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How to Build Customer Training Academy Using an LMS [Checklist + Tools] 

How to Build Customer Training Academy Using an LMS Checklist + Tools

Grab any of your 2-min Maggie Packet and look on its label back, there’s always a recipe for your delicious dish. They don’t just sell you a product but teach you how to make use of it.  

This is the purpose of your customer training academy — teaching customers about how to make the most out of your product. This educational process simplifies the complexity (too technical sounded) around your product & services & helps to advance leads further down to dedicated customer onboarding even creating a lubricative sales funnel. 

It’s high time! Surface the value of your product by educating your customers and letting them become experts in what they’re using. Because an expert product user is hooked to become your brand advocate. 

So, shall we start by understanding why you need a customer-training portal for all this education and how to build customer training academy using an LMS? 

Why Do You Need a Customer Training Portal?

Why do you need a Customer Training Portal

Essentially, you aim to create an academy for your customer to make them aware of your product, but, then why do need a customer training portal for that? Is it worth your investment? 

Every customer needs something more or less when they’re buying anything online, so it all drips down to the amount of information they have, supporting them in their buying decisions. In simple terms, you need an advanced approach to identify your user’s expectations, goals, nature of work, requirements at their job, etc to create a personalized learning experience.  

And hell no, you’re using excel sheets & data segmentation tools to accomplish that process, you need an intuitive portal. You need an AI-tech-driven portal that accommodates a few factors: 

  • Provides a personalized customer experience through Intuitive Onboarding 
  • Reduces churn by providing value-driven solutions 
  • Upsells your sales funnel 
  • Enables your users to become Brand Advocates. 
  • Increases Lifetime value (LTV) & customer retention rate. 

An expert user is like a loyal addition – they will see the value earlier in your sales cycles. Even if they’ll consider activating or up-gradation your higher-end services as your academy serves as a gainful experience, they will stick for longer. 

To upscale your educational bar, consider offering high-quality industry-related education. It will establish your organization as a though-leader or leader in your industry. Furthermore, it improves your position as a strong brand, attracting more and more leads & easy conversions. 

How Companies are Using LMS for Customer Training? 

High chance that you already have customer onboarding in place through various means — resource sections (blogs, ebooks, case studies, etc), an auto-responder email sequence, live webinar sessions, or even a live demo about your product use. Considering the time factor, these are time-consuming mechanisms to achieve any desired sales goals. 

You need to keep a constant tap on your customer’s life cycle and regulate your training process to enable an environment of self-paced learning. A dedicated customer training portal helps to tap such aspects by personalizing the right content mix to teach the use of your product until the customer reaches their “Aha!” moment. 

Segment the courses from basics to expert-level of your product. That’s exactly what Hubspot Academy does with its education academy. They created courses on how to use every tiniest feature of their product, resulting in users buying their premium features to explore more. 

How Do You Build a Customer Academy Using LMS? 

Let’s take the example of Articulate 360 academy to understand the need for a dedicated training portal. Now, you don’t have to align your goals based on these current academies, just a tap of how successful an academy can be for inclusive lead generation. 

This portal was built using Rise 360, a top-rated online course platform (application) and LMS. Rise 360 is a white-label solution with full-customizable features to educate the customer and train the employees or provide courses to a wide audience. 

Tips for an Effective Training Portal 

When we talk about tools that any organization can employ to create an effective academy – there is a wide variety to implement a training portal. Depending on your S.M.A.R.T goal set in to channel the purpose of your academy. E.g:- You can use tools to establish a knowledge hub. They have an integrated system, providing a range of features to achieve your academy goals. 

The Following are Effective Training Portal Features 

  • Lesson-segmenting capabilities 
  • Course-access restriction 
  • Interactive E-books 
  • Interactive Video Content 
  • Media Solutions (Visuals, Audio, Exercises, Quizzes, and Text-format) 

These features help enable a unique learning experience for your users and encourage them to upskill enjoyably. 

Quick Checklist to Build Customer Training Academy (Using an LMS) 

A self-hosted LMS can cost expensive range to set up, but a cloud-based LMS setup might cost somewhere lesser, comparatively. Even though purchasing a learning management system is essential for enhancing your training programs, if you’re hesitant to spend the time setting up your platform properly — your training initiatives may not succeed.  

We’re going to assist you in properly setting up your LMS today by guiding you through the checklist of an LMS setup, are you ready? (Sip up a coffee, you might need these pointers for later whiteboard sessions) 

  • Schedule a launch date 
  • Prioritize the first steps 
  • Define your KPIs 
  • Familiarize yourself with LMS 
  • Set up Integration 
  • Establish User Roles 
  • Set up Customer Portals 
  • Upload Relevant Content 
  • Customize Email Notifications 
  • White Labelling & Branding 
  •  Finalize Courses & Platforms 
  • Onboard & Enroll Users 

1. Schedule a Launch Date 

Choose a day/date when your platform will be ready to accept users. This is the first implementation step. So, let’s start from scratch.  

