Today, elearning is easier to produce than ever before; authoring tools like Elucidat are simplifying the build process and empowering novices to do the jobs once confined to tech-savy developers. With Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) now able to work directly into these tools, you might wonder: Is it time to ditch the elearning storyboard?

What is an elearning storyboard?

An elearning storyboard is the blueprint for an online course or other piece of digital learning. It provides a detailed breakdown of the content, including a description of the interactions and multimedia to be used, along with the actual words to appear on screen (and in any video or audio you plan to create). Whoever builds your course – whether an SME, instructional designer, or developer – will do so using the storyboard as guidance.

Why use storyboards in elearning development?

Though storyboards might seem redundant to someone not au fait with instructional design, they actually serve several key functions:

• Providing a holistic view of the learning experience: Whilst it’s easy to get bogged down with visual and technical details when working inside an authoring tool, a course content storyboard helps you focus on the bigger picture…Does the narrative flow make sense? Have you covered all the essential learning messages? Will each page be interactive enough? These questions need considering before you think about details like how your content will transition on screen.
• Managing scope: Planning out content ahead of building helps you establish how long each section should take your learners and whether anything needs tightening up.
• Outlining your visual approach: A visual storyboard for elearning will serve as a reference for your graphic artists, animators, or videographers to work from later, so they can bring your ideas to life. 
• Ensuring stakeholder alignment: Some authoring tools limit the number of reviewers that can access your draft course or make it difficult for them to leave comments in situ. Conversely, a storyboard can be easily shared, annotated and tweaked by all relevant stakeholders. (However, with collaborative tools like Elucidat now leading the way for course creation, it’s becoming much easier to refine your built courses as part of a team.)  
• Saving resources: Even with the most efficient authoring tool, it takes time to populate a course, sometimes requiring support from graphic artists and developers. Providing the opportunity for your course reviewers to edit content at the storyboard stage means less time is wasted down the line. 
• It improves course quality: Working in a storyboard encourages you to think carefully about things like wording and storytelling, whilst providing an early opportunity for your QA team to review your content – all of which equate to a quality end-product. 
• It promotes careful multimedia planning: Storyboards are an opportunity to script your video drama, vox-pops, animations, and/or voiceover, which need careful consideration and sign-off before you start recording. 

You can explore the rationale for elearning storyboards further in this blog post from the elearning industry.

Key components of an effective elearning storyboard

Even with a powerful authoring tool up your sleeve, a shoddy storyboard will leave you with, at best, a confusing learning experience. So, what should you include in yours?

• A course menu and/or introductory screen, which might include completion instructions.
• A clear outline of the course structure, with content sectioned into topics, pages, interactions, and display items.
• Expected durations (in minutes) for each section of content. 
• A description of what interactions you plan to use and what options there are within these. For instance, if you decide to include a multiple-choice question, what are the possible answers? How many are correct? How many versions of feedback are there? 
• The exact text that will appear on screen. This includes page headings, body text, instructions, and any accessibility aids (for example, alt text). 
• The script for any video or audio elements that need recording, such as the dialogue for video drama or the voiceover for animation.
• A rough plan of the visual assets. You might include links to existing photos, or if you want a new asset creating, a sketch that your graphic artist can use as a reference. 
• Direction on how learners will navigate the content, such as how they will get from one page to another. 
• Links to any resources you want to embed.

Step-by-step guide to creating a storyboard

Use these 10 steps as guidance for constructing your elearning storyboard: 

1. First, agree your learning objectives with your team. These are your bottom line – everything that goes into your course should be based on these. 
2. Create a course outline to structure your initial ideas. Paving the way for your storyboard, this is a much higher-level plan of your course, mapping out what content will appear where and with what creative treatment. (Essentially, it helps you structure your content and ensure you’re delivering against your learning objectives, without worrying about specific wording.) 
3. Choose an authoring tool that will support your design. There is a wealth of information out there to help you pick! You can start here. 
4. Choose a storyboard format. This could be a template in Word, PowerPoint, or some other application but, if possible, use one that your L&D team are already familiar with. 
5. Write your copy, including on-screen text, audio, and video, clearly, concisely and in line with your brand voice. This is where most of your efforts will be expended. To get started, you can find guidance on best practices here. 
6. Include references for what visuals you’d like to see alongside each section of text. In fact, you’d ideally determine these things in parallel, as they should influence each other. For example, by using a diagram to convey a complex process, you can swap out that waffly paragraph of text! 
7. If handing over to a developer and/or graphic artist, add any notes that will make their life easier… If an infographic needs creating, what graphic style should it have? What should it highlight? How will learners interact with it? 
8. Give everything a readthrough to check that the copy flows, that there’s a consistent tone of voice, and that your word counts are reasonable. 
9. Review and iterate with your wider team of SMEs and ideally, your QA team.
10. Brief your graphics team so they can source the necessary assets, then move into development using your storyboard and chosen authoring tool. 

For further guidance on developing effective learning, take a look at this blog post on creating engaging content.

Common mistakes to avoid

Here are some common pitfalls we see when it comes to storyboarding:

• Skipping the storyboard entirely: When deadlines are tight, it can be tempting to go full steam ahead into the build, with just your learning objectives for direction. However, this will nearly always lead to quality problems later when you realize you’ve overlooked key learning messages, or your content order doesn’t make sense. (And it typically takes much longer to rework a build than a storyboard document!) That being said, it’s worth highlighting that Elucidat provides a flexible way for confident SMEs to storyboard in situ; The authoring interface allows you to see your course pages and chapters from a single top-level view, where you can easily change your interactions and locations. Find out more in this feature focus. 
• Not using a template or consistent format: Page elements will get muddled during the build stage if they aren’t clearly identified. For example, your course could end up with missing page titles or text that appears alongside the wrong images.
• Including too much copy: Generally speaking, the more reviewers involved, the greater the risk of last-minute content being shoehorned into your storyboard. So, collaborate with your reviewers to keep the text as tight as possible…If in doubt, cut it out!
• Ignoring the learner’s perspective: Remember to put yourself in your learners’ shoes and consider how, when, and where they will be accessing your content. If you have mobile learners, don’t include interactions that will be clunky to navigate on a smartphone. And if you have some learners who can’t view video content, make sure you add transcriptions. Find out more about how to support accessibility requirements here. 
• Not establishing a consistent writing style: Make sure you have agreed upon a suitable tone of voice from the get-go, so your content doesn’t jump around from colloquialisms to policy speak, for example.  
• Ignoring brand guidelines: Keep your brand guardians happy by writing according to your organization’s guidelines. If you don’t have any, establish your own conventions early on for things like capitalizations and bullet points. Oversights and inconsistencies can come back to bite you later!

Real examples of elearning storyboards

You can find an elearning storyboard example here. This template is specifically designed for drafting microlearning and includes instructions for completing each section.  

Download the template

Here are some key features in this document:

• It starts with a snapshot of how the course will fit together – in this case, as a single scrolling page. 
• There’s a column dedicated to the visual direction for each section. This has been populated with mock-ups for each type of interaction, but you could also use this space for sketches, example photos, or even just descriptions of what you’d like to see in the build. 
• Placeholder headings for each interaction have been included.
• There’s consistent formatting throughout the document, for example, on-screen text is on the left, visuals are on the right, and headings are picked out in bold.
• There’s guidance around word count for each section, to ensure everything will fit nicely on screen.
• There are placeholders for instructional text on interactive page elements. Remember, these should be completed with mobile users in mind (for some authoring tools, this might require two types of instruction).  
• It incorporates all possible learning journeys, for example, offering different feedback text depending on how the learners answer a multiple-choice question. 

You can see an example of how this template translates into a course build here.

Final thoughts 

When it comes to building an elearning course, off-the-cuff usually equates to off-the-mark. So, plan your course carefully and save time in the long run by using a storyboard for instructional design. 

And if you do feel confident enough to skip this phase of development, use an authoring tool like Elucidat that enables you to storyboard flexibly in situ.

Download your free storyboard template 

Download a blank elearning storyboard template for you and your team here. We use it on all of our projects! 

To learn more about creating engaging elearning prior to, throughout, and after the storyboarding phase, take a look at this guide. 

Interested in a free elearning design course? Check out this engaging elearning course, built in Elucidat.

Measuring learning impact is a major challenge for L&D teams. With lack of resources, scattered data, and sometimes an unwillingness from stakeholders to engage, it can be hard for L&D to prove its value. But you’re not alone. By gathering insights from sales, product, and HR leads about the metrics they track, and taking input from our recent learning managers roundtable, we’ve created this guide to help overwhelmed learning managers measure learning impact effectively.

What is learning impact?

Learning impact refers to the tangible effect that training and development initiatives have on business outcomes. It’s about more than just assessing if employees complete courses – it’s about measuring how that learning improves performance, drives productivity, boosts employee engagement, and contributes to overall company goals. 

In short, learning impact shows how effectively training translates into real-world results, whether it’s higher sales, faster onboarding, or better customer satisfaction.

Types of learning measurement

Measuring learning impact is more critical than ever, but with so many factors at play, it can be tough to know where to start. To truly demonstrate the value of your learning initiatives, you need to track the right metrics – those that show how training translates into real business outcomes.

Many, but not all, L&D teams still rely on completion rates, survey feedback, and assessment scores as their main evaluation methods. While these metrics have their place, they don’t fully tell the story of how learning impacts business performance or helps teams experiment with future techniques.

To measure learning impact effectively, collaborate with stakeholders to find and focus on a key business metric. There’s no magic metric that will work across all your projects. It’s about honing in. Here’s some examples:

• Sales training: Look to revenue growth & sales performance: Are trained employees driving more revenue, closing more deals, or working more efficiently?
• Onboarding: Look at time to productivity: How quickly do new hires reach full performance, and how does training speed up their integration? Are employees staying longer? 
• Product training: Look at uptake in usage & satisfaction: Is product usage on the up? Is product knowledge translating into better customer interactions and higher satisfaction e.g. with support tickets?

By tracking core metrics like these, you’ll have a clear, data-backed picture of how your learning initiatives are driving business growth and success. You can hear more about this from learning measurement expert Dr. Alaina Szlachta in this podcast episode.

Why does measuring learning impact matter now more than ever?

