At the very top "A FREE EMAIL COURSE FROM THE CREATIVE CLASS"

And at the very bottom: "FULL DISCLOSURE: THERE'S A PAID COURSE ABOUT FREELANCING OFFERED AT THE END OF THIS COURSE."

I fail to see anything wrong with that. They are giving away something for free in hopes they can sell something else. Nothing wrong with that at all. They are even disclosing that before you join the list, which most people don't. I guess you may not see that before joining but I see no harm.

The free course cannot work.

There is a particularly good reason why the free course in how to be a successful freelancer won't teach you how to be a successful freelancer: If it did then there'd be no reason to buy the paid course.

They ought to be more clear that you're about to spend time on something that they know won't do what it says it does.

Paid training classes _cannot_ work. If free courses on Excel were available, then people wouldn't buy the paid ones.

Paid yoga classes _cannot_ work. If free yoga lessons were available on YouTube, then people wouldn't buy the paid ones.

Paid water _cannot_ work. If free water was available in your faucet, then people wouldn't buy the bottled kind.

Paying for print versions of Shakespeare _cannot_ work. If free versions are available on project Gutenberg, then people wouldn't pay for it.

Ever think there may be varying levels of success, and the free week-long version gets you the basics (I can touch my toes, Yoga success!), but not yet an expert? Just like every other field of human activity?

Not necessarily true. I offer a free email course (also for freelancers), and I position the free course as the strategy - how should a freelancer think about sales? The premium course is the tactics - an actionable deep dive into the content covered in the free course, along with templates, scripts, video interviews, accountability, and more.

It's worked really well. People love the free course, and those who want a more tactics and accountability buy the full course.

People may love the free course, but does it actually make previously unsuccessful people successful? I think the implication here is that the free course is essentially just there to get you pumped up for the paid course, and is not actually useful.

It does. My business goal with my email course is to generate qualified leads for my course. My personal goal is to make people better off than they were before they started the course.

If the free course is nothing but the "sizzle" and a giant pitch for something paid, that's a problem. You're probably not going to get many sales for your paid course, and no one's going to refer others to the free course.

But if it's valuable independently of the premium course, and allows the reader to determine if it makes sense to go pro, then it's a win-win for all involved. At the end of my course, I ask people to reply back with what they got out of the free course and what they plan on changing as a result of it — I get a fair amount of awesome responses (which turn out to be great testimonials) from this last email: http://i.glui.me/1A3VNtx

I can vouch for this. Not with the emails, but came across bdunn's free blog and podcast 2 months ago. They earned me an extra $8,000 last month, and a better end product for my client. Spending a fraction of this to get more advice (the paid course) was a no brainer.

(Brennan, feel free to use as testimonial / ask me to elaborate.)

That's great! We're actually running weekly profiles on people who have used my advice to help grow their business, and I'd love to feature you. Here's the link: http://doubleyourfreelancing.com/student-success-spotlight-a...

If you learn what you need to on the free course, I'm fine with you not buying the paid course (I've told many people not to buy the course if I don't think it's right for them). The free version still has a ton of great information that's already helped the beta testers.

Forget what HN is telling you. They are complaining about your list yet they are the first ones to sign up for the next ruby/angular/whatever JS thingy is popular this week ebook mailing list.

Your logic assumes the measure of success is strictly binary, i.e., it either works or it doesn't. Another way to look at it : becoming good at something is a continuum and we're all at different points along the way. This is applicable to a lot more than freelancing.

How well the course works is not a boolean. The free course could be helpful. The paid course could also be helpful.

Yes, its way better than Linkedin's "free" premium trial, which despite being free wanted my credit card details.

The footer also says "BROUGHT TO YOU BUY" Not sure it was intentional or not, but surely reduces the trustworthiness by a lot and then some

It's not a scam, it's the freemium model.

Freemium is scam.

Yeah, it's like all those famous chefs who give their recipes away for free, and then charge money for a printed and bound collection of them... SCANDALOUS

No one is giving you free recipes saying that they will make you a successful and rich chef. He is giving a free course saying it will make you a good freelancer...but if the free course achieves that, what more can a paid version teach you?

Guess what. People who are really going to be successful are out there working their asses off instead of reading "programmer's self-help" ebooks.

Interesting claim. Do you mind elaborating on your thought process?

Horrible might be overstating it, but I did get the feeling you're referring to. "This person is purporting to want to help me, but is probably actually buttering me up to sell me something."

Like it or not, this approach is popular and effective, b/c email is the killer app.

There are plenty of businesses using the same model. No one complains too much about them.

How would you go about selling an online course? Specifics would be great.

Well, I would start by telling my customers that I have this great course and it's going to cost X dollars. I would also say what this paid course entails, what the chapters are, what I am going to learn etc. Instead, he is offering a "free email course" and only at the very bottom of the page, in gray font, he does say that there will be an option to buy a paid version at the end. No price, no details, absolutely nothing. That's something that I wouldn't do.

Those who might consider your paid course would only have the persuasiveness of your sales site to go off of. By offering a free email course, you're able to figure out whether Paul's capable of providing you value. If he is, he'll have a call-to-action that upsells you on his paid course which provides even more value.

There's nothing at all wrong with this formula, and IMO it's much "safer" for the buyer.

There's a big ol' "Brought To You By" link at the bottom of the page that links to exactly the type of page you're describing, complete with a very well done explainer video.

It's almost as if this course isn't for you, and you've self-selected your way out of wanting it. Fancy that.