PODCAST - from stalled to scalable how to push your elearning program over the finish line
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Have you and your team been working on launching an e-learning program online course or learning experience program for months or even years now? Well, today I'm gonna share with you how to go from stalled. To scaled so that you can push your e-learning program over the finish line. I'm gonna start by going through the three biggest reasons why e-learning programs stall out in the first place and don't get finished.
And actually [00:02:00] in front of our learners. May that be our customers if we're selling the program or our employees. If we are training our internal teams, then I'm gonna go through my. Three step process to take you wherever you are right now, to a finished e-learning program. So you can start capitalizing on the ROI of your program for your business.
So let's start with the three reasons why e-learning programs get stalled in the first place. Let me know in the comments if this sounds like you. Reason number one, analysis. Paralysis. This is the most common reason why programs get stalled. I remember the first time I built my own e-learning program.
This was back in 2019. It took me almost a year to just decide. What sort of e-learning technology I was gonna use, what [00:03:00] platform was I going to choose? And guess what? Within six to 12 months, I decided that I chose the wrong platform and I switched platforms anyway. So I literally wasted two years of my life and my business's life, figuring out the technology.
And this is just one of many decisions that teams and companies get stuck on. 'cause there are three pillars to e-learning. There's technology, there's content. And there's distribution and each of these points can become analysis paralysis traps. The biggest one is definitely technology though, and the problem is bigger depending on how large of a company I am working with.
The larger companies I work with making 50 mil all the way up. To hundreds of millions of dollars a year tend to take exponentially longer than the companies where maybe there's five or 10 employees who are in my on demand learning programs. But no matter what, I bet you are spending way more [00:04:00] time than you need to, trying to figure out the right technology.
But Johnny, how do I figure that out? Well, this is exactly why I took years and years of experience. I've been in this industry for more than a decade, and I have. Gone from scoping out and almost building my own platform to choosing the wrong platform to scaling two businesses. Using the correct platform to working with s and p 500 companies to help them select and implement the right platform.
And that is why I have created my e-learning platform finder, where in a matter of seconds, all you're gonna do is answer three questions and get matched with the best fit platform for you and your company to scale. Your e-learning program and to help you scale your business, I'm also gonna give you access to a free trial of the platform so you and your team can actually test it out before you even have to spend a dime on the technology.
You're also gonna get access to one of my [00:05:00] Made simple courses. I have a specific. Online course built, tell you and your team step by step with whatever platform you get matched with to get things up and running yourself. And then the third thing I'm gonna give you is once you start paying for the platform, I'm gonna give you access to my Platform to Profit strategy session where I sit down with you and your team to build an ROI driven plan to help you customize your platform to serve your company's.
Needs. So that's reason one. Analysis paralysis. Let's move on to reason two. Reason number two that programs stall out and don't get launched is making them or it too big. Does this sound like you and your team, maybe when you started mapping out what a e-learning program, learning experience program online course could look for you and your business, you started with, Hey, I wonder it'd be nice.
If we added an on demand [00:06:00] passive product line or service offering at our business where we could bring in a profit center that prints money while we sleep, wouldn't that be nice? Or maybe you're on the internal side of e-learning. And you were like, wouldn't it be great if we could train our employees without taking the time and the energy and the efficiency away from our top performers, our managers, our VPs, our directors at our company?
What if we could automate all that? See, no matter the reason why you're creating your e-learning program in the first place, the idea may start. As this very exciting idea that you and your team are so pumped to put into place, but eventually it balloons. Into this huge undertaking. I remember when I built my first e-learning program, I went from, hey, maybe we could start with one course to it ballooning to a whole library of 20 to 30 different courses, and what [00:07:00] ended up happening now, I actually ended up getting a program live, and now today I can get a program live in less than 30 days, but that's because I no longer.
Make my programs too big. So let's scale the vision back. You can have an overarching goal, an overarching vision, but let's scale the initial launch back. There's a reason why even the best TV shows All Star with a pilot because. The studios, the producers don't know how it's going to perform. They can do all the research, do all the pre-screening focus groups, but until they get it live on the streaming platform or on the channel for you and I to watch, they have no idea if it's gonna be a hit or a miss.
They have no idea if, even if it is getting rave reviews critically, is it actually making money for that platform, for that channel, for that [00:08:00] business? And it's the same thing with what you are producing. You wanna start small. You can have the overarching big vision, but you wanna start small and start with a pilot and we will go.
Deeper into exactly how to do this when we get to the second part of this video, when I take you through my three steps to install and launch your e-learning program as quickly as possible. Reason number three, hire ROI. Initiatives take over. Or take precedence. So you start with this amazing idea of wanting it be nice.
If we could add a half million to a million, maybe two to $3 million passive income profit center to our business. This is what my $50 million a year enterprise learning accelerator clients think to themselves, wanted to be nice, but then they start making it too big and they start stalling out. Maybe this sounds like you.
