What’s The Best Online Training Software? And How Do You Create An Effective Online Training Course?
That depends on your definition of training!
Does it mean to share enough information with a person until they “soak up all the knowledge?” Is that how you create an effective and engaging online training experience? And does that approach actually develop skill?
You believe if you shout enough information at a person or group of people, you can actually take them from unskilled to skilled in any particular field or competency?
Of course not! That’s not how training actually works.
In addition to information, participants need action to develop skill and improve based on feedback!
They need to practice something, produce something, or put that information into action in such a way that products a result. And they would need feedback on improving those results.
For example, imagine training someone to “shoot a bow and arrow safely.”
Would believe that a person would be effectively skilled in real life if they were trained online by watching 10 videos called, “how to shoot a bow and arrow safely?”
Would you be confident they watched all the videos, absorbed all the information accurately from the videos, and now had the skill to shoot a gun safely? After watching those 10 videos? Would you feel safe having them shoot a bow and arrow (for the first time) right beside you?
They would probably skip through most of the videos anyway, never come back to watch them again, and then say “they finished them.” And even if there were some tests at the end to measure their knowledge, they would just memorize or copy safety words and answer the questions correctly.
It doesn’t mean they can shoot a bow and arrow safely.
So how would you train someone to shoot a bow an arrow safely and effectively through online training?
Is it possible?
You would give them a little information, have them practice something that has to do with that information, then give them feedback on their output when that put that information into action. You could either watch over their shoulder as they did, you could watch a video of them doing it, or you could comment on their reflection of the situation and provide the feedback later on.
For example:
“Here’s a quick video of how you load the arrow into the bow... safely.”
“Try doing just this one exercise."
“I’ll be watching over your shoulder in case anything goes wrong. Go slowly.”
Now they can load an arrow safely.
Next: “Here’s a quick video to show you how to aim safely."
“Try aiming.”
“[Feedback].”
Now they can aim.
Last: “Now we’re going to release safely."
“Try loading, aiming, and shooting safely.”
"[Feedback]"
You could do this for every part of the experience from start to finish, and they would have practice safely shooting a bow an arrow (and the training experience would be 100% remote).
Wouldn't you feel much more comfortable shooting a bow and arrow beside that person compared to the first person?
They would not only have more skill and confidence, but they would have experience and real time training insights.
It’s no different with any skill, knowledge, or competency you want to install into your audience’s brain!
If you want to teach your audience marketing, they won’t become better marketers by only watching marketing videos! They will become more skilled marketers by answering questions about marketing, practicing real marketing, and creating and testing marketing in the marketplace.
Wouldn’t having an experienced marketer walk you through your first 3 marketing campaigns with bite sized information, action, and feedback be a heck of a lot more compelling (and effective) than watching 100 hours of marketing videos?
If you’re a math tutor, will your students learn by only watching videos about math problems?
If you’re a finger painting teacher, do they just want to watch finger painting videos or do they want to actually finger paint with you?
If you understand that action and feedback are more important than information only for creating effective online training and developing effective online training courses, then rest is easy.
All you need is a simple way to share information, deliver actionable exercises, and follow up (with feedback) with your audience quickly.
[That's what we're here for].
The problem with most online training software, and the way people approach creating online training courses, is not only that it's over-complicated and filled with unnecessary, distracting features, but that that they over emphasize the information ... and neglect the action and feedback part of training effectively.
So their audience has more than enough information than they’ll ever need, but no opportunity to put it into action.
There are more “training videos” on the internet today than ever in the history of the world. And tomorrow, there will be more. We already have so much information that we don’t know what to do with it (and really don’t need more information that says the same stuff as all the information we already have).
But we do need to put it into action! And that's where the opportunity lies.
People need help developing skills, not just consuming information.
That’s how you create effective online training and develop effective online courses; you actually train them.
You don’t just share information, you use information to inspire action and you use your insights and knowledge to help train your audience.
Do that and you will have more successful (and happy) participants, more engagement and enthusiasm from your audience, and less stress trying to figure out “how to make the best online training.”
You’ll realize the only thing you have to do is train them.
And the best software won’t get in the way of that.
It will only help you do that faster.