The main purpose of every online learning platform is to offer relevant and educational content to students. eLearning is an interactive medium and allows students to engage with the content.
eLearning platforms enable students to understand concepts and their real-world implications at their own pace. Perhaps that’s one of the reasons for an increased demand for such platforms in schools and universities across the globe.
With this rise in demand, new online platforms are being produced in the market. With every vendor claiming to offer the best platform with plenty of benefits, educational institutes are being put in a dilemma. Selecting the right platform for their students is now becoming a challenging task.
One good thing about these online platforms is that their features are almost similar to each other. What you need to keep an eye out for are the functions that are absolutely non-negotiable. We have researched all the best online learning platforms and curated a list of all the must-have features. You can find them mentioned below.
- Brand Integration
It is important to select an online platform that allows you to integrate your brand elements into learning platform layouts. Such integrations can help you improve your brand’s validity and coherence. This also allows you to motivate your students and encourage them to engage with the content.
- Easy To Use
A good user experience begins with a good user interface. If your students have a difficult time navigating through the platform, it can get a little challenging to keep them motivated. Students want their experience when communicating with your online platform to be seamless. Thus, make sure your platform is easy to use and understand. It’s also suggested to guide your students around the platform.
- Responsive Design
One of the major features of an online learning platform is the ease of access. Every student should have access when they want, from wherever they want. Consequently, you need to adopt an online platform that can be accessed using every kind of device. This is true not only for the course but for the resources as well.
- Customer Support
Suppose you’ve found yourselves a vendor that promises you all the features you’ve been in search of. You make the deal and invest in the software. Now, you face technical defects and you try to contact the vendor but in vain. As a result, you’ll be left with a platform that is not of any use. Thus, make sure that your platform’s post-sale customer support is even better than the pre-sale one!
- Reporting
Results are the key to growth. The more you analyze your results, the more areas of improvement you’ll find. From evaluation to commitment, execution to fulfillment, reports of these platforms will help you witness the total picture of your online teaching efforts. It’ll help you improve on the areas where you think you lack. Also, it’ll enable you to offer constructive criticism to your students.
- Tools Collaboration
It takes a lot more than just well-defined content in order for your course to be popular among students. You need collaborative and social learning practices as well as tools to combine with the relevance and appeal. Via social learning, you encourage your students to get into a habit of peer discussions, making the course more interactive. Recorded live videos, forums for group discussions, and feedbacks can encourage your students to participate more. This is what helps in the success of your course.
Wrapping it up
An online learning platform has altered the learning landscape. We’ve seen a rise in demand and supply of eLearning platforms, which has led to the stage of confusion for educational institutions. Thus, to help you decide on the perfect vendor, we have a list of features that you cannot compromise on. These include ease of use and access, brand integration, good customer support, mobile/tablet-friendly, and reporting.