The Customer Education Playbook - 1st Principles
The HEARST OGC Ops Squad is focused this year on business client-facing learning and internal-facing learning journeys for two of our principal legal ops platforms for document and matter management.
In hearing about our approach Nachum Sokolic in product development at Thomson Reuters recommended The Customer Education Playbook (CEP) by Daniel Quick and Barry Kelly. The book is an excellent synopsis of principles I learned during my past career in developing managing professional training programs.
In the first 3 chapters the authors set out why education programs are essential to successful adoption, and the remainder focuses on the how and provides an excellent summary of education modalities and design approaches.
Our team is reading the book together and applying what we are learning in real time.
3 core principles:
Principle #1: The end point is 100% adoption, not deployment. Without sufficient user training, customer success teams (and Ops Sys Admins) are in constant reactive mode. Customer education turns troubleshooting into training opportunities and reduces triage over time, freeing time for higher value activities.
The support to great content is a highly organized catalog with a visual hierarchy that is easy to navigate. You want your customer to have a smooth, not fragmented experience. There are 3 models for organizing content: Hierarchical, sequential or matrix. We're using the latter with certification paths offered along the vertical access and deep dives by topic on the horizontal access. This allows the client to choose their own adventure.
In the age of action-triggered notifications, which we are all familiar with from online shopping (think of abandoned shopping cart and lowered price emails) there is no reason to allow learners to drop through the cracks. For new team members a 30 day nurturing campaign can provide support and encouragement.
Principle #2: Don’t talk about the product! Instead focus on how it’s going to make the client's job easier. Clients do not have a job about using the product. The product is a tool to help the customer succeed in their work goals.
Focusing on feature how to's requires the customer to make a cognitive leap about how the tool relates to their task at hand. It does not tell them how to use the tool as a whole to do their job more effectively. You have to connect the dots for them to convey the value proposition.
To this end, define customer goals independently of your product. Titles should be marketing content, using active voice. For example, in our case, we would not us the title “How to use iManage” but maybe “Quickly find precedents on point to your draft.” The book's chapter titles are excellent examples of declaring the content's value. For example, chapter 4 is titled, “Motivate customers by curating their path to awesome." Training can lean towards best practices; "how-tos" are incidental.
Finally, instead of glossing over friction in the process, actively focus on it. Acknowledging the friction builds trust. As change agent Cassandra Worthy notes, embracing friction as an opportunity for change can open people's hearts for change.
Principle #3: Create content where the customer is already working. At bare minimum your tool tips should allow the inclusion of hyperlinks to a knowledge base. A knowledge base must offer content that is digestible and concise.
Training is rarely mandatory and can’t scale offered 1:1. Ideally education offered in product at the time the customer needs it without interruption to their work (e.g. just in time learning).
Self serve content is NOT a compromise! It is an additional channel to personal contact and one that when done right allows a customer to get their answer and continue without waiting and without interruption.
New information retention falls to under 20% within 4 days. Offering learning in context, instead of out of situational context, decreases cognitive overload and increases what sticks.
Start by asking your subject matter experts (SMEs) what they say repeatedly to most of their customers. Take those off their plate first so they can focus on more nuanced guidance. When you work with SMEs remember they have full-time jobs and supporting education is not their core responsibility. Provide context and use their time wisely. Record them if you can.
Our legal department website, supported by a chatbot, receives nearly 3,000 visits each quarter, which translates to more than 245 fewer hours spent on ministerial items. And targeted training is served to new employees in their first week so we can ensure everyone understands the company's approach and launches on good footing without having to wait for an in-person scheduled training.
In part 2 we will take a closer look at what The Customer Education Playbook has to say about the "how to."