Courses

The Course product lets you create structured learning experiences using video, slides, text, and downloadable materials. Everything is hosted on your Sherpo site. Each course and lesson can be free or paid and includes progress tracking, completion data, and integrated checkout. If you want to see how Courses appear to users, check this guide:

---

​

Create a course product

1. Go to Products → New product.
2. Enter a title, subtitle, and short description.
3. Select the Course tile (video icon).
4. Click Create product to open the workspace.

From here, use the Settings tab if you wish to rename your course, add a poster, publish it, and/or change specific settings such as progress tracking. Before publishing, make sure you set a price. Courses support the same pricing options as other Sherpo products. For details on the Overview, Basic info, and Settings tabs, see:

---

​

Build your Course product page

Under Page Builder, you can fully customize how your Course page looks using Sherpo’s powerful, lego-like builder.

​

Course-specific blocks

Inside your Course page builder, you will see a Pages block where all lessons and chapters reside, alongside the “Get” and “Content” blocks. Like in every other Sherpo product, these blocks are mandatory and cannot be deleted or hidden. If not populated, they will simply not render. All of this is included by default in the Aside Column, which displays the blocks on the right. You are free to remove them from the column and position them wherever you prefer. Sherpo simply ensures that all mandatory blocks are present before allowing you to update the page.

​

Product-specific blocks

All product Page Builders include an additional Product block category. These blocks are specific to the product type and power the core functionality of the page. These blocks usually include:

• Get — The purchase or unlock interface for the product.
• Summary — A compact overview of product metrics or highlights.
• Review — Displays review ratings and feedback from customers.
• Pages — Lists internal pages such as lessons, episodes, or product sections.
• Content — Displays the files or content included in the product.

Like other mandatory blocks, some of these may already be included in your layout and cannot be deleted, but you are free to move them anywhere within your page.

​

Page builder

The rest of the Page Builder behaves exactly like the Site Builder. If you want to discover more about our blocks and building pages, check this out.

---

​

Manage lessons and chapters

Open the Lessons tab to build your course structure.

• Add Chapter creates a named section and its first lesson. Chapters group related lessons together.
• Add Lesson creates a new lesson inside a chapter or as a standalone lesson.

Each lesson can include video, slides, text, and downloadable materials. At a glance, you can see each lesson’s title, video duration, file size, and visibility status. You can add or reorganize lessons and chapters at any time.

---

​

Add a new lesson

Click Add Lesson to create a new lesson page. Each lesson has two tabs:

1. General for basic info and visibility.
2. Content for the lesson material itself.

You can rename lessons at any time.

---

​

General tab

Use the General tab to define the public-facing details of your lesson.

• Add a poster image (recommended 16:9, up to 5 MB). This appears as the lesson thumbnail and as a static frame before the video plays.
• Enable Publicly available to make the lesson accessible without purchase.

This is useful for introductions, previews, or teaser lessons.

---

​

Content tab

Add the main content of your lesson here.

• Video uploads support .mp4 and .mov files up to 5 GB. Sherpo hosts and optimizes them automatically.
• Slideshow uploads accept .pdf files up to 250 MB and display them inline.
• Description supports rich text, embeds, transcripts, and lesson notes.

After uploading slides, you can enable Downloadable slides to let users download the PDF. Downloadable slides do not include PDF security. If you need watermarking, upload the file as an extra resource instead. When finished, click Create or Save as Draft. For videos, slides, and files to upload correctly, first update the lesson and wait for the uploads to complete.

---

​

Add a chapter

Chapters help organize lessons into sections.

1. Click Add Chapter.
2. Enter a chapter name.
3. Click Add Chapter to save and create the first lesson.

Lessons can be moved up, added before or after others, or moved into a chapter if they were created outside one.

---

​

Drafts and publishing

Lessons can be either Draft or Published.

• Draft lessons are hidden from users but visible in Admin mode.
• Publishing a lesson makes it immediately available in the course.

You can publish or unpublish lessons at any time. When editing a draft, click Update to keep it unpublished or Update and Publish to make it live.

---

​

Course settings

​

Course-specific

Under Settings → Course-specific, you can control progress tracking and course behavior.

​

Progress tracking

• No tracking disables progress indicators.
• Manual lets users mark lessons as complete.
• On lesson open marks lessons as complete when opened.
• On content completion marks lessons as complete when a video finishes or slides reach the final page. Available on Pro and Ultra plans.

Progress is tracked per user and displayed in both the dashboard and the course view.

---

​

Add files and links

Files and links work the same way as in Download products: They will appear under the “Content” block.

---

​

Video security

Videos uploaded to Sherpo are protected by default.

​

Core protections

• Paywall enforcement restricts video access to users who have unlocked the course.
• Tokenized playback uses short-lived, session-bound URLs that cannot be reused.
• Domain restrictions ensure videos play only on your Sherpo site or verified custom domain.

These protections keep your content accessible only to legitimate customers.

---

​

Publish and sell

When your course is ready:

1. Set all lessons to Published.
2. Configure pricing in Prices and add coupons if needed.
3. Click Publish under Settings

​

Customer experience

Once published:

• Visitors can view the course chapters, lessons, and pricing.
• Customers unlock all lessons immediately after purchase.
• Access is scoped to each user account.
• Progress tracking syncs automatically.
• Sales appear under Product → Sales.

---

​

Best practices

• Keep lesson videos under 15 minutes.
• Add short summaries to each lesson description.
• Use On content completion for video-first courses.
• Update lessons over time. Changes apply instantly.
• Use public lessons as previews to improve conversions.

---

​

FAQ