If you’re looking into adopting a learning management system, you might have come across the option for white labelling while perusing the online training software market. But what exactly is white labelling, and why might you need it?
A quality Learning Management System vendor will likely offer you the option to white label their software product. Here at Innform, we provide this choice to our clients too – and we think taking this route can present many advantages in terms of end-user experience and value for money.
What Is A White Label LMS?
White labelling is a way to ensure your Learning Management System is the best fit for your company, reflecting both your brand and your training objectives. White label software is available today across many sectors, and its flexibility is an attractive proposal. But that is it exactly? Well, white-label software is basically software created and developed by one company but delivered to the client under another brand. So by investing in a white label LMS, you’re opening the door to an extra layer of customisation while simultaneously dodging a world of snags and glitches when it comes to the technology side of things.
Customising White Label Learning Management Software
Let’s look at the customisation options open to you if you choose a white label Learning Management System. Firstly, you’ll be able to brand your online learning experience right across the board. If you’ve spent considerable time creating great content and training experiences for your learners, why not bring all that together under an LMS that wholly reflects your business from a look and feel standpoint? For instance, you’ll be able to choose your own domain name rather than that of the software company you buy from, and ensure the terminology, both in terms of the name you’d like to give your online learning interface and on the user dashboard, is precisely the right tone for you. White labelling should allow you also to change and refine the layout of the learner dashboard to increase engagement or better suit the modules you offer.
Engage eLearners With Custom Visuals
Speaking of learner engagement, dynamic graphics and a holistic approach to branding always elevates the user experience! Unlike an ordinary off the shelf LMS, White labelled eLearning software will give you the option to upload your company logo and favicon, and Innform’s white label package will additionally let you upload your own custom welcome video too. Custom colours anywhere you’d like to see them are another benefit to white label learning management systems. And this is more important than you might think: If your business colours are fun and vibrant, then why should your company learning portal be dull and grey? Present online training courses that are visually attractive and dovetail nicely into company visual culture – it can actually help your learners connect their learning paths to their career paths to some extent.
Ultimately, a white label Learning Management System allows you to give your workforce an online training experience that looks and feels like part of your company. You can update and change any of these things when you need to as your business grows.
So that’s a brief introduction to the ‘what’, but there’s more to discover with the ‘why’. Of course, custom visuals and layouts constitute a significant advantage to white labelled Learning Management Systems. Still, we’re going to break down a few other reasons as to why you might need this kind of software solution.
You Need Value for Money
Simply put, quality software development is expensive, and with such great products already out there on the market, you might find there’s no need to reinvent the wheel. Time is also a costly factor; to create, test and tweak the software to ensure the final product delivers what you want takes skilled programmers significant time. Instead, why not work smarter, invest in a white label LMS for far less, and then use the time and money you save to continue creating top-notch eLearning content.
You Lack Development Expertise
Take it from us, building a great Learning Management System from scratch is tough, and without the right expertise at your fingertips, the pitfalls are numerous. Not least, if you lack a skilled development team, then expect glitches aplenty. Worse, these might take seconds to spot but months to fix. And who’s likely going to spot any issues first? Your users! A learning software product full of technical errors will cause you difficulties, but if you plump for a solid white label LMS, you can neatly sidestep this scenario. Take advantage of fully customisable and brandable elements that work perfectly instead to ensure the best UX (user experience) possible.
You Lack The Technical Infrastructure
There’s a whole universe of technical infrastructure that a Learning Management System requires to run well. If things like LDAP, SAML2, CDN, or rest-API don’t mean a whole lot to you right now, then a white label LMS is absolutely the way to go. All these elements, including speedy servers, are included in a white-label product. And if you need assistance, then technical support will be right on hand too. Furthermore, you won’t have to worry about security, which can be a complex area to navigate for the inexperienced. Limited user access, secure ways to communicate across the platform, and 2-step verification should also come with a well-rounded white label option. Phew.
The Learner Experience Means Everything To You
Learning content is king when you’re offering up a successful Learning Management System, and engaging, up-to-date courses require a full suite of robust LMS features. If you choose a white label LMS, the folks designing your courses will have plenty of elements to play with. These can include multimedia, webinars (both live and pre-recorded), multilingual options and gamification, just to name a few. A white label Learning Management System should consist of all you need and more to offer excellent online training to your users – whether that’s on a desktop computer, a tablet or a mobile phone.
You Need To Remove All Signs Of A Vendor
The above features are great tools that should come with a Learning Management System, yet the way a software interface looks and feels is also an essential element to consider. Coherent design, from personalised themes to branded homepages, creates an immersive online learning environment that helps learners focus. With white labelling, you can have total control over how everything looks. Most LMS’s will let you change colours and fonts, for example, but you may still be stuck with the vendor’s logo popping up everywhere or formatting being limited to certain areas. With a quality white-label product, the personalisation options are going to be far superior. Meaning, your LMS will look like you built it yourself, and nobody will be the wiser.
You Need Seamless Integration With Other Applications
It’s likely your company utilises a whole range of applications in the course of a working day – Paypal, MailChimp, or Slack are just a few examples – but how is your learning management software going to get along with these tools? You’re going to need a powerful LMS solution that integrates all these vital apps, but building one from scratch is time-consuming, not to mention costly. Plus, consider that this course of action is also not necessary. By going for a white-label LMS, you’ll find that most leading software apps are already supported, with options to add more as you need them. Don’t waste time building a Learning Management System from the ground up if you can plug and play with white label training software. Then you can make all the custom branding changes you need at the touch of a button.
You Need Data, But Can’t Interpret It
We’ve covered the value of solid reporting and what you can do with LMS data to improve your business here on our blog before. Evaluating how your eLearning courses are going and refining and building upon experiences and results is a surefire route to success. However, data interpretation isn’t always as straightforward as it should be, and information overload can even muddy the waters further. Data is only useful if it’s understandable, right?
A robust white label learning management system will come with all the top rich data tools built-in. This means you and your LMS admins will be able to make the best use of visual summaries and interpretative reports, which are easily generated and disseminated whenever you need them. To spot training issues and correct them, you’ll need to stay informed about things like engagement, performance assessment, and course completion rates. If you can monitor these easily without getting a headache, you’re going to get far more out of your learning software.
Having a tailor-made Learning Management System at your disposal is the ideal scenario for training your workforce online. Of course, one route to achieving this is to create it from scratch, and if you’ve got all the necessary resources, then maybe this is the right option for you! But if you’re more than a little puzzled by software tech, and are looking for value for money, then a white label LMS could be just the ticket. Offering all the benefits of a custom-branded software product, with none of the potential glitches that could happen behind the scenes, white-labelling makes sense if you want a powerful custom LMS while keeping costs sensible.