Measurement is always on L&D’s priority list. Year after year, “showing value” appears in industry reports as both a top priority and a key skills gap for L&D teams.

Is putting it as a priority a symbolic gesture? A superficial nod to the concept of learning and development? Or are L&D teams genuinely committed to fostering growth and enhancing performance in a way they can prove?

Here’s why proving value is more crucial than ever, especially for in-house L&D teams:

• Cut backs: Budgets are under scrutiny and there have been major cut backs. L&D teams need to be able to show their impact and necessity to organizations.
• AI: With AI set to revolutionize workplace learning, offering real-time personalization and on-the-job support, L&D professionals must lead experiments. Data is key for doing so.
• Skill training: As organizations push to upskill their workforce for the future, L&D teams need to prove they’re up for the job and that their skill training works.

Challenges of measuring learning impact

What stops learning teams from measuring more than completions and scores? Here are four key challenges we uncovered in our recent roundtable that learning managers say get in their way:

• Measurement is inconsistent – When working at scale, there are so many types of learning for many different teams. It can be hard to find a success measure that works for all. (Perhaps this ‘magic metric’ doesn’t exist?)
  
• Stakeholders rarely ask for measurement data – Are stakeholders proactively asking for your learning data, or only when something (like a compliance incident) goes wrong? Learning managers shared they are rarely asked for data. (But maybe that’s because it’s not data business leaders are interested in?)
  
• Data is often trapped in different systems – Making it hard to get a clear, joined-up picture of learning effectiveness.This is where AI and AI-driven data tools can now really help.

• Evaluation is often reactive, not proactive – Measuring the effectiveness of learning can often be driven by when there’s a key interest in the learning from the business. For a business critical learning programme for example. Where does that leave other learning programmes? (Hint – perhaps they shouldn’t be developed if they aren’t driving a business outcome?)

How to measure learning impact effectively

Here’s how to take a practical approach to measurement and evaluation, without getting lost in data.

1. Be proactive, not reactive

Many L&D teams only measure when they’re asked to or when a problem arises. Others are focused primarily on completions and scores. Instead, start embedding performance measurement into the learning design process from the beginning.

Ask before design work starts:

• What business problem are we solving?
• How do you know it’s a current problem or gap that needs to be addressed?
• What existing business data could indicate success?
• What will stakeholders care about most?
• How can we make it easy to track?

When you start with business goals and create a collaborative conversation, measuring impact becomes easier and more meaningful.

2. Focus on one or two metrics

Some L&D professionals hold back from evaluation because they assume it’s all or nothing. Full blown ROI evaluation or nothing. This procrastination can keep us in the completion tracking box! Instead, consider a leaner, more sustainable model.

Measure one or two outcomes, rather than trying to do everything. And try to hone in on a metric that already exists!

For example:

• What’s the business goal? (E.g., “Reduce new hire onboarding time from 60 days to 30 days.”)
• Who is affected? (Target audience: “Customer service reps in Europe.”)
• What should change? (Behavioral goal: “Reps should resolve complaints 30% faster.”)
• How will we measure success? (KPI: “Complaint resolution time drops from 5 to 3 days.”)

3. Use what exists already

You don’t need to invent new metrics or data! Ask your stakeholders to show you the metrics they already track in that area – For example:

• HR data –  Retention rates, churn, time to productivity  – e.g. Workday, SAP
• Sales data –  Revenue uplift, deal size, conversion rates – e.g. Salesforce, Hubspot
• Customer metrics – CSAT, product adoption, call resolution times – e.g. Qualtrics, Jimminy

4. Utilise AI to help you integrate and evaluate data sources

Many L&D teams struggle to connect training data with business KPIs because data is siloed and in different systems. AI tools like Tableau, Looker, Power BI, or xAPI-enabled learning platforms can integrate multiple data sources.

For example: You can merge LMS data (course completions, quiz scores) with HRIS data (performance ratings, retention rates) to see if training is improving employee performance and retention. (Or just look at them side by side – it’ll be clear if there’s a correlation!)

5. Test small, then scale

Instead of tracking every learner, find top-performing teams & compare them to low performers.

Look for patterns: What did the successful teams do differently? Did they engage more in learning? Did they have coaching conversations with their managers?

Use these insights to scale up best practices rather than trying to look at all the data.

6. Tell the story, not just numbers

Leadership doesn’t care about completion rates – they care about business results. Use data storytelling to show impact e.g., “We cut onboarding time by 30%, saving $X per new hire.”.

Present data visually and bring it to life with quotes and short case studies.

If you’re looking for even more in-depth advice around learning impact, check out these 20 learning measurement ideas to show impact and improve performance.

Final thoughts

Measurement doesn’t have to be a burden. By aligning with existing business data, focusing on a few key metrics, and using practical measurement models, you can build a stronger case for learning’s value – without adding unnecessary admin.

Start small, track what matters, and share your insights in ways that resonate with business leaders. Because when L&D proves its impact, it gets a stronger seat at the table.

Interested to hear more about learning measurement from an expert? Check out this podcast episode from Dr. Alaina Szlachta, where she shares how learning leaders can drive impact with what’s already at their fingertips.

You can also discover even more learnings, insights, and best practices from the learning community by subscribing to our newsletter.

Did you know that 62% of organizations are now embracing blended learning? As more teams balance synchronous vs asynchronous learning, understanding the strengths of each is crucial. In this article, we break down both formats and show you how they fuel engagement, social connection, and flexibility – so you can choose the best approach to supercharge your learning strategy.

What is synchronous learning?

Imagine learners gathered in a physical classroom or engaging live in a virtual training session. These are both examples of synchronous learning, where everyone learns at the same time. 

The biggest advantage? Real-time interaction. Think of learners messaging during a live webinar, acting out scenarios in a team workshop, or asking questions in a coaching session. 

No surprise, then, that synchronous learning paves the way for active participation, social learning, and immediate feedback to clarify anything that is misunderstood. This makes it great for team-based training, live discussions, and hands-on learning experiences. 

What is asynchronous learning?

Picture learners fitting elearning around their schedule, watching videos in a spare moment, or consulting digital documents on the fly. These are all examples of asynchronous learning, where learners access learning material at their own convenience.

While social interaction is possible with asynchronous learning, it’s not live. Learners might connect through comments, discussion boards, or shared tools. 

The main advantage of asynchronous learning? Flexibility. Content is accessible anytime, anywhere, and learners can progress at the speed that works for them.  

This makes asynchronous learning perfect for on-demand training, microlearning that fits into busy days, and spaced learning for better retention. 

Comparing synchronous vs asynchronous learning: Key advantages and disadvantages

Which approach is best? Let’s compare synchronous vs asynchronous learning and see how they stack up.

Engagement and social connection

Synchronous learning is social, lending itself to engaging conversations, team activities, and a sense of community. Often, instructors can identify disengagement and address it on the spot.

Social connection in asynchronous learning requires more creativity. Elearning features like gamification and social polls can bridge the gaps between learners. But the true key to engagement lies in carefully crafted, interactive content.

Flexibility and accessibility

Synchronous learning poses scheduling challenges, especially for remote or global teams. Time zones, work schedules, and logistical issues can create barriers. If a learner can’t attend, they miss out. 

Asynchronous learning removes these obstacles, letting learners engage at their convenience. It’s especially valuable for accommodating accessibility needs. Content can be tailored to diverse needs without relying on live participation.

Scalability and implementation costs

For small groups, synchronous learning can be quick and cost-effective. But as the audience grows, so do the challenges. Scaling to larger groups brings higher costs, more complex coordination, and a greater risk of technical hiccups. 

Asynchronous learning can be costly to create upfront. But when it comes to scalability, that’s where this format truly shines. Once created, content can reach thousands of learners with minimal extra expense.

Blended learning: Combining synchronous and asynchronous learning

Choosing between synchronous vs asynchronous learning isn’t always necessary. What if you could use the best of both?  Blended learning does just that, combining multiple approaches into a single learning experience. 

Imagine you’re delivering product knowledge training. Here’s a potential blend: 

1. Start with an asynchronous digital activity to assess existing knowledge.
2. Follow up with a synchronous discussion of the answers in small groups.
3. Conclude with an asynchronous elearning module to provide detailed product information.

You get the flexibility and scalability benefits of asynchronous learning. Meanwhile, synchronous interactions boost engagement, encourage social learning, and offer opportunities for feedback and clarification. 

Find out how to build successful blended learning. 

Choosing between synchronous vs asynchronous learning for your training strategy

Deciding between synchronous vs asynchronous learning, or a blend of both? Make the right choice for your training strategy by asking yourself three simple questions.

1. What’s the purpose of your learning?

Work out what you’re trying to achieve and why.

• For hands-on skills that benefit from live demonstration and practice, synchronous learning that gets people together is ideal.
• Asynchronous learning works well for detailed information, spaced learning, personalised learning, on-demand training, or content learners may need to revisit.

Don’t forget to consider goals beyond learning. Aiming to boost motivation or foster team connection? That might also influence your approach.

2. Who is the audience?

Understand who your training is for by asking:

• Who are your learners, and what challenges do they face?
• Where are they located, and what are their schedules?
• Do they all need the same content, or are there variations?

When weighing up synchronous vs asynchronous learning, consider both practicality – scheduling, accessibility, scalability – and learner needs.

3. What other factors shape your choice?

When choosing between synchronous vs asynchronous learning, organizational considerations matter too. Ask yourself:

• What’s your timeline? Synchronous learning is quicker to implement. Asynchronous takes longer but is reusable long-term.
• What’s your budget? Synchronous costs less upfront, but needs ongoing instructor time. Asynchronous costs more initially but less over time.
• What’s your technical infrastructure like? Stable internet is crucial for virtual synchronous learning. Asynchronous usually requires a reliable content-hosting platform.

By addressing these three questions – purpose, audience, and practical constraints – you can confidently choose between synchronous, asynchronous, or blended learning to meet your goals.

Conclusion

When it comes to synchronous vs asynchronous learning, each approach offers distinct benefits. 

Synchronous learning drives active participation, real-time engagement, and social interaction. Meanwhile, asynchronous learning excels in providing flexibility, supporting self-directed learning, and reaching large audiences. 

Why not take advantage of both? A learning blend combines the strengths of the two types of learning to optimize engagement, flexibility, and scalability. 

