Online Language Learning Course: An Ed-Tech Business Model Essay.

Market Overview of Online Education Industry in the United Kingdom

The chosen business model for this particular assignment is the online language learning course and the selected business model will be based on the ed-tech industry. Online education is growing at an alarming rate. Due to the impact of Covid-19, the education industry has got a big hit and the children tend to spend most of their time playing games and scrolling the social media which impacts their mental and educational growth (Kang 2021). As the schools have been closed due to the surge of worldwide lockdown conditions, it helps to promote such a business model for the online language learning course service industry. This innovation of online language learning course service will provide students to use their time more constructively (Medic 2021). They will be getting the opportunity of learning foreign languages under one roof with the help of highly proficient faculty. It has been studied that the parents are also searching for a certain set-up that makes their children learn about the proper usage of smartphones and time. Certain organizations provide almost similar kinds of services through the USP of the selected business model has specific criteria of providing adaptive vocabulary that is an innovative approach to the business model (Tseng and Chen 2020).

This business model will help the young children to boost their knowledge and also know 2 to 3 languages at a time will enable them to build a bright career in a multinational organization.

The online educational field in the United Kingdom is very much fragmented and the market growth of the industry is expected to cover USD 9.94 billion from 2021 to 2025. And it is expected to grow by US$ 585.48 billion within 2027 (Belogianni et al. 2019). The study of the online education field in the United Kingdom where more than 129,400 students have enrolled their name for the online education (Coleman 2021). From the above-mentioned statistical data, it can be said that the online education sector is growing. The proposed business model for this assignment is an online language learning course for children. In the current scenario, this brainstorming idea will allow the children to learn foreign languages under one roof and it will guide them to utilize their time for the subjective course (Linde et al. 2020). Here the consumer is the children and the customer is the parents. Being the customers, they also want their children to get proper guidance for learning new languages with added benefits of adaptive vocabulary and quizzes. The course will be designed in such a way that will provide authentic certificates after completion of the course. This course will help the students to enhance their creative skills and also get knowledge for using their time with electronic gadgets. The course will provide them with live classes and doubt clearing sessions after the course completion. The course will also provide loyalty membership and this loyalty membership feature will allow them to opt for offline classes and quizzes and adaptive vocabulary courses. The course will be based on German, French, Spanish, and spoken English courses.

Business Model Description

Figure 1

Source: (Linde et al. 2020)

As the chosen business model will be based on an online language learning course, technological use will be a must in this case. Technological usage in language learning courses usually helps to turn the students from passive learners to active learners and permits them to have highly profound and enhancing linguistic enthrallment. There are several options for the learners to learn and study their English language courses through the usage of comprehensive technological applications that can help the student practice and learn new languages without even connecting to the internet. This new innovative business model will be using several technologies to strategize the course module and the faculty will use the different applications to provide training on specific language grammar and the cultural norm of that particular language. This innovative course module has identified why such technology is useful for the learners. The main aim of providing the visual technological application to the learners is that through that technology, the student will be able to connect with the foreign land and the visual display will allow them to understand the life of the native and helps them to learn the language in a more interactive and lively way (Halili 2019). AI technology will be used for solving the purpose of visual learning. This kind of technological tool will also allow the teachers to assess the merit of the learners and the faculty members will be able to address the query of the student in more effective ways. The technological and AI  (Artificial Intelligence) use will make the student more interactive during the session and the prime purpose of the course will be solved by engaging the children in a subjective course (Raja and Priya 2021).

The technological usage will allow the children to access the course from their comfort zone and the course will be designed in such a way so that the learners can utilize the course as a flexible time. This innovative business model of online language learning course will be using the blended process of learning which allows them to avail of the course from both the two angles such as online and offline opportunities (Albiladi and Alshareef 2019). This course activity will also help the student to take the membership which will enable them for offline learning opportunities also.

