Online Tutor Earning Potential
How much you make as an online tutor depends on whether you use a tutoring platform, which platform you use, or if you work solo. Some platforms allow you to set your rates, while others pay an average of $16 to $30 per hour.
Tutors with further experience and qualifications can earn as much as $60 per hour on platforms like Wyzant. However, if you're just starting out and don't have much background, it's probably wise to keep your rates low to start.
Requirements to Become an Online Tutor
To become an online tutor, you need to make sure you have the right skills and experience to provide a quality education. That's why it's important to have a solid educational background in the subject you want to tutor. Many platforms prefer candidates with a college degree or relevant certification. As long as you're passionate about providing a great education and have something to share, you're all set.
Depending on where you're based, you might also need to meet legal requirements like background checks or additional certifications. Either way, you'll need to be a great communicator and patient to explain concepts clearly and guide students without rushing. Plus, you'll need reliable tech, like a computer, webcam, mic, and a stable internet connection, since you'll be tutoring online. Some experience with platforms like Zoom and Skype can be a big plus, too.
Overall, being flexible with your schedule and ready for anything can mean you're not limiting your earning potential, allowing you to work with students in different time zones.
How to Become an Online Tutor
Choose Your Subject Topic
Subject
Most online tutors already have a specific subject or area that they are interested in or have a good educational background in. Having the knowledge and experience to back up your tutoring services will help you attract students in the long run, as you'll be seen as more trustworthy. Subjects range from languages, math, and science to marketing, programming, and public speaking, so don't be discouraged if your subject is very specific.
Level
When choosing a subject, it's also crucial to consider the level at which you'll be teaching. Defining the appropriate skill level is key, as it will allow you to create a targeted lesson plan and effectively reach the right audience.
Conduct Market Research
Audience
To give your tutoring service the best shot at success and attract more students, try to understand your audience's needs by asking: What do they like? What are their interests? What difficulties are they having with this subject?
Once you know the answers to these questions, you'll be able to create more engaging and interesting lessons for your students, get positive reviews, and keep people coming back. For instance, if you're aiming for a younger crowd, you might want to consider a curriculum that's visual, interactive, and video-led.
To start researching your audience, you could:
- Check out forums like Quora, The Student Room, StudentNet, and Reddit to see if people are discussing your subject.
- Listen to podcasts, watch YouTube videos, and read blogs created by people in your target audience.
- Create and share surveys and polls using SurveyMonkey and Google Forms to ask specific questions about your topic and audience.
Competing Tutors
Checking out the competition online is a handy way to get a feel for who they're targeting with their services. You can also read reviews from students to work out what they liked and didn't like about the tutoring process.
Find Your Audience
Becoming an online tutor and finding your audience is possible in a couple of different ways. Either you register with an online tutoring platform to find students, or you could set yourself up as an independent online tutor and create your own website to promote yourself.
Select Your Online Platform
Starting out as an online tutor through an online platform is a great option for beginners. The platform handles the legwork of connecting tutors with students by sharing their profiles with a wide and diverse audience. What’s more, they also help with managing payments, providing infrastructure for messaging directly through the site, as well as built-in teaching materials, like whiteboards and screen sharing. Some of the most popular online tutoring platforms out there are:
| Rates | Subjects | Fees | |
| Preply | You set your rates | Mainly languages | Initially 33% of earnings |
| Tutor.com | Set hourly rate | Academic subjects | None |
| Pear Deck Tutors | $16 per hour | Any subject | None, or premium for $149 per year |
| Skooli | $0.65 per minute | Kindergarten to 12th grade and college student subjects | Charge a percentage commission depending on your earnings |
| Wyzant | You set your rates | Academic and non-academic subjects | 25% of earnings |
| SuperProf | You set your rates | Any subject | None |
When choosing your online platform, it's also important to think about how easy it is to use, what support it offers to tutors, and its cancellation and refund policies. This way, you can make sure you're not missing out on valuable earnings if a student cancels at the last minute.
Get Started as an Independent Tutor
For those looking for more independence, becoming an online tutor without joining a platform will require a little extra effort. This means you'll need to create your own website using platforms like WordPress or Squarespace to show off your experience and passion for tutoring. You'll also have to set up systems for lesson scheduling, payments, and choosing video conferencing software like Zoom or Skype.
