what it takes to create a profitable sales funnel for any business. For their course project, they get a chance to answer some questions, and to also use a free online tool to visually map out the steps of their own sales funnel based on what they've learned, or they can actually just tell me what those steps are in written format if they prefer that instead. The instructions that I give within this class is that students can either use their own business, a client's business or a completely fictional business as their example for their class project, which makes it really easy for everyone to participate and put their new skills into practice right away. The beauty of that type of project is that no two projects will ever look the same because every business is totally unique and every sales funnel is completely unique. Everyone has to think really creatively about how the information in this class applies to their particular situation, and then create a sales funnel that would work for them and their business. I've also found it incredibly helpful to walk my students through an example and to submit a project of my own, and to also attach a class guide. That is especially true when it comes to more information classes which cover more complex topics like this particular class. Within this particular guide, I then summarize the most important key points learned within the class and give a little bit more guidance to the class project, which makes it feel less overwhelming to begin and submit for feedback. Now it's your turn. Take a minute to write down the key details of your project, either in the class planning template or in whatever document that you're using to plan your class. Make sure to provide a summary of the project so students know exactly what it's about. Clarify the steps to complete the project. A numbered list would be very helpful. Lastly, ensure students understand what you're asking them to upload to the project gallery. 6. Sketch It In: Write Your Class Description: The class description appears to students in the About section of a published class. While it is one small part of producing a whole class, it's actually one of the most important components for many reasons. First of all, it's a great way for you to organize your thoughts around your class, making sure that you're focusing on the key details. Second, it helps you to have a bigger picture of your class and outline what the students will learn, who is it for, and why they should take it. Third, the class description is one of the key areas of a class that Skillshares internal search engine and external ones like Google use to index your class and ensure it's visible to students in the search results. How you choose to write your class description is up to you but you should ensure that your class description includes the following. An overview of the class, what students will learn, why they should take it, who is the class for, any specifics on what your students might need to complete the class. You could also use these prompts as headings in your class description. I'm going to walk you through the class description in one of my top classes so you get a sense of what really works for Skillshare audience. This is from my class, Botanical Scenes in Photoshop: Incorporating Watercolor into Digital Design. Right at the top, I've included a brief overview of the class. It's important to have the overview right at the top so it's the first thing that your students will read. It's also what search engines will index so make sure that you've got a written summary here that is an accurate and attractive description of your class. Here you'll see some information on what students will learn as a bullet list. Your list might not be as long as mine, but that's okay. Long paragraphs can be hard to read. Adding this as a list or breaking up your texts into readable chunks can help students to scan your class quickly. I've also included some information on why someone should take this class. This is important for establishing your class value proposition and showing your potential students why the class would be valuable for them. I've also added in a small paragraph about who the class is for. In this example, the class would be valuable for both total beginners as well as hobby artists to professionals working in the visual field. It can be helpful to add in what experience is necessary to complete the class as well. Lastly, I've also mentioned what students need to complete the class. In this case, they will need a laptop with Adobe Photoshop installed, watercolor paints, brushes, some watercolor paper. Keep in mind that you can add images to your class description as I have, but it's best to put them after any reading copy for a search engine optimization or a SEO. Now it's your turn. Take a minute or two and write down the details of your class in your class planning template. If it helps, you can use the headers I outlined in my example to help you organize your thoughts. Don't worry about refining your words at this point. You can revisit it later after you have uploaded your content to the Classcraft on the platform. 7. Make a Plan: Outline Your Class: After selecting a topic, developing a project idea and writing out your class description, a class outline is the next step before filming. But why should you make an outline? An outline helps you to figure out in advance where you want to go in a class or in other words, what lessons you need to teach to meet the class goals. It also helps you to make some production decisions early on before the actual filming begins. At this stage, you decide how you form your class. There are plenty of ways how you can film your lessons. Some of them are, for example, the talking head where looking straight into the camera and speaking to the camera like I'm doing right now. Physical demonstration for when you want to show a technique like for example some painting or drawing technique and this might involve some close up shot or overhead camera. Screencast, which work well for software demos on a computer and finally, of course, also slideshows, which can also be screencasts on a computer and added together with the rest of the video in the post-production. In the outline stage, you also make note of what resources you might need for the production day, such as material or props for your lessons. To meet a Skillshare class quality guidelines, you should vary your visuals throughout your video lessons, so you should also think about what assets you might need to source, film, or create to finalize your lessons, such as B-roll, graphics, or slides. You should