Getting Started with Thinkific

When you sign in to Thinkific, the first page you will land on is your Admin Dashboard. Consider this your "control panel" - from this page, you will access all of the parts of your Thinkific account.

From your Admin Dashboard, follow the steps below to get started on your course:

1. Go to Manage Learning Products (from the left hand menu of your Admin Dashboard)
2. Select Courses
3. Select New Course (in the top right corner)
4. Choose your Course Template
5. Name your course (don't worry, this can be changed later)

   Need help coming up with the perfect course name? Check out our free AI Creator tools! Simply enter your product description and get a list of viable options for you to consider.

Now you've got the beginnings of your course set up! Click through the steps below to continue your course creation.

Thinkific courses are made up of Chapters, which contain Lessons.

After creating a course, you'll begin editing it in the Course Builder. You can add lessons from the Curriculum tab, or you can use the Bulk Importer tab if you want to upload several files at once.

To add a new Lesson from the Curriculum tab:

1. Select Add Chapter
2. Name the Chapter, and select Save
3. In the new Chapter, select Add Lesson
4. Choose a lesson type
5. Name your new lesson
6. Add your content (how you do this will depend on which lesson type you chose)
7. (Optional) Configure the Lesson Settings

Explore the different lesson types in our Thinkific Lesson Types article.

Your course image and description will show up in link previews on social media, and in your checkout. It's like a tiny sales page for your course.

To update these from your Admin Dashboard:

1. go to Manage Learning Products
2. Select Courses
3. Click on the course you want to edit
4. Select the Settings tab
5. Select Course image and description
6. Upload an image for the card (760 pixels by 420 pixels)
7. Write a description for the card (Max 250 characters)
8. Save your course card

For more details, take a look at our article on how to Edit Your Product Image & Description.

The Thinkific Course Player is where students will view lessons, watch your videos, take quizzes, and more!

You can customize the Course Player with your personal branding by adding a logo, changing the color, and updating the font. 

To update your Course Player settings from your Admin Dashboard:

1. Click Manage Learning Products
2. Select Courses
3. Select Player Settings
   
   
4. Make your changes, and click Save

For more detailed instructions, check out our article on Creating a Course.

Thinkific Communities can engage your students in meaningful conversations — both with yourself and with each other. Communities can also be used to help drive engagement, and keep your students around longer! They can work in tandem with your courses or as a standalone product.

When you sign in to Thinkific, the first page you will land on is your Admin Dashboard. Consider this your "control panel" - from this page, you will access all of the parts of your Thinkific account.

From your Admin Dashboard, follow the steps below to get started on your community:

1. Go to Manage Learning Products (from the left hand menu of your Admin Dashboard)
2. Select Communities
3. Select + New Community
4. Name your community (don't worry, this can be changed later)

   Need help coming up with the perfect community name? Check out our free AI Creator tools! Simply enter your product description and get a list of viable options for you to consider.

Now you've got the first part of your community created! Click through the steps below to continue working on your community set up.

The Community Builder is where you can customize your community's name, community card image, and description; change the color, and update the font. To update your community from your Admin Dashboard:

1. Go to Manage Learning Products
2. Select Communities
3. Click on the ellipses (three dots) on the community card you want to update in the Community Builder
4. From the Settings tab, make your changes
5. Click Save

For even more customization options, check out Edit Your Product or Bundle Image & Description.

Each product has a landing page (sometimes called a sales page) created for it automatically. You can edit this page in Site Builder, which can be accessed from the Admin Dashboard.

To edit your product's landing page:

1. From the Admin Dashboard, select Manage Learning Products
2. Select either Courses or Communities (depending on which type of product you created in Step 1)
3. Click on the product you want to edit
4. In the top right corner, click Build Landing Page
5. Now you are in the Site Builder!

When editing a product's landing page:

1. Click Theme Settings to change the theme, add a logo, add your brand colors, update fonts, etc.

   Any changes you make in Theme settings will apply to your whole website!

2. Customize the Header for your product website
3. Customize the Banner section
4. Customize the Footer for your product website
5. (Optional) Add, reorder, or delete sections on the page

Check out Site Builder Sections for a full overview of section types, and learn more about setting up your landing page here:

• Build a Course Landing Page
• Build a Community Landing Page

Home pages direct your website's visitors to the right place. They're useful if you plan to create and offer more than one product.

First, decide if you're going to create more than one product.

If you plan on creating multiple products (whether that's multiple courses, multiple communities, or a combination of both), you will want to edit your home page in Site Builder:

1. From your Admin Dashboard, go to Design Your Site
2. Select Site Pages
3. Locate your Home page
4. Click the pencil icon to open Site Builder

For an in-depth guide see: Build Your Home Page

If you are creating only one product for now, we recommend using a home page redirect.

This will send visitors from the home page to your product's landing page instead, so you don't need to spend time customizing your home page. You can always remove the redirect later if you add more products! 

1. Following the first two steps above, select the page you want to use as your homepage redirect, and click the ellipses (three dots)
2. Select Set as Home

Learn more here: Understanding Home Page Redirects

Your site's name and Thinkific URL can be changed at any time, but it's best to set this up before launching to avoid confusing your students. You can change the site name and URL from the Settings page.

Agonizing over a name? Enter a brief description of your business and any relevant details, and this AI tool will generate 9 possible names for you.

To change the Site name:

1. From your Admin Dashboard, go to Settings
2. Under the Site tab, select Site Details
3. Edit the Site name field
4. Save your new site name

To change the Site URL:

1. From your Admin Dashboard, go to Settings
2. Under the Site tab, select Site URL 
3. click the three dots next to the current URL, and select Edit URL
4. Edit the My Thinkific URL field
5. Save your new URL

If you want to remove the '.thinkific.com' part of the URL, check out our article on how to add a Custom Domain.

If you will be offering your course or community for free, you don't need to do anything.

The default pricing for products is set to free, so you can skip to the next section.

If you want to sell your learning product, you will need to connect a payment processor:

1. From your Admin Dashboard, go to Settings
2. Select the Payments tab
3. Follow the instructions to set up Thinkific Payments, Stripe or PayPal

After setting up a payment processor, set a price for your product:

1. From your Admin Dashboard, go to Manage Learning Products
2. Select either Courses or Communities (depending on which type of product you created in Step 1)
3. Click on the ellipses (three dots) on the product card of the product you want to set pricing for
4. Click Edit
5. Select the Pricing tab
6. Select One-time payment, Subscription / Membership, or Monthly Payment Plan
7. Enter a price, and hit Save

Learn more about the different pricing options in Set Your Product Pricing (Guide).

Publishing a product makes it visible to visitors, and allows students to enroll. Products can be unpublished at any time, but this will remove access to students as well.

To publish your product from your Admin Dashboard:

1. Click Manage Learning Products
2. Select either Courses or Communities (depending on which type of product you created in Step 1)
3. Click on the ellipses (three dots) on the product card of the product you want to set pricing for
4. Click Edit
5. Go to the Publish tab
6. Under Publish Status, select Published
7. Save to publish your product

To learn more about publishing, check out:

• Publishing Your Product
• Hidden and Private Products

You can send your published course or community to anyone by sharing the link to:

• Your home page (which looks like https://yoursitename.thinkific.com, or your custom domain)
• Your product landing page (see how to copy your product landing page link here)
  
• Or share the link to your checkout instead!