With Elucidat, creating personalized, blended learning experiences has never been easier. Ready to explore the possibilities? Book a demo with Elucidat today.

Developing training in large organizations brings together a lot of different people. Getting everyone engaged at the right time, in the right way, is key to producing quality learning experiences at scale. But this isn’t always straightforward. If you’re not careful, budgets spiral, deadlines slip and quality goes out the window. But don’t worry, our guide to streamlining your training design process is here to keep you on track!

Understanding the training design process 

ADDIE, Agile, Waterfall… there are plenty of project management models to choose from. But which works best for developing training? We observed the varied processes used by our customers, took the best bits, and created a 5-step process with impact at the center.

We call these 5 steps the 5Cs Framework for successful elearning:

1. Capture – start with a clear plan: Understanding the problem, so you can shape your solution.
2. Conceptualize – lead with a prototype: Turning what you know about your audience’s needs into a vision for an effective training program.
3. Create – build with confidence: Starting to build in your authoring platform with a streamlined, efficient development process.
4. Cultivate – improve and refine: Using data to improve projects and inform strategy.
5. Commercialize – deliver better ROI: Making sure your product works for your business.

Defining roles and responsibilities

A streamlined training design process will help you plan, design, create, optimize, and commercialize your training. But even the best plan will fail if your project team isn’t onboard. 

Clearly defined roles are essential for keeping everyone aligned and empowered to bring their best to the table. For example:

• You and your team are the L&D professionals. Will you get hands-on or play a supportive role, guiding others to create impactful online courses?
• Stakeholders can be a broad group, including anyone who has an interest in your project’s successful delivery. From kick-off to sign-off, who needs to provide feedback and approval at each stage?
• Your internal experts are essential to every learning project. Will your Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) just provide training content or could they build elearning courses for themselves (with the right support and collaborative tool)? 

5 step guide to streamlining your training design process

Let’s take a closer look at what’s involved for your project team at each step of the training design process.

1. Capture – Start with a clear plan

Every project is different. Rather than rushing in and risking rework later, take the time to set a solid foundation. 

• Define your training goals
  You can’t create an effective training and development solution if you don’t understand the problem you’re trying to solve. Conduct a needs analysis. Define the current situation and the desired impact of the training.
  
• Understand your audience
  Before you start your training development, take a closer look at who will take your course. Create learner profiles. A good understanding of your target audience and their learning environment will enable you to create more relevant and effective learning content.
  
• Set measurable goals
  Work with your stakeholders upfront to decide on the goals you’re going to measure for your project. Elearning can generate a lot of data, but data doesn’t always mean insight. So, think about what you want to discover and identify the relevant metrics upfront.

• Identify barriers
  While you can’t predict every curveball you’ll face; some challenges will be clear from the start. Compressed timelines, limited budgets and resource constraints are common barriers to any project’s success. Identify strategies to navigate these barriers at the start and you’re more likely to overcome them.

Ready to get clear on what your project is trying to achieve? Check out our resource on how to Capture – start with a clear plan.

2. Conceptualize – lead with a prototype

With training goals clear in your mind, it’s time to generate some ideas for how to meet them. For best results, do this in collaboration so your project team is aligned and moving forward with a shared vision.

Here’s some approaches you could take:

• Brainstorming:
  Generate lots of different ideas before narrowing your focus to one solution. Avoid looking at the detailed course content. Think about what types of activities, experiences, and tools will work for your learners and goals.
• Action mapping:
  Build out your solutions based on competency and change with Cathy Moore’s Action Mapping. Start with your learning objectives, then work backward to determine the actions learners need to take to achieve these goals. 

Once you’ve defined your training solution, get prototyping to check that you’re heading in the right direction. 

Don’t prototype everything. Focus on the flow and learning design. If you’re designing a blended learning solution, show how the different delivery methods fit together, including face-to-face or virtual classroom-based training. 

For elearning, you can demonstrate your approach with a:

• Wireframe which sets out layouts and sample content, without getting caught up in styling.
• Prototype which provides an interactive walkthrough with visual styling. Remember, you don’t have to start with a blank canvas. Your authoring tool may have ready-made templates which can create a prototype in just a few clicks. 

Top tip: Don’t make prototyping a big deal – do it early, rapidly, and collaboratively. Developing a prototype saves time by identifying issues sooner and providing a reusable template you can build from. 

Want to find out more about how you can do this? Check out our resource on how to Conceptualize – lead with a prototype.

3. Create – Build with confidence

Having confirmed your thinking with a prototype, you can dive into developing the detailed content. After all that needs analysis and ideas generation, this stage may appear comparatively straightforward. However, it’s actually where a lot of elearning falls down. 

Here are some simple actions you can take to keep your training on track:

• Start with your design model:
  Seeing this stage as just about populating the screen with detail is the path to ineffective learning. Reframe how your project team think about their content. Use your prototype as the blueprint and see how the content can support this learning experience.

• Collaborate in your authoring tool
  Invite your SMEs to add their content directly into your approved prototype. Include short instructions to this framework, guiding them on the type of content that will be effective for these interactions. Work with them in real-time to finesse wording and support them with visuals and practical activities.

• Work iteratively
  If you build everything in one go and then gather feedback, you risk finding out something isn’t working and your effort is wasted. Add in regular check in points to gather feedback from your key stakeholders and some end users. For example, you might build out topic 1, gather feedback, and make changes before building topic 2. 

• Set up structured testing
  It may not be the most exciting part of a project, but Quality Assurance (QA) can make or break your digital learning. QA as you go, but always do a full check before you release your elearning.

Top tip: Don’t forget your L&D best practice in the rush to deliver! If you’re going to create engaging content, your team needs to stay focused on delivering a quality learning experience during this stage. For a quick reminder, check out our Designing quality elearning guide and How to create engaging elearning course.

Ready to streamline your authoring process while still delivering quality? Check out our resource on how to Create – Build with confidence.

4. Cultivate – Improve and refine

Your training design process doesn’t end when you upload your elearning to your Learning Management System (LMS). One of the big benefits of digital learning is that data dashboards can help identify how you’re meeting your business goals. The key is to balance data about users and performance by:

• Tracking engagement:
  Most L&D teams measure completion rates. It’s a great start, but it’s not the full picture. Explore the range of analytics your authoring tool offers. For example: 

• Most visited topics: Which topics within your elearning are most popular. This could indicate your audience is actively looking for support in certain areas. 
• Common incorrect answers: Which questions your audience are getting right, and which are tripping them up. This could indicate knowledge gaps that impact performance. 
• Popularity in audience groups: Which countries / departments / locations are engaging most with the elearning. This could indicate where you need to do another round of promotion.

• Measuring impact
  Next, measure the impact your training has had on the business. Here are three steps to help you identify your course’s impact on Key Performance Indicators (KPIs):
  1. Review your goal and the business metric you plan to impact. Identify a benchmark to measure against. 
  2. When you’ve reached significant engagement levels with your elearning, measure your key metric again and compare it to your benchmark. 
  3. Use what you’ve learned from your engagement data. For example, if you’ve seen more engagement and more improvement in the US compared to the UK, get UK managers involved in promoting the elearning again.

Armed with this information, you can learn, improve, and update your training. You can also take forward any learning into your next project. 

Explore how you can do this our resource on how to Cultivate – Improve and refine.

5. Commercialize – deliver better ROI

Having measured the impact of your training, you can work out whether your streamlined training process has delivered Return on Investment (ROI). A traditional ROI calculation takes the benefit (or return) of your investment and divides it by the cost (or investment) you spent. However, this is quite simplistic. 

That’s why we look at the three factors we see at the heart of designing a training program that’s effective:

1. Scalability: The reach that your training has achieved.
2. Quality: The engagement and performance impact your elearning had.
3. Speed to market: Whether the training project was delivered in a timely manner.

Want to find out more about demonstrating your value? Check out our resource on how to Commercialize – deliver better ROI.

Choose the right authoring tools

If you’re going to create a training plan that’s efficient and effective at every stage, you need an authoring tool with the right capabilities. For example:

• Content import: The days of tedious copy and paste content transfer are gone if you can import your PowerPoints into your tool.
• Ready to go templates: Speed up your elearning production with templates that already have design thinking and layouts in place.
• Easy collaboration: With a cloud-based tool, you can build and review all in one place. People can work on the same project at the same time, while permissions allow you to stay in control.

Here’s a quick overview of some of the most popular tools you could consider:

• Elucidat – Helps teams to create impactful elearning quickly and easily by unlocking expertise from any employee.
• Adobe Captivate – Gives experienced authors the power to create high-quality content.
• Articulate Storyline 360 – Ideal for individual users who prefer PowerPoint, with an added layer of customization.
• Articulate Rise 360 – Users with access to Articulate 360 can produce simple elearning courses fairly quickly.
• Gomo – Best for experienced learning designers that are not looking for advanced customization.
• Lectora – Gives traditional, capable authors an effective tool for producing HTML5 content.
• Adapt – Designed for technical authors who are looking to design bespoke HTML5 authoring through back-end design.
• DominKnow – Perfect for teams whose focus is on responsive screen capture and software simulation.
• Easygenerator – Authoring software designed for learning teams who need to create elearning content, easily.
• iSpring Suite – Desktop PowerPoint-based tool that’s a great option for novice learning designers who don’t have to worry about updating content regularly.
• Evolve – Built for teams who need to collaborate together and don’t mind putting in the time to learn how to use it.
• Camtasia – Video editing suite most commonly used for screen recordings, tutorials or product demos.

Read a full comparison in our review of the top elearning authoring tools.

Conclusion

A streamlined training design process can make late feedback, missed deadlines and budget bloat a thing of the past. That’s why we took the best bits from common design models and created a 5-step process with impact at the center.

1. Capture – Start with a clear plan: Put time in upfront to make sure the solution you design is meeting the real business need.
2. Conceptualize – Lead with a prototype: Don’t rush ahead with a solution, generate ideas in collaboration with your SMEs and try them out in a prototype.
3. Create – Build with confidence: Use collaborative and iterative ways of working that involve your SMEs, stakeholders and end users so you’re more likely to hit the target.
4. Cultivate – Improve and refine: Explore the data and analytics your tool offers to tweak and enhance your elearning.
5. Commercialize – deliver better ROI: Measure the impact your elearning has had on your business goals so you can learn and increase your impact.

