Udemy is a leading online training provider, and with its ever going sale, the courses have become affordable for the common man. But the number of courses for a topic or technology that you want to learn is sometimes overwhelming.
If there are 20 plus courses available for a topic, how do you find out which is the right one for you? We often end up going with the first one or the bestseller in the search result, which may not be the right one for you.
And if you end up choosing a wrong course, you not only lose your hard earned money but the efforts and hours that you put in learning and sacrificing several other essential tasks.
Here are a few things to keep in mind while selecting the right course.
1. Read the Course Details
Go through the sections “What you’ll learn,” “Course Content” and “Description,” it gives you a good idea of what the course will contain and does it include everything you want to learn or not.
Most important. check when and how many times was the course last updated. This will give you an idea if the course content is current and how keen and engaged the instructor is to make the course a success.
2. Understand the Course Level
Check if the course is for Beginner, Intermediate or Advanced level users. It makes a big difference.
If you already know to program and only trying to grasp the new programming language, then coding essentials or basics of coding are not required and instead you should focus on learning the nuances of the new language.
Alternatively, if you always been a front-end developer and the course deals with web services and REST API connection without explaining the basics of it, you would be frustrated.
Check the “Requirements” section on the course details page to know what is the pre-requirement to take up this course. What you ought to know before you can take this up.
3. Deep Dive into Ratings
Ratings sometimes could be the most confusing aspect during a course selection. A 5 rating from one person could be equal to 3 of another person.
While reviewing the ratings, we do not know the background of those people who are giving those ratings. So read the detailed reviews as well and try to find out what people are saying about the course. What aspects of the course did they like and what they didn’t.
Be sure to check out poor ratings and bad reviews. Especially look for ratings of 1, 2 and 3 and read what has been the major complaint of those people who have rated the course poor. Their pain points could be similar to yours. E.g., Sometimes the instructor’s accent is not well understood and for you clear English and accent is a must, so it’s better for you to not to proceed with the course.
4. Course Duration:
Check the course duration before you buy the course. If you are a working professional, it’s difficult for you to finish a course of 20 hours and above. You need the course to be focused and short. Sometimes you want a crash course to get started or revise a topic, so any course beyond 5 hours could be a waste.
5. Watch the Previews:
Course Previews (under course content section) are provided for you to take a look and judge for yourself before buying the speed of teaching, content quality, instructor delivery method, and accent. Always watch the previews before you take a decision.
6. Instructor Profile
Read the instructor profile and find out if he is a new instructor or seasoned. Also, what other courses he has on the platform. And what has he actually worked on as part of his work experience. A Microsoft programmer delivering courses on NodeJS or Laravel might not be very astute.
7. Get a Refund
Udemy has publicized it, but still many people buying the courses on Udemy don’t know that they can return the course and get their money back within 30 days if they are not satisfied with the course.
So even after doing due diligence, you end up with a course that you don’t like then make sure you return the course and get your money back.