Episode 327: Are Online Courses Dead? What’s Really Happening in the Course Creation Space with Jasmine Jonte
The Standard Is Higher Now — And That’s Actually Good News
If you’ve been watching what’s happened in the online course space over the past couple of years — big names stepping away, headlines declaring it all over — you’ve probably asked yourself: are online courses dead?
The short answer, according to course creation expert Jasmine Jonte: no. But the rules have changed. And for those of us who care about what we deliver to our students, that’s actually good news.
Jasmine is the founder of CRE8TION, a done-for-you course creation agency. She’s built over 140 programs and 1,600+ lessons for clients, and she’s been watching the shifts in this industry up close. She knows what’s working, what isn’t, and why some courses fail even when the creator is brilliant.
In Episode 327 of the Game On Girlfriend® podcast, we get into all of it. We talk about why some big names stepped away from courses — and what that actually means for the rest of us. We cover what the market is demanding now, why self-paced courses are losing ground in some niches (and still thriving in others), and where AI genuinely helps with course creation versus where it falls flat. We also look at what separates courses that get students real results from the ones that don’t. And we get honest about the marketing piece that catches most course creators completely off guard.
If you’ve been thinking about creating a course or wondering whether the one you have is still worth offering, this conversation will give you a clearer picture than anything you’ll find in a headline.
Watch the full episode
Why Jasmine Got Into This Work
Before we got into the big questions about the state of the course creation industry, I asked Jasmine the question I always ask guests: out of everything she could be doing with her life, why this?
Her answer stopped me.
“I believe students deserve more than what they’re getting in all ways.” — Jasmine Jonte
Jasmine’s path to course creation started in the classroom. She taught kindergarten and first grade in Detroit’s lowest-performing school, and she came to that work with a very personal understanding of what education can do — and what happens when it fails. Growing up, she’d experienced both ends of the spectrum: what school looks like in an impoverished area, and what it looks like in an affluent one. That contrast shaped her entire career.
When she moved into the online space, she recognized the same dynamic. People investing their hard-earned money into programs that promised to help them reach a goal — and being let down, often by experts who had no intention of failing their students but simply didn’t know what they didn’t know. Because knowing something and being able to teach it are two completely different skills.
That’s why CRE8TION exists: not just for the experts who want to build something, but for the students they’re meant to serve.
Are Online Courses Actually Dead?
Let’s talk about the elephant in the room.
When Amy Porterfield and Jenna Kutcher — two of the most recognized names in online courses — announced they were stepping back from courses, a wave of anxiety moved through the industry. If they’re leaving, what does that mean for everyone else?
Jasmine’s answer: not what you think.
She has a close friend who runs one of the leading checkout platforms in the industry. That platform has processed billions of dollars in transactions and continues to. So the expert education space is not going away.
“There are things that we need to be strategic about, and some things we might want to consider doing differently. I think that the standard is higher now…That doesn’t mean they’re gone. It just means you need to be willing to do better.” — Jasmine Jonte
When Jasmine looks specifically at Amy Porterfield’s situation, she points to two factors working against the program: the name — Digital Course Academy — signals self-paced courses, and self-paced courses are losing appeal in many niches right now. Beyond that, the niche itself — teaching others to create courses — has become very saturated. Both the format and the audience were working for her for a long time. Market shifts changed the equation.
Still, that’s a very specific story. It is not a story about online education as a whole.
The Niche-of-One Approach: Getting Hyper-Specific
If there’s a throughline to everything Jasmine shares in this episode, it’s this: clarity on your niche and the specific problem you solve is the foundation everything else is built on.
She shared an example that makes this vivid. One of her clients is a former judge who helps people navigate divorce and custody battles. His programs are entirely self-paced — no access to him at all. And they sell consistently because someone going through a divorce will pay $500 or $1,000 for a course that helps them understand the process, even if it saves them just one phone call with a lawyer.
In other words, the format isn’t the problem. Mismatch between format and niche is the problem.
“Part of it is doubling down on your niche, doubling down and getting really hyper clear and specific on the problem you solve, which sounds so basic. But I look at all my most successful clients, they are super clear and know exactly what the green flags and red flags are for working with someone, and they become the go-to authority.” — Jasmine Jonte
Her most successful clients are the ones who’ve gotten hyper-specific about who they serve and what outcome they create — specific enough that they know exactly what the green flags and red flags are for a potential student. And when you get that specific, something powerful happens: if you want to learn this type of thing from this type of person to solve this type of problem, they’re the only ones to go to. They’re in a niche of one.
Beyond the Self-Paced Course: Thinking in Leveraged Offers
One of the most practical shifts in this episode happens when Jasmine moves the conversation away from “courses” toward what she calls “leveraged offers.” A self-paced course is just one option in that category.
Leveraged offers also include group coaching programs, certifications, licensing, and memberships — any model where you’re delivering knowledge and experience at scale. So the question isn’t only whether the content is solid. It’s: what’s the experience surrounding the knowledge? What happens to help students actually understand and apply what they’re learning?
That’s always mattered. But it matters more now. Jasmine’s version of “do better” in 2020 meant adding experience alongside content — not just delivering a video and expecting students to figure out the rest. Her version of “do better” now means shorter, more intentional curriculum paired with more powerful learning experiences. And she credits AI with making that possible in a way it never was before.
What AI Can Do in Course Creation — And What It Can’t
There are two fears circling the AI conversation in online education. One is: “Why would anyone pay for a course when they can just ask ChatGPT?” The other is: “AI is going to replace expert-led learning entirely.” Neither holds up.
