Courstore — a startup that helps experts launch and monetize online courses

The founder of Courstore shared how the project was created and the challenges faced along the way.

Rauan Syzdykov, 37 years old, Astana, founder and CEO of Courstore, @rauan.appasuly, @courstore

How it all began

The EdTech field became close to me in 2007 when I started my career in education. At first, I taught at schools and later at KBTU and KazNITU universities. Eventually, I took the position of Chief Digital Transformation Officer at Astana IT University. I also conducted numerous seminars and trained employees in PM and Scrum methodologies. At the same time, I freelanced on IT projects and startups as a UX/UI designer, PHP developer, and project manager. Later, I worked as CEO in several companies. Throughout this time, I dreamed of creating a marketplace for online courses.

In 2020, we decided to create a platform similar to Udemy for the CIS countries. Over two years, we realized that the marketplace model did not work in our region. After a series of CustDev studies, in 2022, we pivoted to creating a platform for online courses, an analog of GetCourse with its own features. This marked a new beginning: we opened another company, changed our positioning, and made our first sales.

After the pivot, only my partner Ruslan, the CTO, and I remained in the project. The project developed slowly but steadily. I was responsible for sales, pitching, and strategy, while Ruslan worked on functionality development. We learned to determine key client features through CustDev, which significantly accelerated our growth. I then started forming a sales department and expanding the development team.

Target audience

Our clients are infopreneurs, experts, teachers, and training centers. We offer a service with a convenient course builder and automated sales tools thanks to ready-made integrations with Kaspi payments and other acquiring systems.

At the moment, we are the only educational platform integrated with Kaspi. We have over 135 paying clients, 574 courses, and 24 000 students.

Acceleration programs

We participated in several acceleration programs, which helped us launch sales and improve our positioning. After programs by MOST and Scalerator at Astana Hub, we began entering the Uzbek market.

Challenges

The year 2023 was particularly challenging for us, both financially and emotionally. Numerous meetings with investors brought no results. Thanks to our perseverance and efforts, we exceeded monthly sales of $10 000. Plans to enter the Uzbek market attracted investors’ attention and secured a $55 000 commitment out of the planned $75 000. We are confident that we will soon raise the remaining $20 000 and close the funding round.

To aspiring startup founders, I recommend developing an MVP first and validating the business model. Let go of ego and recognize that there is always something to learn. Persistence, belief, patience, and timely work on mistakes will inevitably lead to results.

Achievements

In 2023, we achieved impressive results: the turnover of experts on the platform amounted to $1,2 million with 43 327 courses sold. The churn rate is only 5%. The platform hosted over 103 schools and experts offering more than 424 courses and 9 245 lessons. Our revenue grew eightfold last year, reflecting client trust and satisfaction. A total of 16 033 students were trained, and we reached 20 297 MAU.

Plans

In May, we plan to enter the Uzbek market, and in the summer, raise the next investment round to further expand into Southeast Asian markets and strengthen the brand in Kazakhstan.