maybe note them down now. At this stage, you should also write down your talking points for each video and some teachers like to script their lessons from these notes, but you can of course choose the approach that makes the most sense to you. The most important thing is that the final delivery on camera should feel natural, conversational, and not obviously from a script. Every class needs an introduction video and it should be the first video of your class. It might be the most important video too as it acts as the trailer for your class as well. In it, you'll want to describe what the class is about, who it's for, and more about who you are and what you offer as a teacher. In the introduction video for my class, advanced video editing, essential graphics, and more in Adobe Premiere Pro, I always make sure to introduce myself first and why I'm qualified to teach the class. I often will reference my professional background as a digital storyteller, video producer, the fact that I run a production company and graduated with a film degree and all that fun stuff or whatever. Then I move into some way to hook people in. A lot of times, it's utilizing B-roll from other things I produced. I actually really love using this shot of me dancing in front of the camera. Then there's another shot of the audience seeing me dancing in front of the camera. If that doesn't say digital storyteller, content creator, then I don't know what does, you know what I mean? I'll also hook people in by telling a story that's relevant to the class and emphasizes my credentials that much more. For this class, I told the story of how I originally went to film school to be a feature film editor, but I ended up finding a creative career online instead. But I still utilize everything I've learned and then I support that quick story with B-roll. After that, the next thing I do, is I go into the value proposition and what you'll learn. I find that in your intro, it's really good to reinforce the things you're saying with text on screen. When I say the title of the class, text on screen usually comes up. If I say something that I feel is very relevant to what they'll learn in the class or maybe even what they'll need, text on screen comes up to reinforce it as I see it. Then I often will say who this class is for, and things like what level you need to be at in the software, in this case, Adobe Premiere Pro, to gain the most from the lessons. I usually give a very canopy explanation about some of the concepts they'll learn within the program. I also say who the class is not for. For this class, if you've never opened Premiere, it's not for you because as the teacher, I'm already going to expect you to know the interface and the basics of it. I think that's really important to communicate who the class is for and who it's not, because you don't want people to start taking your class and then be frustrated that they can't keep up and things like that and then maybe they never take one of your classes again. Which finally brings me to the requirements. I always state what is required to take the class. Usually, it's an Internet connection and the latest version of the application I'm teaching. After the introduction, you'll explain the class project, and this is actually where I also include a class overview as well. Most of my classes are generally broken up into two or three parts and I explain what those parts are here as well as going in depth about what the class project is, why it is, what it is, and what I hope they'll be able to do with it. I also explain what the final deliverable will be. Usually it's some finished video where they've incorporated everything I've taught them and submitted it to the project gallery for review. I usually try to include B-roll from the rest of the lessons. That way, they can start to see and sample what they'll learn and want to continue to the first lesson. After the project video, are your class lessons. Your lessons can include a demonstration of techniques, concepts, or examples, as well as your unique perspective. My approach to planning my lessons is hard to explain, but I'm going to try. As I said before, I break my classes into two or three big sections and then from there I have two or three lessons for each section. For this class, I broke the lessons up into the technical, editing theory and techniques, and building promotional content. Something else I do, is I pull the audience a lot to make sure my lessons are relevant to people. I do this by utilizing Skillshare's community features. I'll write an outline for the class first. Everything I think I'm going to cover in it, really basic. Then I'll shoot it out to the community and see what they're gravitating towards and most excited about, you'd be actually surprised how many people will respond and let you know what they want to learn. Above all, I try to focus on one core concept or step in each lesson to keep the class organized. It's better to have more lessons overall than try to pack a lot of information into fewer lessons. Finally, at the very end, you'll wrap it all up with a short conclusion video. When I wrap up a class, I like to rehash everything they've learned and include B-roll from the class again as well. I find this really valuable to highlight where people have started and what they can now do. I always encourage them to submit their class projects as well, so the community can see what they're up to. Or since a lot of my classes are based on social media, I encourage them to tag me in their posts as well. Again, it's trying to get people to just engage. The other thing I do is I make sure to say, thank you for taking the class. Remember if they don't watch, then you don't get paid. People's time is incredibly valuable, so I always make sure to say thank you for sticking it out with me because there's a lot of other things that people could be doing with their time other than watching my class, and I really appreciate it. Now it's your turn. Take some time to start planning out a rough outline for your class and the class planning template is really great for this. For each lesson, you might include a proposed title, the format you plan to shoot the videos, any needed visuals or media, plus a list of talking points and notes. 