On the selling side: yes, AI makes writing emails, landing pages, and launch copy faster. But the quality of output depends entirely on what you put in. If you go into an AI tool without brand clarity, without a deep understanding of your ideal client’s language, and without training it on your audience’s actual words, you’ll get generic output that sounds like every other landing page in your space.
Jasmine’s recommendation: interview 15 to 20 of your ideal clients, pull the transcripts, and bring that real language into your AI conversations. The difference in output is significant.
On the learning side: AI aggregates what’s already on the internet. If you want to know how to start a podcast, ChatGPT can give you a list. But that list is trained on everything on the internet — including content from people who never got results. Someone who’s actually built a top-ranked podcast and teaches only from that experience is offering something entirely different.
Jasmine regularly sees clients come in with AI-generated course outlines. She’s honest about what she finds:
“People come to me all the time and say, hey I have my ChatGPT course outline and I look at it, and I go, oh that’s about 15% good.” — Jasmine Jonte
What Actually Makes a Course Great
This is the part of the episode where Jasmine gets into the real work of course design — and her answer is consistent with everything she’d said before. Great courses are built for students, not for teachers.
Format matters. Demographics matter. Niche matters. Jasmine’s team has built programs using PDFs and QR codes that link to TikTok videos for Gen Z clients, and programs where clients in their 70s, given the choice between online training, DVD training, or both, chose the DVD-only option every time. There is no universal right answer.
One thing holds true across all of it, though: more content is almost never better. When a landing page advertises a seven-course bundle, most buyers don’t feel excited — they feel overwhelmed. And they leave.
“The Goldilocks number is what’s the shortest you can make it that still gets them the result.” — Jasmine Jonte
Shorter content takes more intention to create, not less. Figuring out what to leave out is the real work.
There’s also a trap Jasmine sees experts fall into: building a course that mirrors the exact path they personally took, without asking whether that’s actually the fastest or best path for the student. Your job isn’t to document your journey — it’s to find the most direct route for your students to get the result they came for. That path might look different from yours. Both the sequencing and the shortcut matter as much as the content itself.
Selling Your Course: The Part Nobody Really Talks About
Say you’ve built something you’re proud of. You piloted it. Students loved it. And then it doesn’t sell. What happened?
Jasmine’s first question is always: Did enough people actually see the offer to generate real data? Before driving cold traffic to anything, you need to know that the offer converts with your warm audience. That’s the baseline. Once it does, you have a metric to build from.
And then comes the part that catches a lot of experts off guard:
“You either have to become a digital marketer or hire them.” — Jasmine Jonte
The vision of passive income — courses running while you’re not watching — is real. But getting there requires either doing the digital marketing work yourself or building a team around it. The pot won’t boil if you keep turning the heat off. I said something to Jasmine in this episode that I really believe: if you leave a pot of water on the stove long enough, it will boil. It will boil every single time. But you have to leave it on. Strategy hopping — trying challenges, then masterclasses, then podcasts, then starting over — is the equivalent of putting multiple pots on the stove without letting any of them come to full boil.
Pick one approach. Learn what works for your audience. And give it time.
“Everyone’s trying to sell their own process, so you hear, ‘Challenges are the best way to sell a course. Masterclasses are the best way to sell a course. Having a podcast is the best way to sell a course.’ And the truth is, they all work. It’s about being strategic about knowing your options, who your ideal client is, where they live, and then picking one and sticking with it.” — Jasmine Jonte
About Jasmine Jonte
Jasmine Jonte is a sought-after expert in course creation, online learning, and client experience, known for transforming expertise into engaging, revenue-generating programs.
Starting from an award-winning teaching career in Detroit’s lowest-performing school, she shifted to creating over 140 programs and 1,600+ lessons, reaching thousands of students and generating millions in revenue.
As the founder of CRE8TION, she helps professionals streamline course creation through our Course Flow to Cash Flow Process.
Connect with Jasmine
- Website: CRE8TION
- Instagram: @jasminejonte
- YouTube: Jasmine Jonte CRE8TION
Jasmine’s Free Gift
10 Next-Level Strategies to Make Your Course as Bingeworthy as Netflix — PDF Guide + Custom GPT (CourseFlix)
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Episode 259: How Building an Email List Helped Increase My Revenue 10X with Sena Wheeler
Jasmine made it clear that before you send cold traffic to any offer, you need to know it converts with your warm audience first. Sena’s story about doubling down on email — and what it did for her revenue — is a practical, grounded companion to everything Jasmine shares here. Listen here
Episode 78: Let’s Shake Up The Coaching Industry with Lee Chaix McDonough
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Love This Episode?
If this conversation shifted how you’re thinking about courses, leveraged offers, or what it takes to build something that actually gets students results — share it with a fellow woman entrepreneur who’s been sitting on a course idea. Sometimes the clearest thing we can do for each other is pass along the conversation that finally makes things make sense.
About Sarah Walton
Sarah Walton is a business coach and the host of the Game On Girlfriend® podcast. Her mission is simple: to put more money in the hands of more women. She helps women entrepreneurs build profitable, sustainable businesses without burnout — working through both the mindset and the strategy sides of growth. Because when women have more financial power, they don’t just keep it — they use it to take care of their families, support their communities, and build something bigger than themselves. Through her programs — including the Abundance Academy and The Art of Receiving — along with her online courses and one-on-one coaching, Sarah works with women who are ready to build profitable businesses and use that financial power to make a real difference in the world around them.
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