Driving Salesforce Excellence through Extended E-learning: The Trend is Emerging

With modernization, the need to adopt effective e-learning approach to train the workforce in retail companies is increasing. The retail companies face a wide array of challenges when it comes to educating their external workforce, especially sales employees who are mostly on the go. Therefore, the delivery of extended corporate training solutions through personalized mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets serve as a viable solution. Mobile learning is no more a new concept, but rather a successful strategy adopted for corporate training to fulfill the pertinent needs for diversified audiences.

Companies in the retail sector now realize the potential of delivering innovative e-learning solutions for their extended workforce. Therefore, more and more sales employees rely on their mobile phones to access training content because of the following reasons:

• Mobile devices are best suited for delivering training content as small nuggets of information which are accessible at any point of time. With instant access to bite-sized content, sales employees can easily fit training into their hectic schedule- between meetings, at home, or even on the go.
  
• The utilization of robust mobile learning apps helps to align individual learner’s activity across mobile devices. As a result, learners can start a course anytime, do any other relevant work in between, and later continue from where they left off. For instance, sales professionals can undergo training on their desktop, and then resume training on their smartphones, thereby supporting an impactful self-paced learning experience.

• The interface of mobile learning apps and web learning portals is entirely different. Modern learners prefer swiping or tapping the relevant information on their smart device, therefore typing and clicking can be a daunting task on mobiles. Netflix and YouTube are popular platforms where users can access data as per their recent search and learning preferences. Similarly, retail companies use custom mobile apps to adequately train their sales employees and get quick access to relevant information- every time and everywhere.

With the increased adoption of e-learning solutions for extended workforce training, the retail industry is emerging as a dynamically improving sector in the global market. E-learning serves as a one-stop solution by catering to the pertinent needs of all. Today, organizations are increasing awareness among their new-age workforce on what tools and knowledge can drive optimal results. Mobile learning is gaining importance in industries especially retail, where training the geographically spread workforce is the primary need.

Training Diverse Audiences & Driving Business Value through Extended LMS

Today, different enterprises have different kinds of learners who need to undergo effective training. Do you think about training your customers on how to use a specific product? Or do you want your partners to get certified after acquiring enough product knowledge? Then, Learning Management System(LMS) for extended enterprise including customers, resellers, partners, sales representatives and others, serves as a viable solution. It holds the ability to reach out to multiple audiences via the same platform and provide them personalized training experience, based on their tailored needs and preferences.

To stay ahead of the curve, organizations now need to push their talent management beyond the confines of the enterprise which includes the extended workforce. Also, as external employees work outside an organization and are mostly on-the-go, it is crucial to impart them training- anytime and anywhere. Discussed below are some of the benefits of using an enterprise LMS to train the extended workforce:

Engaging widespread audiences through mobile apps

As per the research by Aberdeen, companies that leverage mobile technology to support their learning strategy are 58% more likely to attain best in class outcomes. [Source: https://yourstory.com/mystory/51b8279651-scope-of-mobile-app-de]. With the help of innovative mobile apps, internal as well as external employees can access training courses at their own pace of time and convenience. Learners who have to take out time for training from their busy work schedule can engage and participate more if they can access personalized mobile learning apps on their mobile devices.

Training sales reps, resellers, customers and more

Different target audiences- resellers, customers, partners, sales representatives and others; need different kinds of training based on their bespoke needs. This makes the use of extended LMS an effective solution to train the globally diversified workforce. An effective training for external network aids learners to gain expertise on products, services, organizational policies, industry compliance and more. Training channel partners and customers result in increased levels of knowledge retention, engagement and overall customer satisfaction.

Tracking individual performances

To track and measure the performances of employees outside an enterprise is a daunting task. The deployment of extended e-learning platforms helps to create reports based on the time a learner spends on specific courses. Consequently, it helps to track training completions and create reports based on their overall performance during training.

