So, your institute has decided to invest in learning management software and looking for the perfect learning management system,
but have no idea on how to choose a good one. You might wonder where to start your search or what characteristics I should look for!
LMS software does not come cheap. It’s a big financial investment. You need to make sure to buy the right platform, which will
fulfil all of your needs for at least the next couple of years.
But choosing an LMS software is not easy. There are a ton of LMS software in the market. And it’s easy to get overwhelmed by so much choice. However,
we have written a guide to help you choose the right LMS software for your institution.
Why is finding the right LMS system so Difficult?
Latest research has found that the current market value of LMS software is 13.4 billion dollars and is expected to double by 2025.
This status alone can say that the learning management system market is growing fast, and there is a lot of competition in the market.
In this abundant choice of solution, you need to choose the one based on your needs, such as,
- The interface best suited for your organisation, teachers and students
- The easy setup and integration availability with your existing system.
- Analytics to help you monitor all your processes.
How to choose the right LMS for your institute?
The best way to choose the right LMS is by creating a list of things you need your LMS software to do.
1. Understand your Training Needs:
Not all LMS are suitable for your needs. That is why it is essential to analyse all of your current and future needs.
It must be in sync with your course curriculum, content types, needs and analytics.
You may find that all of the other LMS software is giving you similar features. It may make you more confused.
To further narrow down your choice, you need to ask yourself some questions.
- Who are your potential users
- What type of courses are you going to offer your students?
- How many users will use your system?
Your answers will provide you with enough information, with which you’ll be able to further sort the LMS software according to your choice.
The next bit of criteria is to find the type of content, and you will be using in your courses and how you want to deliver training!
Ask Yourself:
- Will you provide a recorded course or live teaching?
- What type of content will you be using? PDF, Audio-video, Animation, PPT etc
- How can students access all the learning resources?
- In which platforms will you want your learning platform to operate?
Based on your answers on all these questions, you can further narrow down your searches and discard some software that is not the right fit.
2. What features do you need?
Do not go with the trend. Select the features you really want. Ask yourself what are the features you really want?
- Sharing Information:
This feature helps you to share information, documents, learning materials across all your teachers and students.
- Online Class System:
This feature helps you to conduct online classes and online lectures among your students.
Students can also come live and do one on one interaction with the teachers.
- Discussion Board/Forum:
This helps students to create a community around a subject,
discuss with each other about problems and their solutions and involve in group activities.
- Test and Assessment:
After teaching, you want your students to give online tests to assess their progress.
With an inbuilt testing engine and exam software, it will allow you to take assessments of the students.
- Analysing:
Taking assessments is not enough. Learning management system must have the feature to automatically
analyse the students’ performance based on their daily assessment, projects, tests, quizzes and tests.
- Security:
Any online tool is prone to security risk. That’s why your LMS must have the feature to protect itself from outside threats.
If your shortlisted LMS software fulfils all these feature requirements,
you can select the one which is close to your budget and go with that.
Have a Free Demo
But Wait!
Don’t go and buy the product right away. It’s always better to have a hands on experience of the product at first before making a purchase.
Most LMS software makers will be happy to give a demo of their product to you. It will help you get familiar with the product.
The initial setup cost of the LMS solution can be a little high. But you also have to take into account the amount of money
it will save you in the coming years. You don’t have to set up hardware separate to manage your institution.
After the installation is done, you need to keep in touch with the support team of the LMS software for troubleshooting and other needs.