Customer Education Productivity Hacks: Be More Productive with LMS Workflow Automation

Every aspect of Customer Education, from onboarding new users to sending ongoing reminders, becomes time-consuming when managed manually. Repetitive tasks create a backlog, and it forces your team to spend hours on administrative duties. This bottleneck not only hinders productivity but also limits your ability to create high-impact learning experiences that engage customers.

This is where LMS workflow automation can help. LMS workflow automation essentially sets your learning platform on autopilot. It automates repetitive tasks like enrolling users or sending reminders, so your Customer Education and Customer Success teams can focus on strategic initiatives and provide effective Customer Education without drowning in administrative tasks.

Key benefits of LMS workflow automation

Here are some key benefits of LMS workflow automation.

1. Time savings

Automating repetitive tasks like user enrollment, reminder emails, and basic progress tracking frees up your team's time. Instead of getting bogged down in administrative minutiae, education teams can focus on higher-level activities like developing training content, building personalized learning paths, and providing in-depth support. Customer success teams can focus on strategic initiatives rather than answering the same questions about logging in and finding information repeatedly. 

2. Consistency and accuracy

When different teams create training content for the same customer groups, the work can easily get siloed and updates may not occur across the board. Missed enrollments, inaccurate information delivery, or inconsistent communication can also hinder training when information is stored in different databases. Automated workflows can help eliminate these inconsistencies, ensuring every customer receives the same high-quality learning experience. This translates to a more reliable customer journey and easier communication and tracking among diverse teams.

3. Enhanced learner experience

Automated communication keeps customers informed throughout their learning journey. For example, customers receive timely notifications about available training courses, completion milestones, and upcoming deadlines. Similarly, automated systems can nudge users who haven't completed a module or offer personalized feedback and next steps based on their actions.

4. Data-driven decision-making

Automated workflows collect data on customer enrollments, course completion rates, and performance metrics. This allows course admins to analyze Customer Education data to discover areas where customers abandon. As a result, they can tailor content accordingly, as well as use insights to continuously refine the education program to ensure it delivers the most value to customers.

How to implement workflow automation in your training program

The key to successful automation is to figure out which tasks in your Customer Education process are repetitive and which questions customers ask most often. Here are some tips on what to look out for:

• Identify automation opportunities: To start, monitor how much time your team spends on manual tasks. Look for repetitive processes like enrolling customers, sending reminders, and collecting feedback. Then, get input from your team. What tasks do they find tedious and time-consuming? What issues seem to come up repeatedly when servicing customer needs?
  
  
• Choose the right tools: An LMS is a great way to automate Customer Education workflows as there is one hub through which all of your training flows. When selecting an LMS, look for a solution with functionality like conditional triggers, dynamic learning paths, and automated reminders. For example, conditional triggers let you set up automated actions based on specific events, such as automatically enrolling new customers upon account sign-up.
  
  
• Integrate with other solutions: A powerful LMS platform with robust automation capabilities should integrate with the solutions your team already uses, like CRM platforms (e.g., Salesforce) or payment gateways (e.g., Stripe, PayPal). All these integrations create a unified learning ecosystem where data flows freely.

For a more in-depth exploration of key LMS features, check out this article on choosing the best SaaS learning management system.

Best practices for implementing workflow automation in your LMS

Here are some effective strategies to get the most out of workflow automation in your LMS:

• Pick the low-hanging fruit: Don't try to automate everything at once. Start with repetitive tasks, like sending automated welcome emails to new users or automated reminders for new users to complete their onboarding.
  
  
• Keep it simple: Don't overcomplicate workflows. Complex automations can be confusing and prone to errors. Start with straightforward rules and triggers, then gradually add complexity, as needed.
  
  
• Embrace flexibility: Learning environments are dynamic. Choose an LMS with a flexible workflow automation engine that allows you to easily adjust automations as your needs evolve.
  
  
• Do more with integrations: Explore integrations between your LMS and other tools your team uses. This could involve automatically syncing user data with your CRM or automating marketing and sales emails based on learning behaviors.
  
  
• Test, refine, repeat: Don't just set it and forget it! Test workflows thoroughly before fully rolling them out and think about ways to implement new triggers and workflows as your program expands. 

Three Customer Education Productivity Hacks

Here are three key productivity hacks to improve your Customer Education efforts and learner engagement.

1. Automate enrollment and onboarding

First impressions matter. So, try to eliminate manual enrollment and onboarding processes. Instead, implement automated enrollment to seamlessly add new users to your learning platform.

Automated enrollment streamlines the onboarding process, allowing new customers to register and begin learning at their own pace when it’s convenient for them. This reduces the administrative burden for your team and ensures a frictionless start to the customer journey.

Take it a step further and consider integrating Single Sign-On (SSO). SSO enables authentication using existing login credentials from another trusted platform (e.g., Google, Microsoft). This eliminates the need for them to create a separate login for your LMS.

2. Schedule communications

Scheduled communication empowers you to deliver targeted messages at strategic moments. This could include pre-course reminders to boost engagement, updates on new content to reignite interest, or words of encouragement to keep learners motivated. 

Automated communication ensures consistent messaging and allows your team to work on more strategic learning initiatives. The result? A well-informed customer base that actively participates in your training.

3. Implement micro-learning

Break down complex topics into engaging, bite-sized modules that can be consumed in short bursts. Schedule automated delivery of these micro-learning modules at strategic intervals to maintain momentum and knowledge retention over time. This approach caters to busy professionals who can access self-serve modules and master new skills throughout their workday.

How to get buy-in for workflow automation

While workflow automation makes LMS management more efficient, you need to secure buy-in from stakeholders for a smooth implementation.

• Highlight the "why": Explain how it will free up valuable time for your customer education and success teams. Frame it as an opportunity for them to focus on strategic initiatives and provide more impactful customer education, not get bogged down in repetitive tasks.
  
  
• Start small and showcase success: Don't overwhelm your team with a complete overhaul. Pilot a few key automations that address common pain points. Once you demonstrate the gains and positive impact, it'll be easier to get buy-in for expanding automation efforts.
  
  
• Demonstrate potential cost savings: Quantify the impact of automation on your bottom line. Highlight potential reductions in training costs through streamlined onboarding and automated reminders. Plus, discuss how automation can lead to fewer support tickets by providing consistent and readily available learning materials.

Skilljar offers a scalable solution for customer training

Skilljar is a customer training platform with tools to create, deliver, and manage impactful learning experiences for your customers. Hundreds of companies trust Skilljar for its automation capabilities. By using pre-built workflows or crafting custom automations, you can simplify every step of the customer journey, from automated onboarding sequences to triggered reminder emails and personalized learning paths.

Get a Skilljar demo to learn how our platform can improve your Customer Education efforts.