Find out more about how you can use these steps to deliver business impact with our 5C resources, elearning best practice guide, and engaging elearning design course.

Want to start testing this training design process? Book a demo of Elucidat to get started with a free trial.

Choosing the right elearning authoring tool for your business can feel overwhelming. With a vast range of platforms, software, and systems on offer, you’ll need to really think about what your organizational goals are and exactly what features each platform offers – and at what price. This handy guide will help you compare the 12 most popular corporate elearning platforms on the market, so you can find your perfect match!

We have reviewed 12 of the best elearning authoring tools against the following criteria: quality of output, speed and efficiency of authoring, and scaling up of elearning production.

Read on to discover: 

• What are elearning authoring tools? 
• Is elearning software different to an authoring tool?
• Why do you need an authoring tool?
• Features of authoring tools
• Types of authoring tools
• Criteria for evaluating the best authoring tools
• 12 elearning authoring tools & software to consider
• Best elearning authoring tools – detailed review & comparison
• Business use cases for elearning software
• Conclusion
• Further Information

What are elearning authoring tools?

Elearning authoring tools are pieces of training and development software that enable the creation of digital learning content. This could be as simple as creating a Microsoft Word document, or as complex as a graphic design tool.

Instructional designers in L&D teams use elearning authoring tools to create training materials for their employees, which might cover compliance, onboarding, hard and soft skills, etc. These will typically be in the form of elearning courses, including features like click-to-reveal interactions, quizzes, and personalized and gamified content in more recent years.

Is elearning software different from an authoring tool?

Elearning software is a broad term that could be used to refer to many elements within a learning technology stack. Within the elearning software category, you’ll find software that focuses on different aspects of digital learning. For example:

• Elearning authoring tools, that are used to create effective, engaging corporate elearning courses.
• Learning Management Systems (LMSs), that automate the administration, testing, tracking, and reporting of these courses.
• Learning Content Management Systems (LCMSs), that are a one-stop-shop for creating, hosting, managing, and delivering content. These days, LCMSs can have all the benefits of an authoring tool, which is why some LCMSs, can be referred to as both an LCMS and an authoring tool.

Read more about the key differences in our guide to choosing the best LMS platform.

Why do you need an elearning authoring tool?

Unsure whether you need elearning authoring software to meet your workplace objectives? Here are the top five benefits you can expect to see from an authoring tool:

1. Allows you to personalize your content and adopt a people-centered approach to learning;
2. Enables you to collaborate with your team effectively, allowing authors, SMEs and stakeholders to work together seamlessly;
3. Makes it easy to roll out corporate elearning courses in different locations and update content to comply with new regulations quickly and with ease;
4. Allows you to continually improve your elearning courses by analyzing data and collating feedback on how your content performs;
5. Enables you to adapt to new demands and produce supporting digital learning content quickly.

Authoring tools features

Once you’ve decided elearning authoring software is the answer, you need to find the right tool. There are a number of features you need to consider:

• User-friendly interface: An intuitive interface means you can start building content straight away. Some products offer a free trial, so you can assess how easy it will be to build, share, duplicate, and update content.
• Collaboration capability: Effective collaboration produces better learning courses. Find out whether the authoring tool supports multiple users building, reviewing, and amending courses at the same time. Also, how easy it is to share your bespoke templates and company assets for re-use across your content and authoring teams. 
• Translation and localization features: If you’re reaching international learners, you’ll want to create courses in the right languages. Check to see whether the tool has a translations workflow – and even better, an auto-translate feature. Some tools also offer course variation functionality to help you manage localized or translated versions of a course.
• Authoring toolkit: If you’re looking for people-centered learning experiences, you might want to explore what options the tool provides for things like gamification and personalized learning. Check out some of the example courses created by the tool to get a good idea of the content output. 
• Ready-made templates: Expert-designed templates can help you choose the best interactions for your learning and save you time in development. Explore the templates the tool offers and how it recommends these to you. 
• Scope for customization: Some tools are designed to offer granular control over course layouts (the course interface, colors, fonts, positioning of assets etc.) – but at the expense of being complicated to use. Some offer more of a compromise. Take a look at user reviews of each tool to see what scope for customization there is, and how complex it’s likely to get. 
• Multi-device: Nowadays learners want to complete content on any device. Find out whether the tool produces content that works across desktop, tablet, and mobile and what additional effort authors need to invest to optimize the learning experience for these devices.

Types of authoring tools

There are many different elearning authoring tools to choose from. Understanding which type of tool is best suited to your organization could be a good starting point. Take a look at the different solutions available and find the best fit for you:

• Cloud-based tools: Flexible online or web-based authoring tools that allow authors to collaborate and work on the same digital learning content simultaneously. No installation is required, and all edits are saved to the cloud.
• Desktop-based tools: Powerful authoring tools that are run locally on desktops and require a download. These elearning platforms are typically run offline, meaning all edits are saved locally.
• Open-source tools: Web authoring tools where the original source code is made freely available. This gives flexibility to experienced developers who want to dig into complex code.
• Authoring tools built into Learning Management Systems (LMS): Simple elearning authoring tools that are included as part of an LMS package. They are often simple to use but limited in output.
• Free tools: Authoring tools with no cost required to start creating elearning – this often results in decreased quality and lack of scalability.

Criteria for evaluating the best elearning authoring tools

What makes a great elearning authoring tool? In this guide, the key criteria we have used to assess the best authoring tools are:

Quality of elearning output:

• The level of customization available
• The variety of formats to choose from
• Whether in-built design guidance is offered
• Options for gamification, personalization, and social polling 
• The level of data and reporting offered 

Speed and efficiency:

• How quickly you can produce high-quality elearning that’s optimized for all devices
• Collaboration options for streamlining the feedback process 
• Whether multiple authors can work on a project simultaneously
• The level of authoring experience required 
• How quickly you can publish and update courses 
• Whether there’s a translation workflow and/or auto-translate feature

Scalability:

• How easy it is to reuse, copy, and scale your corporate elearning content
• The level of control you have over your authors 
• Cost-efficiency for producing elearning content at scale
• Options to update assets and branding centrally

12 elearning authoring tools to consider

In this review, we’ll be taking a deeper dive into 12 online learning software examples you might want to consider. Specifically, we’ll be looking at: 

1. Elucidat – Helps teams to create an impactful elearning quickly and easily by unlocking expertise from any employee
2. Adobe Captivate – Gives experienced authors the power to create high-quality content
3. Articulate Storyline 360 – Ideal for individual users who prefer PowerPoint, with an added layer of customization
4. Articulate Rise 360 – Users with access to Articulate 360 can produce simple elearning courses fairly quickly
5. Gomo – Best for experienced learning designers that are not looking for advanced customization
6. Lectora – Gives traditional, capable authors an effective tool for producing HTML5 content
7. Adapt – Designed for technical authors who are looking to design bespoke HTML5 authoring through back-end design
8. DominKnow – Perfect for teams whose focus is on responsive screen capture and software simulation
9. Easygenerator – Authoring software designed for learning teams who need to create elearning content, easily
10. iSpring Suite – Desktop PowerPoint-based tool that’s a great option for novice learning designers who don’t have to worry about updating content regularly
11. Evolve – Built for teams who need to collaborate together and don’t mind putting in the time to learn how to use it
12. Camtasia – Video editing suite most commonly used for screen recordings, tutorials or product demos.

Save time comparing elearning software companies by downloading our authoring tool comparison template. We’ve completed the Elucidat column for you!

And here’s a handy comparison table to help you along.

Elearning software	Type of solution	Quality of output	Speed	Scalability
1. Elucidat	Elearning authoring platform	High	Fast	High
2. Adobe Captivate	Standalone authoring tool	High	Slow	Low
3. Articulate Storyline	Authoring suite	Medium	Slow	Low
4. Articulate Rise	Online authoring tool	Low	Fast	Medium
5. Gomo	Online authoring tool	Medium	Fast	High
6. Lectora	Standalone authoring tool	Medium	Slow	Medium
7. Adapt	Online authoring tool	Low	Fast	Medium
8. DominKnow	Online authoring tool	High	Average	Medium
9. Easygenerator	Online authoring tool	Medium	Fast	Medium
10. iSpring Suite	Authoring suite	Medium	Average	Medium
11. Evolve	Online authoring tool	Medium	Fast	Medium
12. Camtasia	Video authoring software	Medium	Medium	Low

Best elearning authoring tools – detailed review & comparison

1. Elucidat

Elucidat makes it easier for ambitious teams to produce quality workplace learning at scale. Being a fully cloud-based elearning authoring platform, organizations can open up and streamline their elearning production– without sacrificing quality.

With Elucidat you can empower anyone of any skill level to create digital learning ready for any device. From product training to compliance – Elucidat helps reduce costs and increase business performance. Read our guidelines to elearning best practices here.

Get to know Elucidat in this short video:

2. Adobe Captivate

Captivate is a desktop application known for its advanced authoring capabilities, particularly in creating simulations and systems training. However, it comes with a steep learning curve and isn’t set up well for collaborative working.

3. Articulate Storyline 360

Storyline 360 is a desktop tool that’s purchased as part of the Articulate 360 suite and uses a PowerPoint-style slide-based approach to elearning development. It’s very flexible in terms of what you can create, though comes with a steep learning curve and limitations when working collaboratively.

4. Articulate Rise 360

Rise 360 is a web-based authoring tool included as part of an Articulate 360 suite. It’s designed to be really easy to use and great for creating mobile-friendly learning experiences, but offers a limited authoring toolkit.

5. Gomo

Gomo is a cloud-based authoring tool that allows you to create web-style content that’s automatically optimized for mobile users. It’s a great tool for collaboration but there are a few small hurdles and restrictions in regards to authoring. 

6. Lectora Online

Lectora Online is an authoring tool by ELB Learning, that sits alongside it’s desktop equivalent. It can be powerful when you know how to use it, but comes with a steeper learning curve than many of the other tools.

7. Adapt Learning

Adapt is a free elearning authoring tool that creates responsive HTML5 content.

