Teaching People AI — Building an online academy from scratch

[Remiremi]

What's the vision.

I have taught myself AI a couple of years ago then started a freelancing career.

Later, I trained data scientists for big companies in France. (IRL)

Now I want to help motivated people to get their dream jobs in Machine Learning / Data Science. (ONLINE)

Where am I today?

During the past five years, I have learned to:

• face to face sales
• freelancing
• funnel theory (a fancy way to say, I have watched a lot of digital marketing video during the past year.)
• code (Machine Learning)
• to build an online funnel with WordPress
• how to make my website fast enough for google's tastes (SEO)
• producing high-quality educational videos
• producing quick-and-dirty-yet-value-packed educational video.
• producing well-designed ebooks.
• sales copy basics
• write enticing and value-packed emails for my newsletter

What systems do I have in place:

• A functional WordPress site that can host online-courses and accept payments.
• A landing page connected to MailCheat(Chimp).
• 20+ people in my mailing list, I have sent 10 emails
• A legal entity and I pay my taxes.
• Youtube channel with 6 subs and one video.

Do you know what scares me now?

Customer research

I don't know why, but I avoided it for the last year.
I knew it's a key step to get to know your market. Yet, avoided it like plague.

Knowing your market is king. Especially if you have lazy tendencies like me.
Because the best way to have a good impact efficiently is to provide the help the people want, it saves a lot of time.

So why did I avoid doing my homework?

Is-it because I think I know what people need to learn AI?
Because I think I know what they want and how they feel when they face a wall of mathematical equations and cryptic lines of code?

Well, I have been there. I deeply know the struggle.
Yet I know this is absolutely insufficient.

So why haven't I done it yet?

Arrogance? — Maybe.
But ultimately, it's because I know deeply... It has always been an excuse.

Doing proper customer research is the first step of a real business.
It helps you create the right product, and to write copy with the right words.

The moment I would know what people want, I would have to start helping them.
No more possibility to procrastinate and watch one more course on Facebook ads, you know, just in case.
No more dolce vita, playing entrepreneur.



But yeah, I think it's time. I mean I have built all the pieces of the puzzle backward.

Product creation — Check
Writing mediocre copy — Check
Starting a mailing list — Check
Website and course platform — Check
Brainstorming a couple of different traffic strategy and verifying I was able to set them up — Check

There's only one thing left to do, discovering what people actually need and starting to help them.

I think it's time.

I don't think there's one remaining thing I can still procrastinate without feeling super-guilty.

Oh... wait. There's one more...

Do you guess how this thread was born?

Yup! I was working on setting up the survey, and thought;"You know what, let's start an execution thread. That will be interesting blablabla."

Not that the line of thought is wrong but, —



So what's the plan?

Right now, I don't know my market. I don't know who they are.
They hope, their fears, and their challenges? No Idea.

It's time to change that.

I feel strong resistance against putting myself out there, creating surveys, talking to people one on one.
So I am gonna do it, a lot.

I am gonna do it so much it will become a key part of my business.

Let's get to work.

I will update you when I will have obtained my first response.

 

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[Rabby]

Oh yay, I'm definitely following this. Two of my favorite things, machine learning and human learning!

There might be companies willing to enroll developers or data scientists in your courses. Or even a business intelligence consultancy that needs some online courses. Re-tooling or ongoing training for the technical people. Companies have to be thinking about how to take advantage of AI to keep their edge, right?

I'm interested in how Wordpress works for you as a course delivery system. If you get the chance. It could be valuable to quickly get a learning management system and front end web site up in one step, and not have to worry too much about how it's hosted.

I use Moodle for an LMS (in both companies now) which I assume is a little harder to work with, but incidentally has student success/struggle prediction AI built into recent versions. We're updating how we containerize and host Moodle right now, so feel free to message me if you ever need it for something.

 

[geronimo]

Avatar 1


Anchor: General public know about it from movies and youtube

Pain: Can be learned properly on Masters or PhD level ( multiple reasons, basic one being you need a prospect who aquired basic skills algebra, statistics and coding to begin with by that level ) this requires, money, time, discpline, developed interest in math, statistics, coding at young age, so majority of people already can not play on this level

Avatar is interested in it based on public knowledge of it to value signal smartness, additionally more then average salary and avoidance of menial jobs

Competition
Universities ( pain )
Free courses, 10$ courses, free youtube videos, of people using premade libraries, templates, gadgets, to... make their robot avoid something or recognize an object ( Simplification, mispresentation of actual bussines need and skills required )
Tools to crunch some data and present it in animated form ( Business analyst job, low paid, not science, mispresentation )


I would suggest your Avatar to be a
24-30 year male who completed a low level non university qualification in IT or Bussines, 1 year "diploma" or some low level undemanding cert in IT, "comptia", currently employed in blue collar job or can even be Call center or Support, or unemployed.