Every language will be having different application interface for the learners. These apps will be updated regularly and one of the features of the apps will be containing the current events and news which will be unique to teaching the new languages. This will enable the student to get the taste of a real-life scenario amidst the virtual mode of learning. The audio listening application will be used in the business model to make the student understand the intonations and context clues that will be much helpful for the children to grasp the language even better. These respective apps will be containing fun activities to make the students understand the grammar (Zhou and Wei 2018). This business model will be using the google classroom to provide the online live session and it helps the children to engage in a collaborative way of learning.

Technological Usage and AI in Language Education

The Blue ocean strategy refers to the market of a product or service that renders in the market where there is low competition. Ideally, the blue ocean strategy can be recognized for a business marketplace where there is very less competition and also there are fewer issues from the pricing point of view. The blue ocean strategy stands for the representation of the continuous target of making the high product differentiation and also makes the competition irrelevant in the existing marketplace. The blue ocean strategy helps the startup to look for innovation and provide growth opportunities for the business model (Samrin, Irawan and Se 2019). The affordable price for attracting the target customers is the main aim of the blue ocean strategy.  Here the chosen industry is the online education sector and the business model will be dealing with online language learning courses.

Chan Kim?and Renée Mauborgne’s invented the Strategy Canvas model that works as a central framework tool and a strategic action diagram that is designed to show the blue ocean strategy for the chosen firm (Leavy 2018). It graphically represents the current strategic position of the organization in the existing industry and assesses the future scope of the organization in the industry.

Source: Author

The above graph will represent the blue ocean strategic canvas for the chosen business model. The horizontal axis on the blue ocean strategic canvas represents the competitive factors that the industry wants to invest and the verticle axis of the graph represents the level of offering that the consumers receive from the key competitive factors (Sabatinus and Utami 2021).  This values curve stands for the representation of the business’s overall performance based on the competitive factors available in the industry.

Several businesses use the Blue Ocean Strategy to create a place in the market. The blue ocean strategy is not confined to certain industries or sectors (Kim 2005). A marketplace for a product or service where the competition level is very less is known as the blue ocean strategy. This strategy relies around on locating a business in which there are few competitors and no price wars. in the current market scenario, companies are running for attaining market share and they are ready to go to any extent for capturing the market share. Whenever a product's price is under pressure, a company's operations are at risk. This occurs most often when a company operates in a competitive industry, often characterized as a 'Red Ocean’ (Norikun 2018). When there isn't much potential for expansion, companies hunt for niches or business opportunities where they can achieve an unassailable share of the market or 'Blue Ocean'. There is a blue ocean when there is the opportunity for higher profits because there is very little competition. By designing a product or service with exceptional characteristics, the strategy tries to capture fresh demand and render competitors irrelevant. Because of its distinctive features, the product or service can be marketed a little higher, allowing the corporation to make a lot of money.

Blended Process of Learning and Membership

Similarly, the chosen business model will be creating a blue ocean market for running the business. Although the market of online learning is highly saturated and many industry giants are offering courses for the students. Yet, it can be proved through certain valid points that the unique features of the business will create a place and makes the competition irrelevant. It has been studied that there certain companies that can be the competitors such as Duolingo, Babel, Brightwave, and Hubken Group. All these mentioned organizations are targeting the mass market and focusing on e-learning education. But the proposed business model is focusing on language learning dedicatedly and they are targeting a niche market, customer group that the business focuses on is 6 to 12 years old children. Due to the advancement of technology, the children tend to waste their time by using the technology, the main focus of the business is to guide the children on how to use their time in more productive ways and help them to build a good career by knowing multiple languages. 

The UVP (Unique Value Proposition) of the business model makes the blue ocean strategy more significant ways (Sheth 2019). The proposed business model is offering the customer's language course designed for the children in interactive and visual ways so that they can grasp the language very fast. Most of the businesses in the industry are offering the customer's course material through recorded class materials, sometimes it is difficult for the student to clear their doubt from the recorded class. The proposed business model is providing the customers with live sessions and extra doubt clearing sessions, and they can avail the of guidance from the faculty even after the course completion. Other benefits that the business is offering the customers are membership facilities and it allows them to get offline classes also with adaptive vocabulary courses as complimentary benefits.

