Courses and Community Are Converging with Gina Bianchini

Hey, before we get to the episode, I just want to let you know about an offer at Mirasee.co slash leak. I'm Andrew Chapman, director of podcasting here at Mirasee FM, and we've got an offer for you there for a free revenue leak checklist. That's right. If you run your own business, you can find out exactly where your business might be losing money and you may not be aware of it. So again, go to Mirasee.co slash leak. That's L-E-A-K. And you can get all the info and that free checklist. Mirasee. I think having this kind of conversation and really support environment for course creators and hosts and people that are intrigued with how do I have an impact on more people and make a living having more impact. And unlocking new experiences and new, you know, again, results and transformation for people is just really important. Hello and welcome to Course Lab, the show that teaches creators like you how to make better online courses. I'm Danny Iny, the founder and CEO of Mirasee, and I'm here with my co-host, Abe Crystal, the co-founder of Ruzuku. Hey, Danny. In each episode of Course Lab, we usually showcase a course and creator who is doing something unique with their course. But in this special miniseries, we're doing something different. Abe and I are going beyond the design of courses themselves to dive into the platforms that host them. Because building a course platform isn't just about creating some basic functionalities. It's about having a vision for where the industry is headed and then building the technology to enable that vision. Each of the platform creators in this miniseries has a different perspective on where the industry is headed and what that means for you. Our guest today is the CEO and founder of Mighty Networks, a community-based platform for entrepreneurs and course builders. Welcome, Gina Bianchini. Happy to have you here. Happy to be here. So, Gina, let's start just like the, you know, the origin story, the background. How did you come to be doing what you're doing? What is it that you're doing? What is Mighty Networks all about? You know, the usual spiel, and then we'll get into the exciting stuff. Sure. So, I have worked in this world of online communities going all the way back to 2004, actually. So, I picked my lane, and I am both personally and professionally obsessed with how we create social experiences, communities, courses that enable people to achieve results and transformation. In their lives that they simply can't get on their own. And so, Mighty Networks is a platform that, you know, exists to unlock course creators, creators, and brands in building online empires. And being able to do that through courses, through memberships, through events, all in one place, under your brand, and instantly available on every platform. Web, native mobile iOS, native mobile Android as well. And so, it's how are we helping not just a creator build a course, but how are we helping a creator unlock new thriving communities that are mastering something interesting and important together that members are able to meet and build relationships with each other in pursuit of the results and transformation that they want in their lives. And that might be professionally, that might be around health and wellness, that might be around other important interests from, you know, personal finance to parenting to travel and everything in between. Awesome. So, Mighty Networks has been around for a while, and unlike a lot of the course platforms out there, it didn't start as a course platform. It started as a way for people to create and host their own social communities and networks. Talk to us about that evolution. Yeah. So, we launched Mighty Networks in 2017 as a community platform, and specifically a community platform with the mission of building software that unlocks the ability for any of us to be just a fantastic host. You know, like, you've been to those, like, the best party that you've ever been to, whether that's a dinner party, whether that's a cocktail party, whether that's, like, a rave. They tend to have a host that is making it feel special, but also introducing you to the most relevant people there and making those connections so that they feel natural and normal. And when we launched Mighty Networks as a, you know, you have your own standalone community underneath your own brand, the people that were attracted to creating Mighty Networks turned out to be a lot of course creators. And specifically people that were really focused on, hey, how do I help my members connect to each other, build really valuable relationships that get more valuable to every member with each new person who joins and contributes? You know, in software, we call it a network effect. And because of these really interesting, and obviously they were early adopters of a different kind of community platform, what was so interesting to us is that they basically almost immediately started sharing, hey, you know, you guys should just build online courses directly into the community, directly into My Mighty Network. And at first we were like, really? We were serious that, like, building it in natively is what we want. And we think that it's good for us and it's good for you. It'll extend the retention of folks. It would actually increase the probability that people will finish my courses and I'll be able to offer a membership at the end of my course. And so we got to work and we finally decided, hey, let's give this a try. And we have seen, you know, over 100% year over year growth for the last three years. And so when we launched our courses that have these sort of different flavors, as well as the ability to have courses and community together in one place, as well as just a membership community, I mean, it took off. And it remains something that is pretty unique in the market because of, you know, we just came at it from a very different perspective. And that's unlocked some really incredible course experiences, really incredible course results, not just, again, for the host, as we call the folks, the course creators who are on our platform, but also for members in terms of it being about finding members near you, finding members who are like you, members who care about the