Yes, we are aware that the launch of your LMS is less significant than the launch of Elon Musk’s rockets into space, but setting a deadline will help ease the planning stage for a successful training program launch. All we want to suggest is to keep working with your team to choose a day on the calendar so that your business and the stakeholders are trained enough to keep their necks up. 

2. Prioritize the First Steps 

Prioritize to work on essentials (features, integrations, and learning resources) before launching your LMS. In other words, there may be some features, functionalities, and other course suggestions that might need a detailed inspection eye, not necessarily for the first launch of your training programs. 

3. Build an implementation team 

Some businesses will take up considerably more time than others, depending on several factors;  

  • Learning resources you need
  • The size of your business
  • The level of training delivered

Another thing to consider is that, if your company is getting started (startups), there are chances of hiring any full-time eLearning and training managers or specialized training managers that may get out of budget. For that situation, you can train your employees to implement the program. Start by sketching the picture through questions you need answers for, e.g.:-

Question to Ask to Form the Customer Training Program Implementation Team

  • Who will upload the content and who will produce it? 
  • Who will consult with and employ specialists to aid in the LMS’s setup? 
  • Who will write customized code for the LMS (if permitted)? 
  • Who is in charge of marketing the new training system to your stakeholders—customers, staff, etc.? 

We recognize that your company might have specific demands, so even if these are generalized questions to ask when assembling an implementation team, don’t be hesitant to add additional ones and make them more goal-oriented. 

4. Define your KPIs (Measuring Learner Performance) 

This step will make sure that as soon as your LMS is operational, your team will be able to assess learner performance right away. Moreover, your company and its trainers can quickly monitor learner progress by using analytics & reports in your LMS. 

5. Familiarize Yourself With the LMS 

In this phase, you’ve set a date when your LMS will be operational for registered users to access courses, and you’ve organized an implementation team.  

The exciting phase is about to begin, Sit tight!  

Entering the LMS. Depending on the size of your business, only a few members of your implementation team should be operating the LMS rather than the entire team.

6. Set Up Your Integrations 

Integrations are one of the reasons LMSs are such in-demand training solutions for hybrid training of consumers, employees, and other audiences. Through integrations, your company can link external 3rd party programs with your LMS, so that they can support your training requirements.  

Whether you utilize default features included in the LMS, it’s always worth checking with your provider to see if it can be connected while you’re setting up the integrations. 

Common Integrations in an LMS  

  • Google analytics 
  • Facebook pixel 
  • Hubspot 
  • Salesforce 
  • Other webinar solutions include Zoom, GoToTraining, and GoToWebinar. 
  • Accredited single sign-on (SSO) (for storing CEU and certifications) 

7. Establish User Roles  

Your LMS needs a systematic approach that clearly defines the access permissions and responsibilities that your trainers and admins have for learners. Just like in universities, when students take tests that are graded by professors.  

8. Set Up a Customer Portal 

Customers Portals acts as an exclusive training ground for various user demographics you are educating. Therefore, you can skip to the next step if you’re utilizing the LMS for internal training and are not interested in segmenting training by the department.  

But, in the case of B2B training, your team must create portals for each of your clients. While creating a portal, you should designate an administrator to run the training sessions for the group of learners being trained.  

9. Upload Relevant Content 

You have so far started building your training programs in the LMS and uploaded some learning resources, but you haven’t fully developed a course that is prepared for users to enroll in. If you faithfully adhere to this LMS implementation plan, your courses are currently in the form of outlines or drafts rather than finished products (training courses) that are prepared for distribution through internal and external channels. 

It’s now time to complete your training programs in the LMS to get everything ready for launch. 

10. Customize Email Notifications 

If you’re using a cloud-based LMS, you might already have an email notification system built into your platform, depending on your LMS provider. What are these LMS notifications for? 

4 Reasons Why to Use LMS Email Notifications

  • Sending out notifications to users to tap their learning progress. 
  • Updating your learning about new resources or relevant courses.  
  • Enhancing learner’s involvement in a course. 
  • Promoting new training and courses. 

The LMS can help you keep your learners more engaged and on schedule in completing their training programs. So, you must try to customize your email notifications according to your course requirements.  

For example, a trainee who enrolls in a course using your LMS ought to get an email including their account and password. The ones who need to reset their LMS passwords also require an email. 

11. White-Labeling & Branding 

Since many LMSs are white-label platforms, you may replace any vendor ties by attaching your logo and brand assets to the platform. Your user may feel more at ease when your training LMS is visually customized representing your brand (colors, graphics, and unique pages & URLs). 

Advantages of White Labeling: 

  • Enables a Learning Environment (customizable branded features) 
  • Hide vendor ties 
  • Provide personalized instructions 

Since each LMS is unique, find out what your provider has to offer in terms of white-labeling before starting to customize. 

12. Finalize Courses and Platform 

In this step, many of you are ready to click “Publish” and onboard your users. But since there are many factors responsible for the training to be successful — invest as much time as you need to detail your road map. 

After that, you can access templates to evaluate your training programs here, check that everything is functioning as it should, and polish all of your courses and learning materials.