These are the unique features of the proposed business model that makes the brand unique and will help to gain the customer's attraction and create the blue ocean strategy for the business by making the competition irrelevant.

The business canvas model is considered one of the strategic canvases that are used by entrepreneurs to represent, describe, and visualize the changing model of business (Carter and Carter 2020). It is also used to represent the business resources that are required for the start-up business and also to develop and document the existing elements. The terminology "business model" pertains to a company's revenue strategy. It specifies the commodities or services that the company decides to sell, as well as its target audience and any anticipated costs. For both new and existing businesses, business models are essential. They support new and growing businesses in securing funding, developing talent, and encouraging managers and employees. Established companies should modify their strategic plans frequently, or they will skip out on emerging trends and issues. Entrepreneurs use business plans to evaluate enterprises that they are intrigued by. The business canvas model is considered a high-level profit-maximizing plan for running the operations of the business in a particular marketplace or industry (Esgin, Ozay and Ozkan 2021). Value Proposition is one of the key conceptual elements of the Business Canvas Model. The value proposition stands for the description of the products or values that the business intends to provide their customers, the extra value so that they get attracted to the brand and intend to buy the product or service of the brand. It provides the business with an extra competitive edge to the organization.

Unique Features of Language Learning Applications

The business canvas model of the start-up should also essentially cover the estimated start-up cost, source of finance, target customers segment, and marketing strategy and also depicts the marketing channel used for promotion, forecasting the revenue stream of the business, and last but not the least the customer relationship. This business plan also provides the knowledge of key potential partners with whom they can tie up to earn the growth momentum for the business. Modern entrepreneurs have a business strategy model that enables them to meet customer requirements at a reasonable and long-term cost. Many businesses routinely change their business approaches to meet evolving business circumstances and market dictates. A business model illustrates how an enterprise develops, transmits, and captures value. As the entrepreneurs seek clarity about what they are doing, entrepreneurs must construct and improve a business model for their business model as well as share it with employees, collaborators, and other stakeholders. Furthermore, this marketing strategy will aid them in identifying new opportunities both internally and externally. A business model essentially contains 9 elements and that are as follows:

• Customer Segments
• Customer Relationships
• Exceptional Buyer Utility
• Channels
• Revenue Streams and Strategic Pricing  
• Key Resources
• Key Activities
• Key Partnership
• Cost Structure

This part of the project will discuss the 9 elements based on the proposed business model for an online language learning course.

Segmenting the customers is one of the key components of the business canvas model. There are many other brands available that are targeting the same sets of customers and offering language learning courses. But in the above-mentioned blue ocean strategy, it has been shown how this language learning course stands out from the rest. The brand has segmented its customers based on certain aspects and categories that are mentioned below:

Assessment of the target market is fundamental for any marketing plan since it offers guidance to the consumers and leads to the formation of marketing strategies (Kamaluddin 2020). The target audience for this firm is youngsters aged 6 to 12 years old, inclusively language learning courses designed just for them.

The prime focus of the business is to satisfy its customer's needs and demands and also to resolve the queries of the customers. It is a mandatory element and needs to handle as the customers are the pillar of any business (Sutrisno 2019). For this new business innovation of online language learning course, the start-up will be maintaining the customer relationship through the various channels. Here the main customer segment is the parents and they can get updates about the course materials and fee structure through social media postings and also from the company's dedicated official website. The website will have an FAQ section where the customers can post their queries, and also automated chatbot process will guide the parents to resolve their queries on a real-time basis. The brand will also connect with its audience through Youtube and Google Adwords so that it can meet its audience's requirements.