For Avatar 1 Try to make it fun, calculate Corona virus spread, you know what I mean, give all the code, premade libraries and toolkits or they will not stick around

There are other Avatars but this is the easiest one I can think of on the fly

 

[Remiremi]

Avatar 1


Anchor: General public know about it from movies and youtube

Pain: Can be learned properly on Masters or PhD level ( multiple reasons, basic one being you need a prospect who aquired basic skills algebra, statistics and coding to begin with by that level ) this requires, money, time, discpline, developed interest in math, statistics, coding at young age, so majority of people already can not play on this level

Avatar is interested in it based on public knowledge of it to value signal smartness, additionally more then average salary and avoidance of menial jobs

Competition
Universities ( pain )
Free courses, 10$ courses, free youtube videos, of people using premade libraries, templates, gadgets, to... make their robot avoid something or recognize an object ( Simplification, mispresentation of actual bussines need and skills required )
Tools to crunch some data and present it in animated form ( Business analyst job, low paid, not science, mispresentation )


I would suggest your Avatar to be a
24-30 year male who completed a low level non university qualification in IT or Bussines, 1 year "diploma" or some low level undemanding cert in IT, "comptia", currently employed in blue collar job or can even be Call center or Support, or unemployed.

For Avatar 1 Try to make it fun, calculate Corona virus spread, you know what I mean, give all the code, premade libraries and toolkits or they will not stick around

There are other Avatars but this is the easiest one I can think of on the fly

Hey I appreciate it, but the goal of customer research is actually to not rely on imaginary assumptions made on the fly

You seem to know a bit about the field, are you trying to start a career in Data Science?

 

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[geronimo]

Hey I appreciate it, but the goal of customer research is actually to not rely on imaginary assumptions made on the fly

You seem to know a bit about the field, are you trying to start a career in Data Science?

I created this Avatar by interacting with real people in the past, based on who they are and why they are interested, when I say on the fly, I meant, I am thinking as I type, I did not put more thought to it then it takes time to type it

I know a lot about everything, but very little about anything, I am just around long time, I am done with career, now I want to retire on Cyprus, recently got into swimming

 

[Remiremi]

I created this Avatar by interacting with real people in the past, based on who they are and why they are interested, when I say on the fly, I meant, I am thinking as I type, I did not put more thought to it then it takes time to type it

I know a lot about everything, but very little about anything, I am just around long time, I am done with career, now I want to retire on Cyprus, recently got into swimming

Then thank you very much for sharing @geronimo

By any chance, do you remember some key phrases or notable mindset this avatar used to say about their journey getting into the field?

 

[geronimo]

Big Data, Data Science, Machine Learning/AI, this Avatar would readily invest/comit into any of 3 fields, interchangable, mindset is expectation they either imagine themselves under Tutorship of someone senior who they will assist, or part of the team were they will try new and fun things.

There is also lot of misunderstanding of term Big Data, market believes "Big" is any dataset, they don't understand what really big is "Big" to be called big, and challenges around it.

But at same time would readily take Business Analyst job and produce powerpoint presentations.

This is actually heavily influenced by mainstream presentation of the fields, "learn it in 3 months having fun".

From that I draw, there is misunderstanding what are problems and challenges they will work on. This is opportunity to make it look more sexy, fun, attractive, accessible, then it really is, just don't mention algorithams in your copy

 

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[S.Y.]

Sub

I am making my way in the advanced and augmented analytics field.

Question on the training data scientist field. Analytics seem to be the area where people can make the most impact immediately. Vs the sexy ml/dl stuff. What is your opinion on that?

Tagging @ChrisV too

 

[Remiremi]

Sub

I am making my way in the advanced and augmented analytics field.

Question on the training data scientist field. Analytics seem to be the area where people can make the most impact immediately. Vs the sexy ml/dl stuff. What is your opinion on that?

