Bad communication can lead to misunderstandings, which can lead to students making mistakes and failing the course.
Or, worse yet, if they were to put their learning into practice in the world of work, and it turned out that they got something wrong, who knows what the consequences may be?
As a trainer or teacher, the job is all about communication between you and your students.
That is why when looking into which learning management platform to use to create and sell online courses, you need to consider this very important aspect.
Benefits Of Good Communication In A Learning Environment
Good communication with your students has multiple benefits:
- You can teach your content
- You can check student understanding
- Students can check their understanding
- You can motivate your students
- You can encourage your students
- You can compliment students on their progress
- You can explain things better when necessary
- You can get feedback from students about your courses
- Ideally, students can connect and learn from one another as well
Coming Up
Given the value of good communication in learning and training, it just makes sense to take a deep dive into this very important aspect of any LMS that you might be considering signing up for your business.
That is why this article is going to begin with what a CRM is exactly, does LearnWorlds have a CRM (Spoiler alert: it doesn’t have a CRM per see.), what LearnWorlds has instead, and how it compares.
We will then briefly mention which LMS platforms do have a built-in CRM, before going on to discuss what CRM apps can be integrated into the LearnWorlds platform, and how to do so.
By the end of the article when we get to the wrap-up, you will be in a position to decide whether LearnWorlds has the right communication framework for your business, and if not, what your potential alternative LMS platforms are, or if you prefer, which app/s to use in conjunction with LearnWorlds to better track your communication with your students. (See also ‘What Is LearnWorlds? Details, Features & Final Thoughts.’)
And without further ado, let’s get started. (Please feel free to scroll ahead to any section that jumps out at you.)
What Exactly Is A CRM?
If perhaps you stumbled upon this article by accident or curiosity, and you don’t actually know what a CRM is, don’t worry, I’ll explain…
CRM stands for Customer Relationship Management. It’s basically a software system that tracks all the communication between an organization and its customers.
Such software is typically used in call centers and by the customer service departments of businesses.
Customer relationships is an efficient way to bring up a customer’s query or issue on screen, along with their contact details, and the action that was taken by staff to address any issue or query that has arisen.
And that’s not all. A good CRM is also a great way of keeping track of leads, which is a great asset for your sales because once someone has shown an interest in your online courses.
It provides you with the means to follow up on that, encourage them to buy, or suggest other courses that they may also be interested in.
If you intend to build an entire learning center rather than merely a small side hustle, then you could certainly use a CRM for your business.
If you want to scale your business and take customer care seriously, a CRM can be an important step forward in achieving this.
Does LearnWorlds Come With A CRM?
And now for the details you’re looking for. Technically speaking, LearnWorlds doesn’t come with a traditional CRM per se… (Check out ‘How Good Is LearnWorlds? [Service Explained]‘)
However, it does offer an excellent means to allow instructors and learners to communicate with one another, and arguably, in many ways, this is superior to a traditional CRM app. This leads us nicely to our next section.
What Does LearnWorlds Have Instead Of A CRM? How Does It Compare?
While LearnWorlds does not have a traditional CRM system per se, it does have a handy student management system and a built-in featureful social network. Here’s the lowdown…
Student Management System
Of course, no Learning Management System is complete without a means of tracking important user data.
On LearnWorlds, In the User Management Page, you can search for users by name, filter their records by course or by date, see their last login and registration date, import users, and export user reports.
Each User has a User Details screen, where you can check out the total number of enrolled courses, the average score, and the overall study time of the courses.
In the Profile tab, you can see the badges they’ve been awarded and take notes that are only visible to you.
Grade Book
You don’t need me to tell you how important it is to keep a check on your student’s progress. With LearnWorlds, you can keep tabs on how they are interacting with your content.
You can check the learning activities your users have completed and how much time they spent on each course section and unit.
You can also check their progress against formal requirements of a particular certification (such as having to spend a minimum amount of time in a course).
Other times you can drill down to the statistics, in order to evaluate the course, and analyze data concerning the effectiveness of the course, and how well it does at keeping students engaged.
You can also export user data as necessary for deeper analysis. Along with the likes of correcting typos, arranging resits, and so on.
Emails
You can email your students through the LearnWorlds platform, either individually or in bulk.
Integrated Social Network
By now, we all know the value of social networks. And LearnWorlds has a built-in social network page for each online school.
Your students get to feel that they are part of a community where they can communicate, be guided, or simply stay up to date on the latest news.
Students are free to communicate in real-time, converse with each other, ask questions, and you can answer them and build a rapport with them, demonstrating your unwavering support.
On your school’s dedicated community page, you will also be able to highlight important information, and make polls.