There are two component parts to the Adapt offering: The Adapt Framework is an open-source, front-end framework designed for use by developers. The Adapt Authoring Tool is the web-based application aimed at your average instructional designer with no coding experience. Neither can be used to host content – you’ll need an LMS for this.

8. DominKnow ONE

DominKnow ONE brings together its traditional authoring tool, Claro, with its responsive authoring tool and simulation creator, DominKnow Flow. This elearning software offers a vast authoring toolkit as well as some handy features for working at scale, though it may not be the easiest tool to pick up.

9. Easygenerator

Easygenerator is an elearning platform focused on creating straightforward digital learning content quickly. It doesn’t host content for you, making it more difficult to make content updates, though does benefit from some cloud-based collaboration features.

10. iSpring Suite

iSpring Suite is a desktop-based authoring tool that integrates with PowerPoint. While it’s easy for seasoned PowerPoint users to start using, it’s worth bearing in mind some technical hurdles, including that the tool is optimized for use on PC rather than Mac.

11. Evolve

Evolve is an online digital learning authoring tool designed for novice authors. It makes it quick and easy to create simple courses, though isn’t so efficient when creating very bespoke, large-scale content.

12. Camtasia

Camtasia is an all-in-one software suite for screen recording and video editing. Although foremost a video capture tool, content can also be exported as SCORM packages.

Due to its primary focus on video, Camtasia does not perform all the usual functions of an authoring tool, and so is often integrated, or used alongside other elearning authoring software.

Business use cases for elearning software

Elearning software can be utilized in a number of ways, across multiple business verticals to provide impact. We’ve highlighted some areas below: 

Compliance training

For finance companies, providing engaging, digestible compliance training is critical. Elearning software enables organizations to produce powerful elearning material at scale, and quickly, to keep pace with the ever-changing regulatory landscape. 

Retail training

Keeping pace in a rapidly shifting industry such as retail can be impossible without the right elearning software. With the right tool, retail companies can produce exceptional learning that addresses the big challenges and ever-changing needs of retail customers. 

Sales training 

Educating employees on effective sales methods and tactics is important for organizations looking to boost sales and attract the right type of customer. Authoring tools can help company managers to produce and manage highly customizable, branded digital learning at scale.

Employee upskilling 

Organizations looking to provide employees with goal-oriented online training designed around specific skills should take advantage of authoring tools in order to track employee engagement, success rates, and the impact of their elearning.

In conclusion

There’s a lot of overlap in the functionality of the best elearning authoring tools shown here, but your requirements – such as the quality and scale at which you want to produce digital learning – will narrow down your shortlist. Ultimately, finding the best corporate elearning authoring software for you and your team will depend on your needs.

If you need to produce high-quality content at scale, then an authoring tool like Elucidat would be a great fit for you.

Let us know your specific authoring needs, book a demo to learn more, and get set up with a free trial account.

Further information

To help you make the right choice and also to get you thinking about your wider elearning tech stack and strategy, check out some of our other top content:

Overview of tools that includes LMS’s:

• Choosing the best SCORM compliant LMS 
• How to implement an effective employee training program
• The free elearning templates that will save you hours
• A guide to HTML5 elearning authoring tools
• The 8 best SCORM authoring tools

In a digital landscape dominated by cloud-computing, the embrace of cloud-based elearning marks a significant evolution in how we approach corporate learning and development. Moving beyond the limitations of traditional methods and scattered training materials, this shift harnesses the cloud’s vast potential to deliver a more accessible, efficient, and integrated learning experience. Ready to see how this transformation is reshaping professional training at its core? Let’s dive into the advantages of this pivotal change.

What is cloud-based elearning?

Cloud computing refers to using a network of central remote servers hosted online to store, manage, and process data.

What does this mean in terms of elearning? While desktop tools require a download and will run locally on each user’s device, their cloud-based counterparts are hosted online. This means that content is created, saved, managed, and delivered over the internet, through a central repository. And it’s all done in real-time. Read more about elearning best practices guide.

So, let’s explore the implications of this for enterprise organizations, and ask why they should be investing in cloud-based elearning.

The benefits of cloud-based elearning

Below we have outlined six key benefits you can expect to see from cloud-based elearning.

1. Accessibility

Desktop applications run locally, which means you need adequate hard drive space and an installation to get started. Cloud-based elearning systems, on the other hand, enable you to access learning content from any location and device – all you need is an internet connection.

This means content creators, reviewers, and learners can easily switch between viewing a course on their laptop, home PC, and smartphone.

What’s more, new features and releases are automatically rolled out, without your users needing to do anything. That means no more tiresome downloads slowing down your devices.

2. Speed up production

Cloud-based elearning means more efficient collaboration – particularly when it comes to content creation. What does this look like in practice? For a start, all your organization’s digital content will sit within a single location, and as many users as required can go in and make changes to a particular online course.

Additionally, they can work simultaneously. So, while your subject matter experts (SMEs) input the text, your graphic artists can upload the images. And everything they do will be instantly fed through in real time. The result? Your L&D teams can expect shorter development timelines and avoid the inevitable headaches associated with version control.

Use of the cloud also means your organization’s images, logos, and videos can be saved online for easy access, so your content creators can browse, select, and drop files straight into a training course. From this central repository, it’s easy to make global updates. For instance, in Elucidat, if a company logo needs to be updated, only the original file needs replacing, and this change will be reflected wherever that asset sits.

3. Scalability

Cloud-based elearning also makes it easy to scale up your content; making it easier to manage on a larger scale compared to traditional, desktop-based elearning solutions.

Using a cloud-based elearning platform means you can quickly adapt to the changing needs of your organization. As your number of learners grows or decreases, the platform can scale up or down, ensuring that resources are efficiently used without overburdening your organization’s infrastructure.

Launching new elearning courses or updating existing content can be done quickly and efficiently on cloud platforms. This agility supports scalable learning strategies by enabling organizations to respond promptly to emerging training needs or changes in corporate strategy. What’s more, because everything is stored in the cloud, if a user’s device crashes whilst they’re developing a course, their efforts will have been saved.

4. Cost savings

Ultimately, cloud-based tools help keep costs down. They remove the reliance on computer hardware and infrastructure, making implementing your elearning strategy more cost-effective. Cloud-based elearning means you can increase your number of content creators, courses, and learners for less.

And that’s not to mention the costs saved through resourcing when you consider how much faster and more efficient it is to use a cloud-based tool.

5. Consistent content

The cloud enables you to establish and control your branding centrally. You can set your organization’s preferences for colors, fonts, and more, and save this as a pre-approved style for your team of content creators to use. Tools like Elucidat automatically update this style, applying the changes to consistent branding across all projects.

Some cloud-based elearning also offer content creators the chance to save their custom-made interactions, pages, and templates centrally, so they can be re-used by their peers. This helps speed up content development across the board, whilst ensuring a sense of continuity from one online course to the next.

6. Employee retention

When you embrace cloud-based elearning, your employees will benefit from more fulfilling learning experiences.

For a start, they can access learning materials on any device at the point of need. And because development timelines are much faster, this content will better reflect their ever-changing training requirements.

Many cloud-based tools also offer an auto-translate feature. This is a machine translation service that uses deep learning models, hosted in the cloud, to instantly translate your content into one of many languages. This means courses can easily be created in each learner’s required language, so no one is left behind.

The best part of the cloud is that it provides opportunities for learners to generate and share their own content. Tools like Elucidat enable social polls, where you can ask learners questions, collect their responses, and then show how their answers compare to their peers. The chance to connect learners in this way helps create engagement and boost learning retention.

The short of it? Better online learning experiences mean happy learners, and happy learners means better employee retention.

Examples of cloud-based learning management systems

Now we’ve looked at the benefits of cloud based elearning, let’s look at the top tools that will help you create, manage, and deliver impactful elearning content.

Elucidat

Elucidat is a multi-award-winning, cloud-based authoring tool that enables you to produce impactful elearning courses at scale.

Elucidat is a cloud-based tool, which means it allows multiple contributors to work on a course simultaneously, with all their changes instantly feeding through to a central version.

This is where Advanced User Management comes in handy, as it allows you to assign and customize the User Roles for each person in your Elucidat account. With full control over which users can edit your brand styles, delete projects, or upload assets, you can ensure everyone is working to their strengths, and open up your production without risk.

In terms of outputs, Elucidat offers a rich authoring toolkit, lots of room for customization, and options for gamification, personalized learning, and social polls. These key features help your authors create people-centered, engaging learning experiences. And all content is automatically optimized for mobile view, meaning it’s super easy to create great mobile learning experiences, without additional effort.

Once a course is ready for review, cloud-based hosting means you can invite any stakeholder to access a ‘review only’ version online. There’s no download or license required – all reviewers need to do is follow a link. From there, it’s super easy for them to share feedback amongst each other. Comments will be logged in situ against each element of the page, making it easy for your authors to interpret and action their change requests.

Having all your online courses stored centrally also makes it easier for novice authors to hit the ground running; Your L&D team can set up and share pre-approved company templates, packed with inline guidance. This makes it easy for newbies to start creating courses, whilst embedding quality and consistency into their content.

Elucidat is also one of the few tools to offer an Auto-Translate feature, instantly translating content into 75 languages. Combined with Translations Variations Manager, rolling out and controlling multilingual projects becomes a breeze.

Easygenerator

Easygenerator is a cloud-based authoring tool, designed to simplify the creation of elearning courses.

With Easygenerator, you can jump into course development by using pre-built templates or the inbuilt PowerPoint converter. What’s more, it’s super easy to create quizzes, voiceover narration, and explainer videos.

Once a course has been built, cloud-based reviews will help streamline your workflows. However, because Easygenerator doesn’t host content in the cloud, updating your courses will involve several steps, making the tool less efficient than other, fully cloud-based offerings.

Elucidat vs Easygenerator

Articulate Rise

Rise 360, part of the Articulate 360 package, offers a simpler and more streamlined approach to authoring than its desktop sibling, Storyline 360.

It provides a straightforward authoring experience, whereby courses are built through the selection of pre-built blocks, which are automatically optimized for mobile view. Plus, like most cloud-based tools, multiple authors can work on the same course at the same time and make instant updates to content.

Reviews are smoothly executed via the Articulate Review feature, an online collaboration tool (and part of the Articulate 360 package) where contributors can collate feedback. This feedback is made in situ against each page element, so everyone can clearly see what changes need to be made.