Tagging @ChrisV too

Hey, my take on this is for 99% of the business out there (those which are not AI -first), the first step is to hire a skillful Data Analyst who will start digging into the data to estimate wtf is possible in a company.

So I agree with your idea that "Analytics seem to be the area where people can make the most impact immediately. "

Most of the time companies are so behind that just a few well-crafted SQL queries can generate huge value. for the business.

Basically the roadmap for any business who has never done any Data stuff before is the following.

1st Step / Advanced and Augmented analytics
Prerequisites: Hiring a Senior Data Analyst.
I wrote senior and it's not a typo, don't hire an unpaid intern to do your data analysis, it's like hiring an unpaid intern to do your marketing...

- Generate insights from existing data. (Low hanging fruits)
- Understand which data streams could exist in the business.
- Establish a potential data strategy. (to transition to next step.

2nd Step / Data Engineering
Prerequisites: Previous valuable data analysis has been conducted. The ones who did it are available to report/collaborate with a Data Engineer. Hire a Senior Data Engineer .

- Prepare the collection and storage of quality data streams for future harvesting.
- Data is sorted between "can be valuable" stored in a Data Warehouse, and "we have no clue if will be usable but we keep it just in case" stored in a Data Lake.
- Views of business tables are created to allow analysis team to work heavily without crashing the main business functions.

3rd Step / Data Science / Machine Learning R&D
Prerequisites: Data pipelines are in place, collecting data for harvesting. Hire a Lead R&D Data Scientist.

- Congratulation you unlocked the sexy stuff everybody is talking about, you can now hire a Lead Data Scientist or Lead ML Engineer to create gold Data/AI products.
​

Hope it clarifies!

PS: @S.Y. , I am really curious, can you tell me more about what you mean by making your way in the advanced and augmented analytics field please?

 

[Vincent_Vega]

Another question: How long did it take you to get proficient in AI/ML? All self taught?

 

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[Remiremi]

Another question: How long did it take you to get proficient in AI/ML? All self taught?

I have learned code (C/JAVA) *** , a bit of Linux and undergrad mathematics in Uni.

I have learned all the AI/ML stuff with online resources, self-taught. Also learned Python online.

From zero (I just knew python, but learned it without knowing I wanted to do AI one day. didn't even know what AI was actually), took me 4 months to get an internship as a Machine Learning Engineer (6 months), then got back to online resources to solidify my knowledge and skills, took me around a year before starting freelancing (a huge part of it was the fear of starting a freelance activity, skill-wise I could have started sooner, but can't separate abilities from mindset can't we?).

TLDR: self-taught, took me two years from zero to start freelancing in deep learning.

I am curious, why do you ask?

*** : when I think about it, the programming course I had at uni were bad and I actually learned to code with online courses.

 

[Rabby]

@WillHurtDontCare tag

 

[S.Y.]

@S.Y. , I am really curious, can you tell me more about what you mean by making your way in the advanced and augmented analytics field please?

Take it as I am researching the field and thinking of ways I can build something that adds values to businesses.

I see a lot of potentials there. Specially on augmenting insights generation.

Say you have data, you have an "AI" pipelines doing a bunch of magic. Instead of:
- reporting it with a traditional dashboard or
- having analysts review the data and then sharing to the appropriate stakeholders or
- training people

what if you have something that automatically sends the right insights to the right people?

The best way to describe it having a "chatbot", but one that crunch data and look for contextual insights. The CEO will get something different, the marketing manager something else, the CIO also... but all that in a "story" way.

Dont really know if it is feasible but hey....

 

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[MattPo]

I have learned code (C/JAVA) *** , a bit of Linux and undergrad mathematics in Uni.

I have learned all the AI/ML stuff with online resources, self-taught. Also learned Python online.

From zero (I just knew python, but learned it without knowing I wanted to do AI one day. didn't even know what AI was actually), took me 4 months to get an internship as a Machine Learning Engineer (6 months), then got back to online resources to solidify my knowledge and skills, took me around a year before starting freelancing (a huge part of it was the fear of starting a freelance activity, skill-wise I could have started sooner, but can't separate abilities from mindset can't we?).

TLDR: self-taught, took me two years from zero to start freelancing in deep learning.

I am curious, why do you ask?

*** : when I think about it, the programming course I had at uni were bad and I actually learned to code with online courses.