13. Onboard and Enroll Users 

The team manager feature sells online staff training courses in bulk directly to businesses’ LMS eLearning platforms.  

Put your LMS to the test right now. Get your team managers to send out bulk direct mails to businesses “LMS e-learning platforms” and onboard them into the LMS system. Easily said than done, we understand, that’s why you might need a customer training onboarding guide to keep your process in flow.  

Aye, high time to launch your customer portals as well if you’re conducting external training. Make sure you implement the best practices you can go about onboarding users into the system if you haven’t already. 

Challenges for Making a Customer Training Academy  

  • Traditional customer training methods in different learning environments (Hybrid Workforce) 
  • Course promotion and Increased competition 
  • Lack of time or resources to finish objectives 
  • Failing to make a good first impression 
  • Using old training manuals  
  • Burning out your customer training team 

Conclusion

Educating customers is a continuous process. You might face friction points while establishing your seamless training program, but setbacks are meant to let you restructure your entire process & re-create using tools & strategy to evolve your entire organization dynamics.  

So, to ensure your customer training academy is helping your customers to understand your products & services better – Start with a Free LMS Demo to have a peek at how it shapes your training strategy in a personalized manner.  

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Blog Customer Training

Importance of Training Software in Customer Training

Importance of Training Software in Customer Training

Today, training employees is not enough for a company to succeed – training customers has become equally important. Yes, you read that right! That is why the point comes to know more about importance of training software in customer training.

Customer training has proven to be incredibly successful in customer retention. In fact, with the numerous benefits of retaining customers over acquiring new ones, customer training has become more important than ever.

Such a thing allows customers to be informed and educated about the products and services of a company and helps them make use of these to their utmost. When we talk about products, we are not referring to a pair of heels, and when we talk about customer training, we are not pointing out social media videos related to “How to carry your heels most comfortably?”

What is Customer Training?

What is Customer Training-Importance of Training Software in Customer Training

 

Well, it is all about making maximum benefit from tech products and SaaS (Software as a Service).

Based on the complexity of the product, the training can be completely based on the customer’s pace and in an easy format, such as user forums and FAQs.

In case it is complex, the customers may be offered an on-site demonstration as well. If you wonder why businesses are so invested in training software for customer training, wonder no more. In this blog, we are going to discuss the importance of using such software for training customers.

By the end of this, you will have learned a lot about customer training, examples of customer training software, what to see when choosing the software, and much more.

So without delaying any more, let us dive right in to know importance of training software in customer training.

Customer training is a kind of program, specially designed to aid customers access and utilizing a company’s services and products most efficiently. This covers a range of things, including tutorials for product setup, the onboarding process, and much more.

The major aim of all kinds of customer training is to aid the customers to make maximum out of a service or product and to provide them with the most wonderful experience.

In some cases, customer training also includes external parties, like partners and suppliers. In such instances, customer training is offered to them to make sure that they can utilize the products and services effectively, conduct demonstrations, and share their advantages of these to the potential clients on the behalf of the business.

If you are thinking about the best method of training customers, considering the wide variety of these, let us tell you – there does not exist a wrong or right way for such a thing. It all depends on the medium you opt for. Based on your consumer demographics, create a custom training program for your customers.

Do You Know the Key Trends in Customer Training?

Key Trends in Customer Training

 

With companies realizing the increased need for customer training, here are some key trends that you must know before beginning with a customer training program.

1. Increase in Training Budget

For businesses that sell software, customer training has always been an essential component. However, a common practice followed by them is to cut down on the costs associated with customer training every time they fell short of budget.

With the changing expectations due to COVID-19, positive customer experience became a priority for all businesses. This is why companies are investing more in customer training this year.

2. Self-Direction & Engagement are Priorities

Companies are now focused on providing the best customer experience. Based on the technology investment priorities in customer training, the majority is directed toward customer experience, which is 34% of the total investment. Followed by this are:

  • Virtual Reality (VR) / Augmented Reality (AR) – 24%
  • Analytics Tools – 22%
  • Content Management / Curriculum – 11%
  • Personalization – 9%

3. Adapting to Hybrid Learning Environments

With the hit of the pandemic, hybrid working has become the norm. The same is the case with customer training as well. These programs will progressively take place in hybrid and blended learning environments.

Companies will continue to make impressive virtual encounters that involve potential consumers in-person as well as online.

4. The Rise in Analytics: Customer Training Insights

With companies investing in customer training, the higher authorities must ensure that the investment has a positive impact. Thus, to gain insights into these, the use of analytics is rising. The data gathered for the same include:

  • Success rate
  • Behavior and engagement patterns
  • Usage trends
  • Usage details
  • Customer demographics

5. Mobile-Friendly Customer Training

According to a study, it has been estimated that in three years, about 72% of people will access the internet using their mobile phones. This is why companies have started to make their customer training mobile-friendly.

Why Do You Need Training Software in Customer Training?

Why do you Need Training Software in Customer Training

 

If you are reconsidering your choice of opting for training software for customer training, do not worry. Mentioned below are some of the reasons why using this can turn out to be beneficial for you and your customers. After reading these, you will be sure about your choice.