Undoubtedly, Extended LMS boosts the overall satisfaction of the external workforce as they can connect more and apprise themselves on newer products with their prospective clients. Providing training outside the organization is an important strategic tool to help organizations improve their business line.

3 Business Cases to Deploy LMS in the Retail Sector: Creating the Digital Workplace

With ever-evolving market needs, the personalization of customer experience has become equally critical for any retail business. When it comes to training the workforce in this sector, retail companies face a plethora of challenges from doing their day-to-day operations to managing high turnovers. To transform the overall training experience, it has become significant to engage maximum learners and optimize knowledge retention.

Therefore, modern Learning Management Systems (LMS) are deployed by the retail industry to boost corporate training experience, thereby affecting overall business productivity, customer satisfaction and sales.

Significant Scenarios to Use Modern LMS within Retail Enterprise 

The extensive use of personalized mobile devices such as tablets and smartphones has improved the scope of workforce training. These also help to manage effective communications with the customers, inventory information and quicker delivery. As the retail industry owes its success through optimal customer satisfaction and improved business sales, deploying robust enterprise LMSs for workforce training is crucial. Let us discuss some of the instances where modern e-learning platforms aid the retail workforce in addressing their training challenges:

• New hire training

To effectively train the new hires within the retail enterprise, it is crucial to impart custom e-learning solutions via modern LMS. For instance, if an employee joins the sales department, then they need to seek training on how to engage customers and boost overall sales. Companies provide mobile learning apps to deliver personalized training experience for all. This helps to enhance the accessibility of training courses for the employees – who can utilize their time learning anytime, while at home or even traveling.

• Training on compliance 

Training on the Code of conduct is another challenge faced by this industry. Therefore, a powerful e-learning platform is utilized to deliver mandatory compliance training to retail employees. For instance, the company's existing HRMS (Human Resource Management System) can be integrated with modern LMS to fetch employee data and push automated notifications about the upcoming training. The LMS also triggers information about assessments and retests; along with providing recurring training sessions by setting expiration dates for certifications.

• Training on the latest products

Whenever a retail company launches a new range of products, it becomes essential to familiarize the employees with the new products. For instance, modern LMS is used to deliver game-based learning solutions to train the sales force in a more fun way. When the employees earn scores or badges during training, they get motivated to learn more, collaborate better and retain for long.

The incorporation of modern LMS within the retail organizations begin with the need to affect the overall efficiency and productivity of employees as well as the business on the whole.

5 Crucial Features Supported by Online LMS

Taking Your Business to the Next Level 

The demand for seamless e-learning services and a robust infrastructure to align with personalized training needs are evolving. To effectively train the workforce spread across different demographics, an efficient online Learning Management System (LMS) is essential. In today’s digital era, modern LMSs support improved collaboration among peers, optimal learner engagement and customized training delivery. Most of the organizations understand the need to invest in the latest technologies which focus on boosting learning efficiency, workforce retention and engagement levels.

In the realm to address these challenges stands the need to deploy an online LMS to cater to the ever-evolving needs of all. With the use of latest technologies, workplace training ensures to leave a strong impact on how courses are created and delivered. With changing learning preferences, individual goals are also changing towards team participation and knowledge retention. The key to an effective corporate training initiative lies in the use of modern online LMS supporting the following features:

1. Mobile app support:With the majority of employees working from remote locations, the use of mobile devices to access training courses via mobile apps is also increasing. This approach called as mobile learning includes accessibility of online content, flexibility to download e-courses and access them, when offline. The effective delivery of online courses via mobile learning apps enable employees to learn at their own pace of time and convenience.
2. Social learning:
   
   With the immense popularity of social media sites such as YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and other channels like Netflix, the demand for a similar e-learning platform is increasing. As social learning is a vital component, modern LMSs are designed in a way to support effective knowledge sharing, peer-to-peer collaboration and enhanced business growth. This is achieved by using various social tools such as blogs, forums and wikis to share new ideas, raise the competency levels and overall learning uptake.
3. Personalized approach:

Personalized training delivery comprises of two major aspects- setting a learning environment to align with the right learning path and delivering adaptive learning experience to cater to the personalized needs of all. Modern LMS can be customized to deliver different kinds of e-courses as per the learners’ different job roles and preferences, thereby reducing training time and improving overall workplace efficiency.


