The connected millennial has a hungry mind. Consumption of digital content is a popular past-time for so many today. Rather than simply consuming, the online audience is also searching for a deeper understanding, and real education through these tools.
The e-learning market is booming, it is estimated that between 2017 and 2018, the LMS market will grow by about 23.17%, from $2.65 billion in 2013 to $7.8 billion in 2018.
Combine this with a massive shift in digital behaviors to the mobile device and you have a huge opportunity for educators to share their content with a connected audience.
Worldclass.io are enabling just that, their white-label affordable solution connects small businesses with audiences of students worldwide.
We spoke to Founder and CEO Uri Alexandrovitz about the creation of his edu-tech app service and the implications of a shift to an m-learning model of information sharing, for today’s educators.
An increase in time spent interacting with digital devices has led to a diversification in our habits, what trends have you witnessed in this space?
We do indeed live in an age of information. The internet means that a wealth of content is easily available, so much so that it can actually be confusing for the user. Educators today are looking for a great way to diversify themselves and communicate this information, in an easily digestible way. They need a polished mobile offering, with a user friendly interface that communicates their brand through a white-label solution.
There is a growing emergence of small to medium businesses in need of an affordable solution for in-house learning, or for educators to connect with students. This market is no longer dominated by B2C services like Khan, Udemy and Coursera. Instead we are seeing smaller guys, with great educational content to share.
We have seen a big increase in companies offering language learning, corporate training and academia. We are aware that people need a flexible solution to reach their audience, in a number of ways in an engaging way – it’s no secret that mobile devices and tablets are great way of achieving this.
Mobile usage has been on the rise for some time, why do you think some companies just getting started?
Until now, creating an app was costly and not a viable option for in-house training or smaller SMEs. We really noticed a greater opportunity as mobile use has continued to grow, in ensuring that these companies are not left behind.
We allow companies to create a professional and slick mobile offering, enabling exam preparation, language learning, business training and general academic courses. They can also enhance this experience – through buying content and selling their own courses – and in doing so, customize their mobile offering. We are connecting these SMEs with their students, with each other, and with leading publishers and distributors.
How did your personal experiences lead to the creation of Worldclass.io?
I met fellow co-Founder Tal Morgenstern teaching SAT classes in Tel Aviv. We worked together to develop One On One Test Preparation LTD, the biggest test prep tutoring company in Israel. After seeing such a huge success here we went on to set up our own teaching business.
As a small company we discovered that building an online presence was incredibly difficult. Prices were just so high. As we debated this issue we began to consider an alternative, feeding the desires we had as an SME, as a result we create a tool to enable others to succeed in this space.
Today our blog shares some great tips for our community to empower those struggling with these challenges. We share advise on a number of useful topics, such as setting up a domain and making engaging online courses. We are focused on the educator, through enabling these businesses we provide a better educational offering for all, in a range of industries. Our customers are the experts they know the best content they want to share, in various languages, and they understand their users – we just help them to do it in an attractive white-label interface, for a low-cost yet professional experience.
What does Worldclass.io offer that its competitors do not?
We offer similar the services that other e-Learning branded solutions do from a user perspective; such as structured content, self paced learning, assessments and gamification. We are different because compared to those academies we are not building a connection with the Worldclass brand – we are enabling these smaller companies to do that for themselves. We are completely transparent. Our customer is not the user, it is the educator. We are building a great user experience for our clients, promoting their brands instead.
What advice do you have for educators for setting up a tool to communicate with their audiences?
To start off – you have to consider your mobile offering. Whatever you provide needs to fit seamlessly with the content of your website, for a professional look and a consistent messaging.
Across all platforms it is important to always be thinking about your audience. You have the great information, you know who you want to share it with – communicate this in a clear and sophisticated fashion. The educators we work with are knowledge experts. They have all the best information, they just need to start utilizing the correct tools to fully engage their students.
Identify your student’s goals – ask them what they want to get out of the course. This is helpful for when you come to decide the course content and the best way to deliver this material. Through asking this question at the beginning it kicks off a relationship – with strong communication lines between the educator and the student. Online learning relies on strong student motivation – this can only be achieved when a dialogue is maintained. Personalizing this approach in any way possible will put you in great stead for a connected and engaged set of students, who will learn and share much more.
We recommend visually interesting content. Don’t make it too wordy. Today’s world is full of distractions, be direct and clear and you will keep the students’ attention. This can be done in a whole range of ways, incorporating video, infographics, social media sharing, blogs, announcements – be creative. In turn ask for the same back from your students, promote innovation. People want to share their own ideas, to study with autonomy and make something new. A great educator provides a space in which this can be done.
What do you think the future holds for online learning?
As more and more content becomes accessible we really see the future in the hands of the experts. Continued fragmentation, diversification and specialization mean that the most successful educators will be those who are the knowledge leaders in their fields.
I also think we will continue to see niche products, enabled with a mobile offering gaining more and more traction. Likewise the consumer hunger to learn will grow. People are innately curious, they want to learn. Our connected world makes this possible, and increased use and interaction with content through social media drives people to question information, seek out sources and teach themselves.
Another trend we predict will be the increase of bite-size content. Short lessons and quizzes that can be done on-the-go, be that on the bus, in a queue, during a TV ad break, or sitting down to commit to an hour’s lesson. People want to make the most of their time, and they want to learn. At Worldclass.io, we are helping the experts to teach them.
