WordPress website setup for busy people
Wishing all our friends, customers and supporters a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
Please note we will be closed (but still taking orders) on the following days:
I hope you manage to have a fantastic break.
Our founder Nick Davis, talks about the importance of focus and the origins of ThemeValet on the Game Changer podcast.
NB. If you only want to sell a course and you don’t care about delivering it through your website specifically, you can simply put together a collection of files containing all the course contents (Word docs, video clips etc) and sell it as a ‘multi-file’ product in Gumroad (see Part 1 of this article and more detailed instructions here).
This tutorial, however, assumes that you want to use Gumroad to handle payments / storage of ‘behind the paywall’ files but actually keep the main experience of accessing the course on your WordPress website itself.
You blog, you tweet, you help people out online (for free) and you start to build an audience.
At some point though you may decide you can make a bigger impact (and more directly monetise your expertise) by creating an online course that you can sell to your audience.
A win for them and a win for you.
You just need two things: the content and a way of delivering and selling the content to your customers. But it needn’t be a lot of work.
Firstly, the content. Think back to those aforementioned blog posts and emails, you probably have a good base for the course right there. Oh and don’t forgot webinars, Periscopes and other things you may have done that could all add a lot of value to a course too.
So that’s your head start on the content, now what about the course itself?
Fortunately that’s neither difficult or expensive to set up either. In fact using your WordPress site and Gumroad (who I also recommend as a quick way to sell a digital download on your website) you can get your first course ready to take orders in less than an hour.
Let’s walk through it together.
What you’ll need:
What we’re going to do:
What this tutorial is not designed to teach you:
(Of course, there’s nothing with doing any of the above, but this tutorial / approach is designed for those who want to create and sell a simple course online but have people access all of the course content on their own website for a one-off fee).
What are the costs?
Once you’ve bought the ProductPress plugin and setup your Gumroad account, the first thing you need to do is login to your WordPress website and install the plugin.
From the WordPress menu go to Plugins > Add New and then Upload File. Find the zip file you received from ProductPress, upload it and then make sure you activate it.
Now you need to connect Gumroad to WordPress so that WordPress knows when someone has paid for something so it can create a login for the customer.
In WordPress, go to Settings > ProductPress.
(If at this point, ONLY if you see a message saying: ‘Warning permalinks are disabled. ProductPress won’t work without pretty permalink[s]’ go to Settings > Permalinks, select Post name and click Save Changes and go back to the previous screen. If you don’t see that message you can ignore this step).
On this screen you’ll see Your redirect URI:
Select and copy the highlighted text, beginning http://
Next, in a new browser tab, go to the Gumroad website, login and navigate to Settings
…and then click the Advanced tab.
Scroll down and you’ll see a Create application box.
Enter an Application name, paste the Redirect URI you copied from the ProductPress settings page in WordPress and then click Create application.
The page will refresh and two new pieces of information will appear: Application ID and Application Secret (I’ve blurred out my info because you should not share this publicly for security reasons!)
Now copy and paste each one into the corresponding fields back in the ProductPress settings page inside your WordPress website and then click Connect to Gumroad.
On the next page that appears, click Authorize.
You will now have successfully connected WordPress to Gumroad.
On the same screen (Settings > ProductPress) in WordPress, you’ll also see a list of any Gumroad products you’ve already created.
At this point, if you haven’t already you should create a product in Gumroad that’ll you sell to give access to your course over on your WordPress site.
To do this, go back to the Gumroad website and click Products.
Click Add a product and then Digital product.
And then Product.
Give the product a name and a price (you can change later).
You must then upload at least one file for Gumroad to create the product. For now this could be a simple Word doc, PDF or text file with a welcome message and or instructions but you can change or add more files to this later.
To make things easier for your customers later on though, I suggest you use the Google Doc template I created at the following link:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/19axv229rULi3iKCz2kIm0ZjxYfvHUORIE5FSaH9Rgm8/edit?usp=sharing
Just go to File > Make a copy and then replace all of the parts in square brackets with your details.
Finally, go to File > Download as > PDF document and save it to your computer.
Then click Choose your files. Find the file on your computer, select it and upload it to Gumroad.
When you’re done click Next: Customize.
From here you have the option to create a more attractive sales page for your product by adding an image (Upload a cover) and adding a description (‘Describe your product…’).
If you’re not ready to do this now though just click Save changes and we’ll return to this page later before offering the product to your audience.
Now we need to add all your course content and make sure that only those who are supposed to see it, have access to it.
Of course there are all kinds of different courses (and course content) you could use and create but I’ll take you through a couple of common scenarios.