8. Equipment, Lighting, Space: Prepare to Film: To film your class, you're going to need some equipment. At minimum you'll want, of course, a camera, ideally something that can capture HD video, which is 1080P. An external microphone for capturing high-quality sound, something to keep the camera stable, usually a tripod, and a light source, which can be natural light, which is what I'm using right now, or a lighting kit if you need one. Now, for my Skillshare class from cruise to content creator, as well as most of my talking head YouTube videos, I use a full-frame mirrorless camera, so I'm a professional, so this is what I use. I already had it before I started creating classes, but remember that it's absolutely not necessary to have a camera like this. Of course, a smartphone is a great option for any teacher just to make sure to record your footage horizontally. To stabilize my camera at eye level, make sure it's not above or below, I use a tripod with a leveling base to make it easy to make sure that my shot is level. Now for tripods without the leveling base, don't worry, you simply adjust the head or the legs. Now, while you can get away with just having okay-looking video, good professional sound is a must. We strongly recommend that you use an external microphone to capture audio. Using the built-in microphone on your camera won't produce high-quality audio because for one thing, it's too far away from you. Two, it's not directional enough. It captures wide stereo sound. A lavalier mic, which is what I'm using right now, is perfect for this, but you can also use a condenser or snowball microphone, which you may have seen a lot of podcasters use. It's the little microphone that appears on screen with them. I use a wireless transmitter with a receiver that goes straight to my camera with a professional lavalier mic attached for maximum quality. For lights, I use the simplest light there is. Window light. Light coming from a large window in front of you diffused by curtains is the best option if you have a space in your home that has it. Now when it comes to natural or any light for that matter, the key is knowing how to read and work with the light. It's all about how you position yourself relative to the light source. For a large window like I have here, I recommend positioning yourself not super flat in front of it, but rather diagonally to achieve a little bit of what they call Rembrandt lighting, where you have some shadow cast on the far side of your face to provide contour. You can apply the same technique to any artificial light source as well by positioning the light about one-third to the side and above you. Remember to light the side of your face that's further from the camera. This is a classic cinematography technique that creates a more flattering effect than lighting the near side of your face. You also want to avoid having the shadows get too deep on the other side of your face. Now you can remedy this several ways with a reflector, another light source, or a window, changing your position or diffusing your light further away. The professional diffuser, curtain, white cloth, or other similar material. I would suggest to avoid using your room lights because these aren't often placed properly to get a flattering effect, as well as being too harsh and direct causing unflattering shadows. You want to work generally just with good soft light. Other things you might need are a tripod arm or some other kind of rig for overhead shots or even a second camera to capture in-person demos. You might also need screen casting software if you're doing any demonstration on your computer or showing a slide presentation. When choosing a space for filming your Skillshare class, you're going to want to think about using a space that has few audio and visual distractions. Something that has enough light for you to shoot in. Also, you want to choose a space that really reflects your professional and creative topic that you're going to be filming about. Having props in the space that you're going to be filming can be a really important and impactful way to give a little bit of yourself and your character and your own unique style to your Skillshare class. I do shoot in a lot of different places and environments because I find that I'm often on the road, so I don't always have access to my home environment and my day-to-day living space. A couple of things that I will always use, or I will always put a plant into my frame. I think using a plant just brings a little bit of sense of life, the simplicity of a Skillshare set can sometimes feel a little bit clinical or cold, and I think that using a plant just really warms the space. I also think it's super important to use props that are going to really demonstrate who you are and what it is that you're offering. For me, my creative offering to Skillshare is my photography. I really want people to get a sense of that right off the bat. The things that I'll bring in as props are cameras like you can see these cameras in the background here. Those things are really small and maybe not everyone even notices but I do think that having them in the frame and having them bring that character into the set that you're creating is a really important way to just let the viewer know a little bit about yourself, a little bit about what you're teaching. You've written your script before you jump in there and hit "Record" and end up with footage that you don't like, here's a couple of tips that you should follow so that your class looks great and sounds great and everything flows smoothly. My first bit of advice is I would block out, honestly, especially for your first class a good 4-5 hours of shooting time. My next tip would be set up first before you shoot. You have to set up your camera, you have to set up your lights, you have to set up your background, your set dressing, art department, and you have to put on clothes, do audio test, and do camera tests. What that means is you simply record something, run through a rehearsal of maybe one of your lessons, go through the entire workflow, take that put it into your camera, watch it, make sure it sounds good and make sure it looks good, and things will work much smoother than if you just try to do everything in one day. For any audio test or camera test or when you're setting up, do those tests at the same time that you will most likely be shooting and you don't want to set everything up, say at 1:00 AM when everything's super quiet and it's nighttime outside only to find out that the next day when you're shooting in the middle of the day, the sunlight is coming in differently into your room creating ugly, harsh shadows. There's all kinds of things. There's construction going on outside. Whenever you do your test shoots, plan those out at the same time that you will be shooting the real thing. My next tip would be to rehearse at least one lesson the day before you're really shooting. You're either someone who's a hardcore organizer and you're going to organize every