{"id":4615,"date":"2018-07-01T15:11:57","date_gmt":"2018-07-01T15:11:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.vedamo.com\/knowledge\/?p=4615"},"modified":"2022-12-19T17:57:51","modified_gmt":"2022-12-19T17:57:51","slug":"online-school-set-up-part-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vedamo.com\/knowledge\/online-school-set-up-part-1\/","title":{"rendered":"Online school - how to set it up - Part 1"},"content":{"rendered":"

Setting up an online school is not a business anyone can do. And, it can be hard if you don\u2019t know how. This first part is preparing you for the process by assisting you to check in with yourself first and to start thinking of a business plan. You\u2019ll see which specific questions you need to answer before you decide if you are fit for this business and ready to commit to it.<\/em><\/p>\n

I guess we have all dreamed about it, setting up our own business, making a fortune and living the good\u00a0life forever. Reality, for most, is much different but I will try and stay positive at all times in this series. I\u00a0have been running my own school for many years now and a few years ago branched out into an online\u00a0teaching school teaching English as a foreign language. I have spent a good chunk of my adult life being\u00a0self-employed and can help to guide you through the pitfalls. This series will concentrate on the area\u00a0with which I am most familiar, setting up an online English language school but the principles will be\u00a0similar irrespective of what you choose to teach.<\/p>\n

Look into yourself<\/h2>\n

The first area to look at is yourself, do you have business nous? Have you any experience of running a\u00a0business? Did your family have a business? Are you good at handling people? Handling money? Handling\u00a0stress? Working long hours? Being stubborn and persistent? Multi-tasking? I did say I was going to\u00a0remain positive so let\u2019s take those areas and see what we can make of them.
\nEven if you don\u2019t have any direct experience of business you have been dealing with businesses all your\u00a0life. You know what you want from a business and what you like and don\u2019t like. Apply that. The simple\u00a0rule of business is to give the customers what they want at a price that allows you to make a profit.<\/p>\n

\"How
How to set up an online school<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The next part, handling people is not as crucial as you might think. If you can link up with someone who\u00a0is good at people to manage them, then that solves your problem. I know several successful\u00a0business people who are not good with people. You need to get someone who is.
\nThe same goes with money. Get yourself someone who is good with money if you are not yourself. I do\u00a0believe you need to keep track and control yourself, though. I suspect if you are really bad with money,\u00a0you are going to struggle but you don\u2019t need to be an expert. If you are bad with money the old joke\u00a0may apply: \u201cHow do you make a small fortune in business? \u2026 Start out with a large one\u201d.<\/p>\n

The next few areas, though, are not a question of getting someone else. Be sure that in order to\u00a0successfully run a business you need to be able to handle stress well. You need to be prepared for\u00a0working long hours and being available possibly 24\/7 at times. If you don\u2019t like working for a boss you\u00a0may not be happy at suddenly getting lots of them because to some extent, your customers are your\u00a0bosses.
\nYou will need to be stubborn and persistent. And can not give up because you have difficulties. You will\u00a0have lots of them. And people like persistence in a business. To give an example, I had my own retail\u00a0business and a rep called but I was happy with my current supplier. I told him so but he kept coming\u00a0every week. For a very long time I never bought off him and I used to feel sorry for him wasting his time.\u00a0But one time he came and I needed his stuff straightaway. He got my business then and kept it. If you\u00a0are persistent, customers know you will be there and look after them.<\/p>\n

\"Online
Online school – how to set it up<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Multi-tasking is also necessary. Suddenly you have to have knowledge of everything. Take IT, in the\u00a0modern era, you need to know your stuff. HR, you need to know about recruitment and keeping staff\u00a0happy. Management and finance I have already mentioned. All the different aspects of running a\u00a0business need to be learned. The good news is that as I assume you are an educator because you want\u00a0to set up your own online school, you should be good at learning. Put some effort into this area. Get\u00a0some practical books or maybe sign up for a \u201cStart your own business\u201d course. I am sure you can find\u00a0them online and you will kill two birds with one stone. You will get a direct insight into how an online\u00a0school is run and learn what you need to set up your own.<\/p>\n

Finance and the business plan<\/h2>\n

I am going to finish up this first part with a short look at finance and the business plan. If you are\u00a0planning a very modest start where you set up a school by yourself with you as the only teacher and you\u00a0link with an online provider like Vedamo then expenses are minimal. They provide the infrastructure,\u00a0your training and lots of help to get you going. If you can get students fairly quickly then you could be\u00a0earning fast enough that you don\u2019t need a lot of cash to survive the initial part.<\/p>\n

I still feel that even a modest start-up needs a business plan of some sort. There are business plan\u00a0templates and help online and they help to clarify what you need, and how to survive the early period as\u00a0you are trying to establish customers.<\/p>\n

\"Setting
Setting up an online school -business plan<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Anything more ambitious needs a proper business plan checked or prepared by specialists. If you require\u00a0funding then what you present to a bank or investors is crucial. This area is outside the scope of this\u00a0series and you will need professional advice.<\/p>\n

An honest appraisal<\/h2>\n

To sum up, first you need to take a good honest look at yourself. You are by far the most important\u00a0person in all this. What are your motivations? Can you cope with the changes of moving from a monthly\u00a0salary to an uncertain financial situation? Are you willing to learn new skills? If you are, and truly wish to\u00a0gain the rewards of being your own boss then the rest of the series will cover all the practicalities of\u00a0setting up your own online school. Areas covered will be research, positioning, branding, marketing,\u00a0recruiting, training, lesson materials, operating across countries and cultures, specialisations and more.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Setting up an online school is not a business anyone can do. And, it can be hard if you don\u2019t know how. This first part is preparing you for the process by assisting you to check in with yourself first and to start thinking of a business plan. You\u2019ll see…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":21,"featured_media":4619,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[952,978],"yst_prominent_words":[1889,1881,1879,1883,1880,1888,1890,642,118,1882,1891,1892,1886,1522,621,1884,1400,1887,1894,1885],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vedamo.com\/wp-apiendpoint\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4615"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vedamo.com\/wp-apiendpoint\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vedamo.com\/wp-apiendpoint\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vedamo.com\/wp-apiendpoint\/wp\/v2\/users\/21"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vedamo.com\/wp-apiendpoint\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4615"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.vedamo.com\/wp-apiendpoint\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4615\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39221,"href":"https:\/\/www.vedamo.com\/wp-apiendpoint\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4615\/revisions\/39221"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vedamo.com\/wp-apiendpoint\/wp\/v2\/media\/4619"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vedamo.com\/wp-apiendpoint\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4615"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vedamo.com\/wp-apiendpoint\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4615"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vedamo.com\/wp-apiendpoint\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4615"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vedamo.com\/wp-apiendpoint\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=4615"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}