In Episode 165 of The Proven Entrepreneur, host Don Williams engages Justin Allan Montgomery, founder of ProCourseStart, in a discussion about building a high-demand continuing education (CE) business. The episode, published July 3, 2026, highlights how CE courses for licensed professionals offer a recession-resistant model in a saturated e-learning market. Montgomery argues that while generic online courses face skepticism, CE courses benefit from legally mandated demand, making them uniquely durable.
Montgomery details a strategic approach to launching, marketing, and scaling a CE course business. He emphasizes that licensed professionals—such as dentists, lawyers, chiropractors, electricians, and nurse practitioners—represent a built-in, repeat-buyer market. He advises using AI tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude to validate a course idea before investing in development. Montgomery recounts his audience-first model with his first company, The Elite Nurse Practitioner, and breaks down a $10,000 startup budget: roughly $3,000 on product build and $7,000 on marketing.
Montgomery is candid about the realities of online course businesses, particularly the myth of passive income. 'There's no such thing as passive income. I'm sorry. There just isn't,' he tells Williams. He explains that even his eight-figure CE business required about ten hours per week of active input while generating $250,000 to $300,000 in monthly course sales, with some Black Friday months topping a million dollars. He warns aspiring creators: 'You really need to spend more time developing your idea, developing your value proposition, identifying the problems that you're gonna solve. You need to spend more time on that than you actually spend building the course itself.'
Montgomery's trajectory underscores his advice. He launched The Elite Nurse Practitioner in 2018, spent six months building an audience of roughly 3,000 nurse practitioners before selling anything, then generated $50,000 in his first seven days. He grew that audience to 20,000, 30,000, and eventually 40,000 subscribers without viral videos or a six-figure follower count. While operating multi-location men's health clinics, he realized, echoing a mentor's advice, that 'you can only build one bridge at a time.' He doubled down on CE, engineered an eight-figure exit, and retired at 39. He now runs ProCourseStart, offering a 15-hour evergreen course and a mastermind program at ProCourseStart.com.
The Proven Entrepreneur, hosted by Don Williams, delivers real success stories and tactical frameworks from operators who have built and exited businesses. Episode 165 is available now wherever podcasts are heard, and at provenentrepreneurshow.com.
