Best online business courses teach you the skills and knowledge you need to run a successful online business. You can learn everything from how to build a profitable blog, create an online store, and market your products and services, to how to hire and manage employees, generate revenue, and build a scalable business.
Our Picks on the Best Online Business Courses
1. Business Foundations
Created by: University of Pennsylvania
In this Specialization, you’ll develop basic literacy in the language of business, which you can use to transition to a new career, start or improve your own small business, or apply to business school to continue your education.
During this five courses, you’ll learn the fundamentals of marketing, accounting, operations, and finance. In the final Capstone Project, you’ll apply the skills learned by developing a go-to-market strategy to address a real business challenge.
2. Entrepreneurship: Growing Your Business
Created by: University of Virginia
Growing a business needs a dynamic set of skills, ranging from leadership, employee management, strategy, planning, finance, accounting, ethics, accountability, and profitability.
Developed at the Darden School of Business at the University of Virginia, and led by top-ranked Darden faculty. This specialization covers challenges faced by private businesses, when they attempt to grow substantially.
It starts with common challenges and human resource issues faced by private business. It then teaches you essential financial accounting skills for entrepreneurs, such as creating and interpreting cash flow, balance sheet, and income statements to make financial health conclusions.
Related: What Is a Cash Flow Statement and How Do I Read It?
This specialization also presents an exciting new approach to values-driven leadership development in the workplace, in business education, and in life.
In an action oriented introduction to Giving Voice to Values (GVV), it is not about persuading people to be more ethical, but instead starts from the premise that most of us already want to act on our values, and we feel that we have a reasonable chance of doing so effectively.
It then discusses the emergence of a new story about business, contextualizing it within a societal framework.
Finally, it teaches you to write innovative business plans, by driving meaningful focus, forcing specificity, and bringing linkages between key business drivers to the foreground.
3. Strategic Leadership and Management
Created by: University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Through this 6-course Specialization in Strategic Leadership and Management, you will learn the fundamentals of effectively leading people, teams, and organizations and develop tools to analyze business situations.
In addition to building a conceptual framework for leadership, learners will develop and practice strategies for immediate impact. The Specialization covers the strategic, human resource, and organizational foundations for creating and capturing value for sustainable competitive advantage. Both within a single business and across a portfolio of businesses.
The specialization culminates in a capstone: a leadership and management plan where you’ll apply what you’ve learned to a business situation. With participation by one or more focal companies, the experiential and hands-on deliverable. The course will provide valuable practice and create value from the perspective of potential employers.
This Specialization is part of Gies College of Business’ suite of online programs, including the iMBA and iMSM.
4. Successful Negotiation: Essential Strategies and Skills
Created by: University of Michigan
We all negotiate on a daily basis. On a personal level, we negotiate with friends, family, landlords, car sellers and employers, among others. Negotiation is also the key to business success. No business can survive without profitable contracts. Within a company, negotiation skills can lead to your career advancement.
I hope that you will join the hundreds of thousands of learners who have made “Successful Negotiation” one of the most popular and highly-rated MOOCs worldwide.
In the course, you’ll learn about and practice the four steps to a successful negotiation:
(1) Prepare: Plan Your Negotiation Strategy
(2) Negotiate: Use Key Tactics for Success
(3) Close: Create a Contract
(4) Perform and Evaluate: The End Game