4. Analytics & Assessments:

The Analytics and Reporting feature supported by the modern LMS helps to track individual performances during the training program. Also, the robust platform helps to simplify the skill evaluation process by uploading assessments and tracking learners’ progress at each level. The online learning platform can efficiently save time and money by enabling learners access updated information without using any third-party applications.


5. Video-based learning: 
   The new-age LMS supports video-based content delivery to engage maximum employees undergoing training on sales, compliance, onboarding and more. E-courses delivered in the form of interactive video nuggets allow the learners to understand the context in a better way. The online learning platform supports video learning feature to ensure the delivery of a continuous and socially interactive corporate training experience.

Online LMS is being used by the majority of organizations to impart the ephemera of training experiences through personalization, collaboration, assessments, video-based learning and so on.

Combining Mobile Learning & Microlearning Approaches- The Need is Evident

Today, Learning & Development (L&D) departments have realized the potential of personalized learning through mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets. The current e-learning strategy is providing the new-age workforce an edge with the flexibility to access online courses at their own pace. The demand for short and crisp content is rising and mobile learning has made it more convenient for the organizations to provide training on the go.

Mobile Learning & Microlearning- Their Key Benefits 

Before, you look at the combined benefits of microlearning and mobile learning, let us outline their individual benefits. Talking about mobile learning first, it allows the learners to access online courses anytime and from anywhere. There are different kinds of mobile learning apps which helps the learners to download the course and access it later when offline. Few benefits of mobile learning are outlined here:

• It supports multi-device support, which means that same course can be accessed on multiple devices, from desktops and laptops to tablets and smartphones.

• It proves as an effective e-learning approach to cater to the diverse corporate training needs including onboarding program, compliance training, soft skills and more.

On the other hand, microlearning is the process of delivering content in the form of short learning nuggets. The trend is fueled by the learners who want to consume bite-sized information on the go. Few benefits of microlearning are outlined here:

• Short content chunks are created to cater to specific learning needs.

• They are shorter in length (between 2-7 minutes).

Why to Choose the Combination of Microlearning & Mobile Learning?

With the broader adoption of mobile learning, microlearning also serves the following benefits:

• Formal training- A learning path can be created by combining shorter bites of content. Considering the short attention spans, learners tend to access more courses on their mobile devices, without any hassle of going anywhere.

• Performance Support Tools (PSTs)- These help to optimize the effectiveness of formal training through just-in-time aid. PSTs help enterprises to boost their performance and leave a strong impact on the entire business.

With technological advancement, organizations are adopting the blend of mobile learning and microlearning to offer a highly engaging experience. The prime reason behind this is that content nuggets can be easily accessed on the go. Several other benefits of this combination are highlighted as follows:

• Delivery of continuous learning experience rather than providing discrete forms.

• Organizations can offer personalized learning experience as per the varied needs of diversified audiences. Some learners grasp quickly, while others may take time, so this enables them to choose the time and place to undergo training.

• This also increases the number of visitors coming to the learning platform, as they can review the same courses time and again.

• Short nuggets in the form of videos, audios and images are easier to digest, thereby helping to improve learner engagement and retention levels.

Certainly, the rising scope of mobile learning and microlearning have overcome the traditional training challenges such as engagement, flexibility, real-time accessibility and retention. With this combination, organizations can witness more engaged employees with the rise in business growth and overall workplace productivity.

Delivering Effective E-learning Solutions to Optimize Sales Training Delivery

Many sales organizations have traditionally trained their employees within a classroom setting. Learners could glean best practices and learn new lessons from trainer, share ideas with their peers and interact face-to-face. But, training sales teams in a classroom has many drawbacks such as high infrastructural costs, less learner engagement and more. 