single word you're going to say or you're someone who's just going to add bullet points and just talk on camera. Regardless of which one of those you are, rehearse, because you'd be surprised how even once you have bullet points and you get in front of the camera and you hit "Record", it's natural by the way, to freeze up and forget what you're going to say. Run through a few rehearsals that way you can cut out a good hour of time if you're just stumbling through and forgetting what you were going to talk about because once you start rehearsing, things start coming out naturally and you don't sound like you're reading something or you don't sound like you're remembering something and you don't sound like you're just going through bullet points and your class will have a lot more personality, everything will come out much better. Another bit of advice I would give you is also have a shot list. When you're shooting, you're going to forget everything. You're going to forget what you have to shoot, you're going to forget, and then when you're editing and you realize, "Oh, I forgot to shoot this. I forgot to shoot that." Have a shot list so everything is organized. You get there, you just go down your list. You know you're going to shoot Lesson 1, Lesson 2, Lesson 3, you get B-roll, or basically, that's a footage that you're going to have in your lessons. Shoot your B-roll, have your shot of your close-ups, of your paint brushes, of your pictures, of plants, or whatever it is you're shooting, have a shot list of all of that so everything below is a lot smoother. 9. Get on Camera: Film Talking Head Videos: Now I'm going to demonstrate my typical setup for a talking head video, which can seem a little daunting if you're doing it for the first time or you don't like seeing how you appear on camera. However, remember, students really love to see their teacher on camera, and it can really help you connect with your audience. First, how to set up your lavalier microphone. I like to run my cable underneath my t-shirt as you see here, and clip the mic somewhere on my collar. If you're wearing some blazer, that's also a really nice place to put it that hides it pretty well. I'll test it by moving around a little much, making sure it doesn't make too much noise. This is usually straightforward, but make sure not to start rolling until you've done a few sound checks to make sure you're not getting too much clothing noise and that your audio levels aren't peaking. Don't worry. When in doubt, set your audio levels to auto where that option is available. It's usually the default for non-professional cameras and smartphones. Also, listen on your earphones for any devices or appliances emitting background noise like fans, air conditioners, and turn them off during takes. Now your lavalier cable will run into a wireless transmitter like this one, or straight into the camera if you're using a lavalier with a long cable or into an external recorder like this one. Now, if you are using an external recorder, you'll need to sync your audio and post. Remember to also capture reference audio on your camera so that you have something to sink to. It's a good practice to clap once at the start or at the end of every take to give yourself an easy sinking point. In terms of framing for a class or tutorial, you want to position yourself in the center of the frame with adequate headroom, but not too much. Your eye should be roughly aligned with the top third of the frame. Some external monitoring is a must if you're shooting on your own. But if you really don't have a way to monitor, then what you'll do is you'll frame, roll a take and check afterwards, then go back and adjust until it's about right. This takes patience but I made my first Skillshare course this way, so don't worry about it. One hack I employ is to shoot in 4k a little wider than I intend to use in the actual frame, then edit it down in 1080p HD so I can freely reframe and post and adjust for any mistakes I may have made in terms of framing. Next, of course, breathe. Remember, if you feel awkward at first, it helps to think and focus on the value your viewer will be getting from you and let that positive feeling lift you through the shoot. Once you start rolling, I recommend just letting the camera roll continuously for long stretches so that you don't have to get up and go back to your seat every time you make a mistake. You'll have plenty of retakes. This is totally normal, so don't get frustrated if you mess up a line or so multiple times, this happens to everybody. What helps is to just get it perfectly in manageable chunks. Don't try to do your entire script in one perfect take. First, this is nearly impossible and it will just exhaust your physically and mentally trying. You can always smooth out the cuts with B-roll or by punching into the frame to hide the cut. Like many Skillshare teachers have actually started to use a teleprompter to turbocharge the speed, at which I'm able to get good takes. But remember reading naturally from a teleprompter takes practice. Make sure to watch yourself on playback when doing this for the first time, to check that you don't look or sound unnatural. No matter how I'm filming, I probably do anywhere from three to even 10 takes for each chunk of dialogue, depending on how many mistakes I make or ideas I get. If I'm not using a teleprompter or even when I am, I've actually found that this is a good way to find the best way to say something. I'll often improve or improvise on the script I wrote. In any case, it gives you more options in the edit so you can splice a best of each chunk one take smoothed over by B-roll and punch-ins. Now, if you're dreading having to sort through all of these stakes in the edit, especially if you didn't shoot the parts in order for whatever reason, what can help is to slate or label each take, either with an actual movie slate, a whiteboard, a tablet, or simply an audio label saying Lesson 1, Part 1, Take 3. That's it for my filming tips. Hopefully, this helped you get through this challenging phase in producing your class. Don't worry, even the pros still struggle with this and do many takes. Again, just breathe, smile, laugh, and be confident in the value you're delivering. 