TalkWell Academy — self-guided course site
A site for Beyond The Masks, a ten-module self-guided course by Kamarun Kalam, a BACP accredited psychotherapist with 25+ years of practice. It sells the course, gives away Module 1, and handles checkout and sign-in.
Self-development courses lean hard on countdown timers, hidden prices and big transformation promises. This audience is people who already spend their lives adapting to what others want from them. A site built on pressure would be doing to them exactly what the course is about.
Persuasion by transparency. £99 once in the header, Module 1 free with no card, the full syllabus published and credentials in the hero. A section tells some readers this is not the right time, and crisis numbers sit on every page.
Kamarun has spent 25 years as a psychotherapist, counsellor, family mediator and social worker. Beyond The Masks turns one question from that work, who am I underneath all the roles I have learned to play, into ten modules people can work through at their own pace.
We built the site in Astro, and most decisions on it run against the category. £99 once, no subscription, stated before anything else. The first module is free and identical to what is inside the paid course. A two-minute quiz, Which Mask Are You Wearing, gives visitors a softer way in than an email field. Checkout runs through Stripe, and returning students sign in with a one-click email link instead of a password.
The look is deep green, warm illustration and serif type sized for slow reading. The FAQ covers refunds in full, says plainly that this is not therapy, and answers the crisis question with 999, Samaritans and Shout. For this audience, turning some visitors away is part of earning everyone else's trust.