And eventually what ends up happening is, [00:09:00] well, we have all these other things that we're focusing on that are higher ROI that are proven higher. ROII say proven because when you launch an e-learning program properly, it should be launched based on ROI. Our goals with re-learning programs, with our learning experience programs is to bring a return on investment.
To our organization, and that's why making the biggest, most robust e-learning program is not our goal. Making the highest ROI program is our goal, and this is why I am going to share with you my three step process to get your e-learning programs over the finish line so you can have a high or highest.
ROI program for your company so that you not only are going to add that profit center, you're [00:10:00] not only going to free up your highest performing team members to do what they do best and train up your other team members so that they can join them. At that high level, you are going to cut other costs at your business to drive your profit margins up so that you have a company running more efficiently and effectively because of e-learning.
Step one, to get your e-learning program across the finish line, start with ROI. What does this mean? This means that the primary goal of your program. Is to get a return on investment for your business. So you need to define why are you creating the program in the first place? Are you creating the program to create this massive cool program internal university that you are excited about?
Or are you creating a program that is going to increase your revenue in [00:11:00] some way and decrease your expenses, your cost? In some way, and here's how you can look at doing that. What I want you to do is integrate something called the Pareto principle. The Pato principle is also known as the 80 20 rule. The 80% 20% rule.
What does this mean? This means that 80% of results stem from 20% of efforts. And this also means 20% of results stem from 80% of efforts. I am actually an accountant. I went to school for accounting and film, went and worked for PricewaterhouseCoopers as an IT auditor where I'd go in and I would look at their internal accounting systems, look at the technology, assess run reports.
Let them know how safe and efficient everything is running on a accounting and financial systems level. [00:12:00] Well, the backbone of any business is what customers and employees. So when we look at your business and we look at integrating the e-learning program, we wanna. Look at those two things. How is it impacting the two core parts of your business, your employees and your customers?
Are we building a program to sell to our customers to create a new profit center? What is the highest value thing we could sell? Let's focus on the 20%. When I work with my Enterprise Learning Accelerator clients, where we actually partner with the organization, E-Learning partners, we become their e-learning partner.
We help you select, implement, and maximize the value of your technology so that you can save five to 200 x your technology spend. And ultimately, we're gonna save you six figures or more per year, which is. Millions of dollars over time. Well, we [00:13:00] do this by focusing on the 20% because when we're looking at creating a program, instead of looking at this big picture, let's find out what is the crux of the program?
What is the crux? Well, in rock climbing, the crux is the hardest part of the climb. When you get through that part, everything else is easy. The rating system for rock climbing, for hiking is actually based on whatever the hardest feature of that hike or climb is. The hardest feature is the 20%. You get through that hardest feature, you're gonna have a successful climb.
So we wanna focus on that 20%. Now we can actually take this a step further. We can take. 20% of 20% and 80% of 80%. This brings us to 4% and. 64. Now, what does this mean in relation to the Pareto principle? This means that 4% [00:14:00] of efforts result in 64% of results, 64%. So this is why when we talk about a AST learning program, really.
We need to break down what you currently have into the essential 4%. At the very least, we gotta break it down into the essential 20%, but once we break it down into the essential 4%, what is the essential 4% of that program that is going to create 64% of the results in your business tied to that program? It might be one.
Course, most of my clients have one flagship program that is bringing in 80 to 90% of the revenue for their entire learning business. And this is the same for my clients who build internal programs. There's typically one program that changes the lives of their employees. The most that makes them the most [00:15:00] effective and efficient.
That's what we really need to focus on. We start with ROI and everything else will fall into place now that now we've taken this huge undertaking and we have carved out the 4% and that's what we're gonna build. And that brings us to step two, focus on the. 20% or even better, 4%. This is what I have done at E-Learning Partners.
I have multiple online courses that I sell, but there's really just one that makes up 90. Plus percent of my online course income, and that is E-Learning Simplified Academy. Now one of my Enterprise Learning Accelerator partnership clients, CoStar, they have multiple programs, but they really have two that make up 90 to 95% of their online course e-learning program [00:16:00] revenue.
The chia and the kata, and if we distill it down even more, the chia probably makes up about 64% of that income. So let's talk about focusing on the 4%. When I partner with an organization, this isn't just the thing we launch with. We focus on the highest ROI, part of your e-learning business. Your e-learning department within your business.
We focus on the 4%, not just at launch, but for years. This is where we spend our energy, and then yeah, we will dabble in the 20% as well, but this is how. We not only grow top line revenue, but we decrease our costs so we can increase our profit margins and save our enterprise Learning Accelerator clients six figures or more per year.
Millions of dollars over time. So step two. Is [00:17:00] focus on the 20% or better yet the 4%. Step three, select the right tech without overthinking it. You see how we flip this process? Typically, I see most companies start with the tech. They're like, we need to find the right technology and that's gonna drive everything else is completely wrong.
We start with the ROI, we figure out that 20% are better yet the 4%, and then we. Select the right technology, and better yet, then we use my e-learning platform finder to select the right technology in a matter of seconds, and then you can start demoing it right away. Get access to that online course. You get that Platform to profit strategy session with me and your good.
