Hey RTO – Does your Online Training Make you money?

This is a valid question for most RTO’s.

With online training and elearning the fastest growing part of the training sector, its no surprise that most RTO’s have joined the stampede and started to put their training online. In fact, in my day to day conversations with RTO’s around the country, I rarely come across someone who doesn’t have some sort of online component, or hasn’t tried some sort of online delivery for their training content or assessments.

What is surprising though, is the number of RTO’s that have online training, that simply doesn’t work. And by doesn’t work I mean DOESNT MAKE MONEY.

The whole reason we put training online is to grow our reach and grow our revenue. Regardless of how great your content is, if your training is not delivering a return, its simply not working.

So if your online training not making money, here are a few questions to consider in getting your training to work.

Content:
You’ve got to have good content. This should go without saying. But how is your content presented. Is it logical for an online learning experience. Is it engaging enough to hold someones attention. Does it cover the right areas to address the assessment questions. Does your content create a change in behaviour?

Is your content really presented the best is could be for an online audience?

Platform:
The Platform you select will have a big impact on the attractiveness of your training and ease of use for your students. Is the platform you’ve selected stable? Is it intuitive to a “green” user. Is it responsive and available on most devices and browsers? How do you provide support for your users. Can your administrators successfully use it?

Is your platform really the best platform to leverage your online training initiative and opportunities?

Marketing:
This could be the single most important part of the whole equation. We all know of training organisations that have pretty ordinary content, but seem to have no trouble in filling a training room with students. In the online world things are no different. Great marketing will beat great content most times. But if you can take great marketing and add it to great content, thats a real formula for success.

Is your ongoing marketing strategy and tactics reaching your target market. Do you know your target market and have a clear strategy to reach them, using multiple methods and mechanisms?

Feedback/Tribe:
Next to marketing, your feedback loop and tribe creation may be the most important thing you focus on. Your feedback loop is a great way to build a tribe or group of loyal followers that like your content and your delivery style. Leveraging this tribe to create evangelist and help drive you marketing initiatives will drive future students and enrolments. How do you currently encourage feedback and engagement with students, during and after the training?

How many of your students or users are true evangelist of your online training products? Are you doing enough to drive this?

Up Sell and Value Add:
Once you have a loyal tribe of followers, you should be looking to leverage that opportunity to up sell and value add with other training and service offerings. Online gives us a great opportunity to offer other training. Expand on key ideas or concepts. Build on the foundation. Leverage the relationship and trust you have established to grow your online revenue. Here more then ever, quality of content is critical. You don’t wan’t to burn a great relationship you have with your tribe by providing poor content.

Do you have other courses and offers for past students and their family and friends?

Once you get here, the cycle starts all over again.

The biggest mistake we see is when RTO’s think that their online training is a set and forget product. Just like you constantly refine your in classroom delivered content and marketing initiatives, online is no different. Measure and review everything and continue to add improvements.

So there you have it. If you have online training and your not realising the return you first expected, get started by reviewing how you are addressing the above.

Better still, why not contact OTrain for an Online Training Audit. For just $750, we’ll review your current online strategy against the 5 criteria above and provide you with a written report and recommendations. You can implement the changes or have one of our Training Success Club Consultants help you implement a strategy to get the return you expect.

Call us today on 07 3040 3310 to learn more.