same topics that also exist, you know, within this online course. So would you say that if you look at the evolution in terms of not just functionality, but focus and outlook, would you say that it's more a matter of Mighty Networks having begun as, you know, a membership or community platform and evolving to be a membership and community platform that also has course functionality? Or is it more about kind of an evolution of that focus to being like, oh, actually, it's more about the platform for the, you know, being the hub of the business or the platform for the lifecycle of the customer as, you know, they go through this experience of being part of, I guess, a community that is centered around an expert in a certain space? I'm not sure I understand the distinction. I don't actually think there's a distinction. I think as human beings, we want to be in community where we learn, where we grow, where we apply what we are learning together with other people who are on that same journey, who care about and want the same results and transformation that we want in our lives. And so what I would say is that, you know, we really envision Mighty Networks as offering all of the services that you would want to run any flavor of digital subscription business. But ultimately, we are about how are people achieving the results and transformation that they want to have in their lives. And if anything, we think that the future is not having, you know, courses in one place, community in another place, events in a third place, subscriptions in a fourth place, but rather the experiences that can be created when you have all of these tools in your toolbox, and you are able to create a really immersive, incredible world where some of this is about learning, some of this is about applying, some of this is about the ongoing habit forming and practice building that, you know, I would argue is how every great educational experience has ever emerged. It's why, sure, where you went to school, there's some brand level to it. But it typically isn't what happens in the classroom, or what you read, or the, you know, the professor's lecture. It's the combination of those things with who is in the conversation, who is in the discussion, and how are we learning from each other. Awesome. I have more questions, but Abe, do you want to jump in? Yeah, just, I guess, building off of what you're saying, you know, something else we've heard you mention in other interviews is about the growth of kind of niche markets and niche communities. So I was wondering if you could explain a bit more about why you see this as being so important. And how does that tie into like the trends and communities that you're seeing? So I think overall, what is so exciting about technology and so exciting about the internet is that we get to explore more and more unique combinations of who we are, what we care about. And, you know, I would say what I love is creators increasing creativity, as it relates to how they are building experiences that become really unique. So when I think about, you know, niches aren't small, they are different, they are unique. And what they allow us to do is as individuals, build unique identities around our interests, our passions, our goals, the things that we want to accomplish, you know, in our lives, or just the way we define identity. So one of my favorite examples of this is Martinez Evans, an Instagram influencer and creator with his account on Instagram called 300 Pounds and Running. And for him, it's about being and bringing the community of back of the pack runners together. He created, you know, the Slow AF Run Club. So you immediately know who this is for people that, you know, aren't marathon runners and aren't, you know, typical marathon runners, I should say. And he's created a space for them to not just find each other, but to train and to explore nutrition and explore training programs that would allow somebody to run their first marathon. And all in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in a in courses and course communities that go deeper than videos and PDFs. Yeah. Do you think that we're kind of emerging out of the first phase of online courses in terms of their growth and development and how they're structured? And if so, like what's in your crystal ball? What do you see coming over the next few years? So yes, and this isn't because I have a crystal ball. This is because I am in conversations with tens of thousands of course and community creators through my work and through what I see in the data. And what I would observe is that online courses in their sort of initial shape and form, and this is true for every interesting and innovative technology, you know, have been relatively rudimentary. They have, if anything, focused on the sophistication with respect to marketing and conversion. You know, how do we get people to buy as opposed to how do we get people to find their people? And so I think that, you know, what we're offering at Mighty is a different approach that if we do it right is not just innovating on, you know, videos and PDFs and that first generation of what it meant to have an online course, but really the convergence of courses and community. Because, you know, in this initial 1.0 world, you know, what happened to so many course creators is that they were promised that the content alone, and even if you think about a membership site, the promise is that you create content and it becomes passive income. You don't have to do any more work. People will, you know, put their credit card in, they'll look at your content and, you know, you've created something that is a valuable asset. What most course creators found pretty quickly was that you have the challenge of like, are people even going to like, do they finish the course? We know that course completion rates are pretty abysmal. And then, so what happened? It's like, okay, well, it just sort of seems obvious that I need to have a community related to this course. And by the way, this is true for podcasters and true for newsletter writers and YouTube stars and everybody in between. So you create a Facebook group and then, you know, that one-time passive income of either as a course or as a membership subscription becomes something that is more