As a course creator, you need a platform that can accommodate your needs. But many course platforms are expensive, rigid, or hard to grow. Instead of using a premade course platform, you could use a content management system like WordPress.  

Powering nearly half of all websites, WordPress is the leading content management system. It’s ideal for course creators because it’s user-friendly, flexible, and easy to maintain or scale. 

WordPress can also be used to host your courses directly, and you own all the content you create. 

Let’s explore more reasons why you should use WordPress to create and sell online courses. 

Flexibility and customization  

One of the best reasons to create and sell courses with WordPress is for its flexibility and endless customization options. You can get quickly started with any theme, or you can choose a theme specifically designed with courses in mind. With a starter theme in place, you can begin tailoring to your needs – whether your course business is large or small, niche or general. 

You can continue customizing your course website by adding plugins, which extend the features of your course. There are a lot of plugins to choose from–over 59,000, in fact. These plugins enhance your online course site and allow you to use features like calendars, forums, contact forms, and much more. Plus, many plugins are free.

LearnDash is a WordPress plugin that adds a learning management system (LMS) solution to your website to make any type of course you desire. With LearnDash installed, you’re ready to start creating professional, engaging courses in just a few clicks!

User-friendly with complete control

WordPress was built for non-technical users, so it’s quite beginner friendly. The user interface feels intuitive as you easily navigate through website pages, settings, and more. You can drag or click to upload and organize content or media, and add content to your pages with the Block editor, Gutenberg. 

Gutenberg makes the editing process more visual and user-friendly. There’s blocks for text, media, embeds, and much more. With plugins like Kadence Blocks, you can extend Gutenberg’s capabilities and functionality with custom blocks and options. 

Plus, when you use WordPress to create online courses, you have complete control. Share what you want, when you want. You won’t have to abide by any third-party platform rules that risk you losing your content. Plus, you set your site’s look, feel, and functionality. 

Easy to maintain and scale

With WordPress being a user-friendly site, that also means it’s easy to maintain and scale. Maintenance mostly includes keeping WordPress, along with your theme and plugins, updated. Keep your backend organized as your course library grows with easy dashboard management. 

With a manageable backend, it’s simple to extend your course website with plugins that add elements like shops and memberships. For selling ebooks or other products, the free WooCommerce plugin will allow you to set up a shop in a few steps.

You can sell individual courses through your WooCommerce store, or through a membership plugin like MemberDash. MemberDash was created to work well with LearnDash, so it’s easy to turn on subscription models to keep learners coming back for your content. The more premium content you add, the more you can scale your membership tiers and increase your revenue!

Low costs 

Compared to other course-creating platforms, using WordPress to create and sell online courses costs less, with lower monthly subscription fees. 

For course creators, the upfront costs include hosting, premium themes and plugins, and a WordPress LMS solution. Many solutions package these together for a premium, but on WordPress, you can purchase all you need for a fraction of the cost. 

This is a great option for both beginner and experienced course creators. Beginners have lower risk and can experiment more while trying to find that perfect course-creating groove. Advanced creators can utilize premium plugins to extend customization and advanced LMS features. For example, if you’re experienced with LearnDash, you can extend your flexibility by adding on features like reporting, gradebooks, notes, groups, and more. 

Marketing tools 

WordPress wouldn’t be the powerhouse it is if it didn’t make marketing easy. There are tons of plugins, zaps, integrations, and more to make your course site easy to find, letting you sell more online courses. 

Here are a few ways you can easily market and sell your WordPress course and keep your branding consistent: 

• Social media integration. Get users to share content directly from your site and connect your profiles to be displayed on your website. 
• Email marketing. There are many email marketing plugins that allow you to create emails and connect to services like MailChimp. 
• Website analytics. WordPress can integrate with Google Analytics so you see metrics like time spent on a page, where your audience came from, and more. 
• Search engine optimization (SEO). Plugins like Yoast SEO are available so your site is optimized for search engines, helping you drive free traffic to your course site. 

Get Started with LearnDash 

WordPress is a leading content provider on the web for good reason – it gives you the freedom and flexibility course creators need. Easily grow and manage your online course business with a user-friendly interface, full site ownership, and marketing tools. 

For the best experience using WordPress to create and sell online courses, we recommend setting up an LMS like LearnDash. Try the LearnDash demo to see its features in action. 

If securing hosting, purchasing a domain, and installing WordPress seems daunting, check out LearnDash Cloud. It’s a fully hosted WordPress website that comes with LearnDash pre-installed, plus starter templates to get your website published in minutes.