With everyone and their cat launching a membership site and getting into the whole online learning thing these days, how do YOU intend to stand out?
One of the things that has helped us stand out over the years is the Quality Control Bar we set for ourselves with our courses, workbooks, online meditations, community posting guidelines and even the way we onboard new clients.
Questions:
Are you clear about your quality control bar?
Have you created posting guidelines and a clear protocol?
How do you ensure you maintain a professional, consistent look, feel and experience across the board?
Listen to this short lesson on Quality Control from our April 15th Majik Mind.
Listen to the Making Majik Podcast on iTunes, Spotify or Google Play.
How often have you been on a website, in a membership or watching a video that was poorly put together & something about it made you feel on edge?
I get this all the time. If something is not designed well or produced professionally, I immediately get my bullshit detectors up and lose trust, or at the very least, I lose interest… Do you experience this ever?
Don’t get me wrong, I haven’t always had a Quality Control Bar. This has been a muscle we’ve developed over the years. But now that I know this is a thing that should be created for any company who wants to play the online game seriously, I realize it’s an important thing to share with all of you.
There are so many people & businesses fighting for attention. Producing high quality stuff will help you get more of that attention.
Here’s the thing: Everybody will have a different quality control bar. If you’re new to producing, your bar will be lower. But something you can do to raise your bar, even in the beginning is to just pay more attention to how others are producing their media or running their communities. Copy the pieces that make sense.
The bottomline is: If you can create a beautiful & consistent look, feel and experience in your online community, courses or website, then you will minimize chaos and on a subconscious level, your audience will feel more at ease.
If they are at ease, they will be more open & receptive to listening, more inspired to stick around and more trusting of what’s coming out of your mouth. And ultimately, if they enjoy themselves while interacting with your creations, they’ll be more likely tell their friends and come back for more.
Here are some simple things to consider when setting your Quality Control Bar:
Banner Images:
The banner image below is an example from a client project we’re working on. Each topic inside their Mighty Network is colour coated with the rectangle outlining the title. The topic name is above the article title. The article title is big & bold. The background image is related to the topic. This banner format also fits all of Mighty Networks’ “sneak peak view” so things don’t look weird after it’s been published. When someone is scrolling “the wall” in their community, it will be easy to identify the content a member is interested in. It also creates a consistent, universal look for the entire platform.
Video Production:
At Majik Media, we have gone above & beyond the call of duty to produce binge-worthy courses. You may not have the time or budget to do that though, so just know that there are simple things you can do to improve your videos, which’ll go a long way. Here are some suggestions: Add a lower thirds to the beginning of each video (logo, name of teacher, their title OR the topic of lesson). Add intro/outro music to each lesson to set a mood. Add a logo animation & call to action to the end of your videos. If using slides, make them beautiful and themeified. Canva is a great tool for that. Choose a video thumbnail that includes the lower thirds as demonstrated below. These small details go a long way and if you really want to take your lessons to the next level, follow the guidance of our courses and learn to produce educational media like the creative genius you were born to be!
Posting & Formatting:
Try to keep the look, feel and flow of your posts & course lessons consistent. For us, we put the banner at the top of a post, with the lesson title embedded in it (and a logo or course/module name if it’s a course). Under that is an intro description, followed by the featured media (video/audio). Beneath that if it’s an article is more writing OR your “next steps/to-do’s” if it’s a course lesson. Under that are any additional resources, like PDF’s, etc… I always use a H2 for main titles and bold font for minor titles and an indented H3 font for quotable statements that I want to stand out when trying to drive a point home.
Other Areas to Consider Quality Control Bars:
- Create a signature style & voice for your newsletters.
- Get a great microphone and produce an intro/outro for your Podcast.
- Make sure your website looks professional and represents you well.
- Find creative ways to improve your live webinar classes.
If you commit to increasing the level of quality you’re putting out, only good things will come of it. Not only will you feel more confident about what you’re doing, but people will seek you out more often to work with them.
In a Sea of sameness, doing quality work because you care will cause you to stand out as a go-to, trustworthy person to learn from and work with.
Final Thoughts:
Your quality control bar doesn’t need to be complicated. It could be as simple as a checklist that you go through before posting anything.
It could also be you watching some of your favourite Vlogs on Youtube and making a list of new things you’ll add to your own Vlog to match their style.
Wherever you are with your skills, I encourage you to stretch your abilities and do at least 1-2 new things that you’ve never done before, which you know will make your work even better. Your audience will 100% notice if you do.
And if you take this advice, share your new works and tell us what you changed. We’d love to see!