Learning content options: what should you use?

Find the right learning content options to deliver the experiences you want for your learners.

There’s no single right way of doing things when it comes to sourcing or creating learning content for your organisation. The best approach will be led by the skills and experience you’ve got in-house, the subject matter you’re dealing with and your budget.

Even within a single organisation, it’s unlikely there will be a one size fits all solution to learning content options. Instead, it’s a case of assessing what’s going to deliver the best results at the right price on a case-by-case — or perhaps course-by-course — basis.

In the simplest terms, there are three ways of approaching learning content:

1. Create your own learning content.
2. Buy off-the-shelf learning content.
3. Have someone like us create bespoke learning content for you.

Let’s dig into each of those learning content options in more detail.

Create your own learning content

It’s never been easier to create your own learning content. Platforms like Totara Learn, Moodle LMS and Moodle Workplace make it really straightforward to build content using a suite of tools already included within the package.

These tools allow you to:

• Break down content topics into smaller, bitesize chunks
• Embed video and other multimedia content
• Upload SCORM (Shareable Content Object Reference Model) packages built using other authoring tools
• Embed H5P content for media-rich, interactive experiences
• Create quizzes
• Set and grade assignments

If you’ve got the skills to create content in-house — or you get LMS training to build these skills — creating your own learning content can be a cost-effective way of creating unique courses that do exactly what you need them to do.

Buy off-the-shelf learning content

Buying existing modules is another way of securing the learning content you need. Buying learning content is a useful option if:

• You don’t have the in-house skills to be able to create your own learning content
• You don’t have the in-house knowledge to create learning content on a specific topic or topics
• You need learning content for a generic topic that isn’t specific to your organisation
• You want to save your budget to create unique content on topics that are specific to your organisation by buying ready-made learning content in other areas

Off-the-shelf learning content can be more cost-effective than creating your own learning content once you’ve factored in the time and resources needed to create your own. While this can help you to stretch your L&D budget, the downside is that the content won’t be bespoke to your organisation.

With some ready-made learning content, you can expand or customise the existing module to tailor the content for your organisation. Plus, most off-the-shelf content is in the form of SCORM packages that are quick and easy to update when new versions are released or other changes introduced.

Have bespoke learning content created

The final option — and one which incorporates everything we’ve mentioned so far — is to have us create bespoke learning content for you.

This is a useful option if you don’t have the skills, time or resources to create your own learning content. This approach would include:

• Digital conversion — Taking your existing PowerPoint presentations, PDFS and workbooks and converting them into engaging online content using the core functionality of your LMS.
• Rapid — Using industry-leading content packages to expand and complement your existing learning content.
• Bespoke — Creating new, interactive learning modules from scratch with a full-service content conversion based on our detailed knowledge of in-built tools and other multimedia functionality.

This approach helps you to deliver a truly unique learning experience for your learners without tying up your in-house resources. In this case — or even if you’re creating your own content from existing PowerPoints and other resources — we can guide you to create engaging content that can be tracked and reported on. This reduces the need for you to run costly, time-consuming, ad hoc face-to-face training sessions.

Talk to us about your learning content options

Get in touch for a chat about where your learning content currently stands and the best way of getting it to where you want it to be. Just fill out the form below and we’ll be in touch.

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