Association eLearning

A Philosophy on Education Product Pricing Strategy

Marketing new education programs is always a fun challenge. In particular we are getting a lot of inquiries about how to market and price new educational programs – especially eLearning products. Before I explain some key philosophies on this, let me refer you to my friend and co-author Mickie Rops’ fantastic entry entitled, “Knowledgizing Associations” that speaks to four value-based services that all associations should focus on. They are simply the ideas of Connect, Context, Filter, and Feedback (see her entry for the details).

Focus educational programs and services around the four values Mickie describes. Work very hard to provide as many of these values to your members as possible. But in the short-term, focus highly on the context and filtering aspects of content. Perceived value is what drives participants to education programs. Identifying what that perceived value might be is absolutely critical to the marketing and pricing challenge. Many times it is saving a member time and money by filtering out irrelevant content and explaining how and why that content can be applied to someone’s professional or personal life. Time and money are the two most common “value” items. With this in mind, here is a philosophy on pricing…

Free is not good. Unless you have some sort of legitimate reason for not charging for a program (a grant funded program, for example) you need to charge something to participants. The more you charge the higher the perceived value of the program. When you offer something for free, the buyer’s mentality is that it is not as valuable, even if it truly is. We also see significant numbers of no-shows for “free” programs versus paid ones.

Bundling products and services creates higher value. If you offer an education product, be sure to think about other products you can bundle with it. For example, you offer a seminar on how to build a great tree house. Your organization also happens to have a research report on new trends in tree house building. Bundle the products together to add value. You could even simply send an email out to everyone who attended the ‘how to build a great tree house’ course that lists all of your other tree house resources, with links to each. This links back to the filtering aspect of value creation.

I'm Back

For those of you who subscribe to the Association eLearning blog, you've noticed it's been very quiet for the last year.  I'm finally back from some time off and I'm really excited to be re-engaged in the world of eLearning - although I didn't go far.

In October 2007, I made the strategic decision to merge my consulting business with another, larger firm in Arlington, VA.  The new company is called Kadix Systems.  I'll be maintaining the association work I've been doing for the last seven years, but I am also taking on some new responsibilities in the federal space.  So far it's been great.  I'm loving the fact that both associations and federal agencies are mission focused.  While the procurement process is night and day, the work is challenging and rewarding.

With this change comes new contact information.  You can still reach me at AmySmith@amysmithconsulting.com or at ASmith@kadix.com.  My cell phone is (571) 236-8959 and my office is (703) 236-0919.

Some other new announcements - In August of 2007 I helped co-author the Always Done it That Way book.  We have now sold about 1,100 copies to date and have recently added new postings on the blog.  A second version is coming out in 2008.  It's available for purchase at Lulu.com and on Amazon.

I'm looking forward to seeing everyone in the association community again.  Don't hesitate to contact me.

Be Well!

Educational Crisis Planning - Do It Now!

I was recently reflecting on the five year anniversary of my business and was reminded very quickly of the world events that helped kick start the company.  We started ASC in July of 2001 - and when September rolled around you may remember the turmoil that surrounded annual conferences and travel.

So it is 2006 and I worry more than ever about what associations will do should their annual conference need to be canceled?  While prudent organizations have insurance for such things, the insurance doesn't address the bigger set of questions that will most assuredly come up.  Here are some questions to ponder:

• How quickly can your association disseminate (push) critical information to your entire industry or profession?
• How quickly could you get a vast number of your members together in a synchronous (real time) way?
• Many of us are located in major metropolitan areas - what would happen if your staff could not get to the office?  How quickly could you reach your entire membership?
• If your annual meeting was canceled or indefinitely postponed, what plans have you made to provide members with critical content during the interim?

These were questions that very few organizations pondered prior to September 11th.  However, as the fifth anniversary approaches I'm not sure enough organizations have asked and answered these questions.  The technologies available to us have drastically changed, and I would argue, did so as a result of our technology needs after 9/11.  Many of us use virtual seminar or webinar software of one kind or sort.  But we use it for events that typically require a six week lead time.

What is your education department planning to do if you have 24 hours notice?  Six hours?

Think about how your organization will handle this if a major crisis occurs.  Being prepared and thinking through the options now will provide you with a clear game plan going forward.

We Have Always Done It That Way - the book release!

I'm thrilled to announce that this past week The Five Independent Thinkers released We Have Always Done It That Way: 101 Things About Associations We Must Change.  The book was co-authored by myself, Jeff De Cagna, Jamie Notter, David Gammel and Mickie Rops (we're the five).

The book can be purchased through our publisher's site (Lulu Publishing) at the following URL:  http://www.lulu.com/content/356408.  It's available in hard copy or as a downloadable document. 

We are also working on a couple of speaking engagements around the book so be sure to check in at our blog www.alwaysdoneitthatway.com for new info and more postings!

eLearning Strategy Auction Item

For those of you interested in eLearning strategy consulting -  you should know that we have added an auction item to the ASAE/The Center's Silent Auction for their Annual meeting.   This is the third year we have supported the ASAE Foundation and have really enjoyed our strategy engagements with the auction item winners.  You can click on the link to the home page of the auction here.

You should know that 100% of the proceeds of the auction go to the ASAE Foundation.  Our auction item will be posted this week, so keep an eye out for it!  You can bid on auction items online or onsite at the annual conference.

eL Strategy Development - First Steps

In the last six+ years working in the association eLearning space it has been my observation that most organizations want to select technologies much too early in the process.  In fact, this excitement about technology has driven a fair number of organizations to make terrible technology selections in hindsight.   So as your organization gets started (for either the first or second time) creating an eLearning strategy, here are some tips as you begin down this path.  Keep in mind that future blog posts will take a deeper dive into each one of these areas separately.