10. Show and Tell: Film Live Demos: I primarily teach different watercolor techniques, so you'll see me do a lot of demos on how to use this medium in a lot of my classes. I have a pretty basic setup with an overhead camera, so you can see the area that I'm working on, and then another camera for my lower left because I am right-handed. That captures a lot of the close-up aspects of my demo. Also, a little reminder not to have the settings on autofocus, but rather locked onto your work surface so that there isn't that weird zooming in and out when your hand is moving around. When I'm shooting a demo, there are a few things that I keep in mind. Before I start filming, I do make sure to rehearse the demo ahead of time, and I use this practice run as a casual review to give me an idea of the potential challenges that might crop up, like ink flowing off the paper when I turn on the hairdryer, for example. Also, maybe I need to get in really close with the camera in order to highlight a crucial stage of the process. Or perhaps I need to change to a smaller brush. Also, I make a note of the pigments I'm using for that piece because students love to know that information. I end up including it as a little info graphic at the bottom when I edit my videos together. From those initial notes that I make during the practice run, I write a checklist of what I need to explain as I paint. As I seldom work from a script for the demos, I refer to this list that is just sitting off camera and I reference it when I'm filming. I find doing it like this really helps me to keep things on track. Everything is on schedule and I won't forget anything. For most of my demos, I'll narrate in real-time as I paint so that there's a real sense of immediacy, I can point out some things straight away. Sometimes you might hear real surprise in my voice. It's really useful to hear me talk out loud about my decision-making process, so they can understand the process a lot more clearly. Often, I pretend there's a friend watching me paint, so I keep the narration really natural, easy, and super-duper relaxed. I think it is important to incorporate any mistakes that might occur when the demo is taking place because they happen in real life. It's also a chance for you to show the students how you might incorporate it or deal with that mishap. I think students need reminding of the fact that not everything has to be perfect and even teachers make mistakes, and that is totally okay. I want to end by saying, it is so important to let your personality come through by really expressing that joy and fun you're having when you're demoing. When you're being yourself, you sound so much more relatable as a human and an authentic teacher that they can truly rely on and trust. Many of us teach classes on how to create art on screen-based media. In this lesson, I will briefly walk you through some tips for capturing screencasts simply and effectively. Tip number 1, narrate with clarity. It's not uncommon for students to follow your instructions step-by-step on their computer while watching the class on their phone side-by-side. It's very helpful if you could narrate the locations and the labels. For example, instead of saying click here, you can say click on the triangle icon on the upper left-hand corner. The descriptive information can help your students to follow along without having to jump between screens back and forth. Tip number 2, zoom into the area of interest. It's much easier to follow the instruction when the area of interest takes over a larger portion of the screen. In this way, students have a much better view of the demonstration, and therefore, it's easier for them to process and practice the new found knowledge. Tip number 3, think of ways to highlight your points with stills or motion graphics. It can be as simple as a circle around the cursor or a pop-up motion graphic for the keyboard shortcuts that you use. By adding simple onscreen graphics, it helps students to follow along. At the same time, our classes become more inclusive for folks who are hard of hearing or speaking a different language than your own. 11. Put it Together: Edit Your Class: When you first get started with editing your Skillshare classes, it can feel really time-consuming. But by following a few of these simple steps, it can really help you to just streamline your process and create a really high-quality class. There are so many editing programs out there and they range from being basic for beginners, all the way up to more advanced for professionals. Whichever one is going to work best for you is the best one for you to use. Don't be concerned if you don't have a professional editing suite once you first get started. You can really utilize any editing tool to do these more simple Skillshare edits. I personally do use Adobe Premiere, but I also work as a film editor in my regular job and have just found that that's the easiest one for me because it's the one that I'm utilizing most of the time. Don't hesitate to start with a free and really basic program. It can feel fun and exciting to go overboard with your edits, throwing in different elements and various effects. But the best Skillshare classes are going to be really simple edits. You want to have clear, clean cuts and only utilize any element, animation, or text when it's really necessary and helps to actually enhance the class. My first and one of my most important tips for you is to organize your footage. This is going to help you really streamline the rest of your editing and keep it quick and simple and so you're not losing any files throughout the process. The way that I do this is organizing my footage and assets based on each lesson. I will have a cam A, a cam B, an audio and a music, and an assets folder for each one of my lessons. This just really helps me so I can find it when I'm in the editing process and know exactly where I need to look. As a rule, when you're editing your class, you want to really cut down your lessons to be only 2-8 minutes. This is going to ensure that your audience is going to stay engaged and really keep watching. Breaking things up into smaller lessons really just helps them to be able to flow easier through the class. If you do happen to have a longer section where you have a longer demo or a longer lesson, consider maybe how you might be able to break it into a few different lessons. When you're editing down these classes, what you really want to think about is how to keep your students engaged. One of the best ways to do that is to just be really diversifying your visuals. If there's a long talking head portion, make sure they are cutting back and forth between your A cam and your B cam or if there's too much talking head, consider if you can actually get some B-roll for those moments. Maybe consider if there is a graphic or a certain text that you can put into those videos to really help to diversify your full visual narrative. Motion graphics can be really easy to use if you're using a more professional style editing software like Adobe Premiere. There are various libraries online for motion graphics. I personally like to use Envato elements. They ask for a monthly subscription which you can pause or cancel at any time. I think utilizing these elements just really helps to bring my class to life a little bit. If you have a list of different concepts that you want to group together, you can use bullet points and put those on, or if you have a larger definition of a word or a concept, that can also be a really great time to use text. The last tip I have for you, but probably one of the most important, is just make sure that you're reviewing the Skillshare guidelines for how to record and export your footage. This is going to give you the best quality for Skillshare's platform. 