Whilst the simplicity of Rise 360 is its biggest selling point, the tool is not so strong in terms of output. There’s little room for things like gamification and page layouts are very restricted. As a result, courses built in Rise 360 can start to feel a bit repetitive, which is intensified when working at scale.

Elucidat vs other authoring tools

The future of cloud-based elearning

So, now we’ve looked at the benefits of going cloud-based, as well as some of the products on the market, let’s consider what the future of cloud-based elearning might look like.

Use of AI

Cloud computing is key to the development of AI systems; Cloud vendors provide the resources and infrastructure to store and analyze vast amounts of data – exactly what’s needed for AI systems to operate. It’s no wonder then that as cloud computing has expanded, we have also seen huge developments in AI. But what does AI mean for the future of elearning?

We’ve already seen how some elearning authoring tools are using AI to generate things like course summaries, knowledge checks, and translations. But these features aren’t fool-proof; Like any AI-generated content, the outputs will need reviewing and finessing by a human. But as the industry continues to refine these machine learning models, and they grow more intelligent, we can expect AI to deliver more advanced results, meaning authors can become more reliant on AI for more applications.

More collaborative learning

Our 2024 State of Digital Learning report found there’s increasing pressure on L&D to respond quicker to business needs and to do more with less. Organizations need new, more efficient ways of working, with an emphasis on collaboration, so they can harness the expertise of the right people to meet the right training needs.

As a result, enterprise organizations might expect to see smarter ways of capturing expertise, upskilling new authors, and rolling out content quickly. Social learning and user-generated content may continue to be explored as part of this, empowering learners to meet their own training needs.

Key takeaways

Cloud-based elearning will benefit everyone at your organization:

• It offers fast and efficient ways for your SMEs to create and manage digital content, rivalling traditional desktop approaches. This will become more apparent as we start to see AI playing a greater role in content generation.
• Learners can benefit from more accessible courses, delivered in their required language and on any device. And they can be sure this content is up to date and reflects their current training needs.
• Use of the cloud improves your data security while reducing the risks of data loss, unexpected costs, and technical difficulties, keeping your business leaders happy.

You can kickstart your transition to cloud-based elearning by investing in a cloud-based authoring tool, like Elucidat.

Getting started with cloud-based elearning with Elucidat

Elucidat is the ideal cloud-based elearning authoring tool for enterprise organizations, giving them the power to scale their content and create impact.

Gamification is a word with a lot of baggage! Maybe you hear it, roll your eyes and think “buzzword”. Or perhaps gamification in elearning sounds a bit daunting to you? The truth is, there are loads of ways to incorporate games and gaming elements into your corporate elearning. Read on to learn more and for a few inspiring examples of gamification in elearning.

• What is gamification?
• How to use gamification in elearning?
• 5 best gamification in elearning examples
• The benefits of gamification to businesses & employees
• Challenges of gamification in elearning
• Best tips for effective gamification elearning

What is gamification?

Gamification allows you to supercharge your elearning experience. It is the strategic use of game elements to enhance the learning experience. It involves integrating features like points, badges, and leaderboards into online courses to motivate and engage learners. No more dull, passive courses. Instead with gamified elements, your elearning is transformed into an interactive and enjoyable learning experience.

How to use gamification in elearning

Now we’ve taken a look at some best practices in gamification, it’s time to see it in action. Here are five examples of gamification in elearning that show different ways to incorporate some or all of these gaming elements.

1. Stories

Create a compelling storyline to captivate your users and take them on a journey. Create a story that embeds users in the plot as they tackle each section of the content. This is a great way to create immersive content and keep learners engaged throughout. Incorporating characters or avatars to represent employees can add an extra layer of fun to this form of gamification in business.

2. Visual design

Eye-catching visuals and aesthetically pleasing designs can make your corporate elearning more appealing and draw your users in. Combine bright colours and graphics for a visually stimulating gamified learning experience.

3. Competitions

Who doesn’t love a bit of healthy competition? Gamification at work can allow users to compete against others in their team or anonymous players, or even against themselves to keep motivation levels high. Consider including leaderboards so learners can see how they’re performing against their peers. This is especially effective for sales reps and top-performing employees, who particularly want to keep achieving more.

4. Challenges

Use elearning gamification to reward your learners with smaller, more frequent tasks and then ramp up the difficulty level as the session progresses. This will not only help them get into the swing of things, but leave them primed and ready for more difficult, rewarding challenges using what they have learnt along the way. 

5. Rewards

Gamify your learning to incentivize your users in the way of rewards such as badges, medals or unlocking new levels can help to boost their motivation and keep them engaged for longer periods of time.

6. Feedback

Providing instant feedback when a learner completes a task or quiz is a great way to keep them focused and engaged as it allows them to track their progress as they move through the different stages of the game.

Are you seeking additional advice on creating effective elearning with gamification? Look no further. Access the ultimate guide to transform your elearning to the next level.

5 best gamification in elearning examples

Now we’ve taken a look at some best practices for gamification in elearning, it’s time to see it in action. Here are five examples of gamification in elearning that show different ways to incorporate some or all of these gaming elements.

1. A gamified quiz with badges to motivate

When does a quiz become a game? Perhaps when visual rewards and badges are introduced alongside basic point-scoring, or maybe when a timer introduces an element of competition. This gamified elearning example does both of those things, as well as demonstrating several different question types.

See this example

This game-like quiz challenges learners to prove their financial crime knowledge. It includes question rounds that increase in difficulty, points to reward correct answers, and bonus questions with badges to collect.

Why it works:

• Gamifying quizzes with badges boosts participation by creating competition and motivating users to actively take part, resulting in higher completion rates and an immersive learning experience.
• Incorporating gamification and badges into quizzes makes learning interactive and enjoyable. Badges represent achievements, fostering a sense of progress and accomplishment, making learning enjoyable, reinforcing positive behavior, and encouraging continuous learning.
• Badges provide recognition and reinforcement for participants’ efforts. Earning badges for completing quizzes or reaching milestones validates accomplishments, boosting self-confidence, motivation, and the desire to continue participating in quizzes and learning activities.

2. Scenario + game elements = sales simulation

This gamified elearning demo shows how simple gaming mechanics can be cleverly applied to a scenario-based approach. The result: a realistic learning environment that really resonates with salespeople.

Try this sales simulation example

The elearning example provides interactive scenarios and simulations mirroring real-world sales situations. It enhances sales skills and decision-making through safe practice, fostering effective sales strategies and improving overall performance. It offers a hands-on approach for learners to develop their abilities in a realistic environment.

Why it works:

• The sense of competition and urgency created by the game mechanics is relevant to the subject, with real life scenarios reflecting a fast-paced, target-driven sales floor
• The user isn’t controlling a character; they are the character – so the stakes feel higher and the game can be more directly transferred to the workplace
• It’s a low-cost audio-driven simulation and a great demonstration of achieving gamification in employee training without huge expense

3. Product knowledge game-like quiz

Creating a sense of play in your corporate elearning is great for engagement and easy to achieve through gamification. Fun, game-like product knowledge quizzes, like the example below, are a great, interactive way to test a learner’s understanding.

Test this gamification example.

This game-like quiz is designed to enhance product knowledge by offering an interactive learning experience through gamification elements such as badges, competition, and achievements. Learners engage in the quiz to earn badges, reinforcing their learning progress and providing recognition for their achievements. 

Why it works:

• With this example of elearning, question rounds are used to emphasize increased difficulty using different points assigned to different questions.
• Learners are incentivized to apply their skills correctly, making the content more likely to stick in the learner’s mind when handling a real-life situation.
• Game-like quizzes are great for the creation of content that involves high-pressure scenarios. Gamification is great for replicating this sense of pressure or less serious topics that you can have a bit of fun with.

4. Game-like quiz: General purpose

This fun, game-like quiz is made up of three rounds on your chosen subject. Each round offers the chance to win points and badges. Decide whether to formally assess learners or not.

See this example.

The showcased elearning is a game-like quiz with a general purpose. It offers an engaging and interactive experience for learners through gamification elements. The quiz aims to enhance knowledge and understanding in a fun and enjoyable way and can be catered to a wide range of topics or subjects.

Why it works:

• You can appeal to the learner’s competitive spirit by rewarding correct answers, as well as providing bonus questions with badges to collect. 
• The interactive nature of the elearning helps improve knowledge retention. By actively participating in the game-like quiz, learners are more likely to remember and understand the content, as they are applying it in practical scenarios.

5. Time-saving tailored retail training

This piece of elearning offers a personalized and engaging learning experience for retail professionals. It showcases how to cater to a range of learner needs by offering different paths through the content.

See this example.

In this gamified elearning example, tailored retail training comes to life. Learners embark on a journey filled with interactive scenarios, practical challenges, and real-world simulations. The training focuses on enhancing customer service skills, product knowledge, and sales techniques, ensuring that each participant gains valuable skills and insights that are directly applicable to their roles in the retail industry.

Why it works: 

• This type of training is great for businesses with high staff turnover, seasonal staffing, and busy learners.
• Incorporating interactive elements such as scenarios and simulations ensures that the content closely mirrors real-life situations encountered in the retail industry. This gives learners the practical skills and knowledge they can apply immediately.

The benefits of gamification for businesses & employees

Gamification in business comes with a number of benefits, both for the organization and participating users. Here, we take a look at some of the most prevalent benefits of gamifying your learning.

1. Encourages active learning

The gamification of elearning encourages learners to take an active role in their learning by providing them with ample opportunities to interact with the content. Rather than passively absorbing information, learners can test their knowledge as they go and gain instant feedback. 

2. Promotes continuous learning  

The competitive element of gamification can spur users on to beat their score or move to the next level, which promotes continuous learning. Users are also more likely to revisit a module if they feel they can score higher, meaning they’re more likely to retain the information through repetition. 

3. Improves productivity

Incorporating gamified elements into your corporate elearning can help employees to stay engaged for longer, meaning they get through more content in less time. Instead of spending half an hour watching a training video, learners can take part in three 10-minute quizzes, for example. Research has concluded that 89% of respondents would be more productive if their work was gamified, with increased happiness levels at work.