The simplest way to do this would be to create a single page that contains the entire course but you can spread the course out over several pages if you prefer.
Let’s start by restricting a single page. From the WordPress menu go to Pages > Add New.
First let’s give the page a title and add all the content (don’t publish the page yet, but you can click the Save Draft button if you need to).
Now you’ll need to restrict access to this page’s contents to just yourself (a WordPress administrator) and the people that buy the course, to do this look for the ProductPress Products box on the Edit Page screen and check the Gumroad product (or products) you want to associate this page with.
And when you’re done click the Publish or Update button to make these changes live.
You can even embed YouTube and Vimeo videos in the page content if you wish.
To add a video just copy and paste the link to it on a new line somewhere within your page’s content and press Enter and WordPress should figure out it’s a video and embed it automatically, as in the following example.
One note about video though. If you upload a video to YouTube or Vimeo and it’s set so anyone can find or view it (i.e. it’s publicly available), theoretically someone outside the course could find and watch it.
This may or may not be an issue for you but you have a few options:
Similarly to videos, you can either:
In short, do whatever works you think will work best for your customers.
To create a multiple page course, just repeat the ‘Single page course’ steps above for each page of content.
At the end or each page you’ll likely want to link to the next step of the course.
You can do this in the page editor by simply selecting the page you want to link to, clicking the link icon and linking to the appropriate page (the page must be published for you to link to it).
When you’ve added your link just click the Update button.
Once you’ve set up your course, it’s now time to open the doors to get some sales!
If you didn’t already set up the sales page for your product and publish it, now is the time.
Head back to the Gumroad website, browse to Products, and click the name of your course product.
First of all, click Upload a cover, find a good image on your computer you want to use, upload it and you’re done.
Next simply type your sales pitch for the product in the Describe your product… box.
When you’re done, click Publish.
Next click Preview and you’ll get a preview of your landing page, plus your product’s link which you can include on your website, social media or email list to drive people to purchase your product.
You can of course come back to the Gumroad website later and get the link then, but if you want to you can copy it now so it’s ready.
Now that you’ve fully set up and published your product, you just need to activate it in WordPress.
To do this go to Settings > ProductPress and under Configure your Gumroad products set your course product to Active and then click Save Changes.
Finally, if you want an email every time someone makes an order simply enter your email address in the Email(s) section under Logging on the same page and click Save Changes.
Oh and one final final step, just to make things a bit nicer for all your customers.
To do this follow the instructions at:
https://help.gumroad.com/11169-Creator-FAQ/creating-workflows-to-send-automated-updates
And I suggest using my Google Doc template for the wording if you’re not sure what to write:
https://help.gumroad.com/11169-Creator-FAQ/creating-workflows-to-send-automated-updates
And that’s it.
You’ve got your link, you’re all set up, you’re now ready to sell!
After going to the sales page and paying via credit card or PayPal, the customer will be invited to first download any files associated with your course (I suggest making at least one file a ‘read me’ or instructions file which tells them what to do next and how to contact you if you they need help).
Your customer will receive an email like this telling them that they should set their password.
However as this is not the clearest email in the world, I suggest you make the steps more obvious by doing two things, both described above:
After setting a password, customers can then login (via WordPress) and access the course content at whatever page you created to hold the course content, e.g. mywebsite.com/course.
Simply repeat the steps above!
And you’re done.
As you can see this is pretty simplistic solution for selling courses via a WordPress website and it has it’s quirks, like:
…but compared to many options, it’s not difficult to setup, it has a very low up-front cost and uses a very popular and trusted platform in Gumroad. It also supports multiple courses too.
If you’re just starting out and want to offer a simple online course to your members you could do a lot worse than using Gumroad and ProductPress as a great way to monetise your site and provide something valuable to your audience.
Thoughts? Questions? Let me know in the comments.
You’re building an audience through content marketing and generally being awesome but there may come a time where you’re ready to charge for access to some of your best content by creating an online course and only allowing paid members to access it for a one-off fee.
The aim of this tutorial is to show you how you to do exactly that with your WordPress website using the Restrict Content Pro plugin.
(This tutorial specifically covers one-off payments in return for access to online courses and does not cover subscription or recurring payments).
First up, why use Restrict Content Pro in the first place.
Well, first of all, it’s simple, it’s not expensive and it’s built by a top top developer (Pippin Williamson) who stands by his plugins.
Features include:
Finally, because Pippin and his team are also responsible for two other solid plugins (Affiliate WP and Easy Digital Downloads) it’ll work nicely with those too if you plan to use either of them in future, for affiliate sales or selling digital downloads respectively.