12. Prepare and Polish: Class Merchandising: Now that your class is nearly done, it's time to refine all of the public-facing elements of your class so you're ready to make it live for your students. At Skillshare, we call these elements merchandising, and they include your class title, lesson titles, cover image, project description, category and subcategory, and skills tags. In addition to being the final polish on your class, which will entice students to take it, many of these merchandising elements have an impact on SEO or Search Engine Optimization, which in turn impacts how students discover your class on Skillshare or on search engines like Google. It can be helpful to put yourself in your students' shoes here. Think about what students might be typing into the search bar when looking for a new class to take. We call this search intent. To help them find the most relevant content, it's important for you to incorporate those search terms and keywords into your class title and class description. In this lesson, I'll walk through tips for optimizing each merchandising element as it exists in your class draft. In order to follow along, its best to make sure your class content has already been uploaded on the platform as a draft and then head to the Class Details section. If you need help finding this, you can refer to our step-by-step guide on uploading your class content in the teacher Help Center. Alternatively, you can refine your content and your class planning template before you upload. A lot of teachers prefer this approach as it's easier to check for spelling and grammatical errors. Before we get into the specifics, remember that spelling and grammar do matter. Make sure you're checking all of your content for typos at this stage. First, you'll want to optimize your class title. An effective title is the catchy, readable hook that quickly summarizes what the class is about. Consider how you word your class title. We've got a few strategies for formulating a successful title in the teacher help center. Above all else, read your title out loud so you get a sense of how it sounds. To ensure the right students find your class, make sure your title is between 30 and 70 characters. Longer titles can get cut off in search results. Ensure you're using at least one relevant search term in your title too. Finally, make sure you're using proper capitalization for your title based on the selected language for your class. We've got recommendations in the Help Center. Next, let's tackle your class description. The first 2-3 lines are what students see first and what search engines index. So make sure it counts. We recommend that you put the most important information about your class right up at the top, such as a brief overview of your class. For SEO purposes, your class description should include relevant keywords and search terms. Incorporate these terms organically within the text. Don't keyword stuff your class description by using those terms and keywords way more times than you would in natural speech, or including random ones out of context. Take a little time formatting your class description for readability too. No one enjoys reading a wall of text. Add headers, paragraph breaks, or bulleted or numbered lists to make your description easy to scan so students quickly understand what your class is about. Want to add an image to your class description? Go for it. Just make sure you drop it in towards the bottom for SEO purposes. Your project description has less relevance for SEO, but consider ways to format it for readability too. Just like your class description. Add those headers, paragraph breaks, or bulleted or numbered lists so your students can quickly read what the project is about. In addition to selecting the language and level for your class, you'll need to choose a category, subcategory, and skills tags to ensure your class shows up correctly in our catalog and search results. Now back to your video content. Once you have all your lessons uploaded to the platform, you can add a title to each one. Lesson titles should be approached in a similar way to class titles. Your lesson titles should accurately reflect the outline of your class so that students can quickly orient themselves to the entire class and jump into whatever lesson they'd like. Keep lesson titles under 35 characters so they don't get cut off in the class player and capitalize them in the same way as the class title. Finally, don't forget a cover image. You'll be able to add one once you've uploaded your video lessons. Your class cover should be a high resolution, visually compelling image that clearly depicts what your class is about. Take some time to think about what image would appeal most to students and align with your teacher brand. Here are a few examples of compelling cover images to spark some ideas. While you're at it, now would be a great time to update your teacher profile too, so you're able to share a little more about what you do as a teacher and a creator. At minimum, you should include a profile photo, a title, a short biography, and links to your website and social channels. Once your class is published, a link to your class will appear here too. 13. Get the Word Out: Class Marketing: Promoting your class is a key component to finding success as a teacher on Skillshare. It really helps to have a marketing plan in place before you publish so you can hit the ground running with promoting your class soon after launch. Plus planning ahead gives you an opportunity to generate some pre-launch buzz and follow-up posts with your audience on and off Skillshare. Remember, you don't have to have a massive online following to promote your class, your immediate network is a great resource to start with. Consider the channels you already have access to such as email, social platforms like Instagram, Facebook, TikTok or LinkedIn, or word of mouth as