The State of Courses in Business
Original survey research. 22 solo and small business owners. Data collected November 1 to 25, 2025.
This report was born from BS statistics. In the fall of 2025, I did some digging so I could have real statistics on course creation, and what I found was a conflation of contexts. ALL the data was coming from higher education, corporate learning and development, or the course platforms trying to sell you something. I was so pissed, I created a whole YouTube series on it.
So I created a survey, did some interviews, and this report is the result of that study.
Why should you care where the data comes from?
Because the learners are different. Students signing up for college courses and employees completing a required cyber security training are coming to the learning situation with completely different goals and expectations than your clients are coming to you with. The learner is a stakeholder in the process and if you’re not considering the difference in context, you’ll be wasting a shit ton of time and money.
The next survey for the state of courses in business will go out in October of 2026. If you sign up for the report, you’ll be on the list for the survey request.
What did I find?
Two things are true at once in this data, and together they explain most of what's wrong with the industry.
The market is scared that courses don't deliver. Asked what worries them about the course creation industry, respondents named course quality more than anything else: 11 of 22 raised it unprompted. Another 6 named the trust damage that follows.
And the people selling courses largely can't tell you whether theirs deliver. Of the 11 respondents currently selling courses:
3 of 11 don't track completion at all.
4 of 11 don't track whether students achieve the stated outcome of the course, or say the question doesn't apply.
5 of 11 don't track how long their course takes to complete, or say it varies too much to answer.
These aren't beginners. Most have been selling for three years or more and have built several courses. They're just quietly unsatisfied with what those courses give back. Not one of the 11 rated their course revenue a 5 out of 5. Six sat at a 3. Three sat at the floor, a 1.
You can't improve a thing you've decided not to look at.
What format do people think actually works
| Format | Responses | Percent |
|---|---|---|
| Hybrid (recorded plus live components) | 15 | 68% |
| Live or scheduled cohort-based | 12 | 55% |
| Pre-recorded video lessons | 9 | 41% |
| Interactive or gamified content | 6 | 27% |
| Audio or podcast-style lessons | 4 | 18% |
| Self-paced text or workbook content | 3 | 14% |
| Not sure yet | 3 | 14% |
Two more worth naming. Economic uncertainty is the trend people are most worried about, at 15 of 22 (68%), ahead of AI at 12 of 22 (55%). Web3 and NFT courses were named by nobody.
Who answered?
Half the respondents already have and sell courses, half are on their way. 21 of 22 are sole proprietors or freelancers. One is a small business of 2 to 10 employees. Nobody in this sample has more than 10 people, and nobody has an instructional design department, which is the whole point.
Who am I to do this?
I’m Dr. Catrina Mitchum. a course creation consultant. I have a PhD in Rhetoric, Writing, and Digital Studies, and my dissertation was on why people don't finish online courses. I’ve been designing for and teaching adults online since 2009. I co-wrote Teaching Literacy Online for the National Council of Teachers of English, which won the 2025 Divergent Award for Excellence in Literacy in a Digital Age Research Publication, and I've published research in Composition Forum, Currents in Teaching and Learning, and The Journal of Teaching and Learning with Technology, among others.
It matters to me that the data is from the right source.
How I did it
Instrument: online survey administered via Tally, plus three semi-structured follow-up interviews.
Collection window: November 1 to 25, 2025.
Sample: n=22 total, split evenly between owners currently selling online courses (n=11) and owners not yet selling (n=11). Figures drawn from the seller subgroup are stated as counts out of 11.
Recruitment: open call through my newsletter, YouTube channel, and social channels. No email address was required to participate. Interviewees were bought a coffee.
Analysis: closed-response items reported using descriptive statistics. Open-ended items and the interviews analyzed using open coding.
No inferential statistics. The sample is too small to support them, and I'm making no claims of statistical significance or that this generalizes to every small business course creator.
Where this falls short
The whole reason this report exists is that other people don't state theirs, so I’m being transparent here.
The sample is small. n=22, with the seller subgroup at n=11. Every figure here is directional. On a base of 11, one respondent moves a percentage by nine points.
The data is self-reported. Completion and outcome numbers come from owners' own estimates, not platform analytics. Given how many said they don't track these things, those estimates carry real error.
Respondents self-selected. Recruitment ran through my own channels, which skews toward people who already care about learner outcomes. If anything this sample should look better on quality than the broader population, not worse.
This is a first wave. Comparisons across waves will be worth more than any single number here.
Cite this report
Mitchum, C. (2026). The State of Course Creation in Business. Catrina Mitchum Learning Design. https://www.cmlearningdesign.com/state-of-courses-in-business-report
Data collected November 2025, n=22. Reuse is fine with attribution and a link. If you're a journalist, researcher, or writer and want a clarification on a figure, email catrina@cmlearningdesign.com.
What's in the full report
The numbers above are the problem. The report is the benchmark.
If you're trying to work out whether you're pricing right, earning what other people earn, or stuck on the same things everyone else is stuck on, that's what's inside:
Pricing. What this group charges for their highest and lowest priced courses, and which pricing models they use.
Revenue. What share of total business revenue courses actually bring in.
Audience size. How many students these owners have sold to after years of selling.
Marketing. Which channels this group uses and which they've given up on.
Platforms. What they're hosting on, and whether they use what they're paying for.
Challenges. The ranked list of what's actually hard, in their words.
Investment. What owners have spent getting a course off the ground.
Three interviews, including the coach who doesn't believe in courses and the one who won't launch without proof.
Every chart, and my analysis of what each finding means for how you build.
It's organized as a summary where I tie things together, then the descriptive statistics, then the analysis of two open-ended questions and the three follow-up interviews.
The next survey for the state of courses in business will go out in October of 2026. If you sign up for the report, you'll be on the list for the survey request.
Sign up for the full report below.