Are you seeking ways to streamline continuing education course registration, reach a wider audience, or increase non-dues revenue? If so, investing in an on-demand content library through a robust learning management system (LMS) could be the solution. This resource will not only enhance the learner experience but also provide a valuable asset for your continuing education program.
Read on for strategies to create your on-demand content library and improve the learner experience in your continuing education program.
What is a Continuing Education Program Content Library?
An on-demand content library is a repository of any materials you might need to create your continuing education program courses. Within a content library, you can upload video files like WMVs and MP4s. You can also support MP3s and other file recordings. Additionally, you can house any form of document or image to ensure that your learners have all the information they need for a continuing education course.
With the right LMS, creating an on-demand content library should be simple. Staff can drag and drop necessary files and sort them into corresponding folders. They can also create clips from educational videos, making video content more accessible to learners. Consider repurposing learning clips for nano-courses or repackaging a variety of clips to create a new continuing education course.
How to Leverage an LMS to Build a Continuing Education Program Content Library
Now that you know what a content library is and how your continuing education program can leverage one, it’s time to consider building one for your learners.
Here are seven steps to get started:
1. Define Your Goals and Learner Needs
Before you build your continuing education program content library, you’ll want to understand your program’s objectives and your learners’ needs. Ask these questions to guide the structure and content of your library:
- Who are your learners? Consider their professional backgrounds, skill levels, and goals.
- What are the program’s outcomes? Identify whether your continuing education program should be focused on skill-building, certifications, or career advancement.
- How do your learners want to learn? Create surveys and seek learner feedback to gain insights into whether your learners prefer videos, articles, webinars, nano courses, interactive modules, or different learning formats.
2. Repurpose Your Current Content
As you look to build your on-demand content library, review the continuing education content you already have. Use this material to build out your content library with your LMS, making it easy for staff to create courses. For example, consider utilizing your LMS to sync existing slides with new audio to update a continuing education course.
Leverage Path LMS to update and repurpose your current continuing education content and build your on-demand library. We can efficiently manage and categorize courses, pull reports, and enroll users.
3. Archive Live Programs
Be sure to archive all of your live events. Then, you can offer the recording on-demand, reaching more learners and stretching your continuing education content further. Consider building your on-demand content library by recording annual conference sessions and repurposing the session material for future continuing education courses.
Schedule production services and book a team of professionals to record live events or annual conferences. If you stream or capture the event (audio or video), your continuing education program can leverage the recordings in future course offerings, building out a vast content library.
4. Build Chapters
To maximize the content in your on-demand content library, try using your LMS chapter feature. Chapters help you divide up content for your learners, ensuring your content is easy to understand and digestible for all learners. Once you create a chapter, you can easily upload your content, like videos or audio recordings.
Customize your chapters with quizzes, assessments, or other checkpoints to ensure the CE course meets all curriculum requirements. With chapters, you can allow learners to submit for credit after completing certain sections, offering learning flexibility and customization.
For more robust continuing education programs, support SCORM file uploads directly into the course to ensure learners and speakers have all the content they need.
5. Offer a Variety of Content
Build out your course offerings to attract even more learners to your continuing education program. Consider providing just-in-time learning content with short videos, easy-to-download graphics, or accessible audio recordings. When you offer more content in a variety of formats, you’ll boost accessibility and attract learners from across generations and backgrounds.
6. Reach a Wide Audience
Ensure your continuing education program reaches a larger audience by making your content available to non-members. Offering continuing education courses to non-members is a great way to drive non-dues revenue.
Consider offering a separate course registration fee for members and non-members to highlight the benefits of joining your organization. Ultimately, this can drive more non-members to membership, ensuring they return to your continuing education program year after year.
7. Streamline Course Registration
Leverage your LMS to list and organize your continuing education program courses properly. Easily create continuing education course descriptions, detailing speaker information, important dates, and crucial details. Try building a channel so learners can easily find and register for courses within their continuing education program. Leverage tags to make your courses searchable, streamlining the registration process for learners.
Look for an LMS that seamlessly integrates with your association management software (AMS). This integration ensures that your learners can register for their continuing education course either from your LMS or AMS, providing them with a convenient and efficient registration process. When you choose software that integrates, your learner data will automatically sync, tracking course registration and credit completion, thereby streamlining your administrative tasks.
When you integrate Path LMS with your AMS, all necessary purchase and course registration data automatically syncs. Just have your learners go to the checkout screen to complete their course registration successfully.