great places to start getting the word out. Finding different ways to talk to your audience about your teaching on Skillshare can really go a long way in boosting the number of students who take your classes and your overall minutes watched and earnings each month. At the very least well before launch give some thought to what, where and when you'll promote your class so you have a plan in place for pre-launch, launch and post-launch. Now let's hear from one of our teachers on what they do for each of these stages. I've been teaching on Skillshare for a few years now and I also happen to teach marketing so my marketing plan is a bit involved and you do not have to do all the things you're about to talk about for your class but hopefully knowing a bit about my plan will spark some ideas for your own marketing efforts. Let's talk through it starting with the things that I do a few weeks before my class goes live. During this stage I really like utilizing Instagram stories to share content about my filming set up and what I'm working on behind the scenes and this is what I also really like asking my audience questions about the topic that I'm creating my class around which helps them to feel more invested once the class is live but it's also actually a really great way to include their ideas in my content before I finish filming. Then if you already know when your class is going to be going live you can do a cheeky event reminder story or post on Instagram about a week or so before your launch day so people can start getting really excited and this is when you also want to gather any assets that you want to use on your launch day so everything is prepped and ready to go and it's all going to be stress-free. Here are a few things that are on my own launch prep list. I will start by preparing my email newsletter and my Skillshare announcement to my followers, then for Pinterest I will create one static and one video pin which will point to the class and sometimes I'll put a little bit of money behind these pins as a paid ad for the first few days after launch and that is absolutely not a requirement but it's just an idea of something I've done in the past. Then for Instagram I will format my class trailer into vertical format so it can be used as a reel and then I'll prepare some stories that I can use on launch day that will have a link to the class within them. Then the day the class goes live I make sure that the newsletter, my Skillshare announcement, my Pinterest pins and all my Instagram content all go live. I also make sure that I'm changing over the link on my YouTube channel to point to the latest class and then I'm updating the link in my Instagram bio with the details of the latest class. Finally for me I also update the learn with me section of my own personal website with the details of that latest class as well. Then for the first few weeks after launch day I continue promoting this class using some of these strategies. I will create an additional email and Skillshare announcement but this time featuring student reviews and projects submissions and I will also continue creating Instagram stories or Instagram reels featuring student reviews. During this stage I also really like showcasing a skill students can learn in the class through my content on social media. For example, in this particular YouTube video I'm walking people through the steps to creating a beautiful LinkedIn profile banner which is a skill people can learn in my social media content creation class. In the description of the video I'll link to the Skillshare class so that if people want to learn additional skills that are similar to the one featured in the video they can click on that and take the full class. Finally, whenever I'm doing a final edit of all my content I make sure to note down any parts that would make for really good standalone social media snippets so that I can then release these to continue promoting my class for even weeks or months after launch. Of course whenever I'm promoting my class I'm using my class referral link which is a way for new students to get an extended free trial of Skillshare and if they sign up to the paid membership after their trial I'll earn an additional payment on my monthly payout so it's a win-win. But look overall, the important thing to remember is that there's no right or wrong way to promote your class. Just do what feels right to you. Choose the platforms where your ideal students are already hanging out if you can and remember to have fun with it. Now it's your turn. Take a minute to jot down your marketing plan for your class and remember, you do not have to do all of the things we talked about here. Just try to have at least one campaign or strategy for your promotion for your class during the pre-launch, the launch day and the post-launch stages and make sure you're also taking note of when and where you'll be sharing content and what copy and assets you'll need to prepare ahead of time. 14. Launch!: With all of your content uploaded to Skillshare and your marketing plan in hand, you're now ready to launch. Use our publishing checklists in the class planning template to make sure your class meets our class quality guidelines and that you haven't forgotten anything. We recommend doing one last pass on all of your video lessons and class merchandising for both spelling and grammar, including any texts you may have added to your lesson videos. Correct spelling is important to inequality class and it's much better to fix it now, before you launch. Then click that green Submit button. Your class is now live on the platform and you can start promoting it and sharing your class referral link with your audience. Now keep in mind, our moderation team does review all new classes to ensure they meet our guidelines too. Your followers on Skillshare will eventually get an email notification that your class is available. Note that it might take a little time to generate subtitles and fully translate your class across all the languages available on our platform. 