Due to the geographically spread salesforce, e-learning is adopted as an effective approach to deliver training for sales personnel at their own pace of time and convenience. While employee interaction can be better addressed in classrooms, e-learning solutions are imparted for sales employees to boost their skills and overall workplace performance. Undoubtedly, online learning is a great way to reinforce learning as it can be delivered across personalized mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets, even on the go. 

With modernization, sales companies have centralized the scope of training at the workplace, thereby making e-learning to take the first place. Several use cases where various types of e-learning solutions are provided for sales training are outlined as follows:

• Game-based learning approach has been widely adopted by a majority of sales organizations. When salesforce can access online courses in the form of short games, they feel motivated to complete the game and gain expertise on an entire range of products and services. As a result, it results in better employee engagement, knowledge retention and improved business sales. 

• Sales employees fail to engage and retain what they learn during a lengthy classroom-based training session. Consequently, they fail to effectively sell the products to their customers, leading to poor sales. Therefore, Augmented Reality-based mobile-learning apps are designed to showcase various product features and benefits through interactive visuals and audios, and less of text. 

• Online training programs for sales can be customized as per the learner’s job role, their location and need. In addition, e-learning programs also support performance tracking and reporting, thereby allowing organizations to analyze how their employees are performing. 

Effective sales training solutions help to enhance employee’s skills and boost organizational performance through better profitability and workplace productivity. Highly engaging online sales courses can result in an increase in activity levels, sales volumes and product orders. E-learning solutions are delivered to benefit sales personnel looking for improving their selling skills and building new skill sets. These prepare the workforce to attain sales success by gaining knowledge expertise, confidence and seeking the necessary skills to succeed. Sales workforce training is another cost-effective way to improve the overall business uptake and employee performance. If delivered effectively, online sales training can be repaid many times over.

Gaining a Competitive Edge Using Modern LMS for Extended Enterprise

With the advent of internet technologies, organizations have set a major difference in the way they impart training to engage and retain the modern workforce. Extended enterprise learning, aims at training non-employees and impact their behavioral changes.

Organizations work to tailor the existing LMSs for specific audience needs as well as, an in-house development team to cater to the bespoke business requirements. The extended enterprise is more than technology, which requires an organization to provide e-courses beyond internal workforce, through external distribution channels. 

With ever-increasing business expectations, the scope of using extended LMS for workplace learning leads to better employee productivity, knowledge retention and greater impact on the bottom line. As the extended network of employees, work from varied locations, it becomes imperative to use an external e-learning platform which is mobile-supported, flexible and easy to access. Extended enterprise learning appears in varied forms as discussed below:

• Dealer workforce training

Automotive companies know how to address the challenges of training their extended dealer network. Therefore, ensuring consistency of training across the contingent personnel is critical for the delivery of an incredible customer service. Today, robust online learning platforms are integrated with Dealer Management Systems (DMSs) to provide training- anytime and anywhere. A significant data is utilized from DMS so that dealer employees, can trigger the LMS for an effective content delivery.

• Workforce compliance training

Industries such as transportation, oil & gas and retail, need to timely update their workforce on regulatory compliances. An extended LMS is efficient enough in delivering mobile-based compliance training to the workers and contractors based at diverse locations.

• Partner channel training

Several companies in the manufacturing, telecom and other sectors comprise of independent partners that resell their products and services on a global scale. So, it is crucial to certify the extended workforce on the entire product range and deliver just-in-time performance support. This ensures an overall improvement in organizational sales, business productivity and customer satisfaction. 

Modern organizations leverage opportunities to train their extended enterprise in an effective way. Using an extended LMS, they aim to engage, motivate and retain learners, thereby combining the business and training outcomes into one measurable program. While e-learning began as an internal workforce training program, organizations have now realized the need to provide online courses beyond and outside their four walls. So, when extended employee training begins with strategic decision-making via a powerful distribution network, the outcomes can leave a great impact on an organization’s overall reach, brand value and growth.