How can you design effective onboarding materials using learning principles?

1 Know your audience

Before you start designing your onboarding materials, you need to understand who your audience is, what they need to learn, and how they prefer to learn. You can use various methods to gather this information, such as surveys, interviews, focus groups, or analytics. Based on your findings, you can create learner personas that represent the characteristics, goals, and preferences of your target audience. These personas can help you tailor your content, tone, and format to suit their needs and expectations.

2 Define your objectives

Once you know your audience, you need to define what you want them to learn and do as a result of your onboarding materials. You can use the SMART framework to create specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound objectives. For example, an objective for a customer onboarding material could be: "By the end of this video, you will be able to set up your account and customize your profile in less than 10 minutes." These objectives can help you focus your content, assess your outcomes, and provide feedback.

3 Organize your content

After you define your objectives, you need to organize your content into logical and meaningful chunks. You can use the ADDIE model to guide your content development process. The ADDIE model consists of five phases: analysis, design, development, implementation, and evaluation. In the analysis phase, you identify the gaps and needs of your audience. In the design phase, you outline the structure and flow of your content. In the development phase, you create and refine your content. In the implementation phase, you deliver and distribute your content. In the evaluation phase, you measure and improve your content.

4 Apply learning principles

To make your content more engaging and effective, you need to apply some learning principles that are based on how people learn and remember information. For example, use a combination of text, images, audio, and video to appeal to different learning styles. Additionally, use a conversational tone and address your audience directly to create a sense of connection and rapport. Furthermore, distribute your content over time and provide opportunities for review and practice to enhance retention and recall. Lastly, provide timely and specific feedback to your audience to reinforce their learning and correct their errors.

5 Test and iterate

Finally, you need to test and iterate your onboarding materials to ensure that they meet your objectives and satisfy your audience. You can use various methods to test your materials, such as usability testing, A/B testing, or user feedback. Based on the results, you can identify the strengths and weaknesses of your materials and make adjustments accordingly. You can also monitor the performance and impact of your materials over time and update them as needed.

6 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?