How Long Should Your First CE Course Be?

Most professionals who stall on their first course aren't stuck on what to teach. They're stuck on how much.

Some picture a ten-hour masterpiece with custom graphics and a studio-quality video for every lesson. Others want a quick 30-minute module they can knock out over a weekend. Both plans tend to go nowhere. The first one never gets finished. The second one is hard to sell.

There's a better target, and it's simpler than either.

The sweet spot is three to four hours

In my experience, three to four hours is the sweet spot for a course. Anything less loses value. Anything more starts to get redundant and tedious, and it can feel daunting to a busy professional who already works long shifts.

A longer course can be justified if what you're teaching is genuinely deep and valuable. But for your first one, aim for three to four hours of content that walks someone from a real problem to a real solution.

The 30-minute test

Here's a quick way to check your idea. Ask yourself: can I build a three to four hour course that goes through this problem and lays out the solution in detail?

If the honest answer is that the whole solution takes 30 minutes to explain, that's a warning sign. A course that short is hard to market, because it usually means one of two things:

• The problem is too small. Don't solve a nitpicky little problem. Solve a real one that your colleagues actually lose sleep, money or confidence over.
• You haven't broken it down yet. You know more than you think. Once you start explaining the background, the first steps and the details, the 30 minutes turns into hours.

If you can fill three to four hours on one real problem, you have a course.

What three to four hours looks like in practice

Three to four hours usually works out to about 100 to 120 slides.

That sounds like a lot, but here's the thing: building a course is the easy part. It just takes time. If you put solid content into 100 slides, plan on roughly 40 hours of work. Building the slide deck is about 80% of the effort, and the rest is recording and uploading.

So you're not looking at a year-long project. You're looking at a focused few weeks.

How to fill the hours without padding

Filling three to four hours doesn't mean repeating yourself. It means teaching the way a good mentor would. Here's the structure I use.

Start with an introduction section of 8 to 15 slides. Cover who the course is for, who you are and why they should listen to you, the pain points that brought them here, the course objectives and an outline of what's coming.

There's a bonus here. Once you record that introduction, it doubles as a free preview and a sales video for the course. You build one section and get two assets out of it.

Then build out your chapters in a logical order:

• The background and foundations of the problem
• The first steps a professional needs to take or learn to solve it
• The details behind the solution, down to the nuts and bolts
• A summary of the key points they need to remember to use it in the real world

End on a motivational note. Your last slide should tell them they can do this, and that the solution you just taught them works.

Assume your student knows nothing. This is the part most experts skip. Treat every student like a novice. Don't assume they know the basics, even if the basics feel obvious to you after years in practice. Hold their hand through every step. That's where the depth comes from, and the more you explain up front, the fewer questions you'll get later.

Keep it chronological and don't be redundant. Foundations come before advanced material, and you don't need to say the same thing five different ways.

It doesn't need to be perfect

The length is set. Now let go of the idea that it has to be flawless.

Your students don't care how fancy your graphics are. They care about learning something valuable and actionable that solves a problem in their life, whether that's passing an exam, getting a promotion, earning more or becoming more competent. As long as the course is clear, easy to follow and free of technical problems, that's what matters.

Here's all you need to build it:

• Write a basic outline of your topics. Don't spend weeks perfecting it.
• Build your slides from that outline.
• Record your voice over the slides. Video of yourself is optional.
• Edit the audio, or hire an editor to do it.
• Put the audio and slides together and upload the videos to your course platform.

That's it. Make it on demand and pre-recorded, not live, so it can sell around the clock without you having to show up. And don't spend tens of thousands of dollars on production. You can always improve it in version two.

A quick note if you plan to offer CE credit

If you're going to accredit the course for continuing education, check how your accrediting body counts a credit hour before you lock in your length. Each one has its own rules, and you'll want your three to four hours to line up with the credit you plan to offer.

Your next step

Pick the one real problem your course will solve. Then ask whether you can teach it in three to four hours, from the foundations to the solution. If you can, start your outline this week and get it built.