We continue to build without guesswork. Starting this time by defining successful outcomes with the help of our customers.

Let’s get started:

When we pitched the idea of our cohort to our audience members we used the phrase:

“Have this idea of getting a small group together where I teach [X]. Is that stupid?”

We are now teaching the topic, live in our first cohort. Let’s explore what exactly that looks like.

We need first to define what the outcomes will be for the people you are working with.

You could easily come up with a list of outcomes off the top of your head. Or indeed use ChatGPT.

But you don’t truly know if these are valuable outcomes for your actual customers. How do you find these out? Well…you ask!

Now that you have a live cohort you can build with them rather than for them. It’s a shift in dynamics that will let you serve them far better and (as we’ll see in the next Part) also create a killer evergreen product.

Session Zero

Your first live session should be (for you!) reconnaissance gathering.

I like to run a short session zero as an introduction and information collection session. Then session one is where the core content comes into play.

Session zero should include thanking everyone for signing up and then a rapid fire structured roundtable.

Basically go around the participants and get them to tell the group:

• name

• their past experience with [your topic]

• blocks they’ve previously hit

• what they are hoping to learn this time that’ll make it different this time

• what success would look like to them

Keep it rapid fire and structured so all participants know what to say and don’t get flustered. Don’t let anyone relate their entire life story either - keep it zippy.

During the session provide your thoughts but this is primarily about them. Session zero is about letting them talk, meet one another and see that they are not alone in their problems. So keep it casual but don’t go into hardcore teaching mode.

Instead focus on capturing everything they say and (if possible) the language they use to do so. Better yet record the call and transcribe/summarise with AI. Zoom has this built in otherwise upload the audio to a third party service.

You can also do this with a survey in Google Docs but you won’t capture as much information that way.

Either way we’re going to adapt the cohort structure we made by feeding in what we’ve learned.

Go back to your AI generated cohort structure and use this prompt:

Analyse the collected information from my students. 
My objective is to solve these problems for my students and help them achieve their desired outcomes. 
Intelligently adapt the current cohort structure to allow me to do so.
[Collected information copy/paste]

Here are some example notes from a student about running workshops

If I run this (and all the other student information) through the above prompt ChatGPT will adapt my initial cohort structure to better suit their needs:

For example here ChatGPT has added in section on simplifying complex concept, building confidence and even personalised feedback on presentation skills. Those parts are bolded.

Basically we’re listening to what our students want and adapting the curriculum to them. We don’t assume we know best. We let them tell us.

Stay one step ahead

You’ll now prepare Session one. No more.

We stay one step ahead, one week ahead.

This isn’t because we are lazy. Quite the opposite.

It’s so that at the end of each session we continue to tweak and adapt to better suit what our customers need.

After each session reuse the prompt from above with this basic adaptation:

Session [x] is completed. Ignore any sessions including and prior to this session.

Analyse this additional collected information from my students. 

My objective is to solve these problems for my students and help them achieve their desired outcomes. 

Intelligently adapt the current cohort structure to allow me to do so.
[Collected information copy/paste]

This will fold new information about your students into the curriculum. But only into upcoming lessons. This lets you adapt week to week - we never need to set in stone but instead continue to tailor to what our customers need.

Get them where they need to go

For your first pass give it everything you’ve got. You need to get your students the result they expect.

If this hasn’t happened by the end of the cohort I’d genuinely recommend continuing with them until you have succeeded.

Will that take more of your time? Yes. But that extra distance will not only ensure fantastic reviews and testimonials but also help you work out what your product looks like moving forward.

In the next Part we’re going to “fix” our cohort into an evergreen course or product so it can be scaled. And to do that we have to nail this first cohort - even if it takes longer than we originally thought. It’s the right thing to do for your first cohort customers and for you as the business owner! Win-win.