What is your growth strategy for France ?
We plan to increase the number of French-language courses from 300 to 500 by the end of the year. Of our 14 million users, 200,000 speak French yet 80% of the courses that they buy are in English.
The idea is to create French versions of their favorite courses. The demand will drive the supply.
Which topics are the most popular with your French audience ?
As with most countries, France's top courses are about programming and software development. Yet our French audience is unique insofar as most of the I.T. courses are beginner level. Our biggest successes in France teach coding, mobile app development, video game engines like Unity, digital marketing, data science and machine learning.
How do you recruit new teachers ?
I look for individuals with knowledge of upcoming in-demand topics. For example, I contacted the highly qualified French data scientist Hadelin de Ponteves to teach an overview of data science in French. Yet not every expert has the desire or time to teach.
Most of our instructors are professionals and they are passionate about their field. Udemy is not like other MOOC platforms, which are very academic. That distinguishes us. Our most popular courses have a highly practical approach and teaching style.
What is your business model ?
For courses sold via our platform, we split the earnings 50/50 with our instructors. When they sell their courses directly, they keep 97% of the profits. Our earnings come from Facebook and Google marketing campaigns as well as teacher memberships. In the latter case, teachers take home 25% of the profits.
Who are your main competitors on the French market ?
OpenClassrooms creates free courses, provides mentors and offers fee-based degrees and certificates. At Udemy, we have positioned ourselves as a MOOC marketplace rather than a course creator. We may open offices in France one day.
Do you plan to offer certificate courses ?
No, that's not part of our model. However, some of our most popular courses could help students prepare for certifications.
