As you consider transforming existing print or live training to eLearning a natural tendency is to also reduce budgets to reap the “savings” of eLearning. That may certainly be appropriate in some cases, however, it’s important that you think strategically and make smart decisions in order to maximize the budget you have.
For many organizations, particularly small to mid-sized ones without dedicated learning or IT staff, it’s often much more cost-effective to consider collaborating with an experienced eLearning specialist, such as Monarch Media, to serve as the technical and/or instructional “extension” to your team.
This provides several benefits including:
- Flexible “staff augmentation” that can be framed specifically to your budget demands
- Technical and eLearning expertise without the initial and on-going cost of training existing employees on new technologies, strategies, or software
- Ability to scale up or down resources and/or requirements quickly without penalty
- Affordable access to a broad collection of skillsets necessary for successful eLearning development including Strategic Advisors, Project Management, User Experience, Graphic Design, Instructional Design, and Programming
- Economies of production scale for eLearning content including interactivity
Monarch believes in using open source tools whenever possible to keep costs manageable and to drive smart and flexible solutions for our customers. One example is in the area of HTML5 development of rich interactive activities and templates that can be delivered to a number of publishing platforms. We often leverage templates found at www.h5p.org.
There are currently 42 H5P activity options with more added every day by the broad open-source community. These templates provide a solid framework on which to build your own uniquely branded digital experience.
While it’s possible to do this yourself, without a knowledgeable team, your budget and time can quickly get absorbed in the learning curve. At Monarch, we build these at scale and can effectively produce a large quantity for a very low cost. As an example, it’s feasible to produce 100+ interactives leveraging any of the H5P templates for as little as $25 each. Most customers work with us to develop custom pricing models based on specific and unique requirements.
Please reach out and leverage our expertise for your next project. We realize your budgets may be shrinking and we can help you maximize what you have and still produce outstanding eLearning and online training.