Designing Training Programs that Drive Business Growth

In today's competitive market, a good product experience should be the cornerstone of any successful business strategy. Exceptional product experiences drive customer satisfaction, repeat purchases, and brand advocacy, all of which contribute to surpassing business goals. More importantly, these experiences ensure that the devices are utilized to their full potential, having the impact they were designed to achieve. In this article we will explore how an effective training program is not only the foundation for an excellent product experience but if designed with your business goals in mind, can also be the driver for sustainable growth.

The Role of Training in Enhancing Product Experience

Due to the logistics and complexity involved in teaching end users how to use medtech and B2B products, product training has often been a one-off information dump, typically linked to initial installation and then never repeated or built upon.

For training to have as big an impact as possible however, it must evolve into a dynamic, ongoing process that supports your customers' lifelong learning.

Shifting from standardized training to tailored, configurable programs that address the specific needs of both enterprises and individual caregivers along their product journey ensures that end-users fully leverage the technology they’ve invested in, for the lifetime of the solution. This approach not only boosts customer satisfaction but also reinforces the value of their investment as the user benefits from all that your product has to offer.

In addition to focusing on customer satisfaction levels, think of training and knowledge transfer as an additional customer engagement opportunity. Businesses can generate deeper customer insights at every moment of learning, gaining valuable customer feedback, enhancing product experience, and even uncovering new revenue streams or ideas for future customer investments as they better understand the impact your solutions can have.

Challenges with Traditional Training Content and Programs

Traditional training content and programs face several challenges that hinder their ability to fully contribute to business goals.

Content Design Issues:

The creation of training materials—whether it’s user instructions, courses, or online education—is a massive undertaking, especially in a highly regulated environment like healthcare. This complexity brings its own set of challenges:

• Difficulty in Updating: As product features or designs evolve, traditional training content quickly becomes outdated. Even when master content is refreshed, ensuring that updates reach all existing customers is a significant challenge.
  

• Localization Issues: Adapting content to meet the specific regulatory and other requirements of different countries is complex and becomes even more challenging with new content editions.
  

• Limited Reusability: Training content is often siloed, limiting its potential to be repurposed for sales, marketing, or integration into other programs. This is a missed opportunity to reinforce your value proposition and support customer-facing staff in demonstrating the product’s impact.
  

• Limited accessibility: Useful content is restricted to manuals or online modules, and practical know-how often hidden amongst reams of information.

Program Design Issues:

Traditional training programs are often rigid, offering a one-time knowledge transfer with little flexibility. They lack the configurability to cater to different learning levels and fail to deliver advanced training when it’s most relevant to the customer. This inflexibility can leave end-users sticking to basic functions, as accessing additional knowledge is often cumbersome and time-consuming.

As a result, the long-term impact of training on customer satisfaction is diminished. The focus remains on initial product use, with little consideration for the customer’s ongoing journey. To truly support your customers and maximize the impact of training, the approach to content development, utilization, and education must evolve.

Designing an impactful Training Program

To overcome traditional training challenges, effective content creation is key:

• Modular Content Creation: Begin with small, modular snippets that can be easily integrated into existing training programs or directly into the product itself.
  

• Ease of Updates: The modular approach allows for easy updates, ensuring that only the necessary content blocks are revised, keeping training materials current and making it easier to distribute updates.
  

• Accessibility: Modular content makes it easier to provide end-users with the exact instructions they need, accessible via a tablet or mobile device, ensuring they have the right information at the right time.
  

• Configurability: Designing content in small blocks enables trainers to tailor programs to individual needs, allowing for a mix-and-match approach that aligns with the user's level and requirements.
  

• Content Repurposing: High-value content, such as "How-to" guides, can be repurposed for sales or marketing, extending its usefulness beyond training.
  

• End-User Focus: Small content blocks allow customers to quickly access specific information without sifting through extensive manuals, particularly useful for advanced training scenarios, refreshers, or post-formal training when trainers are no longer available.

Aligning Training Programs with Business Goals

Now that we've optimized content flexibility, let's focus on designing a training program that maximizes impact on business goals:

• Lifelong Learning: Shift towards a model that supports lifelong learning. While continuous in-person support isn’t always necessary or feasible, providing key resources at critical moments is crucial, so define what those moments would be for the individual customer – even if those moments are a year from their initial purchase. The goal is then to ensure that the customer becomes self-sufficient at all other times. For example, Medtech Providers need to own the initial training but could leave modular content with the customer for ongoing use, allowing them to refresh knowledge as needed or integrate into their own training plans
  

• Strategic Timing: Delay advanced feature training until the customer is ready to use those functions, avoiding knowledge overload and ensuring that learnings can be immediately applied.
  

• Customer Satisfaction: Prioritize features and functions that will significantly impact that specific account, driving higher NPS scores and overall customer happiness
  

• Co-Pilot Functionality: Integrate a co-pilot feature into training tools, providing users with reassurance as they adopt new functions, which accelerates their integration into daily use.
  

• Continuous Engagement: Use modular content to enable sales teams and clinical specialists to engage with individual caregivers during regular visits. "How-to" snippets can keep customers excited about all the product has to offer and remind them of what other functionality can have an impact

Conclusion

Enhancing the customer experience is crucial for business success. By shifting from one-off training sessions to programs that support lifelong learning, you empower caregivers to fully utilize their medical devices, leading to improved patient care and stronger business outcomes.

A modular approach to content creation is essential in this process. The SIMPI method for developing "How-to" content enables quick, easily updatable, and configurable snippets, making continuous and in context access to the right information at the right time not only possible but highly effective.

At Unplain Jane, we are experienced in designing and deploying training programs that drive results—impacting not only your end customers but also your broader business goals. Contact us today to discover how we can help elevate your approach to education and transform your business.