1. Higher Security

Using a trustworthy vendor for training software means a lower risk of data breaches associated with confidential information associated with customers and the company.

2. Developed Reporting

When you opt for training software, you get advanced reports regarding several aspects of customer training, such as the total number of customers who finished the training, and the test scores. This will eventually aid in understanding the overall impact of training on the objectives of the company.

3. Better Accessibility

The right training software can help your customers undergo training via any device, including Linux, Mac, Windows, Android, and iOS. Higher accessibility further means that your clients can make training a part of their daily life as well.

4. Effective Learning Abilities

The up-to-date training software can offer dynamic learning abilities, which makes learning more useful, engaging, and exciting. These can include:

  • Virtual machines
  • Self-labs
  • Two-way interaction through a live training that is led by an instructor
  • Providing recommendations for learning based on previous activities
  • Personalized learning paths

5. Intuitive UI

The most recent learning management systems offer a user interface that is intuitive, modern, as well as effortless to navigate.

Examples of Training Software in Customer Training

With continuous advancements in technology, various kinds of learning management systems and software are available for training customers.

So before we help you in identifying the best customer training software for your business, let us first have a look at some examples of customer training software.

1. Docebo

An e-learning platform that is scalable for meeting the needs of a business associated with customer training, Docebo offers a subscription-based Software as a Service plan. Organizations can also opt for a 14-day free trial to experience the working of the software.

2. CXcherry

Cxcherry makes use of an on-demand customer educational platform to enhance customer retention, generate potential clients, and build brand awareness. The AI-enabled LMS with consultative solutions, knowledgeable team, and Cxcherry culture offered by the platform is a one-stop-solutions for training solutions.

3. TalentLMS

TalentLMS is an eLearning tool, which is also cloud-based like Litmos. It provides an entire platform to businesses to help them grow and offer efficient training to their customers.

The software allows companies to perform a variety of tasks, such as offering certification tests, managing customers, carrying out virtual classes for external and internal clients, and even tracking their progress.

4. Paradiso

Paradiso is the software that is utilized by some of the major businesses in the world. It offers services associated with managed learning, course creation, and ready-made courses as well.

5. Litmos

The Litmos LMS software allows companies of all sizes to provide engaging training exams and courses, manage programs, and track the progress of learners. This learning management system is cloud-based and is rich in features, affordable, and easy to use.

6. UserGuiding

UserGuiding enables companies to onboard their customers with walkthroughs of products and services that do not need any kind of coding. The software allows the creation of personalized user segments, NPS surveys, resource centers, user onboarding lists, hotspots and tooltips, and engaging product tours.

Checklist for Selecting Training Software in Customer Training

Checklist for Selecting Training Software in Customer Training

 

With an extensive range of training software for customer training available on the market, it can be daunting for you to choose the right one for your business. To help you overcome this challenge, we have prepared a checklist for you, which is given below.

1. Identify Your Objectives

Ask yourself the 4W’s and 1H of the LMS – who, what, where, when, and how. The answers identify your business objectives associated with software training.

2. Determine Your Requirements

Think about what you require from an LMS. This will further aid you in determining the usability and features you seek in the training software. Once you are done with the process, make a list of features that your company requires in the software.

3. Shortlist LMS Software Vendors

Look for all the LMS software vendors, online and offline, and find out about their online existence, involving free trials and demonstrations. Some of the common parameters for judging a software vendor are:

  • SaaS availability
  • Features
  • The ratio of pricing to features
  • Mobile-friendliness
  • Future upgrade plans
  • Sustainability of the business
  • The workforce of the business
  • Client testimonials
  • Case studies
  • Functionality and form factor
  • Service support

Based on these factors, narrow down the vendors that meet your requirements for training software.

4. Issue a Proposal Request

Based on the shortlisting of vendors, propose an RPF to them according to your company’s requirements. After obtaining a response from them, you can request a demo, wherein you must involve your team to acquire feedback on the software’s usability.

5. Evaluate the Vendors

Post using the demo software, evaluate the vendors based on these factors:

  • Deployment model
  • The simplicity of maintenance by the manager of training
  • Support from vendor after deployment
  • Software compatibility with the company’s resource files
  • User interface
  • Form factor

6. Negotiate

Once you have further narrowed down the list of software vendors based on their evaluation, negotiate with them regarding a discounted price or a better deal. Do not forget to discuss timelines for LMS deployment and constant support from their team.

Best Examples of Customer Training Platforms

Some of the best instances of customer training platforms are shared below, with brief insights into the “why” of them being the most satisfactory.

By getting to know the features of these platforms, you will have an idea of which software vendor offers a wide variety and which one you should opt for to meet your business requirements.

1.  Hubspot

Hubspot offers a free certification program associated with marketing and inbound sales. The customer training platform has various segments:

  • Topics, like SEO, social media, and email marketing
  • Kinds of Content, like user guides, certifications, and lessons
  • Categories, like design, marketing, and sales

2.  Outreach

Outreach

Outreach makes use of customer training for actively addressing support queries to obtain novel clients efficiently. The platform clambered its success associated with customers through the utilization of customer education to enhance how its team functions.