15. Engage Your Students: Student engagement is a really important part of teaching on Skillshare. By regularly connecting with your students, you can encourage so much more participation in your class and the class projects. This also has the added benefit of helping your students retain that knowledge that they learned in your lessons. One of the first things I do when launching a new class is to create a discussion post to welcome students to the class which I always pinned at the top. So it's the first thing that students see. I thank them for watching my class and I let them know I'm available to answer any of their questions. Students really appreciate a note like this as it makes you sound very approachable and it makes them feel a lot more at ease about asking for your help or advice. You'll see that I do give very lengthy answers to many of their questions. That is the beauty of a class discussions post. It is a space where students feel their questions and thoughts are valid. It's really important that they feel heard and acknowledged by the teacher when you reply to them. Also with this first discussion post, I remind them to post projects in the project gallery so I can give them individual feedback, which again is a beautiful bonus. In my personal experience, I noticed that students really appreciate you as the teacher taking the time to really look at their projects, comment on specific things about it, and really show that you are there, you exist, you are a real person behind the screen. This really helps your students feel more motivated and encouraged to come back, watch more classes, post more projects. I know that we've all been there being a student and being shy with our own creations. It can be a little overwhelming to post a project to strangers online. When you as a teacher give a feedback to your students, it really helps them feel more comfortable to come back and keep creating, and keep posting, and keep learning. I have multiple students that are super engaged with my classes. I recognize their names, they're always coming back. They watch all of my classes. They follow me on Skillshare. They comment on discussions. They participate on giveaways. They are just present. They are there. They want more. I really know that they appreciate not just my content, but me as a creator. I do feel like giving feedback, it's a big part of the community building aspect that is super appreciated inside of Skillshare and just makes Skillshare a little bit more special. 16. Continue Your Teaching Journey: [MUSIC] When I first joined Skillshare, it was June 2020. Now we all know what was going on in June 2020, we were in the middle of a global pandemic. Unfortunately, a lot of us either lost our jobs, or really struggled to gain new clients or projects and we had to pivot and rethink the way we create and we share our work. Luckily, I was able to pick up a little bit of work teaching art workshops on Zoom. While I was doing that, my husband was teaching himself editing and video and photography through Skillshare as you do when you're on lockdown. One day he told me, hey, all these classes that you're teaching on Zoom, you should actually convert them to Skillshare. I'm learning all of these tricks and skills so I can help you. At the time the summer teach challenge was about to launch. I thought, look, it's not like I have a whole lot going on right now, so why not give it a go? That summer we filmed my first-class. Yes, you can draw. I didn't know it at the time, but it really was the beginning of a great Skillshare adventure because that particular class ended up winning the teach challenge. From then on, I got really motivated to keep going. I created another class which was mentored by Skillshare top teacher. Then I became a top teacher. The more classes I published, the more involved I got with the platform, the more I was able to own a small passive income, which in the middle of a pandemic was actually amazing. It gave me a small safety net, which gave me the confidence to focus on the project I was really passionate about. Instead of saying yes to projects that might have been financially interesting but didn't really make my heart sing, I was able to work on writing and illustrating in all the things that I'm actually passionate about. After you've published your first-class, one of the most important things to do to get all the benefits of teaching on Skillshare is to publish more classes. Published class number 2, 3, 4. I'm about to publish class Number 10. The benefits that you'll get from that is that you'll start building a community. You'll start developing a following. You'll get more and more followers. That will snowball into earning more revenues, which will then make you want to publish even more classes. You'll also noticed that as you publish more classes, the first-class is the hardest. Once you get past that first-class, honestly classes get easier and easier to make. I'm not to the point where as you slowly start buying equipment and gear and you can have a place to shoot and you have the experience. You'll start pumping out classes pretty quickly. Your setup will be fast, your breakdown will be fast, your editing will be much faster. I promise you, publishing consistently will get easier and easier and easier. Before you know it, you'll have a system in place where you'll be making a class very quickly, very easily, and very efficiently. We recommend publishing a new class once every 2-6 months, so that each of your classes is able to reach maximum engagement within the Skillshare community. While also building a foundation of passive income from your previous classes. Once you've taught your first-class, build on that success in your next one. Figure out what's working in your classes or what your students are asking for more of to help you hone in on that next class idea. You're welcome to teach anything on Skillshare, but starting to build your expertise in a specific topic area can be really helpful to gaining traction in our community when you're just starting out. [MUSIC] As Skillshare grows internationally, we're also looking for teachers who can teach in languages other than English. Consider ways you can reach new audiences by replicating one of your classes in another language or teaching on a brand new topic. 17. Final Thoughts: That's a wrap. You've finished the class. Congratulations. We hope that this has given you some solid tips for creating your next class on Skillshare, whether it's your 1st or your 50th. We're all eager here at Skillshare to see your proposed classes in the project gallery. Don't forget to upload them below, and we're excited to see your published classes on Skillshare too. If you liked this class and found it useful to your teaching, please leave us a review. We always encourage feedback from our teacher community. If you have any questions, feel free to post it in the class discussion board or send us an email at anytime to teach@skillshare.com. On behalf of Skillshare and our teacher guests, thank you so much for taking this class. We are thrilled to have you join us in our mission to make high-quality learning accessible and become a part of our active, supportive, and thriving teacher community.