Let’s face it! Keeping learners engaged in lengthy courses is difficult, and even just grabbing attention on the importance of the learning itself can often an impossible task.
This is where learning campaigns come in.
A learning campaign approaches a learning initiative more like how marketers manage their efforts. So, rather than thinking of a learning initiative as delivering a course, with learning campaigns, the effort begins with the promotion of the initiative or outcome, and incorporates every step of promotion, delivery, core content and post content interactions.
Just like marketing campaigns, learning campaigns can effectively advertise and promote your courses, and increase engagement and participation.
These are some ways you can drive a successful learning campaign.
Identify your target audience for the campaign
During your Learning Needs Analysis, a lot of the heavy-lifting will already be done. For example, understanding your audience based on roles, departments, learning needs, preferences, etc. You can also create learner personas to understand motivations and barriers as part of this activity.
It’s during this exercise that you can also check-in with your value proposition by answering questions like “How will this learning help my audience in their roles?” and “What new skills will they gain?”
As part of your analysis, you may also identify ‘behavioural change’ that requires attention. Applying ‘Nudge theory’ and incorporating these goals within your learning campaign can lead to better outcomes.
Create a learning campaign with channels available.
This is not the time to create new channels. Just understand and use the ones that are already in play. This usually consists of things like:
- Emails: Leverage the digital assets used to create the course to design eye-catching emails highlighting key course features and benefits. Your call to action should be a deep link to the course on the LMS or enrolment instructions. Where possible, make it personalised. If you’re promoting your course externally you can use tools like Mailchimp, but keep the emails personalised where possible.
- Intranet announcements: Another oldy but a goody. Post regular updates, success stories, and reminders on your Intranet or internal social platforms like Workplace (Facebook) or Microsoft Teams groups.
- Posters and digital signage: So, this can be things like ‘screensavers’, but don’t be afraid to go to print. The digital assets used to create the course might come in handy here. You can use things like your ‘course welcome graphics’ or narrator images as visual aids around the office to create awareness. Granted, you could do the same here with ‘digital signage’.
- Leader endorsements: Build awareness and understanding with leaders across the organisation. Encourage managers to discuss the course in team meetings and one-on-one sessions. You could also create short videos of your leaders talking to key concepts related to your learning initiative.
Gain traction by using promotional content
Many learning campaigns will consist of bite-size learning pieces that then lead in to the ‘main course’.
You can use short grabs of the course as a “teaser”, or a preview of the course content to spark curiosity. This is another activity where you can leverage the existing assets to build promotional content.
Gamified approaches can work well and can also be promotional by design. In practice, this generally involves introducing elements like badges, points, and leaderboards to spice up the learning journey and make it competitive across teams.
Integrate all elements of the learning pathway
It may seem obvious but sometimes we lose sight of the broader picture. Remember, activities within your learning campaign aren’t standalone. Consider all the other learning interventions, change activities, or even business-as-usual activities and events that are aligned with you achieving your overarching course outcome. This could be further supported by additional activities in the campaign like hosting webinars where team members are given a soft introduction to the topic and offer Q&A with subject matter experts to better understand its relevance.
Perfect planning = perfect execution
Let’s finish where we started. DON’T wait until the eleventh hour to plan your learning campaign. It will come across as disjointed and reactive…. you may also be limited with options that have time constraints. Success measures will be critical to planning, as this will lead to more effective reporting when it comes to achieving those targets.
Considered planning early in the piece will often lead to a well-executed learning campaign that can truly transform the way learning is adopted within your organisation.
Learning campaigns are key part of our end-to-end delivery for many of our projects at Lucid. Reach out to your local Lucid rep or contact us to learn more.