3.  ServiceNow

Service Now

ServiceNow is a platform that has changed various of its live classes to on-demand design. They provide a wide range of choices for learners, including public and private live classes’ led by instructors.

4.  Zendesk

Zendesk

Zendesk provides paid as well as free customer training for onboarding their clients at scale. Their training program comprises the following:

  • On-site training
  • Custom training
  • Virtual ILT (instructor-led training)
  • eLearning
  • On-demand content

Conclusion

Customer training is highly valued by most businesses because of its beneficial extent at both ends. While customers learn to make maximum use of the company’s products and services, organizations experience higher customer retention, resulting in better ROI.

Since training software has proven to be greatly useful in providing customer training, tracking clients’ progress, and analyzing the extent to which the company’s objectives are being attained, several businesses have switched to LMS software.

If you are looking for the most effective method of training your clients, you must look for the most suit. We hope that you get all information about the importance of training software in customer training.

 

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Blog Customer Education

Top 6 Best Strategies for Creating Customer Education Content: Hybrid Workforce

Best Strategies for Creating Customer Education Content Hybrid Workforce

Let’s Know About the Top 6 Best Strategies for Creating Customer Education Content: Hybrid Workforce

Best Strategies for Creating Customer Education Content Hybrid Workforce_1

 

In this blog, you will learn how a new-age hybrid workforce demands the change in learning content strategies for L&D departments. By creating an adaptable learning strategy – your customer training program can stay progressive for the long run.  

All of us know about the importance of best strategies for creating customer education content. If you implement best strategies for creating customer education content in your customer education program then you will get more impactful result. So let’s learn which are the best strategies for creating customer education content.

Also, the factors about how enabling a learning management system (LMS) in your content distribution strategy can become your access to wider audiences. Know the best strategies to create your learning content through – 6 best strategies for customer education content creation.  

You can also download this free blog for later touchpoints in your content strategic stage with your L&D team and project managers. 

To give you an outlook of how dedicated SaaS companies are in structuring their future hybrid work model, Here is how Hubspot is planning to manage its new hybrid workforce:   

From January 2021 they allowed employees 3 work options.

  • From the office: You come into a HubSpot office 3 or more days per week. You have a dedicated desk for your laptop, monitor, family photos, and anything else that makes your workplace truly yours. 
  • The Flex: You come into a HubSpot office 2 or fewer days per week. When you come to the office, you’ll be allocated a “hotel desk”, which will be organized by the team when possible. 
  • From home: You work the majority of your time in a HubSpot-approved entity. 

Why mention all these plans & timings?

Two reasons:  

1. Customers are changing their work environment.

2. Access to remote working support.

Here Are the Best Strategies for Creating Customer Education Content: Hybrid Workforce You Can Use.

Best Strategies For Creating Customer Education Content Hybrid Workforce

1. Adapt to Blended Learning 

Creating a learning experience for a hundred thousand people and million-plus learning items and planning to execute it in a personalized way is not an easy task. Moreover, if it is not deployed at the right time for the right person – your entire efforts and time spend on curating content becomes useless. 

“Our leaders are building their strategies to connect to those who are better & faster in building digital content & give our people access hands-on.” -Simon Brown (Chief learning officer, Novaris) 

To create a variance of learning content in the age of the hybrid workforce, you need hands-on learning solutions to cater to your different sets of customers. 

Here’s why the only 1:1 learning in your L&D course deployment might not be the best strategy: 

  • 60% of SaaS companies are adapting to remote culture post-2021.
  • 16% of employees in Top SaaS companies prefer WFH to in-office.
  • 91% of remote job posts grew on Linkedin post-March 2021.

It is not that 1:1 interaction or classroom learning won’t be of any use shortly. Many companies believe that L&D courses are best catered to once they are deployed in person. 

Also, an employee retains at a higher level when they are in a classroom environment. But, not to forgot how times have changed the entire corporate working paradigm – Your L&D needs blended learning courses to execute your customers where ever they are.  

What is Blended Learning? 

What is Blended Learning-Best Strategies for Creating Customer Education Content

Blended learning is an approach to educate your customers with both online learning materials & traditional classroom methods inclusive of online interactions. It requires a physical presence of a student & a trainer, with some elements of student control over time, place, and medium.     

Benefits of Blended Learning (Companys’ Perspective)

  • Reduced 1:1 Training Courses Cost (Travel, accommodation, and printed training material) .
  • Better learner engagement: Online gamification and webinars.
  • Greater ROI.
  • Easy to track learners’ training completion or pending status. 

Benefits of Blended Learning (Learners’ Perspective)

  • Self-paced learning: Convenient & flexible for remote learners. 
  • High comprehensive understanding: According to academic research. 
  • Social learning is supported: Interaction with trainers, instructors, and fellow learners. 

2. Enable LMS – Planning, Development, and Distribution (Continuous L&D model) 

 

Enable LMS - Planning, Development, and Distribution

If you have a hybrid workforce – you need to update your distribution model. You need a continuous adaptive strategy that applies both for remote workers and office ones. 