active, that, you know, that is more about the people who you're taking this course with, about their application of the programs or the training programs or the nutritional programs, whatever it might be, that was the promise of the original course. And now you start to see this Frankensteining of like the things that actually go into creating a thriving course, which is the community, which is the, the ongoing relationship, not just between you and your content and the people that have purchased it, but also, you know, how do you apply it and how do you stick with it and how do you level up? You know, I was actually just on a call with Danielle Leslie, the course creator, who's just done some incredible work with course from scratch and what she is pioneering and really looking at in terms of an offer ladder where it's about fundamentally one-time purchase for a course. Plus that ongoing membership is I think incredibly innovative. And I think that if I do look ahead, certainly not in a crystal ball, but from what I'm seeing, I think the convergence of community and courses is only going to accelerate. And what is going to happen because of that are some truly knowledge and learning experiences that are going to be unlocked. I'm curious about kind of the evolution of the course creator in this process, because, you know, it used to be, and I agree with you completely. I mean, courses by and large were, you know, a bunch of videos in a membership site. People are paying way too much, getting way too little. It wasn't delivering transformation. They weren't completing the material. So, you know, you're preaching to the choir here, but that being said, it was rudimentary in terms of the functionality. It was also, you know, simpler to set up. And so if someone had a coaching or a consulting business and they wanted to add a course as, you know, something they do on the side, they could do it, you know, in a portion of their time. And then gradually they're like, okay, I think we're going to add the community with the Facebook group. As you said, I'm going to add the membership through that other thing. And you're right that you end up with this kind of Frankenstein of technologies that, you know, people have to switch from one platform to the other, to the other, which is a huge pain in the ass and things break and they don't integrate well. So there's a huge value to, you know, everything being integrated if you're looking to have all that functionality. My question is, do you feel like we're moving in a direction of kind of it being an all or nothing where, you know, either you say, all right, you know, so I'm going to create a course and I've got to have the membership side and I've got to have the community and I've got like, essentially, this is a full-time thing. Yeah. Yeah. And if not, like I'm out. Yeah, not at all. Not at all. So going back to just how Mighty Network is set up, we are set up so that if anything, you can start simply, you can start with a course that is just content and you can literally shut down all the community features, nearly every single one. And anyone that you can't shut down upfront, we're going to give you the opportunity to do that shortly. And so what is really, I think, important is to one, have that ability and choose platforms. And again, I'm, I'm certainly biased. That's how we have set Mighty Networks up so that it is not all or nothing. And we see a lot of success with brand new course creators, uh, as well as people who are migrating over 77% of people who offer courses and memberships on Mighty Networks sell those courses and memberships on a Mighty Network. And we're seeing people have wonderful success with even as few as 30 members, you know, making a thousand dollars a month. So it's, I think a really exciting shift that is happening when you go from, I have to choose individual platforms to, I get to choose one platform, really be able to start small and grow. And I don't have to change platforms every time. And I don't have to like move things and have things break. And it, in your words, be a pain in the butt. So I happen to agree with those words. And so I think it's a really important point. I think that, you know, if anything, we look at our mission and we look at why it's so important that we share that this is now possible to do something small on a more flexible platform is because it leads to greater success. Just simply does. So I, that makes total sense in terms of the platform's functionality from a philosophical standpoint. The argument of, if the belief is essentially that the future of learning is that learning happens in community, are we getting to a place where if you don't have the community and the learning, it's like, you know, well then don't even bother. It's not going to work. No, I don't think so. The other thing that I would say is there's this expectation that, for example, one-on-one coaching and the content that you're building, those are the things for course creation versus community and community is hard. I would suggest the community is actually not hard. The hard part is coming up with like, what is that topic? Like what is, we talk about, is your big purpose, you know, the motivation for your course, what your members are going to get from it, what your students are going to get from it. So if anything, what I would say is community is, is significantly easier than people I think believe it to be. On average, our successful course creators are posting no more than like once a week, once a week, twice a week, that's nothing. And so when you look at what's possible, what it really comes down to is not thinking about things in the siloed way of the past, but really that there are these new models emerging that are profoundly more effective in helping members achieve the results that they want, that most of us get into this business to help people with. I certainly know that from the course that I teach. There's no greater high than watching people that have participated or are participating in something, you know, something about was thinking about it as being just like as simple as one half step ahead, get value from it and build real relationships from it. And it's so much easier. So to answer your question, I think philosophically, you