4. Creates more enjoyable learning experiences

Not only does gamification help employees to stay engaged for longer periods of time, but it also provides a more enjoyable learning experience. This helps your digital learning become less of a chore and something users can enjoy getting stuck into, instead!

5. Allows companies to collect performance data (and track performance against learning objectives)

L&D teams can leverage gamified workplace assessments to gain useful insights into employee performance and uncover topics or concepts that employees may need further training on. This can help to inform future elearning material and identify where existing modules may need improvement.

Limitations of gamification in elearning

While gamification in elearning has many benefits, it’s not necessarily right for every purpose. In some instances, where you’re dealing with more serious or challenging topics, such as compliance, for example, it may not be appropriate to gamify your content as it may detract from the key messages or takeaways. 

It’s important to treat each topic or module as unique and set your learning objectives before you decide whether gamification will be effective. Gamified content may also not be the right fit for your company depending on your company culture and/or sector, so you should also factor this in when designing your corporate elearning content. 

The most effective elearning programs are tailored to their users and individual learning needs, so if gamification isn’t right for you, experiment with other formats. Check out our guide to elearning best practices for inspiration.

Best tips for elearning gamification

1. Start small but don’t cut corners

Rather than going all-in on a high-profile gamification project, target a particular business area, audience or programme and experiment with different approaches. Make sure you have some control data and gather more after implementation to assess value add. Build up to more complex or widespread implementations. Just remember, starting small doesn’t mean just adding points to a task or tacking a leaderboard onto an end-of-course quiz. The game mechanics have to serve a purpose beyond ‘making it fun’ for gamification in business to be truly beneficial.

2. Prioritise the learning, not the game

Points and competition only deliver value if they’re tied to behaviours and performance. Always get the employee training objectives straight first and design game mechanics to be in service of those. It can be worth developing a hierarchy, whereby points are easily earned (maybe for completing a profile or sharing the course) and accumulate quickly, but badges are more meaningful, offered only in return for doing something that demonstrates new knowledge, competence or skills.

3. Be clear on criteria and progression

Transparency and clarity about how the game works will keep people engaged and motivated. What tasks earn points? What do points mean? Perhaps they translate into badges or unlock new content. What’s the criteria for reaching the next level or reward? What do rewards mean in reality? (Maybe they translate into tangible or financial benefits, or serve as accreditation of a skill that opens opportunities.)

4. Ramp up the challenge gradually

Learners need frequent, easy achievements to begin with. Once they’ve got to grips with things and seen that effort reaps reward, they’re primed and ready for a bigger challenge. The aim should always be for the next level to be within sight, challenging but attainable. Even better if each new challenge requires learners to draw on what they’ve most recently learnt.

5. Don’t disregard individual competition

It isn’t always feasible or appropriate to pit learners against learners on public leaderboards – but that doesn’t mean you can’t successfully gamify your content. Social polling lets an individual see how they compare to others, but anonymously. Or take FitBit: it has the community aspect, but plenty of people use it without that. There’s something intrinsically rewarding, even slightly addictive, about setting a goal and measuring your progress towards it (then hopefully achieving it!).

6. Facilitate continuous learning

Look for ways to encourage learners to keep returning and improving their score (and therefore, their skills and competence!), such as resetting leaderboards regularly or introducing new challenges or rewards periodically. Give people a reason to keep coming back rather than considering their learning ‘done’ and you’ll be supporting a culture of continuous, informal or on-the-job development.

Summary

These four examples show that including gamification in elearning doesn’t have to be daunting. Gaming elements such as points, badges, and levels can – with a little thought – add an extra dimension to your online courses that will help engage learners and make your content stick. To discuss these gamification examples or to find out how Elucidat can help you add gamification at work, get a free personalized demo today. We can help you do it!

Want to create engaging gamified examples like these? Take your elearning to the next level with this certified course in engaging elearning design.

Elearning Subject matter experts (SMEs) are essential to L&D’s success. From understanding the context to developing the content, they shape your learning solutions. But their role doesn’t have to end there. With skill gaps and training needs on the rise, many L&D teams are looking for new approaches to meet demand. We spoke to L&D leaders from a number of large, global organizations to find out how they involve subject matter experts in successful elearning production at scale.

Why subject matter experts are essential to design elearning at scale

Changing customer expectations, digital transformation and increased regulation have left many businesses facing skill gaps. L&D is key to overcoming these issues, keeping pace with change and making sure businesses and employees have what they need to thrive. But L&D teams are struggling to keep up with the demand and the list of training requests continues to grow. If they want to avoid becoming a bottleneck, a new approach is needed.

For many large, global organizations, this has meant subject matter experts playing a bigger role in learning projects. Rather than just providing content, SMEs are becoming elearning authors. And with the help of rapid elearning authoring tools, the L&D teams we spoke to were seeing lots of benefits to this approach:

• Directly harnessing specific expertise areas
• Ensuring learning is relevant
• Responding to emerging skill gaps more quickly
• Unblocking L&D workflow so the team can focus on strategic oversight
• Supporting truly scalable elearning production 

What to consider when getting subject matter experts involved in authoring online learning course

Of course, it’s not just a case of handing out authoring tool licenses and waiting for the results. Before you get your subject matter experts producing elearning, you need to set them up for success. 

Here are three key factors you should consider:

• How can you best use your SMEs’ time?
  SMEs need to do their day job alongside their new elearning author role. Some may only produce elearning once a year. If you’re going to sustain their interest and keep to project timelines, you need to provide the right level of support and avoid overwhelming them. 
• How can you help SMEs produce effective learning?
  SMEs are content experts, not learning designers. They’re also used to sharing their expertise face-to-face, rather than digitally. No one wants to rework unengaging and ineffective elearning, so you need to provide a framework that empowers SMEs to produce quality straight away. Learn how to leverage your subject matter expert to build your dream elearning team.
• How can you maintain oversight and quality?
  Getting lots of different people from across your organization involved in authoring elearning can lead to a wide range of results. If you’re going to maintain consistency, you need to put a robust process in place.

How are other organizations setting subject matter experts up for success?

Whether starting out or well on their way to getting subject matter experts involved with elearning authoring, the L&D leaders that we talked to had many shared experiences, challenges, and successes. Every industry and organization may be different, but all these L&D teams highlighted the same four steps to help keep subject matter experts and elearning production on track.

1. Decide on your approach first

Don’t rush ahead and get SMEs creating elearning before you’ve decided on the approach you’re taking. Whether it’s design principles or a governance model, all the learning leaders we talked to said deciding on their approach upfront made it a smoother journey to elearning production at scale.

2. Provide an onboarding package

Get off to the right start by onboarding your SMEs. The aim is to get SMEs engaged and feeling comfortable with the project, rather than overwhelmed with technical details. From a short kick-off meeting to a design hub full of inspiring best practice examples, these L&D teams used a full range of onboarding tools to do this. 

3. Take steps to maintain quality

Onboarding is just the start. You need to provide SMEs with the right level of support throughout the project to ensure quality and consistency are maintained. Many L&D leaders were directly involved in key approval stages, but they also used templates, guidelines, and peer reviews to keep SMEs on the right path.

To streamline this process, you can explore these free elearning template designs that will save you (and your SMEs) hours.

4. Create momentum

L&D leaders who were further along in the process of scaling up elearning production found that their SME successes organically fed back into the process. As the number of elearning champions and author community grew, so did L&D engagement levels and their learning culture.

Explore more ways how you can transform the way you work with your subject matter experts.

Revolutionizing SME authoring at Decathlon: A case study

Decathlon, a leading global sports retailer, embarked on an innovative journey to transform its learning and development (L&D) approach. The mission was clear: empower every employee to shape their own career path through autonomous elearning creation.

The initiative began with a select group of content creators, which then rapidly expanded to a wider employee base. Supported by straightforward onboarding and guidance, these new elearning authors were given the freedom to create, adapt, and share courses globally. This approach enabled Decathlon to:

• Overcome geographical and sectoral learning barriers.
• Foster a sense of ownership and autonomy among employees.
• Facilitate easy course adaptation, ensuring relevance across different regions.

In just one year, this strategy led to over 1,000 employees in 41 countries producing nearly 5,000 courses, accessible to more than 90,000 learners. The result was not just an increase in learning content but also a boost in employee engagement and skills development.

Subject Matter Experts and the future of online learning

Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) are set to play a pivotal role in shaping the future of elearning. Their involvement is key to enhancing both the capacity and quality of learning content. As highlighted in our State of Digital Learning Report 2024, SMEs are driving significant advancements in online learning. Here’s how:

Increasing L&D capacity

By getting involved in content creation, SMEs help L&D teams scale up their training offerings without compromising on quality. SMEs can efficiently turn their expertise into learning modules, easing the workload on L&D professionals.

Enhancing content quality

The depth of knowledge SMEs bring is invaluable in crafting high-quality elearning content. Their insights ensure that the training is not only informative but also deeply aligned with real-world applications.

Bridging knowledge gaps

SMEs are instrumental in identifying and closing knowledge gaps within the organization.
Their expertise can directly address specific learning needs, thereby enhancing overall employee competence.

Boosting employee retention

Engaging and relevant training content, developed by SMEs, can significantly improve employee retention. Tailored learning experiences make employees feel valued and invested in their professional growth.

The integration of SMEs into elearning represents a significant step towards more dynamic, effective, and personalized training solutions, crucial for the future of workplace learning.

In summary

If you want to stay ahead of training demand by scaling up elearning production, you need to involve subject matter experts. Getting SMEs onboard, engaged and producing effective learning isn’t straightforward. But the effort you put in at the start will pay off with a smoother production process. And, ultimately, this will lead to your team better meeting your organization’s current and future learning needs. 

We spoke to L&D leaders from a variety of industries who have put this approach into practice. Although they used different models and tools, they all highlighted four key steps to setting subject matter experts up for success:

• Establishing a clear approach from the start
• Getting SMEs on board without the overwhelm
• Providing the right level of support to maintain quality
• Enabling your SMEs feed back into the process with peer support

Want to hear more examples of how these L&D teams set their SMEs up for successful elearning production? Download our SME best practice guide.

Everyone should be able to have a great learning experience. This means making sure you consider accessibility when designing elearning. Online accessibility is the key to unlocking great learning for all.