Typically, the customer training program is owned by a single team – The customer success team. But, that doesn’t mean that other teams shouldn’t get involved.  

Planning out a combined effort to deploy your customer education content covers each area of how well you know your customers. As an example: 

  • Customer success team: creating course content while developing & managing the LMS. 
  • Sales team: Subject matter experts & customers insights. 
  • Customer support team: Improvement through customer insights.
  • Design team: Course design creation. 

How LMS becomes a need in a Hybrid environment? 

  • Single-channel distribution for different working environments. 
  • Curate diverse learning content for specific training through AI support. 
  • Self-paced learning programs designed for different working profiles. 

How you will create your learning content depends majorly on how you distribute it. So, updating your distribution channel will ensure that your remote learners don’t feel left behind & envision their career progression wherever they are. 

3. Update Your Content 

It real tricky to understand sometimes what type of content would be best for your customers. Therefore, it’s best to create a content audit to identify where your organization’s content strategy stands.  

Start by asking few questions: 

  • What type of training resources are we currently giving our customers? 
  • What teams are involved in the customer training process? 
  • What tools are we currently using to train our customers?  
  • What is our internal data telling us? 
  • What are internal teams and our customers saying about the training program? 

After you create a full content audit basis on such questions – develop learning objectives. When you have an overall goal in your online training strategy, you can easily plan out training courses that will have a definitive outcome for learners as well. 

Researching and planning your learning content on basis of customer-centric goals helps your organization in the long run. From curating and streamlining training courses to defining KPIs, it is the stage that will boost your chances of getting the training right.   

For example, if you are training your customers on how to use your emailing software, the objective of your course could be that the customer can add a CSV email list to your system.  

In simple terms, one objective is that a customer can build a course using our provided solution. This sounds simple, but it makes creating your training courses much more straightforward. 

From here, you can now branch out your content in form of slide decks with images, creating course PDFs, and other easily build text to image formats to help customers develop their skills easily.

You can also use videos using tools like Camtasia or a fully fletched content authoring tool. Because it’s good to develop a mix and match content type to cater to different customers’ choices.

A good LMS can provide you to add multiple content formats into your courses. Also, by doing this you will keep your learners engaged. 

Don’t forget to dig into the resources you already have – you have a gold mine already. It can be an eBook written by your marketing head, or decks handed out by your sales guys, or even internal guides. Take a keen look at your current assets to check if the content fits for repurposing into training courses. 

4. Be Accessible to a Wider Audience

Many SaaS companies are opting for freemium membership of their education program to reach the broader new customers and existing audiences. Beyond boosting customer engagement, this strategy also helps generate brand awareness during challenging times – goodwill in social impact. 

Also, make sure that you employ the right technology while curating your content strategy so that you can scale, improve and repurpose your training impact later on. 

For example, Moz, a marketing analytics software company, offers free courses on its training academy to help marketers and other contributors to develop & improve their search engine optimization (SEO) skill sets. By scaling training programs on such a level, Moz is immensely broadening their impact of training impact.

5. Stay Updated

Since Covid-19 has hit, industries have seen an increase in remote work demand. Some SaaS companies are adapting to use technology to curate their hybrid workforce training content and some are still managing flexible classroom schedules as an L&D course deployment option. 

But, those companies who opted for online learning are now understanding the value of updating & the scope of engagement. Customer trainers and instructors are becoming proactive in seeking to understand the changing needs via 1:1 interview, zoom meeting coffee hours, and product & service usage analytics. 

Once you keep all your ears up, building a learning content strategy for your training programs becomes an iterative process. Don’t get de-motivated if your training program is not deployed on time, or friction points coming now and then, or even you feel that this is not good.  

Remember, no training program is perfect, that’s the best thing – It is a continuous process of improving.  

The rule of your training program must focus on what is most important for customers? What are they finding value in? Keeping your approach in such a mindset will make the entire process more achievable and will allow you to improve while adding more value for your training courses in the long run.

6. Your Minimum Viable Product (MVP)

The changing speed of L&D courses delivery and development caused many SaaS companies to align their focus on their minimum viable product (MVP). 

In practice, it is the most authentic and impactful development strategy to curate your learning content around your high product value.  

To create and distribute valuable content – companies are experimenting with new formats like videos and image-texted resources to put out their message as clear as possible.  

Conclusion: 

Educating customers is a continuous process once you understand the seamless results it gets as an experience for customers.  

Friction within the training process is likely to happen in each & every training program. And, setbacks are meant to let you restructure your entire process, but re-creating through tools & strategy will evolve your entire organization dynamics.  

To ensure your learning content is helping your customers to understand your products & services better – Bring a learning management system (LMS)  as a tool to hammer & shape your content strategy according to customers’ needs. Employ the pioneering in learning technology to retain & delight your customers now.   

 

Importance of Building an Effective Customer Training Strategy

 

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Blog Customer Training

Best Practices to Measure Impact of Customer Training Program (Intuitive Method + Templates + Tools)

Best Practices to Measure Impact of Customer Training Program (Intuitive Method + Templates + Tools)

Learning & Development (L&D) isn’t about what you can remember, it is fundamentally how you apply what you learned to improve your life. 

