8 Best [Simple] Course Management System for Course Creators

Every aspect of life has gone digital. It is not a surprise that education has received a makeover by going digital. Many students across the world lacked the means to pursue the subjects/ courses of their dreams previously. Courses in a variety of niches are available for students of all backgrounds through Course management systems. Course materials and faculties available anytime, anywhere through the course management system, has caused quite a stir. Courses through the course management system are available both for free and a price, offered by both individuals and enterprises. The course management system has made it possible for students and working professionals to enhance their skills, thereby enabling them towards career advancement.

Employees previously worried about pursuing another skill/ higher studies. Course management systems with pre-loaded lectures, syllabus, online tests, and certification make it easier for working professionals to learn and make career advancement effortlessly. A systematic training process, easy upgradation, evaluation, simplified learning, time & cost-saving, and anytime, anywhere learning are a few benefits of a course management system. Instructor-led course management, notifications, assessments to manage performance, certifications, competency management, administration, course calendar, and reports are a few features of a course management system that helps individuals and businesses to manage the entire cycle of a course management system.

Coursera, Udemy, Udacity, Codecademy, LinkedIn Learning, Data Camp, and a few others are some of the course management system providers in the market.

Features of Udemy

• Course catalog
• Course quality checklist
• Ad Hoc email campaigns
• Course marketing
• Assignments
• Training videos

Disadvantages of using Udemy

• Searching for pre-certification classes is quite challenging
• You might accidentally end up paying for outdated courses
• Some of the lectures are less engaging
• Some of the courses lack offline training
• The crowded platform lacks organizing
• Lacks live training by instructors

Features of Coursera

How is a course management system helpful?

A course management system enables students and working professionals to pursue various subjects that they may take up either for a better career or because they would like to learn a subject of interest. Course management allows teachers/ instructors to join hands with educational institutions to create online and offline course material for various courses and subjects. The courses are classified as beginner's, intermediate, and expert level, making it easy for users(employees/ students) to pursue the most suitable course to their level of expertise. Some providers also offer features like course administration, skill gap analysis, tracking, and reporting that enables employers to manage skill mapping and skill development of their workforce.

What is the difference between CMS and LMS?

A learning management system helps businesses to plan and manage their training needs. LMS can be cloud-based or on-premise, too, depending upon the business needs, although cloud-based is becoming the hot favorite across all types of businesses. Most of the Learning Management Systems offer features like mobile learning, collaboration tools, reporting, and an online quiz. These features enable companies to provide an engaging and interactive learning experience for their employees. LMS makes online training fun and is most suitable for employees who travel a lot of work from different locations.

Company-wide training reports can be managed with a few clicks and enables the training department to manage the workforce's learning needs effortlessly.

Content Management System is a centralized platform that enables multiple users to upload written content with infographics, videos, and images. CMS enables uploading, viewing, and editing rights for multiple accounts/users. The content can be a training tutorial, onsite workshops, a blog, or educational content-wordPress is one of the best examples that can explain a content management system.

Learning through a content management system is passive learning, and a CMS does not offer features like online quizzes, tests, or discussion forums. Since CMS offers multiple accounts/ users version control, it is beneficial for companies to update content by various collaborators.

Which is the best LMS system?

The market offers many learning management systems. While each of them provides various features and pricing plans, it can be overwhelming to research a humongous amount of data to decide upon the best learning management system. Several factors need to be taken into consideration while choosing the best learning management system.

Identifying the needs - Making a list of the key challenges you are looking to find a solution would be an excellent start. Induction training is a part of the onboarding process. Information about company culture, details about the products/ services offered, and a few other critical pointers based on business requirements should be involved to enable the new employees to perform efficiently on their first project.

Employee development and retention - These are the key goals for a training and development department. Compliance training and training to improve sales teams' performance is another critical use case to be considered.

Reporting / Analytics - Reporting and analytics play a vital role since most businesses rely on them for making data-driven results.

Customization options - Large business organizations have a variety of business needs and require many users to be a part of the learning management system. Logo, gamification, language options, role assignment, certifications, and a few other features need to customize as per the business needs.

Assessment - While most of the learning management system offers assessment features, it is vital to check whether the provider's assessment features are suitable for business needs.

What are the examples of learning management systems?

Learning management systems can be of a variety of sizes.

Cloud-based learning management system - Cloud-based LMS does not require any hardware and software installed, and the users can log into a web portal. Easy implementation, lower costs, automatic updates, and cybersecurity are some of the benefits of using a cloud-based learning management system. Cloud-based LMS has been a great choice, especially during pandemic times.

SaaS - SaaS is a subscription-based software that is priced at different levels depending upon its features and the number of users.

Open source-based learning management system - The source code is available for the open source-based learning management system. While there are no license fees collected, the software download may come at a cost. Open source-based LMS is an excellent fit for a business looking to customize the source code as per their business needs.

Free - A forever free learning management system offers limited features and courses. It is also an excellent fit for start-ups and small businesses with a limited budget. Go skills LMS and Spotify are a few popular examples for a forever free learning management system.

Proprietary learning management system

While an open-source system enables users to customize the source code, the proprietary learning management system has closed source code that cannot be changed. A proprietary LMS covers both SaaS and Cloud-based is a type of LMS and provides technical support, upgrades of paid subscription, and a few other areas that make it a complete package. Moodle, Schoology learning, and Google classroom are a few examples of a proprietary learning management system.

An excellent web-based platform that offers training sessions on technical and soft skills to professionals. The video training courses are available for various technical areas like software development, IT administration, and many others. Users can also access the catalog for many courses.

