How to Ask for Feedback and Reviews for Your Online Course

They say that feedback is the breakfast of champions, but it’s also a key ingredient in the success of your online course.

Not only does feedback help you improve your course (and generate more sales as a result), but it also gives you reviews and testimonials that you can feature in different places. And boy do reviews go a long way toward generating more course sales!

In fact, reviews and testimonials are a key piece of your course sales page - so if you don’t have any feedback from your courses, then this is the guide for you. In this article, I will cover how to ask for reviews, what questions to ask, and I’ll even share a template you can steal to ask your past students for feedback and reviews of your course. 

By the end of this article you’ll be a pro at asking for and using feedback on your course, so let’s dive right in!

Why you should ask for reviews for your online course

I’ve created and launched many courses over the years. In fact, you can browse thousands of ready-to-sell, brandable, white-label courses in our shop!

If there is one thing I’ve learned since creating and selling courses, it’s that the single best way to ramp up course sales is to ask for feedback and customer reviews.

In the grand digital marketplace of online courses, reviews are more precious than diamonds.

I’m not exaggerating in the slightest. Testimonials about your course is like your own personal cheer squad, working tirelessly to convince potential buyers that your course is the absolute best solution for their needs. That’s because no matter what you think or say about your course, there is nothing more powerful than the words of other people who are just like your ideal customers.

Not only that, but reviews give you feedback to help you tweak your course. It's like having a personal coach guiding you as you continue to refine and perfect your offering. So, whether you're selling a course on social media, SEO, or sales tactics - make sure to ask for reviews. 

What to do with the feedback that you get for your online course

Okay, you’re convinced. So when you actually do get feedback, what will you do with it?

I recommend doing two things with the feedback that you get from your online course:

1. Use the feedback to tweak and improve the course for future students
2. Feature snippets of feedback as testimonials on your website (this is the biggie)

Use feedback to improve your course for future students

Feedback, whether positive or constructive, is your best asset in improving the quality of your course for new students. 

While I’m sure your course is fantastic (if it’s one of ours it definitely will be!), there is always room to tweak and improve it based on how your students results. I recommend that you take a critical eye at the feedback you receive. Not all comments will be actionable, and that's okay. Your goal is to distill the most useful insights that can help improve your course. It's about maintaining a balance between your vision and your audience's needs.

Once you have the key pieces of feedback pulled out, apply them in a thoughtful and effective manner. This might require making modifications to your course content, improving your teaching methodology, or adding more resources. You might even need to take out content that was too overwhelming or not valuable enough to make a difference. Remember, the journey to perfection is a process of continual learning and adaptation. So, embrace feedback as your ally in this journey, and let it steer you towards creating an exceptional online course.

Feature snippets of feedback in testimonials

Using feedback to improve your course is important, but using it to sell your course is even more essential. 

It’s already been proven that word of mouth is one of the most effective ways to market and sell a product. A stellar course and superb sales page can only go so far. If you really want to make your sales pop, then you’ll need recommendations from your past students. While your copy may be convincing, most buyers tend to be a bit aprehenisive if they are brand new to your business. Reviews show them that they’re not the first ones to jump into the pool, which reduces their hesitation in pulling out their credit card on your sales page. 

If you have especially positive feedback on your course, pull out snippets to use as testimonials on your sales pages. These will go a long way to providing social proof and ease any last-minute concerns your potential customers may have when browsing your website. 

We have two excellent ways to use feedback from your online course, so now let’s get to the fun part: asking for it!

How to ask for feedback for your online course

I know, asking for feedback is intimidating. 

We all hate asking for something…  but if you want to launch a series of successful courses and build a new revenue stream for your business, then you need to get used to asking for feedback! There are a number of ways to ask for feedback for your online courses, so let’s review them in depth.

Ask for feedback directly

The simplest method is to be direct. Either in-person or over email, ask your students to leave a review or provide feedback. The key here is to be sincere and stress how much their opinion matters. I’ve included a sample feedback request email towards the end of the post that you can steal for this method. 

