Playbook, online course
Two prices for one curriculum, and the difference is a date
A buyer comparing the two numbers on a course pricing page is usually looking at the same modules twice. One version has a start date, a group and somebody answering questions; the other has neither and costs less. Nothing on the page says that unless somebody wrote it down, so the question arrives instead.
Why this is not the general answer
The handling pattern for pricing questions holds across every trade. What follows is the part that does not.
- The higher price is rarely buying more material. It buys a start date, a group moving through it together and access to a person, which means the honest comparison is about what happens around the videos rather than about the videos.
- Lifetime access is a price component and an open ended promise at the same time, so what happens when a course is retired is part of the pricing answer rather than a detail hidden three screens into the terms.
- The payment plan is a fixed total divided into instalments, not a monthly subscription, so it frequently costs more in total than paying once, and a buyer is entitled to see both totals next to each other before choosing.
- Where tax is added at checkout according to where the buyer lives, the figure on the page is not the figure charged, and that arrives at the last screen of a purchase somebody had already decided on.
How it arrives
- why is the live version more expensive than the self paced one
- does lifetime access really mean forever
- does the payment plan cost more in total
- is there a discount if my whole team enrols
- is tax added on top of the listed price
- do i pay again when new modules are added
What has to be indexed for this to work
| The two versions written side by side | What the cohort includes that the self paced version does not: the live sessions, the group, the question route, the deadline. List the differences rather than the two prices, because the price gap is only defensible once somebody can see what sits in it. |
|---|---|
| What lifetime access means, in the words you will be held to | Whose lifetime, what happens if the course is retired or rebuilt, whether material added later is included, and whether anything is downloadable so it survives the platform. This is the clause most often quoted back and least often written properly. |
| The instalment total alongside the single payment total | Both figures, the number of payments, the dates they fall on, and any difference between them. A plan presented only as a monthly figure reads as cheaper than it is, and the correction arrives as a complaint rather than as a question. |
| The point at which places stop being a checkout and become a conversation | How many places can be bought self serve, whether there is anything published for larger groups, and who a buyer talks to beyond that. Without this the assistant either invents a group price or turns away a buyer who wanted several places. |
The reply
Both versions cover the same modules. The cohort adds live sessions on set dates and a route to ask questions while you work through it, and the comparison of what each one includes is on the pricing page [1]. The payment plan splits the fee into fixed instalments toward the same total, and the page shows that total next to the single payment figure so you can see the difference before choosing [2]. Lifetime access is defined there too, including what happens if the course is retired. I cannot quote a price for a group or apply a discount, so if you are enrolling several people, leave your name, an email and how many places and somebody will come back to you.
It answers the comparison with what differs rather than with the two numbers, because the number gap is what the visitor already knows. Putting the two plan totals next to each other pre empts the argument that follows a monthly figure. And it refuses group pricing outright rather than gesturing at it, since a course business that negotiates places is not doing it in a chat window.
Where it stops
The trigger. The visitor asks for a discount, for a price on several places, or whether tax applies to their own country before they buy.
I cannot quote for a group, apply a code or work out what tax will be added for where you are. Leave your name, an email and how many places you are after, and somebody will send you the figures.
It stops answering before it guesses, says who will pick it up, and asks for the one thing that makes a reply possible. Nothing about it reads as a dead end.
Never say this here
Out of bounds
- Never quote a price, an instalment amount or a discount that is not on your published pricing page, because the visitor will screenshot it and buy against it.
- Never say lifetime access lasts forever, since the promise is bounded by the course existing and your own terms say how.
- Never say a price will rise or fall, or that a cohort is nearly full, as both are sales pressure the assistant cannot verify.
- Never confirm what tax a particular buyer will be charged, because that depends on where they are and what they entered at checkout.
Questions
- Can it tell somebody which version suits them better?
- It can describe what each includes and let them decide. Recommending one is a sales judgement about a stranger's week, and the cohort is the expensive one, so an assistant that steers people toward it is doing something you did not ask for and cannot defend.
- Should the payment plan total really be published?
- Yes, next to the single payment. A buyer who discovers the difference at the third instalment feels charged for something nobody mentioned, and that is a card dispute rather than a conversation. Publishing it costs you a small number of plan sales and prevents every one of those.
- Can it apply a discount code somebody says they were given?
- No. It cannot see a code, validate one or change a price, and it should say that plainly rather than encouraging somebody to try it at checkout. Codes belong to the purchase page, and a code that fails there is a message for a person.
Keep reading
- Everything for a online courseWhat is included, how long access lasts, refund and cooling off rights, and the honest limit that it cannot see a learner's own progress.
- Handling pricing questions in generalPublished price versus the price for this buyer. Bands, ranges and from pricing, and why a firm number for unscoped work is the damaging failure.
- The receipt has a person's name and finance will not accept itA learner paid, then finance wants a document with the company name and number on it. What can be changed after checkout and what cannot.
- The second of three payments declined and the course stopped openingThree payments toward one total is not a subscription. What a decline does to access, and the retry window a learner needs the date of.
- The reset worked and the course was still not thereTwo addresses, one purchase. Why resetting the password rarely helps when a course was bought at one email and is read at another.
Try it on your own material
Upload a document or point it at your site, paste one line of HTML, then ask it something only your business could answer.