Once you understand that what you are learning are simple tools to operate your complex task without putting extra effort – your interest grows & exercises your will to learn even more. 

That’s how your customer should feel about your training program. But how would you know, if they are already in that phase of curiosity? Or maybe they’re excited but clueless to narrow it down. It is better to know best practices to measure impact of customer training program before implementing customer training.

Again, how would you know which part of your training is making a change? Through KPIs, or feedback starters?  

Know more about the best practices to measure impact of customer training program.

Fundamental Questions You Need to Focus to Evaluate Which Part of Your Customer Training is Making a Change.

  • Did they like it?
  • Did they learn?
  • Are they able to apply what they learned?
  • Is training improving their goals in their organization?

Best Practices to Measure Impact of Customer Training Program (Intuitive Method + Templates + Tools)

 

Yes, there are countless measuring metrics to analyze your customer response & satisfaction rate during training, but, just think about it for once!  

Your self-paced learning program – capable of delivering diverse content according to diverse needs – establishes a personalized benchmark for your diverse audience.  

Such a diverse paradigm of training and you decide to limit your evaluation to just tools? 

Your training evaluation may find customer pain points & improvement insights through analytical meters.  

But, you need an intuitive method to evaluate your training and to establish your success meters. 

Yes, we know, it’s not that exciting part though, but by intuitive evaluation, you can easily figure out if your training works and how to improve it. 

Kirkpatrick’s model of learning is meant to be the most widely used method to evaluate the results of training and learning programs. Although, this model has been an effective benchmark to evaluate employee training programs, but has shown even more successful results when it comes to customer training. 

Donald Kirkpatrick (1924-1950) was a Professor Emeritus at the University of Wisconsin. He developed the four levels of evaluation model in the mid-1950s as part of his Ph.D. dissertation. And, his vision of L&D training evaluation has now been used for over 30yrs by many different companies as a major system for training evaluation.  

Kirkpatrick Model – Four Levels of Learning Evaluation

  • Reaction.
  • Learning Evaluation.
  • Knowledge gain.
  • Results.

 

Kirkpatrick model - Four levels of learning evaluation 

Level #1: How Are They Reacting?  

There are good chances that you already taking a survey after customers’ first learning session. The fundamental idea to evaluate right after the first session is to gain insight into the training experience from the learner’s perspective. 

Ideally, most B2B companies limit their first survey to just collect basic responses from customers because of many reasons like “They might churn off customers soon”, “They are overpopulating after the first signup onboarding emails.  

The problem here is, they are focussing on just a customer response. They need the right questions to pinpoint the accuracy of the first survey: 

Smile Sheets

A smile sheet is simply a form consisting of a series of questions combined, asking your customers about their satisfaction.  

In a recent survey, many B2B organizations were asked about the smile sheet effectiveness, and most responded that “they don’t understand how to bring improvement in training through just good or bad customer responses”. 

We understand it can get hard to find precise pain points to improve when scalability is of a wide range. And, we accumulate such common limitations that smile sheets may have:    

Limitations

  • Data is basic. 
  • It doesn’t necessarily correlate with actual learning or customer behavior. 
  • It is hard to scale. 

Now you might be confused that whether to use smile sheets? Are there any evaluating benefits? Whether to infuse a smile sheet in evaluating your training or not?  

Well! There’s always a good and a bad side to any tool. All you have to do is to find the right way of using it.  

Benefits of Smile Sheets

  • It demonstrates respect for customers thoughts & concerns. 
  • It provides early satisfaction results. 
  • It gives you insights about your training’s valuable side & not so valuable. 

Smile Sheets doesn’t limit to the “Just asking for your feedback” tool, you can employ it as a performance-focused evaluation for your customers during training sessions. 

Performance-Focused Evaluation

E.g. Writing a TPS Report.

Instead of asking your customer, “How are you liking the course/training?”

Focus on their progression towards set goals, “How well are you able to imply the reporting skills in the practice of your job?”

On a learner scale your feedback to get customer reaction must be of some accuracy, to understand specifically about the customer experience, here’s an example of how you can touch down customer’s understanding: 

Are you able to apply what you learned in the training? 

  • I am not able to apply these concepts. 
  • I have some understanding but require additional training. 
  • I can apply the concepts but require support. 
  • I believe I have competency.
  • I know I can perform to an expert level. 

Level #2: Are They Learning?  

This phase of evaluating your training programs focuses on measuring the customers’ knowledge, skills, and mindset developed as a result of your training program.  

Here we want to ensure that your customers are learning what they are supposed to have learned. Take an example of how Hubspot evaluates their customer knowledge & skills acquired during their delivered training. 

  1. Quick Quiz: Few questions to ensure customer retention level. 

Few questions to ensure customer retention level

 

Hubspot Academy’s – Know Yourself Quiz 

Hubspot ensures that its customers are understanding the concept and also, they provide further assistance by providing helpful resources to make it easy for customers to catch up on what they learned, later on. 

