How To Choose The Right LMS
Choosing a Learning Management System (LMS) is a huge investment for a company, and making sure you choose the right LMS can be a daunting and difficult thing to do.
Choose an unsuitable LMS and prepare to lose time, money, and energy finding another option and moving everything over to a new system.
By choosing the right LMS for your business the first time you set one up, you’ll be able to cut down on future training costs, eliminate the need to pay for expensive consultants, and avoid trying out multiple training methods until you find the right one.
Implementing the perfect LMS for your business is a strategic investment. If you want to take full advantage of it then you should figure out exactly what your company needs from a Learning Management System to help make the right decision.
With the LMS market growing so quickly there are a lot of options to choose from. Hunting for the ideal LMS to fit your needs can be time-consuming, stressful, and sometimes expensive. With all the different types of technology out there these days and the different features offered it’s hard to know where to even start.
Today we’re going to go through 5 tips that you can use to choose the right LMS for your company.
Consider what you actually want an LMS for
Consider what you actually want an LMS for
With so many Learning Management Systems to choose from you should start your search by defining what you believe is crucial to have in an LMS. Think about how the LMS you choose will help you reach your training goals and your business objectives.
An important part of this step is to know your audience.
Who are you using your learning management system to train? What do they need from your LMS?
Here are five questions you can ask yourself to help get an idea of who your audience is and what kind of training they need.
1. How old are your employees?
2. Do your employees have varied skill levels?
3. How tech-savvy is your staff?
4. Where will they be studying?
5. How many employees do you need to train?
By answering these questions you’ll be able to see what features are needed for your LMS of choice.
Consider the needs of your admin team
With your learners and their needs in mind, it’s time to find the perfect fit for the team behind your training modules.
The best thing to do here is to evaluate your LMS by its technical considerations and limitations.
Think about what content you’re considering using. Are you going to use video presentations, interactive content, audio, quizzes, essays, or PDF documents? How will your users access this content?
You want to get an LMS that will match the administrators’ skill level so they can easily organise the content for your courses and training programmes.
Getting an LMS that’s too complex might be confusing and a waste of time, whereas if you get something too simple it might not have everything your administrators need. Balance is the key here so get something that suits your team’s specific needs.
Get your priorities straight
The LMS market is growing, and technology is changing every day. With a myriad of services and features available, it’s important to know which ones to prioritize.
Some examples of features you might want to keep in mind include:
• Discussion boards
• Assessment capabilities
• Enhanced security measures
• Grading
• Capabilities to track progress
• Data tracking
• Automated user function
Prioritize those that directly benefit your business.
Which features will be useful in meeting the objectives you’ve set for your learners?
Evaluate each vendor
Now that you have a list of Learning Management Systems, it’s time to dig a little deeper and learn a bit about each LMS.
The ultimate goal here is to get a short-list of about 3-5 vendors.
What you can do is:
• Browse through their websites
• Test the LMS
• Ask for a demonstration
All this will help you narrow down your long list to 3-5 that you think are good choices for your needs.
Choose your LMS
Sometimes it’s hard to make your final decision. You could be stuck with two amazing learning management systems and struggling to see which one meets your needs more.
We recommend that you check reviews and previous customer testimonials to see which one comes out on top. If you still can’t decide then check out our extensive guide on how to choose an LMS.
If you’re still looking for the ideal LMS for your company or can’t decide which one is right for you then why not check out LearnRight.
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