Send a feedback survey

Online surveys or feedback forms are a great way to solicit structured feedback. You can ask specific questions about different aspects of your course, which can help you pinpoint areas for improvement. Services like Google Forms, SurveyMonkey, or Typeform make it easy to create an effective (and beautiful) survey,

Provide an incentive for feedback

Everyone loves a good perk. Offering a small incentive, like a discount on a future course or an Amazon gift card, can encourage more students to take the time to provide feedback.

Provide a course evaluation at the end of the course

Make feedback a part of the course completion process. Include a course evaluation section at the end, where students can reflect on their learning experience. This could be included as a course module to make it feel embedded into the course. 

Crowdsource feedback from your community

If you have a course community, such as a forum or a social media group, use it as a platform to ask for feedback. A casual and friendly tone can help make this a conversation, rather than a formal request.

Remember, asking for feedback isn't just about gathering data, it's about showing your students that you value their opinions and are committed to improving their learning experience. 

Sample questions you should ask when asking for feedback on your course

The feedback you get is only as good as the questions you ask.

If your questions are leading, then you won’t get genuine responses. And if your questions are too open-ended, you’ll get a lot of noise. Here’s a set of questions that I recommend you pull from when asking for feedback. You don’t have to ask them all, so choose the 3-4 questions that stand out to you and start there. 

• How would you rate the overall quality of the course? (Scale from 1-5, with 1 being Poor and 5 being Excellent)
• Did the course meet your learning goals? (Yes/No)
• What specific topics or concepts did you find most valuable in the course?
• Were there any topics or concepts that you found difficult to understand? If so, please specify.
• How would you rate the course materials and resources provided? (Scale from 1-5, with 1 being Poor and 5 being Excellent)
• Did you find the course length appropriate for the content covered? (Yes/No)
• How would you rate the instructor's teaching style and communication? (Scale from 1-5, with 1 being Poor and 5 being Excellent)
• What improvements would you suggest for this course?
• Would you recommend this course to others? (Yes/No/Maybe) Why?

Choose a set of questions from this list to include in your next course feedback survey and watch those reviews come in.

Steal my online course feedback email template

To save you an hour of wordsmithing, steal this feedback request email template to collect feedback from your next course sale.

Subject: Your Opinion Matters - Help Us Improve [Your Course Name]

Dear [Student's Name],

Thank you for completing [Your course name]!

As I continually strive to enhance the learning experience of my students, your feedback is invaluable to me. Do you have a few minutes to provide feedback on your experience taking this course?

To make this process as easy as possible, I've created a short feedback survey here [link to survey].

Your insights will help me understand what I’m doing right, where I could improve, and what you'd like to see more of in future courses.

Thank you again for being a part of our amazing learning community. I’m looking forward to hearing your thoughts and making [Your Course Name] even better for future learners.

Best,

[Your Name]

Naturally, you need to fill in your own details where there is content in [brackets]. And always add your own personal voice!

Ready to kick your revenue up a notch? Here are some resources to boost your course sales

Armed with customer feedback, there is nothing stopping you from building a six-figure revenue stream from selling online courses.

There’s more to growing your course sales than feedback though, you’ll need to make sure you are pricing your course correctly, that you have a sales page optimized to convert, and that you are minding each leg of the journey with an effective course launch checklist. 

Each of those in-depth resources are based on years of course-creation and course-launching experience and will guide you to opening up a new revenue stream for your business. 

Creating, launching, and selling a course is a lot of work though. Often it feels like you need to spend just as much time and money selling the course as you did creating it! 

So here’s a shortcut: you can purchase a ready-to-sell, brandable, white,label course that will allow you to focus all of your energy on launching and selling rather than creating. I’ve curated thousands of courses across topics in my shop. From email marketing and SEO to social media and sales tactics, no matter your business niche there is going to be a course for you.