Finally, promoting services independently is more challenging because you don’t have access to the audience on tutoring platforms. However, platforms like Upwork, Fiverr, LinkedIn, and Craigslist can help reach a wide audience and still advertise to potential students.
Create Your Tutoring Plan
Tutoring requires a lot of flexibility and adaptability when teaching, depending on your student’s previous education and skills. That said, it’s still vital to come up with a plan, so you can stay on track and help your students fulfill their learning goals.
Establish a Lesson Plan
A basic lesson timeline is a surefire way to keep you and your students on track. Depending on your student’s previous education, you could put together three different lesson plans: beginner, intermediate, and advanced. Each stage can have its separate lessons with clear, direct goals and objectives. Like if you were tutoring algebra, you could put together a tiered lesson plan like this:
- Beginner: Introduction to Algebraic Expression: by the end of the lesson, students will understand how to identify and evaluate simple algebraic expressions with one variable.
- Intermediate: Solving Linear Equations: by the end of the lesson, students will be able to solve one-step and two-step linear equations.
- Advanced: Solving Quadratic Equations by Factoring: by the end of the lesson, students will be able to solve quadratic equations using factoring.
It would also be useful to roughly estimate how long each lesson will be before you start. Online tutors usually offer lessons in an hour-long slot, but they can be longer or shorter depending on the difficulty of the topic. Either way, each lesson you teach should build on the previous one and lead up to a final goal.
Create Some Content
Once your lesson plans are in place, focus on creating engaging content and activities to keep students engaged. While some platforms provide teaching resources, designing your own can add a personal touch with tools like Quizlet to create pop quizzes, Canva for fun infographics or fact sheets, and PowerPoint for presentations. On the other hand, including games, puzzles, and interactive exercises can make lessons more dynamic. By keeping your content varied and fresh, you can keep classes fun and exciting for students and enhance their learning experience.
1-to-1 or Group Tutoring
The content and lesson plan will depend on whether the tutoring is one-to-one or in a group setting. Many platforms are designed for one-on-one tutoring, which allows for more personalized classes that can be adjusted based on each student's needs. This often requires regular tweaks to the lesson plan over time. In contrast, group tutoring usually follows a more structured and consistent plan to accommodate multiple learners.
Promote Your Online Tutoring Service
Online tutoring platforms already do the first job of promoting your profile to a big audience, through their website. However, there are a few additional marketing and promotional tactics you can take advantage of to increase the number of students signing up for your classes.
Write an Impactful Bio
It's key for online tutors to get their bio right because it's the first thing students see when they're looking for a pro to help them out. A great bio shows off the tutor's qualifications, teaching style, and expertise, which helps build trust and credibility.
Plus, it lets students see if the tutor is a good fit for their learning needs and goals. On top of that, a great bio can help a tutor stand out in a competitive market, attract more students, and boost enrollment.
Utilize Social Media
There's no doubt about it: social media is a great way to get the word out about your services. You can create fun and snappy videos, posts, or even set up a separate social media account just for your online tutoring work.
Write Blog or Website Posts
Websites and blogs can help in promoting your tutoring services by writing posts related to your specific subject. It'll show that you know your stuff and can be a valuable and trustworthy tutor. Plus, if you have an email sign-up form on your website or blog, it can also help you grow your email list.
Email Marketing
For new students, consider sending a welcome email thanking them for joining and offering updates on new content. Exclusive content can also be shared, highlighting recent developments in the subject area through a blog or newsletter.
Post in Forums
Forums such as The Student Room, StudentNet, RedditEducation, and Education Observer are useful for reaching students who are actively looking for tutoring. Posting to subject-specific forums, such as coding-focused discussions, allows for targeted promotion and engagement with a relevant audience.
Search Engine Optimization
Using marketing tools such as SEO (Search Engine Optimization) techniques can significantly increase your visibility. By applying these methods to your website or blog, you can increase traffic and draw in more students.
Encourage Reviews and Feedback
Encouraging students to leave reviews and provide feedback is essential to building credibility. Positive reviews not only attract more students but also provide insight for continuous improvement.
The Summary
To wrap things up, there are a few key steps you can take to make sure you succeed as an online tutor. We've looked at how to choose a subject based on your expertise, do thorough research to understand your target audience's needs, and create engaging and educational lesson content.
Mastering these basics lays the foundation for a successful and fulfilling online tutoring career. By creating engaging lessons and effectively marketing your services, a thriving digital classroom can lead to both satisfied students and a decent profit.