1. Get the right people on your eLearning Strategy Team.
2. Be crystal clear about all of your learning populations. (This is key!)
3. Create a content map based on learning populations and/or core competencies.
4. Determine internal program management issues.
5. Map your content to the best delivery method to deliver the content. (Technology, face-to-face, or a blend)
6. Design content for delivery mechanism.
7. Test and Launch program.
8. Evaluate and update program.

Each one of these phases requires more in-depth processing but it gives you a road map to begin down the road of creating a strategy.  One of the things you may note is that the technology selection piece doesn't happen until step #5.  It is driven by the content sections of the strategy.   

Long-term success of an eLearning strategy depends on realistic and clear learner population needs.  More on all of this in the coming weeks.

Non-profit to run Boston's city-wide Wi-Fi

So how cool is this concept!  Here is the link to an article I found this evening regarding a proposed recommendation to the mayor of Boston.  Non-profit to run Wi-Fi for Boston.

In summary, a task force believes that Boston will be best served by finding either an existing or new non-profit to run and manage a public wi-fi system for the city.  The concept is simple, a non-profit can keep the wi-fi network working in the best interest of the public and not special interest groups.  The non-profit will be tasked with raising $16-20 Million for the network that will cover approximately 49 square miles.

Click on the "Non-profit to run Wi-Fi for Boston" link above and be sure to post your comments on this innovative idea!

Internet "Search"

Jeffrey Killeen, Chairman & CEO of GlobalSpec spoke this morning at the CESSE conference about Internet search and what knowledge workers want and need in their Internet searches.  His firm specializes in engineering fields, a true pool of knowledge workers.

Killeen focused his conversation on how associations, and in this case scientific associations, can focus their websites to better serve their members.  Here are some key points.

• The user community is in charge. Users know what they want and where they want to find it.
• Specialized (vs. general) information providers & search engines will be the user choice
• Association's knowledge products need to be easily and fully discoverable.  (If not, you go from a strong brand position to a weak one.)
• You must be present where your audience is aggregating online materials
• Develop a keyword, indexing, and discovery strategy

Indexing Online Content.  Killeen suggests that regardless of whether your information is free or for-a-fee, you must get your content indexed so it shows up at the top of Internet search engines.

Some suggestions for maximizing your searchability...

• Optimize your content & your site to enable easy crawling and deep indexing
• Know the differences between mass market engines and specialized vertical engines
• Have a keyword strategy and manage it.

For association education and knowledge products, you must develop a marketing strategy that doesn't just include putting your content on the Web.  We assume that if a member searches your website (using a search capability) that they will find the relevant knowledge product immediately.  But you will want to focus this same marketing principle where anyone searching the Internet can find your course or program.

Put yourself in your member's shoes.  Here is an example that may be relevant for you.  Let's say you want to find information and a course (either face-to-face or online) that focuses on how to build your dream home.  Where would you go to find this information?  Google? Amazon? Yahoo Search?

Let's try it...and I'm making this up on the fly.  I'll use Google and search on "building a home".  As of today, http://www.builderonline.com/ is the first site that pops up.  This is the website for Builder magazine - a publication from a for-profit publishing company in Washington, DC.  Several of their pages show up at the beginning of the search.  Now, if I were NAHB (Natl. Assn. of Home Builders) I would be a bit concerned.  A deep page within their site doesn't show up until #5 on the initial search.   

I'm not picking on NAHB at all, but it is a great example of Killeen's point.  If your association is THE place to go for your industry or profession, you had better think hard about how your information presents itself on a global Internet search.  And here is a great tip - social media tools like blogs for example, get searched by engines very often.  If you use keywords to index your blog postings, these keywords get picked up by search engines quickly and will help launch your association's knowledge products to the top of the search list.

As you develop your eLearning programs, face-to-face conferences, and other knowledge products, think about how anyone on the planet can find that information quickly and easily.

Developing an eL Strategy

I am blogging from the CESSE Conference in Salt Lake City.   The Council of Engineering & Scientific Society Executives hosts this annual event utilizing a completely volunteer group of association executives.  It's very amazing.

Tomorrow we will be talking about developing an eLearning strategy.  This topic has really morphed over the last five years.  In the past few weeks leading up to this conference I have been focused on creating an analogy between strategy development and building a house.  While I'm not going that the home building process now, I can say that there are a lot of similarities.  Here is a short list of some of those.  You need to

1. Clearly identify the "team" you will be working with.
2. Clearly define the kind of house you want and make sure you identify all of its uses early on.
3. Make sure that all of the people living in or using the house have some input into their needs.
4. Be realistic about your budget and be sure to plan for a 10-15% overage in budget.
5. Know that the project will always take longer than you initially estimate.  Be patient.
6. Create a blueprint for your house and have the house built to the blueprint.
7. Know that you can always make changes to the plan. The changes just need to be well justified.

More on the details of the strategy process soon!

Is "Free" eLearning a Good Thing?

FYI - Here is my two cents on offering "free" online courses.  It is a double-edged sword. 

"Free" is a good thing if (1) you have a grant that has paid for the technology and/or the course development and thus the course has been created as a member benefit, (2) if you want to invite a small group of mavens to take the course and then have them provide you with great testimonials to use in future marketing campaigns.

"Free" is not good over the long-term because (1) it creates an unintended perception that the quality may not be as good as something you pay for, and (2) you'll also see that completion rates for free courses are lower compared to those that people actually financially invest in.

My advice on "free" - step carefully. Think thoughtfully about the rationale.  Create a strategy for how you are going to approach "free".