Exceptional buyer utility specifies a six-stage level to unlock the exceptional buyer's utility. The six stages of achieving the exceptional buyer utility factors can be described as Simplicity, Convenience, Customer Productivity, Fun & Image, and Risk, Environmental Friendliness (Serrano et al. 2021). This business model is offering its customers online language learning course with added benefits that helps the brand to create a blue ocean strategy for them in the existing market. The learning materials and course will be designed simply and that will be very much convenient for the students as the service is targeting not only the domestic students but also the international students. It will help the student to learn the language with more visual representation so that the learning method will be easy and it will enhance the customer's productivity. The course will also offer loyalty membership which is the core value the course will provide and this option will help the student to learn the language by solving fun activities such as quizzes and adaptive vocabulary learning. Also, students will be getting guidance even after completion of the course. Even this loyalty member will be offering the students with offline classes too. The course will be designed at a lower cost so that it will become affordable for all sets of customers.

Blue Ocean Strategy

The marketing channel in the business canvas model is one of the key elements. The marketing channels are specifically used to communicate, distribute the service, and for increasing the sales volume. There are many ways to reach the target audience. Business organization tends to reach the potential customer segment through a mixed channel such as the direct channels or the indirect channels. The direct channel can be classified into salesforce and website, on the other hand, the indirect channel is optimized as opening own store, partner's stores, and connecting to the wholesaler (Silvia 2019). These channels are usually used to raise awareness among the customers, enable them to avail of the service and also create a buzz in the market about the start-up business. Here the language learning course will be having a separate dedicated website to promote its brand and service. They will run the campaign on their social media pages so that they can connect with customers over there. They will also run YouTube and Google video ads and image ads that will provide the course details so that customers can be aware of the new brands. LinkedIn networking will also help to promote the brand and its service to the target customers.

The revenue stream can be broadly classified into two particles. These two can be such as one-time clients and recurring payments. The revenue stream mechanism can be varied from fixed cost to dynamic. Fixed cost can be defined as the predetermined pricing from the static parameter and the dynamic cost can be verified through the dynamic pricing from dynamic parameters (Abrate, Nicolau and Viglia 2019). Asset selling can be an option for earning the revenue streams such assets selling can be of the physical product or viable service selling. It can be of different variants such the subscription fees, membership allowance, advertising, and such temporary selling assets can generate a hand full of revenue for the business. Here in the case of the online language learning course, certain elements will be the revenue stream for the business such as course fees per student ( around for Spoken English £49 and for other languages £55). The total revenues earned for 6 months will for the brand £5375. The brand is expecting to reach the break-even points within 3months of the business.

To start functioning in the existing market scenario, the entrepreneurs need to have certain resources that can be physical, psychological, and financial resources. Every firm requires assets, monetary support, cognitive support, and human resources. These are the resources that permit the firms to serve the best service to their customers and sustain themselves in the market. The key resource for this business model is the highly proficient faculty members. The other key resources for the organization can be the online platforms and the engineers that will help to build the website of the organization and also helps in seamless operation in providing the classes to the children.

Key activities are considered as attributes that the organization contains to work and operate the business in the existing marketplace. Productivity, problem-solving, and infrastructure are only a few of the operations that various organizations concentrate on. Being in the online platform and providing the service through an online medium there are certain activities that the chosen business model needs to emphasize. The first activities that are focusing on the infrastructure and IT facilities and also supporting the current stakeholders of the organization. The most important aspect of the organization is to ensure that they are providing the value that they are promised to provide their customers. To ensure the classes are properly designed or not, to ensure that the number of conversions get increased from the social media post, and also to resolve the queries posted in the FAQ section of the websites.

Companies build alliances to improve their efficiency, reduce volatility, or expand operations. Strategic partnerships amongst non-competitors, coopetition—strategic alliances between opponents, partnerships, and buyer-supplier interactions are the four main kinds of partnership (Yulia et al. 2020). For this business model of the Online language learning course, the investors, the IT professionals, engineers, and the proficient faculty members can be considered as the key partners for the selected business model.

Every business incurs costs due to their operational functions though tha can be variable or fixed. All businesses, whether fixed or variable, incur costs as a result of their operations. They may also encounter scale and scope economies. Organizations assume their cost structures in two different ways: cost-driven, where all expenditures are cut as much as practicable, and real worth, where the priority is on expanding growth and profitability. Fixed assets, variable costs, economies of scale, and economies of scope are frequently considered in cost structures. Here in this case of the selected business model,

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