Coaches, course creators, infopreneurs: selling online courses through a US LLC

Selling knowledge has a rare advantage: the product sells everywhere, in every language, with no stock and no shipping. It also has a constraint you discover at the first frozen payout. Stripe suspends an account with no company behind it, a platform asks for a W-8 or a tax ID, a US client wants a business invoice. The US LLC solves all three at once, which is why it has become the most common structure among coaches and course creators selling internationally.

What Stripe, Kajabi, Teachable and the others require

Every course platform relies on a payment processor, almost always Stripe. Stripe opens an account in the name of an entity and verifies its tax ID, address and bank account. With a US LLC you provide an EIN, a US business address and a Mercury or Relay account: the file is complete, the account is approved, and payouts arrive in dollars with no intermediate conversion. Kajabi, Teachable, Thinkific, Podia or Systeme.io then connect to that Stripe account, or to a PayPal Business account opened with the same documents.

Sell in dollars, get paid in dollars

A growing share of online program buyers lives in the United States, Canada, the Gulf and Asia. Those clients pay in dollars without a second thought, while a price in euros triggers exchange fees and card declines. With a US bank account you collect in your clients' currency, pay your tools and your Meta or Google ads in dollars, and convert only what you bring home.

Credibility with clients and partners

A program sold by a US company, with an invoice in the name of an LLC, a US address and solid terms of service, inspires more trust than a payment to an individual. Affiliate partners, guest experts and companies buying training for their teams prefer to contract with a company. An LLC gives you that status without changing how you work.

Taxes: what you pay, and where

An LLC owned by a non resident, with no office or employee in the United States, generally pays no US federal income tax on its profits, and a course sold to a client outside the United States carries no US sales tax. Your obligations in your country of residence apply, as with any structure. On the US side, what remains is the annual IRS filing, Form 5472 with a cover Form 1120, which we can prepare for you. A coach living outside their home country, or traveling for much of the year, gets the most out of this structure: our guide for digital nomads covers the details.

Which state for selling courses

Wyoming or New Mexico suit almost every course creator: low fees, no state corporate tax, owner kept off the public record. New Mexico does not even have an annual report. Delaware only makes sense for those planning to bring in US investors.

What the LLC Place offer includes

Everything a platform or a bank can ask of you is provided by LLC Place from the first payment: articles filed in the state of your choice, registered agent, US business address, EIN obtained without a Social Security number, operating agreement in English and French, help opening the bank account with a physical card, and tracking of every deadline. The annual IRS filings are available as an option and included in the Pro and Founder plans. You provide a passport and the name of your company. Everything happens online, in ten minutes of input, and your LLC is approved by the state within 72 hours.