Hi @Remiremi

thanks for opening this thread and the description of your journey. Super Interesting. Myself, I have studied Physics and I'm thinking about transitioning into Data Science as I love to solve problems! Reading your post, the transition could take like 6-8 months, I believe. I also think data science is the future: getting clearity and insights from the data noise/ chaos with help of data science is getting more and more important as the C-Level won't be able to trust their intuition to make good business decisions in a world getting more and more complex.

I have found this diagram quite helpful:


Do you have a defined business domain for you as freelancer? Is there a demand/need for AI / Data science education mixed with your domain expertise?

 

[IndolentFastlanr]

Hi,



Questions:

What sort of delivery system do you use for lessons? (email click funnel?)

Did you build the site yourself or did you pay someone/ use an established (e.g. Squarespace/shopify/wordpress with plugins) system?

Do you do zoom calls to teach? e.g. face to face teaching or pre-written coursework?

Would you be able to share your website?


Regards,

I

 

[Remiremi]

What's the vision.

I have taught myself AI a couple of years ago then started a freelancing career.

Later, I trained data scientists for big companies in France. (IRL)

Now I want to help motivated people to get their dream jobs in Machine Learning / Data Science. (ONLINE)

Where am I today?

During the past five years, I have learned to:

• face to face sales
• freelancing
• funnel theory (a fancy way to say, I have watched a lot of digital marketing video during the past year.)
• code (Machine Learning)
• to build an online funnel with WordPress
• how to make my website fast enough for google's tastes (SEO)
• producing high-quality educational videos
• producing quick-and-dirty-yet-value-packed educational video.
• producing well-designed ebooks.
• sales copy basics
• write enticing and value-packed emails for my newsletter

What systems do I have in place:

• A functional WordPress site that can host online-courses and accept payments.
• A landing page connected to MailCheat(Chimp).
• 20+ people in my mailing list, I have sent 10 emails
• A legal entity and I pay my taxes.
• Youtube channel with 6 subs and one video.

Do you know what scares me now?

Customer research

I don't know why, but I avoided it for the last year.
I knew it's a key step to get to know your market. Yet, avoided it like plague.

Knowing your market is king. Especially if you have lazy tendencies like me.
Because the best way to have a good impact efficiently is to provide the help the people want, it saves a lot of time.

So why did I avoid doing my homework?

Is-it because I think I know what people need to learn AI?
Because I think I know what they want and how they feel when they face a wall of mathematical equations and cryptic lines of code?

Well, I have been there. I deeply know the struggle.
Yet I know this is absolutely insufficient.

So why haven't I done it yet?

Arrogance? — Maybe.
But ultimately, it's because I know deeply... It has always been an excuse.

Doing proper customer research is the first step of a real business.
It helps you create the right product, and to write copy with the right words.

The moment I would know what people want, I would have to start helping them.
No more possibility to procrastinate and watch one more course on Facebook ads, you know, just in case.
No more dolce vita, playing entrepreneur.

View attachment 34582

But yeah, I think it's time. I mean I have built all the pieces of the puzzle backward.

Product creation — Check
Writing mediocre copy — Check
Starting a mailing list — Check
Website and course platform — Check
Brainstorming a couple of different traffic strategy and verifying I was able to set them up — Check

There's only one thing left to do, discovering what people actually need and starting to help them.

I think it's time.

I don't think there's one remaining thing I can still procrastinate without feeling super-guilty.

Oh... wait. There's one more...

Do you guess how this thread was born?

Yup! I was working on setting up the survey, and thought;"You know what, let's start an execution thread. That will be interesting blablabla."

Not that the line of thought is wrong but, —



So what's the plan?

Right now, I don't know my market. I don't know who they are.
They hope, their fears, and their challenges? No Idea.

It's time to change that.

I feel strong resistance against putting myself out there, creating surveys, talking to people one on one.
So I am gonna do it, a lot.

I am gonna do it so much it will become a key part of my business.

Let's get to work.

I will update you when I will have obtained my first response.

Well time for an update!

At the beginning I tried to do survey and to ask questions on forum.

It was interesting but not very game changing.

Then today, I got on the phone with one of my customer, for 90 minutes.

Omg.

This was so interesting! I have so many ideas of how I can help more and have a bigger impact.

Getting on the phone is GOLD. If you never did, do it really.

I have two more calls planned.

I will update you about the results of what I did with those gems in about a month.

Tldr: GET ON THE PHONE WITH YOUR AUDIENCE IT'S WORTH EVERY MINUTES.

 

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