To go, you're off to the races. Now. You may fall into the same boat as my clients over at CoStar, s and p 500 company, where they had a legacy [00:18:00] system. They had a system that they'd been using for about a decade, and when they came to. E-learning partners to partner with us so we could become their new E-learning partner.
They wanted a system that could not only do what they needed it to do, 'cause there's plenty of stuff the old system just wasn't allowing them to do. They also wanted to save significant money. And what I find is that when we get to this step, or the technology conversation in general, if your organization is making $50 million a year or.
If you didn't watch this video or listen to this podcast, most likely you would end up spending somewhere between 50 K to $1 million a year on your technology. Now, 50 K doesn't sound too bad, $1 million, or I have seen people spend even up to 1.5 mil or more per year on the technology. Well. [00:19:00] You shouldn't be spending this kind of money.
I know it's great. The company makes $50 million a year, but if we're really starting with ROI, if we're starting with paying $1 million a year on our platform, that's $1 million out of the gate, and you're probably not making a million dollars that day that you write that million dollar check. So you have immediately gone negative.
With your e-learning program. Now, even if you're on this end of the spectrum at the $50,000 range, it's still $50,000 that you have to spend or that you spent because you thought you had to spend it without any immediate ROI. 'cause you're not gonna get sales day one of spending this money. You need time to set things up.
And that's why when I match people with a learning management system or a learning experience platform, I match you with a system that you're gonna get a free trial of. So you have. Time to set things up. That free trial we use to get [00:20:00] everything in order so that when we start paying for the software, we do have the opportunity to start getting ROI.
And I've even seen clients make money before they even spend a dime on the platform. So how much are you actually overspending if this is what you're spending? Five to 200 x. That's how much, but Johnny, that, that, that's crazy. This is a crazy number. It is a crazy number. And guess what? Back in the 1950s, the first commercially available computer was created that, uh, people could buy.
And how much was it? It was a million dollars. What is that in today's dollars? Well, $12 million. And last time I checked, I didn't spend $12 million on my phone. I think I spent less than a thousand dollars on my phone. And my phone is a lot more powerful than that computer. That was a million dollars back in the 1950s.
$12 million in today's dollar. It's the same reason why I see people, I see organizations spend 200 x what they should be [00:21:00] spending. How much should you be spending? Well, if you're building an internal e-learning program to train your employees and you're making $50 million a year. At your organization, I highly recommend Talent LMS, and I also recommend that you check out my e-Learning Platform Finder to just double check based on you and your business.
If Talent Talents is right, I'm able to give you a much more personalized assessment based on my e-learning platform finder. LinkedIn description below, if you're watching this on YouTube, and it's in the show notes if you're listening to this as a podcast, but Talent LMS is less than $10,000 a year for a.
Thousand users, and this is like the top of the line package that they sell is less than $10,000 a year. They have packages that'll support a thousand users for much less than that. This is like your worst case scenario if you have a thousand in eternal. Team members, and if you're making about 50 mil a year, you're probably in the [00:22:00] 200 to 500 team member range.
Maybe you're up above 500. This will cover you and it's 10,000 on the low end. You're saving five x on the high end. You're saving a hundred x next. If you're selling a program, I highly recommend Kajabi. Now yet again, check this with my e-learning platform finder so I can give you a more nuanced recommendation.
But this is gonna cost you less than. $5,000 a year and it's gonna support a hundred thousand sales. This is 10 x to 200 x less than what people think. What companies think is normal to be spending on a system, and I currently have 50 organizations, including high-end, 50 mil. Plus per year companies paying for Kajabi to run their e-learning business, and I have over 250 organizations using talent, LMS to run their internal programs.
These [00:23:00] systems work. There's value in having a free trial to set them up so that you can start getting ROI by the time you start paying for the system. Now, if you want help with all of this, everything we talked about today, and you are, you know, making $50 million a year to your business, maybe you have between 200 500 employees, you have some sort of e-learning or training department, or you're looking to build one, and maybe you have a stalled program.
Maybe you do have old tech and you want it to be modernized. Maybe you just need someone to partner with to help you through all this, to cut down. The time that it takes to integrate this into your business. If this sounds like you, I invite you to join my Enterprise Learning Accelerator partnership program.
It is my highest end program where me and e-learning partners, we literally become your e-learning partner for your company, and we save you six figures or more per year. [00:24:00] On your e-learning initiatives so that you can save millions of dollars over time and drive ROI in your business. I'll see you in the next episode.
Thanks for tuning in to Learning Transformed Now, if you're designing a transformational learning experience and wanna skip the overwhelm of trial and error. Check out our e-learning platform finder. Just answer a few simple questions and we'll match you with the right platform plus an extended free trial.
And as a bonus, you'll get free access to a course that walks you through building your learning experience on your matched platform. Click on the link in the show notes or go to www.elearningpartners.com/elearning-platform-finder. I'd [00:25:00] also love to hear from you. Leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify or drop a comment on our YouTube channel.
Thanks for listening and I'll catch you in the next episode.
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