Product training for customers: Why and how

Building successful product training for customers

Your company has developed a competitive product. It is actually one of the best on the market. You have also trained your sales team to promote it as best as possible. And customers are buying. But what happens after that? Do your customers know how to fully utilize your product to get the most out of it?

In the modern business world, too little attention is paid to customer education. This is despite companies (especially software vendors) releasing more technologically sophisticated and innovative products that can sometimes leave customers scratching their heads.

The simple fact is that new and exciting products require new knowledge and skills from customers. And if customers are not educated about the uses and benefits of a product or service, they will not be able to recognize its full value.

This is why “customer education” is also understood as “customer empowerment”. Your product or service should help customers do what they do best and do it even better than before!

Let’s see what companies can gain by investing more in customer education.

5 Key Benefits of Customer Education

The benefits of customer training range from daily product satisfaction to increased brand trust. But before you start planning your customer education program, it’s important to understand that training doesn’t just have to be about new customers.

Customer education is key to success at all stages of the customer lifecycle. Prospects and newly acquired customers should be logged in to use the product for the first time. Existing customers will still need training on added features, new products or upgrades.

No matter what stage customers are in, these are the biggest rewards for customer training.

1. Improved customer satisfaction

Imagine you just bought a new car. It’s fresh from the showroom and is set to include some stunning new features that make driving easier and more enjoyable. The only problem is that you haven’t driven in years.

Your first drive is supposed to be fun, but instead you repeatedly stumble and keep mistaking the wipers for the air conditioning. Needless to say, you are not happy with your purchase. The big shame is that there is nothing wrong with the car, you just need some training on how to use its great features.

The point is that customer satisfaction increases when customers are properly educated about using a product or service. This is because they can use all the tools and features without encountering problems that frustrate their user experience.

2. Increased customer engagement

Educating customers improves the experience they have with your product, which in turn increases customer engagement with your brand. And of course, everyone engages more with brands they trust and enjoy.

This increased engagement will make customers more likely to renew or repurchase your product. They are also more likely to spread positive word of mouth about your product and brand to their friends and colleagues.

3. Increased loyalty

It probably won’t surprise you too much, but satisfied and engaged customers are less likely to look for an alternative product or service. Why? Because they are loyal. And customer loyalty has many benefits.

Some of the benefits of customer loyalty are directly related to return on investment, such as:

• Lower cost to secure each purchase – securing repeat purchases costs a company far less in marketing spend than securing a new customer.
• Improved brand advocacy through positive customer word-of-mouth and testimonials, translating into free, high-quality advertising.

4. Better customer support

When companies invest in customer education, there are fewer complaints and questions for the customer support department to deal with. This is because customers are able to detect these pitfalls using their knowledge of the product.

Removing most of the smaller issues from the customer support queue means that the customer support team can focus on the more complex issues that keep getting reported. And because the support team can help customers with complex issues more quickly, better customer support is reflected in increased customer satisfaction.

5. A more trusted brand

When customers are able to find useful information about products, services and their benefits, their trust in your brand increases. They understand that you have their back and appreciate your professionalism.

And why build this trust with your customers? A trusted brand improves customer support and returns and reassures new customers that they are in good hands. All of this increases customer loyalty and improves return on investment.

So make it easy to find customer education materials. Your customer support team should be well trained in recommending relevant resources to customers who report a problem. Don’t just focus on product training. Your customer service reps should also be honing their soft skills.

A complete customer service course should include, for example, how to build long-term relationships and how to increase trust.

How to educate customers about using your product

If you plan to use customer education for its many benefits, start with understanding WHO you train Knowing your audience is the first step to designing customer education that truly adds value to their user experience.

Does it sound complicated? Just follow these best practices to help you deliver valuable customer training.

Make your team an asset

We have good news. You don’t have to guess what your customers need. There are already people on your team who spend time with customers and understand their problems and desires.

Invest some time talking to your vendors, suppliers and customer support teams. Focus on understanding the causes of common customer questions and where training will be most effective in providing the right answers.

These “front line” team members will also play a special role in your customer education efforts. They will direct customers to educational materials and educate customers on how to use your products while they are setting them up or solving their problems.

Rely on existing communication channels

You’ve already invested in a blog, social media marketing, and customer support forums. So why not use these channels to share your educational content?

Join forces with your content marketing team to create customer training resources that are engaging, user-friendly and easy to share.

Using channels your customers are already familiar with, such as Facebook and Instagram, to support your customer education efforts is a quick win. But think carefully about what kind of content you’re creating and how it will perform on platforms designed for concise information and quick entertainment.

Offer video tutorials

The old adage “show don’t tell” is especially important when creating educational content.

Do you need customers to learn a process or understand a use case? Short videos are a powerful tool for customer support. Consider how to practically demonstrate the use of your product or service and create an engaging video tutorial that covers the basics.

A Learning Management System (LMS) with video functionality can be a great platform for customers to access your learning videos in a user-friendly and convenient way.

Harness the power of webinars

While harnessing the power of a live video demonstration, be sure to consider the role of webinars in your customer education strategy.

Maybe something new is happening with your brand or one of your products? Offer a free webinar in your LMS and advertise it on your blog and social media channels. Webinars bring a sense of active discussion and collaboration to your training, which can be invaluable in making customers feel valued, engaged and satisfied.

Create related case studies

Case studies and scenarios provide a valuable opportunity to practice new skills. They provide a safe space for customers to fail and try again, as well as to get feedback that will help them succeed in the future. This allows them to feel comfortable with the product before making a financial commitment to purchase it.

The key to successful case studies is to make sure they are relevant and relevant to your target customers. So you may need to create custom cases and scenarios for subsets of customers.

LMS to support customer education

With an LMS that integrates with your CRM, you’ll be able to upload training content in a variety of formats and your customer education efforts will definitely pay off. Even better, your LMS provides mobile capabilities so you can truly deliver training to customers anywhere, anytime.

By using the best practices we’ve outlined here combined with a powerful LMS, your customer education will not only improve your customers’ product knowledge, but also their continued trust in your brand.

Originally published on www.talentlms.com.