It’s subjective of course but I’d say that if you plan or already sell products via WooCommerce, you might be better using something like WooCommerce Memberships for your online courses.
In other words sticking to one e-commerce ‘ecosystem’, one set of my account pages, checkout pages etc.
You can of course run Restrict Content Pro alongside Woo but I think in the long run it’ll be less headaches for you and your users if you just pick one, unless you have a compelling reason to do otherwise.
Restrict Content Pro costs $42 at the time of writing and then $42 a year – after the first year – if you decide to keep selling courses with it in future.
After you’ve purchased and downloaded the plugin, you’ll receive a purchase confirmation email with a download link.
Once you’ve download the zip file which contains the plugin, login to WordPress and go to Plugins > Add New > Upload Plugin from inside the WordPress admin.
Locate the Restrict Content Pro zip file you downloaded, upload it and then activate the plugin.
At this point, if this is the site you know you’re going to be using Restrict Content Pro on for your courses (i.e. it’s not just a test site you’re playing around with), go ahead and enter your license key (from the purchase confirmation email you received) so you can get updates for the plugin as they’re released (for better security, less bugs, new features etc).
Now we’ve installed the plugin, we’ll go ahead and create an example course called ‘Launch with WordPress’ to sell to customers.
From the WordPress menu go to Restrict > Subscription Levels where we’ll create a new subscription level which we’ll be used to determine who should (and shouldn’t) be able to view our new course.
Now we’ll add the course content to WordPress and restrict access to it.
The simplest way to do this would be to create a single page that contains the entire course but you can spread the course out over several pages if you prefer.
Let’s start by restricting a single page. From the WordPress menu go to Pages > Add New.
First let’s give the page a title and add all the content (don’t publish the page yet, but you can click the Save Draft button if you need to).
You can even embed YouTube and Vimeo videos if you wish (though bear in mind if they’re set to display publicly in YouTube or Vimeo anyone would theoretically be able to find the same video by searching on Google).
To add a video just copy and paste the URL and press Enter and WordPress should figure out it’s a video and embed it automatically.
Now we need to restrict the page’s content. Below the content you just added is a Restrict this content box. Set it up with:
At this point if you’re done with the content you can go ahead and hit the Publish button.
The content will be published but only visible to you (as a logged in administrator in WordPress) and to your course members once they pay.
By default, this is what non members will see when they try to access our content:
However to make it easier for members to login in future we’ll add a login link to the page which paid members can use to easily login and access the content.
Plus, we’ll also make it easier for any non-members who stumble across this content to purchase it too.
[login_form]
Just type or copy / paste this into your page.
Here’s my example to follow:
Finally, we need to setup an appropriate welcome message telling members where to find the course after buying it.
To do this go to Pages from the WordPress menu, browse till you see the Welcome page (which Restrict Content Pro automatically created) where you’ll see the following default content…
…and edit it to include a link to your course.
To create a multiple page course, just repeat the ‘Single page course’ steps above for each page of content.
At the end or each page you’ll likely want to link to the next step of the course.
You can do this in the page editor by simply selecting the page you want to link to, clicking the link icon and linking to the appropriate page (the page must be published for you to link to it).
When you’ve added your link just click the Update button.
Now we need to sell our course.
To do that, first of all we need to pick at least one payment option (e.g. PayPal) for buyers.
To start setting this up:
The easiest gateway option for most people to setup is likely to be PayPal Standard. This is where the buyer goes to the PayPal website to make a payment and then returns to your website afterwards.
Depending on the gateway you want to use, you should now follow the appropriate instructions on the Restrict Content Pro website…
…and then return to this guide.
If you get stuck on any of the gateway part I encourage you to contact Restrict Content Pro support who will be extremely helpful.
When you installed Restrict Content Pro it automatically created everything you need for members to register and access your course.
And with all of the steps above completed you can start selling right away (though you might want to do a test purchase from a different email account before sending the link out to your email list!).
To start selling memberships and allow members to register you simply need to point them to the Register page which Restrict Content Pro already created for you.
You’ll usually find this at:
yourwebsite.com/register
But if not, go to Pages from the WordPress admin, browse until you see the Register link and then click View. The page that appears now will be your registration page.
In terms of creating a sale page or anything else that’s entirely up to you. If you’ve got a list of people waiting to buy you can simply send them an email with a link straight to your register page.
Otherwise you can simply create a blog post (Posts > Add New) or sales page (Pages > Add New) which contains more details about the course and with a link to the register page at the end.
After purchasing the course (assuming there were no issues with their payment of course!) members will automatically be logged in and redirected to the Welcome page we edited previously.