don't have to have everything at one time. If anything, though, there's a different frame of reference on community that actually makes it easier to build your first course, that makes it easier to grow and scale what you're building and ultimately easier to reach and have an impact with more people, which is why so many of us do this. Awesome. That was great. Thank you. I don't have any other questions and I know you have a call you've got to hop off to get to. Is there anything else you want to add before we do the readout? No, just that I'm really grateful that you guys are doing what you're doing. And I think having this kind of conversation and really support environment for course creators and hosts and people that are intrigued with how do I have an impact on more people and make a living having more impact and unlocking new experiences and new, you know, again, results and transformation for people is just really important. Thank you. Awesome. All right, Abe, do you want to do the readout? Yeah, let's see if I can get the pronunciation right. I'll help. Bianchini. Gina Bianchini is the CEO and founder of Mighty Networks. To learn more about her and the platform discussed in today's episode, head on over to MightyNetworks.com. That's MightyNetworks.com. Now stick around for my favorite part of the show, where Abe and I will pull out the very best takeaways and share our own insights as well. So Abe, what jumped out to you? I mean, in terms of Gina's perspective on where the industry is going and what people need to pay attention to? Well, I mean, kind of the big obvious trend is community, right, and the convergence of courses and online community. And it's not necessarily something new. It's more the way that it's accelerated and become more central, I guess, to the opportunities for course design, as well as for course marketing and creating successful online education businesses. Community seems to have become more central to these models than it was in the past. And what do you think of the perspective of something that struck me was the idea that like, well, no, community is actually really easy, which I think might depend on the strengths and skills and proclivities and personality of the host. I could see it being that way for some people, but I don't know, maybe not for other people. What do you think? Well, I don't believe that building online community is easy at all. It certainly hasn't been in my experience, you know, both creating and facilitating communities and also as a participant in many different online communities. I don't think I've ever seen one that where real energy was built and sustained over time without a ton of effort by the community creator and someone having a real passion for doing it. So like, it's absolutely possible and the tools for doing it are, you know, getting better all the time. But the demands on people's attentions are growing all the time. Two, like, it's become easier and easier for more people to create content. And so now there's, you know, a million YouTube videos and a million blogs, a million podcasts for people to choose from. So you have to really have a specific focus to stand out. I think the same is becoming true with communities, right? Like, there used to be a limited number of communities about baking or bidding or creating a successful webinar or whatever your interest is. And now there's probably many different communities to choose from in any kind of significant niche. So the opportunity is big for sure, but I wouldn't want it to like undersell the challenges either. Well, I mean, I think it goes to, you've got to play to your strengths. Look, nothing is easy if you're doing something that is, I mean, nothing is easy that you don't know how to do until you learn how to do it, obviously. Right. I mean, you know, that's why we are in education to begin with, but also, you know, there are certain things like I'm never going to be great at playing basketball, right? It's like, I could work at it. I could practice at it. I could get a lot better, but you know, I'm just, that's not what I'm wired for. Right. And so recognizing your strengths and playing to that is important. In terms of like, whether you really focus on building community. Well, yeah. I mean, let's go with an example. It's closer to home. I'm never going to be the life of a party, right? Gina talked about, you know, the experience you've had being at an electric party, whether it's a dinner party or a house party or a rave or whatever it is. Right. And a lot of it comes down to the host. Like I'm not the host who is going to host that kind of party. I'm just, you know, I have many strengths and I'm not lacking in self-esteem, but I'm also self-aware enough to know that that's not my sweet spot. What was interesting to me though, that I was actually a little bit resistant to, but as I thought about it more, I was like, yeah, actually, I think she's got a point is kind of the idea of looking at, looking at a business less in terms of being about a particular expertise or even transformation. It's not about like the course or the coaching or, or any one of those things so much as it is having that host or leader in the center. And then you've got the community around it. You've got the course around it. You've got the membership around it. And my first thought was like, well, no, I know a lot of businesses that don't have all of those components and they do just fine. You don't need all of it. But as I think about it more, you know, there is a progression where you might not start with all of it, but there is a tendency of the better you're doing, the more likely it is to make sense to add those layers. And there is a flywheel effect of the more of that is in place, the better an experience you tend to be able to offer to the audience, the community, and the more transformation. And then of course, the more money you end up making. So that is an interesting perspective around kind of, you know, taken to their logical conclusion. If you do really well growing a business, you may not start with all of these components, but you're much more likely to end up with a lot more of them, if not all of them. Right. That makes sense. I mean, we all want to move education and online education