Courses should be tweaked within a term. This is based on various feedback received from students, which may be in the form of test scores, emails, surveys, etc. Turn around on this feedback should be done quickly and communicated.

Instructors need to be involved in their courses frequently and richly. Students know the difference between an instructor commenting briefly to one interacting daily. Touch base with students frequently (weekly or even more often) will make the student that they are not alone.

Just dumping material on students can easily overload students and faculty. Planning a controlled release of information in a thoughtful way can eliminate much (if not all) of the overload felt.

Organization is a key to online classes. The clearer the structure of the class the less students will be confused and the less the teacher is going to have to deal with questions and workarounds on the backend.