Resources (to Provide & Understand What Audience Needs)

  • Slides. 
  • Transcripts.
  • Goal calculator. 
  • Knowledge Base. 
  • Templates. 
  • Ebooks. 
  • Blog Post. 
  • Reports. 
  • Website.

 

Resources to provide & understand what audience needs.

 

2. Free Certification: Presenting a Learning Win to Grow for Customers.

 

Free Certification_Presenting a learning win to grow for customers

3. Hand-on Surveys & Assignments: To Assess Customer Retention Rate by Providing Assignments Right After Each Training Session. 

 

Hand-on Surveys & Assignments

Hubspot Academy’s – Survey Assessment 

They assess their customer’s demographics and improvement scale after they are done with the course. Perfect CTA!  

Two Major Benefits for Post-Training Session Assessment

  • The customer is still in the learning mode, high response rate. 
  • Customers want to exercise their choice after learning, future improvement in training required would be answered precisely. 

 

Two major benefits for Post-Training Session Assessment

They appreciate customer learning efforts & acknowledge their time, so to improve significantly – They choose accuracy to deliver value. It simply means, “Knowing your customer”. 

Level #3: Are They Applying What They Learned?    

“One of the reasons why most SaaS companies are failing in customer success program is because their program is driven by cost, not value”- Glide Consulting (Customer Success Expert)   

Customers who can achieve success with your product on their own do result in reduced support cost but such consequence becomes your value when you see your customers value in it too. 

So, level 3 is all about evaluation based on, “Are you customers applying what they learned or not?” 

You can further segment this evaluation into 3 steps: 

  • Monitor customer’s performance.
  • Offer support. 
  • Measure the results. 

How to Monitor Your Customers’ Performance? 

Firstly, find a natural data point to monitor your customers’ before and after training performance. Are they improving in any areas of their applied work? Is there any issue they are facing while applying it? 

You can develop a demographic survey (one like given above) to understand the basic needs of your customer before you develop a working environment for them.  

Secondly, you may have noticed your customers feedback filled up this survey form real quick. You can use a start and stop time to measure the accuracy and pace of answered value. This way you will see if there are any errors customers while answering due to limited time. 

After your trainers assessing those errors closely, combine this data with the above data points to understand where the customers are getting that error and offer performance-focused support to customers to improve.     

How to Measure Your Customers’ Results From the Training Provided? 

Okay, Let’s continue with the above TPS reporting example. Let suppose your manager tells your customer to complete 10 TPS report.  

Before training when you delivered this task, customers were able to complete 5 per hour with only 60% accuracy. But after baseline training sessions, your customers can complete 11 TPS reports per hour with 80% accuracy. 

Knowing your customers’ improvement gives you direction to assess your level 1 and level 2 training evaluation accordingly to let your customer keep exceeding the benchmark. 

Level #4: Is There Any Training Impact on Their Organizational Goals?

In level 4, you assess whether the training program was accomplished? Have they achieved their effective goal?  

Now, to evaluate level 4, you need result-oriented data that provides a comparative measure. 

Let’s take an example of a company that spends 20 % of their workweek time in team meetings to structure & plan out things accordingly. 

 

Is there any Training Impact on their Organizational Goals

They plan to infuse training with their work environment to reduce team meeting time as a result. And, they found that after employing training for each employee, they successfully reduced their time spent for meeting & whiteboard sessions.  

Similarly, you can map data points considering your before and after training results for customer’s in their working areas.  

Well, as every L&D experiences this most in their life that no training program ensures perfect results, as there is consideration for using with Kirkpatrick model as well: 

Considering Using Kirkpatrick Model

  • It works best if training results are relatively isolated (It means there are no depending factors that rely on training results apart from customers’ growth itself.) 
  • Degree of accuracy (There are chances that your customer already knows best to be assessed for a basic training test. So, to deliver training, in that case, won’t be necessary.) 

4 SaaS Customer Success Metrics (Tools to Evaluate) 

 

4 SaaS Customer Success Metrics (Tools to evaluate)

  • Product/Services Usage Rate: The more customers use your product, the more valuable is the product for them. Your customer support team can easily track the product use frequency by customers and create a scale for the ideal growth rate. 
  • Active Customers: As a SaaS company, your goal is to land up recurring customers. Measuring daily, weekly, and monthly active users will provide you access to short-term activity time & long-term customer active time. 
  • Free Trial Conversion Rate: Free-trail conversion metric is a must-have in SaaS recurring business model to identify how well your customers are switching from freemium – to – premium services while monitoring churn rate too. 
  • Average Time Spent on Platform: Evaluating the average time will provide you with a detailed story as to how much time your customers are integrated with your software. 

We hope that you understand about best practices to measure impact of customer training program.

Conclusion: 

As a SaaS company, you may come across a lot of measuring metrics and perfect training evaluation tools to infuse for results. But, eventually, your customers are changing goals on daily basis – So, it becomes an adaptive practice to employ intuitive methods to evaluate your training program. Also, ensure you are using effective L&D strategies to evaluate your training up to the current market benchmark. 

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