specifically from just providing information and content and ideas to actually helping people achieve transformations and results. So like, that's what CourseLab is all about. But it's a little bit of a seductive idea that like, you can just sort of sprinkle in some community to existing courses, or, you know, launch a community and add a kind of standard course format to it. And then your clients, your participants will start getting like better results and achieve greater transformations by virtue of that. I mean, the other thing that kind of came out to me as a theme that I thought was interesting is the importance of technology that is integrated well to do everything you want, right? You know, the danger of ending up with this Frankenstein of like this tool, that tool, the other tool, and like none of them talk to each other very well. And your students have to switch from all these tools, which is really frustrating. I think there is always a certain amount of a trade-off in terms of as a tool, as a technology, are you going to be really great at one thing or mediocre at a lot of things. But I think that trade-off was much more the case, like five or 10 years ago, that was a real challenge, right? Like tools would be really good or maybe even not really good, but just good enough at one thing. But, you know, then the all-in-one tools were not very good. But I think we're getting to an evolution of the landscape where you can find much better, more robust integrated tools. So I think the through line there is that kind of to think through what you expect the functionality stack to be of what you want to do, and then make sure that the tool you end up using does all of it if possible. Yeah, makes sense. That's all I got. I thought it was a really interesting interview. Anything you want to add before you do the readout? No, that was great. All right, go ahead. Thank you for listening to Course Lab. I'm Abe Crystal, co-founder and CEO of Rezikiu, here with Dan Eny, founder and CEO of Mirasee. Course Lab is part of the Mirasee FM podcast network, which also includes Just Between Coaches, Making It, and Once Upon a Business. This episode of Course Lab was produced by Cynthia Lamb, Jeff Govertz and assembled the episode, Danny Eny is our executive producer, host production by Post Office Sound. Big thanks to Gina Bianchini for coming onto the show today. Remember, you can find out more about her and Mighty Networks over at MightyNetworks.com. To make sure you don't miss the really great episodes coming up on Course Lab, follow us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you're listening right now. And if you like the show, the best way to help us keep making it is to leave a starred review or to share it with a friend. Thank you, and we'll see you next time. All right, are you ready? Wait, what's my cue? It's a behind-the-scenes kind of thing. Hello, and welcome to Just Between Coaches, the podcast that tackles difficult coaching conversations head-on. I'm Melinda Cohen and your host for this show. I also know that I'm listening when, again, my mind is relaxed, so I can almost sense that I'm listening on multiple levels. That's a great framing. That's a really great way to think about it. I think so, actually, now that I'm thinking about it, because I think that something that is very dangerous is for people to think that being a great coach comes from having the credentials. One has nothing to do with the other. So again, part of it is just, you know, either through questions or asking what they've tried, or sometimes it's, you know, the forest for the trees thing. My favorite part of having the hard conversation is, wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute. Okay. So while I love what's on the other side, I think navigating through that conversation is my favorite part. Yeah. Because we're not there necessarily as coaches to provide solutions. We're there to guide our people towards solutions. And I don't know if it's, you know, societal pressure or peer pressure, but we don't want to look like we don't know what we're doing. I want to help and support coaches so that they can evolve into their greatness. My desire for the show is if I could scoop up all of the coaches and bring them into my living room and bring up the topics that leave crinkles in our foreheads so that we can fully understand what it means to show up in our greatness, fully confident so that we can build better businesses, so that we can be better coaches, so that we can make a lasting impact on this world collectively. And we want to rise to that level. That being said, you do want to set yourself up and your clients up for success by making sure that there is clarity around their expectations and your expectations as to how you can help them. People have to know a little bit about what you offer. Otherwise, how do they know that they need what you can help them with in terms of that transformation? And I love having the conversations and navigating the topics that keep us at the forefront in a time with what I call the results revolution. Yeah, well, first of all, I just want to start by saying that this is a really good problem to have, right? So if you have someone who's resisting your price, it means they're really interested in working with you. The thing is, sometimes it becomes negative. It becomes toxic. I've been in the coaching industry for almost 20 years now. And over these years, I have seen everything behind the scenes in our industry, everything that works, everything that doesn't work. I've seen the evolution of our industry and of what it means to be a coach. I just want to say to all the coaches out there, you know, matching who you are to the kind of coach that you want to be is just a practice. Do you want to add some parting words? No, I think you did great. This was a lot of fun. Thank you so much for having me. This is Melinda Cohen, and you've been listening to Just Between Coaches. You'll find us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your podcasts. Yeah, this is absolutely the tone, the feel, the everything. Okay, so I'm going to stop the recording now. Why are you stopping the recording? This is going to be fun. Oh my gosh. That's a wrap. That is going to be an amazing session.