From here they can simply browse to the course they paid for via the link you created.
Members can also login to your course in future by browsing to the course page and using the login link we created in the Editing the ‘this content is restricted’ page step of these instructions.
And, that’s it.
For $42 and a small (but not terrible) amount of work you can now sell a course on your WordPress website.
Restrict Content Pro has great documentation and fantastic support, but if anything is not clear in the instructions above or if there’s something else you’d like to do with Restrict Content Pro I haven’t talked about, just let me know in the comments below.
I would not have been noticed at all if I hadn’t worked from day one on engaging influencers. It’s extremely hard to get noticed. Even if my content was great, I still needed to get it in front of the right people
– Dan Norris, founder of WP Curve and author of Content Machine
Here at ThemeValet we love everyone.
Equally.
But if you really push us we’d have to admit that there’s just some people in that big group of people we love who have just a little more clout.
People who know how to get a message out and have the audience ready to hear it.
I’m talking, of course, about influencers.
But how do you reach them and persuade them that what you’re doing is interesting to them and their audience too?
Well here’s a few ideas to get you started.
Although I don’t have my own podcast (I’m all influencered-out right now) I’ve seen their enormous value in reaching influencers from other people I know that do run their own shows.
For example, Jon Nastor started his Hack the Entrepreneur podcast just over a year ago. He had no major background in podcasting and is not, to my knowledge, ‘internet famous’.
His first guest? New York Times bestselling author Chris Brogan.
Who else has he spoken to? Derek Sivers, Guy Kawasaki, Seth Godin and Elon Musk!
OK, not Elon Musk, but you get the picture.
Having your own podcast a great way to reach influencers.
Here’s what Jon had to say on how having a podcast changed his life and helped him reach influencers:
Interviewing someone for my show is a great way to quickly go from a ‘cold’ relationship to a ‘warm’ one. All of the work I have put into building my audience, now provides instant value to my guest, and starts off a relationship by providing value. This is how true relationships are built.
Sounds pretty good, huh?
(Jon also now runs a second podcast called The Showrunner which is all about how to get into and succeed with podcasting if it’s something you’re interested in trying).
Check out this podcast on ‘How to build a world class network in record time’ from investor, author and productivity god Tim Ferriss.
Although he’s mainly talking about how to network at events specifically, there are some solid tips in here in general on reaching influencers.
Help help help them with something.
Lots of things.
Don’t ask for anything back (at least for some time).
Just help.
Don’t be overly familiar, but don’t treat them in some weird way that you don’t treat your peers.
Unless you’re dealing with a total diva / ego maniac, there is nothing more likely to make them want to shut down and run for the hills in my experience.
Email Seth Godin he emails back.
Email Derek Sivers he emails back.
Of course, the flip side of this is not to abuse that privilege.
I know someone who gets access to amazing influencers – sometimes almost completely cold – by recording a short (to camera) video – explaining why the influencer is the perfect person for this particular thing, how it can benefit them and what help they can expect in return etc – and then including a link to it in the initial email.
Shows extra effort and distinguishes from just another standard email.
On a similar tact, I’ve got the attention of people I wanted to reach in the past by doing content that covers their product / service / thing to an almost ridiculous level of depth that they can’t ignore.
Just anything to stand out.
OK, don’t copy him exactly but do learn from some of the ways Product Hunt founder, Ryan Hoover used to build an amazing community and set of relationships.
In the following tweet, Ryan explains how he used Twitter to help him build his network:
Pre-@ProductHunt what things did @rrhoover do to build loose ties & relationships w/ people in the startup ecosystem? pic.twitter.com/4DWbBYjMEs
— Adam Kazwell (@kaz) October 6, 2015
Instead of chasing the people that are already ‘big’ (and likely get dozens or hundreds of enquiries a day), why not think about things another way / more long term.
For example, I’m sure there’s people you know of that might not be an influencer yet but you can be pretty certain from their trajectory that they look very likely to be one.
Of course it’s a lot easier to reach those people at this stage than later on, so I say don’t just aim for the big guns, look at those who are coming up and seem destined (by their hard work and smarts) for great things.
Check out Dan Norris’ excellent book Content Machine, all about content marketing, including an in-depth discussion of reaching influencers.
In fact they’re probably even better than my suggestions.
Reaching influencers is not about sucking up to or pretending to have some connection with someone who has no relation to you or what you’re doing.
Neither is it trying to trick them to ‘sell your stuff’ (they won’t fall for it anyway).
But if you have the chance to connect and build a relationship with someone who interests you and is at the top of the field why not take it.
Got an influencer tip of your own? Let me know in the comments.