Correspondence Courses
CORRESPONDENCE COURSES HAVE become popular because they offer an easy and fun alternative to going to college or hunting around libraries. They arrive in easy to read and understand sections, are generally stimulating and informative, and nobody need even leave the house to enroll.
Running a correspondence course is an excellent business idea – one where you can utilise your own experience or the knowledge of friends, and help people fulfil their dreams and ambitions into the bargain. All you need to do is find the right subject, advertise your course in a particular area or specialist publication and soon the course subscriptions should start rolling in. Here are 20 potentially popular correspondence courses you could set up:
- Script writing
Script writing for the stage, film or radio is something many have an interest in and would like to know more about.
The most fertile areas in this field are comedy and drama. Explain in detail the kind of themes and structure producers are looking for and also show how scripts should be submitted in terms of format. Outline how new writers can ensure their work is actually read by providing information on the key departments, that sift on-spec material. You could also outline examples of other writers’ work.
- Journalism
This is another area many would like to get into. You could include advice on basic writing skills and explain how to write clear and concise articles, what makes a good news story and what a good feature article. You also need to supply advice on obtaining leads, doing interviews and where to go for your sources of information.
You could give advice on specialist writing such as sport, pop and business, and give advice on editing and word processing along with how to sell articles.
- Short stories
It is amazing how many frustrated but extremely enthusiastic novice writers there are, many desperate to get into print. Help them by focusing on the short story market and advising them on plot, character development and dialogue.
Advertise in newspapers and magazines, and offer clients and instalment payment plan depending on the nature of the course. Up-to-date information on potential and likely fees would also be very useful.
- Poetry
There are even more would-be poets than short story writers – use the same strategy as above.
- Film making
Films are popular with most people so there is great scope for setting up a film making correspondence course.
You should cover all the technical aspects, such as equipment involved, who does what when making a film, plus the artistic aspects of cinematography and film writing and direction. You could also include sections on how to raise funds to make films and how to market them.
- Being a DJ
The glamour of being a disc jockey, working in night clubs, running their own mobile disco, hospital or even mainstream radio, greatly appeals to a mass of younger people.
To be noticed they need to be professional with the ability to develop any zany or commercial characteristics, so your course could outline how to do this. It could offer advice on studio techniques, studio hardware, mixing techniques, genres of music and jingle-making.
The course could also give advice on getting into hospital and mainstream radio, plus advice on how to market the service to clubs, promoters and the public. A further helpful and versatile aid to the course could be use of audio cassettes.
- Fashion
Fashion is something that also greatly appeals to the young, although there are specialist area that would appeal to all ages, so this course could well be a popular one. You could teach fashion design, how to buy materials and manufacture clothes, plus how to run a fashion business.
- Sketching and cartooning
Although many people admire the skill of artists and cartoonists, very few are able to follow in their footsteps with any degree of competence. Any help they can obtain to help them become better in chosen pursuit will be welcomed with open arms.
Sketching is an increasingly popular pastime and a course covering the basic rules and useful tips to enable beginners to become more competent should get a warm reception. You could offer tips on cartoon drawing and storyboarding plus advice on selling their own cartoons. You could even pay a skilled cartoonist to devise the course.
- Magic
Even if most people don’t aspire to emulate Paul Daniels or the more flamboyant David Copperfield, there are great numbers who would love to be able to mystify their work colleagues, family, or an intimate dinner party, group, but don’t know how.
A basic course for keen amateur magicians should therefore be very well received. You could enhance your income by selling the equipment needed to perform some of the tricks.
- Self confidence
You could run a course teaching people how to improve their self-esteem and confidence. Stress that these are qualities that are vital to impressing job interviewers, enhancing promotion prospects and attracting the opposite sex, and advertise your services in magazines and newspapers.
- Running a consultancy business
As work patterns and practices change, with a growing number of short-term contracts and leaner payrolls, there has been growth in the need of consultants across a wide range of business sectors. They are popular because they are only used when needed and are cost effective.
If you can illuminate the possibilities for this kind of work and describe in detail what is involved there will be many others keen to explore the opportunities offered.
- Beating the system
Offer people the opportunity to shorten the odds when gambling by supplying systems which you know you can increase the punter’s chance of winning at various games or sports. The course could cover poker, horse racing, roulette, the pools, and various card games.
- How to invest wisely and profitably
With traditional safe havens for savings realizing pitiful interest returns, a whole new segment of people is looking for ways to make their money work harder.
Within this group will be those who are highly cautious, some looking for moderate risk and other who are prepared to speculate in highly volatile markets. What they all need is understandable, jargon free advice on how the Stock Market operates, the rewards and pitfalls to watch out for and opportunities in foreign markets.
You don’t have to promise you will find them a fortune – just a monthly focus on a particular sector with hints for the uninitiated to the knowledgeable general predictions and possibly tips for them to have and flutter on.
- Business success
If you are now successful in your chosen career after struggling against the odds early on, or if you have dragged a part-time venture up by its bootlaces, why not advertise a general blueprint for success so that other can reap the benefit of your experience?
There are many people out there who would welcome the know-how to solve their current problems, and who better to advise them than someone who has been at the sharp end?
- Inventing
Produce a course which caters for the many people who tinker around in the shed at the bottom of the garden or in a spare room with bits of the wood, metal and plastics to try to save themselves some money.
These are the fold who may well appreciate information on how to make some extra cash with their inventions. Sound advice on taking out patents, a list of companies who are looking to invest in new ideas and stressing the fact that some inventions can be a pot of gold for their creators should ensure this type of course is very popular.
- Home computing
Anyone who has struggled to master in their new computer will not need any convincing that the manuals supplied with the systems can send you round the bend. All the more reason for and enterprising person to set up home computer courses for any or all of the popular home computing systems.
It is probably best to assume the viewpoint that all new computer users are absolute idiots and need slowly taking by the hand through what seems to them a dense technological haze. There is mass of computer magazines in which to advertise which should help make this correspondence course a popular and fruitful one.
- Playing bridge
The rules of playing bridge can be like a foreign language to many people. Because in some circles it is socially advantageous to be able to play to a reasonable standard, a course designed to take the complete beginner to a higher level, should prove welcome.
The programme could be extended to cater for those who desire to play the game at very high standard. Examine the market for appropriate advertising targets.
- Writing cookery books
Your course advise how to write and present cookery books, covering devising recipes, trying different types of cooking, compiling recipes on a theme, and making them understandable.
The course will be particularly attractive to women’s groups and possibly fundraising bodies.
Advertise in specialist cookery magazines, women’s magazines, publications issued by women’s organizations, and general social and entertainment publications, as well as the local and / or national press.
Note: Delia Smith’s latest book sold 500,000 copies in one week – a record. This shows the level of demand for cookery books and what your course members could aim for.
- Crossword setting
Everyone knows Britain is a nation of dog lovers, but the number of crossword devotees would probably give them a run for their money. So set up a course which describes in detail how to construct these puzzles both for simple pleasure or, better still, making money.
It’s surprising how many different publications carry a crossword and quite often they are on the lookout for new sources of supply. The rise if free newspaper for instance has created a vast new market, so some information on the kind of journals taking this material would be helpful.
- Tracing ancestry
It is amazing how many people are deeply interested in this specialist field. The course should cover obtaining information, procedures to follow when researching a family tree, and how to avoid blind alleys.
In addition you could outline procedures for marketing family trees to people with a particular surname and selling personalized family trees.