You can also create course discussion groups, and all users can receive automatic notifications whenever they are directly mentioned in the chat, which can be particularly handy.
Contacting Leads
Everyone who subscribes to your school’s newsletter has their email address and contact information captured by the system.
And while LearnWorlds is not designed to have marketing emails sent out directly to your leads from the platform, you are able to export this data into another program.
What’s more, you can also integrate your school with other email marketing tools and campaigns, including the likes of MailChimp, Active Campaign, AWeber, and ConvertKit.
Which CRM apps can be integrated into the LearnWorlds platform?
Using Zapier
One of the most valuable CRM integrations you can get that work with is Zapier. Believe it or not, and it is hard to believe, Zapier is one app that can work with over five thousand other apps!
And conveniently for course creators and coaches, some of these apps that Zapier works with are CRM systems.
And, I hasten to add, some of these are known to work perfectly seamlessly with LearnWorlds. This includes the likes of Hubspot CRM, Salesforce, Zoho CRM, and Agile CRM.
Incidentally, Zapier, with all its various integration possibilities, can also help your business in many other ways in addition to CRM, such as with marketing.
What’s more, much of it can be done through convenient automation, which will require minimal manual work from you once it’s all set up.
Which LMS Platforms Have A Built-In CRM?
There are some LMS platforms that have their own built-in CRM system, and due diligence requires that they get mentioned here, so that you get a fuller picture of what your options are, so that you can choose the most appropriate platform for your business.
The most notable one is Thinkific, which we’ll get onto next. And we’ll also discuss BrainCert for good measure.
Thinkific
The Learning Management System Thinkific has a built-in CRM system to bring up and manage the details of your various students.
However, if you wish to sync contacts and leads across multiple really simple systems CRM, then even Thinkific themselves recommends that you use third-party software to take care of things like this.
BrainCert
BrainCert may be less well-known than Thinkific, but it does come with a fully integrated CRM that you can use to track sales, user activities, and payment status, chat with your new users, and more.
There are dedicated dashboards and tables to visualize and track new user data including the likes of enrollment status, payment status, course progress, and more related categories.
You can keep track of your sales data to see how it’s performing against your business objectives.
And you can tailor custom marketing campaigns to boost sales. You can also identify and target potentially profitable customers for more business revenue.
It’s also a very good LMS in general, with some very attractive features such as an intelligent gamification engine which is great for learner engagement, learner retention, and having repeat custom because customers loved their first course so much.
Summary
So, to summarize, the main point to be made here is that LearnWorlds does not come with a built-in CRM.
However, after reading the details provided in this article, you may feel that what LearnWorlds has to offer in place of a CRM is sufficient (or better) for your business needs and for your own website.
After all, the integrated social network embedded within LearnWorlds enables students and trainers to interact with one another in real-time, all the while maintaining the words of the conversation in memory.
That said, if you don’t feel that way, you can still go ahead with using LearnWorlds, but then use Zapier to connect the LearnWorlds platform with your preferred CRM app. (Or some other app, sales, or marketing integration.)
And this option is perfect for any course creator who is already established with their own CRM already set up and running, who wants to continue with the same CRM software, but also wants to move over to the LearnWorlds platform.
Admittedly, there are alternative LMS platforms out there that have an integrated CRM, such as Thinkific and BrainCert, as mentioned earlier.
So if that does sound tempting to you, that’s certainly something you can explore further before committing to any one platform.
Conclusion
Before I let you go, I just wanted to add that in these times the various data protection and legal compliance laws (whether they be CCPA or GDPR), are something that you’ll need to bear in mind both when choosing your CRM app, and also thereafter when recording personal details.
So, to conclude, no LearnWorlds does not have a traditional built-in CRM system, however it does have some great features that can, in many ways, replace a dedicated CRM.
And if you were of the belief that you would benefit from having a dedicated CRM system, you could still go ahead with utilizing the LearnWorlds, in conjunction with your favorite CRM system, provided that they are one of the many ones that can integrate with Zapier, and consequently integrate LearnWorlds.
In short, while LearnWorlds doesn’t have a traditional CRM system, there is no good reason to let this fact put you off signing up.
And it may interest you to note that not only does LearnWorlds offer a 30-day free trial, but Zapier also offers a free trial as well (a 14-day one).
This means that you can go ahead and give LearnWorlds a start, together with Zapier and the CRM of your choice, and do so completely free of charge for a limited period of time, while you consider whether you wish to stick with this particular setup and judge whether it suits your technical skills, business needs, and objectives.
Whatever you decide, by this point in the article, you have a full picture of what your options are.