There are some simple and practical changes you can make to your corporate elearning course design to meet (and exceed!) WCAG 2.1 and Section 508 guidelines. Here are 7 tips to help you create accessible elearning experiences.

What does accessible elearning mean, and why is it important?

Accessible elearning means that anyone, no matter their needs, can fully experience your learning. For instance, if a partially sighted person were to use your digital learning course, they should get as complete an experience, and gain knowledge equally efficiently, as a fully sighted person.

Making your corporate elearning accessible is essential. In fact, it’s law:

All parties “must consistently design, construct, develop, and maintain facilities, technology, programs, and services from the onset so that all people, including people with disabilities, can fully and independently use them.” Section 508 2017 (the UK equivalent is the Equality Act).

This doesn’t have to be a problem for you, the content creator; in fact, it should be something that is integrated into your development process. Here are a few simple guidelines to follow to make implementing learning accessibility easy:

7 practical tips for designing accessible elearning

1. Design with audio and visual in mind

There are several reasons why a learner may prefer an audio or visual version of your course. However, it’s important to make sure all your audio content is also available as text, either via a transcript or closed captions, to cater for all those who are deaf or hard of hearing.

If visuals are a must-have, make your content compatible with assistive technologies (e.g., screen readers). This can be done by:

• Adding closed captions
• Providing a transcript
• Choosing your language wisely
• Adding alternative (alt) text

Here’s a list of screen readers you can test for free:

• JAWS
• NVDA
• WebAim
• Mac and iOS users have VoiceOver screen reader already built in

2. Add subtitles to your videos

If you are including video or audio, ensure that you include an introduction before the video to introduce the content and tell the learner how to interact with it.

Always ensure that you include subtitles of the multimedia content. This can be done either via closed captions or by including a separate transcript field. This way, individuals with visual or hearing disabilities can have an equally as effective experience, ensuring online learning accessibility.

3. Add captions to images

If key information is included in your images that you need all learners to understand, then add a caption to your images. Make sure you also include the text alternative, or “alt text,” to explain what the picture is displaying. Creating accessible digital learning imagery through captions is essential for the visually impaired.

This might not be required for all images e.g. if they are supporting graphics that are not essential for understanding your content.

4. Check your color contrast

Contrast is key to the readability of text. Ensure that contrast is high, either by using very different tones or very different colors. Consider boosting your text size too, to improve legibility.

If you’re placing text on a background image, then use a colored tint to knock back the image so the text stands out as clearly as possible – try to avoid placing text over busy backgrounds! Effective color contrast will make any text far easier to read for individuals who are partially sighted or color blind.

5. Use similar hues

A well-designed graph or table with a range of distinct colors may look great, but it’s not heavily accessible.“When designing visual aids, using a variety of colors might seem like a good idea at first, but it can make it a lot harder for people with color blindness to interpret the data.” (Steve Schoger – Designer)

Instead, try using multiple shades of the same hue – it’s much more accessible and looks better, too!

6. Consider your interactions

Certain interaction types are not fully-accessible for all learners. For instance, some drag and drop and sortable activities rely on a learner using (and being adept with) a mouse, which will exclude anyone using keyboard navigation. Consider whether your corporate elearning content can be reworked slightly to allow an alternative, more accessible interaction.

If using an image explorer, consider switching the hotspots from icons to text labels to ensure they are not reliant on the image alone and clear for all users.

7. Think about your choice of words

Words like “click” imply that learners are using a mouse. Links are summarized by screen readers, so ensure you make the sentence that is linked self-sufficient so it will make sense out of context.

For these reasons, consider using “Select this link to find out more about XXX” rather than “Click here.” We recommend that you read this great article on inclusive language.

You can find more best practice tips to designing accessible elearning here. 

How to apply these tips to accessible training

When you incorporate the seven tips above into your elearning design, you’re not just meeting accessibility standards you’re creating more inclusive, accessible training for everyone. Start by checking elements like captions for videos, alt text for images, and ensuring text contrasts well with backgrounds. You should also test interactive features, ensuring they are keyboard-friendly and compatible with screen readers.

Use tools like WAVE, axe Accessibility Checker, and Google Lighthouse to run automated accessibility tests and catch common issues. Once you’ve identified problems, apply the necessary fixes. Regularly reviewing and testing your content ensures your elearning materials are accessible to all learners.

Summary

Designing accessible corporate elearning is a win-win. Not only will applying these simple design and development changes help you meet content accessibility guidelines, but it also ensures that you’re creating great learning experiences for everyone. This will naturally boost overall performance and understanding within your organization. As such, accessible digital learning is a necessity in the modern workplace.

Open up your elearning to anyone with Elucidat

Empower all your learners, no matter their circumstances or capabilities, to have access to impactful elearning experiences. Book a demo of Elucidat to explore how you can quickly and easily create accessible training.

Read on to learn more about Elucidat’s accessibility capabilities!

Are you ready to start using branched scenarios in your online learning experiences? In this article, we’ll share inspiration and practical advice to enable you to bring your branching scenario ideas to life.

Branching means designing different routes through your content, depending on actions made by the user. A branching scenario is a way of placing your learner into the role of a decision-maker, allowing them to make their own choices and see the outcomes play out. It can be a safe space for them to try out different approaches and see the consequences of their actions, preparing them for similar situations in the real world.

We’ve previously explored different examples of branching in elearning, and in this article, we offer some practical advice on how to create an effective branching scenario.

7 ideas that can help you create simple branching scenarios in your online training.

1. Start with a plan

The nature of branching experiences is that your learners will take different routes through your content, so it’s important to invest time upfront mapping out the flow of your learning. Working on paper or using a wireframing tool to rough out ideas will help you make decisions about where to branch and ensure there are no outcomes left uncovered.

Here’s an example of a structure diagram we created for a showcase project on Shared Parental Leave, which features personalized learner pathways branching from a dynamic menu:

Practical tips for Elucidat users:

• You can use Elucidat’s project structure view to check your interactive structure as you build it. This gives you a quick way to see how everything is linked together and sense check whether your project matches up with your original structure diagram.

2. Put your learners in control

A great way to engage learners is to let them steer the experience and choose their own starting point. Consider providing a series of scenarios so they can choose which one they want to opt for, or giving them an option to brush up on their knowledge before diving in. This has an added bonus of appealing to a wide range of learners at once.

Here’s an example of an interactive sales scenario, where sales team members have an upfront choice about whether to start the simulation immediately or recap on the basics first:

Practical tips for Elucidat users:

• Use Elucidat’s range of different menu interactions to give your learners a choice of which route to go down.
• Think about whether this choice will replace the global navigation, and take a look at our Masterclass on when to hide and show the navigation.

3. Tailor your scenarios to the individual

If you want to deliver scenarios or learning content that are as relevant as possible to your learners, then consider introducing personalized learning pathways based on role or experience level.

Shared parental leave example:

This example about Shared Parental Leave leads with a role selector question to find out the user’s area of work and then serves up different topics on the menu as a result.

The benefit of using this approach is that only the relevant content will display, making effective use of your learners’ time and ensuring they only interact with the content that directly applies to them – People-Centered Elearning in practice!

Practical tips for Elucidat users:

• Use Elucidat’s Rules feature to determine which pages or scenario topics show based on how a learner answers an upfront question.

4. Immerse your learners with branching video

Storytelling has the power to engage, motivate, and trigger changes in behavior and improvements in performance. Make your scenarios feel real and give them emotional resonance by building them into a believable story. An effective way to achieve this is by using video or animation to drive your narrative. 

In this example from The Open University, high quality video is combined with believable characters and dialogue to immerse the user in an emotionally-charged experience. The story is paused at various points to invite learners to decide what they would do next, making it an interactive two-way experience.

Practical tips for Elucidat users:

• Use Elucidat’s different video interactions, like branching video, to combine decision points with video and make the user journey feel as seamless as possible.  

5. Make it challenging

We’re all aware that the challenges we face in real life don’t always have a clear-cut right/wrong solution, and branching scenarios are a great way to allow someone to explore grey areas and practice their skills in a safe environment.  

This compliance interactive is an effective example of this, there is the opportunity for an ‘imperfect’, as well as correct and incorrect decision to be selected and played out. It’s a perfect example of the kind of nuanced situation that someone might come across in real life.

See this compliance example:

The branching example offers extensive training about unconscious bias in professional settings, including its effects on decision-making and relationships, along with approaches to reduce and handle these biases.

Practical tips for Elucidat users:

• Don’t make the “correct” choices too obvious. Scenarios are great for exploring sensitive situations and outcomes, so make them as realistic as possible.
• Use Individual Feedback questions in Elucidat to deliver instant feedback that reflects and responds to the specific choice made by your learners.

6. Recognize good performance and highlight knowledge gaps

An important part of learning and improving is understanding the impact of your decisions. Make sure your learners know how they’re getting on by delivering valuable feedback as they move through a scenario.

Try out this sales simulation:

Features like scoring or badges can be introduced to highlight both positive performance and areas for improvement. These can be made to feel quite gamified, like the points-based rewards in this sales simulation demo, for example.

Practical tips for Elucidat users:

• Find out more about recognizing achievements in our Masterclass on using rewards to incentivize learners.

7. Highlight other outcomes

The beauty of a branched scenario is that someone reaches an outcome that’s specific to their choices and the path they took through the experience. However, it’s worth considering whether they might be missing out on valuable learning points through the choices they make.

A final summary page can be a great place to recap the scenario, show other outcomes or perspectives, and weave in some expert commentary to embed your key learning points. 

Explore this branching scenario:

This branching scenario gives learners immediate feedback on each safety precaution, building competence and minimizing the likelihood of mistakes in the working environment.

Practical tips for Elucidat users:

• Use Elucidat’s Clips feature to play back the choices made by your learners and compare them against other outcomes or an expert viewpoint.
• Consider adding a link button to enable users to start the experience again, so they can work through it in a different way and learn by exploring.

Summary

Branching scenarios are an effective way to engage learners through challenges that provide an environment to safely practice their skills and knowledge. When done well, scenarios guide learners deeper into problem-solving activities that can help change behavior and improve outcomes.

We can help you do it! 

Feel inspired by these examples? Book a demo today to discuss how Elucidat can help you in creating transformative learning experiences.