Features

• Functionality features include Skill Gap Analysis, Course Recommendation Engine, Comprehension checks, projects, skill assessment, channels, and learning paths.
• Content features include Video content and interactive content.
• Training & e-learning features include Manager Portals and Content Libraries.
• Reporting and analytics features include Advanced Analytics, Single Sign-on, and API Access.

Benefits

• On-demand video training
• High-quality learning materials
• Training courses
• Powerful training tools

New features for course creators

Flow users who did not have a Pluralsight skills subscription have access only to limited features, including Skill IQ, Flow Academy, and a selection of free courses.

Pricing

• The Personal plan costs $29 per month and $299 when paid annually. The plan covers course discussions, offline viewing, channels, course certificates, email & phone support, skill assessments, mobile & TV apps.
• The professional plan costs $499 per user per month when billed annually and works well as a basic reporting and analytics tools for teams. All the personal plan features are a part of the professional plan. Basic skills and channels analytics, trend and usage analytics, team management, course learning check, and exercise files are a few other features that are a part of the professional plan.
• The Enterprise plan costs $699 per user per month when billed annually and works well for large enterprises with its flexibility and advanced analytics. The enterprise plan includes all the professional plan features. Single sign-on, six mentoring sessions, API access, data export, and advanced skills analytics are a part of this plan.

Member Factory by Invanto enables users to build online courses, membership sites, online discount stores, training portals, and much more. It helps businesses to save time and scale business effortlessly.

Features

Benefits

New features for course creators

Pricing

Spayee enables online teaching with a secured platform of trainers, institutes, and teachers. Spayee helps users to create and launch websites for online courses and online tests.

Features

• Unlimited courses, accounts, and practice quizzes.
• Multiple level security
• Easy course builder
• Doubt clearance
• Marketing tools
• Payment gateway
• Domain names

Benefits

New features for course creators

• Supports E-commerce
• Simple checkout process

Pricing

• The Basic subscription costs ₹2999 per month. All the core features, unlimited live classes, up to fifty GB free bandwidth, up to three hundred live test attempts, payment gateway, email & phone support.
• The Pro subscription costs ₹4999 per month and covers all the features in the basic subscription. Plus a white-label website, a hundred GB free bandwidth, and one instructor account.
• Business subscription costs ₹9999 per month. One hundred and eighty GB free bandwidth, three instructor account, and push notifications marketing along with all the features in the pro subscription.
• The Advanced subscription costs ₹14999 per month. Unlimited live classes & sub-admins, up to five instructor accounts, two thousand live test attempts for free, and all the business subscription features.

If you are looking to create, edit, and add testimonials, videos, and image content. The editing tools, email marketing, and other features of Podia help you do all that effortlessly. Podia is very well suited for marketers, content creators, developers, entrepreneurs, and administrators keen on building an online business of selling webinars, online courses, and much more.

Features

• Create online courses
• Host membership
• Sell digital downloads
• Email system
• Quizzes for courses
• Integrations

Benefits

New features for course creators

Pricing

Teachable allows users to create their website with branding, messaging, pricing, and student data features on a single platform.

Features

• Academic/Education
• Synchronous and Asynchronous Learning
• Blended Learning
• In-built Course Authoring
• Business
• Learner Portal, Mobile Learning
• Video Conferencing
• Assessment
• Course publishing
• Self-paced and instructor-led courses

Benefits

New features for course creators

• The new page editor button has an added functionality of directly leading to a course curriculum and checkout page.
• Bundled course block on the new page editor.

Pricing

• The Basic subscription costs $39 billed monthly and $348 when billed annually. Custom domain, coupon codes, integrated affiliate program, email marketing, and a transaction fee of 5% plus credit card fees are a part of this subscription.
• The Professional subscription costs $119per month and $1188 when billed annually. All the basic plan features are part of this plan, along with graded quizzes, advanced customization, certifications(course completion), course compliance, and 0% transaction fees.
• The High volume subscription costs $299 and $2988 when billed annually. Bulk import, custom user roles, )% transaction fees, and all the other professional plan features are available in the high volume subscription.

An online course platform helps users to create courses on a branded site. Educating customers, sell courses, improve audience engagement, and create brand awareness are all made easy with Thinkific. Thousands of trainers, speakers, teachers, coaches, professionals, companies, and consultants are all a part of Thinkific.

Features

Benefits

New features for course creators

Pricing

• The basic plan costs $49 per month. Works well if it is your first-course creation experience. Coupons, Email students, unlimited courses & students, affiliate reporting, and drip content are a part of this plan.
• The Pro plan costs $99 per month and includes some of the best features. Two site admin accounts, advanced course pricing options, private & hidden courses, and all the features in the basic plan are a part of the pro plan.
• The Pro-growth plan costs $99 per month and includes all the pro plan features. Thinkific branding removal, advanced user segmentation, and public API access are a part of this plan.
• The Premier plan costs $499 per month. All the Pro-growth plan features and five site admins, fifteen group analysts, an onboarding package, and up to fifty-course admins/ authors are a part of this plan.

An excellent platform for students to improve their skills. Instructors can also make money while enjoying what they do. Udemy offers courses in various subjects like public speaking, digital photography, cartoon drawing, mobile development, digital marketing, and web development. Instructors also receive insights from Udemy about creating quality courses online.

Features

• Assignments
• Coupons and discounts
• Training videos
• Course catalog
• Ad hoc email campaigns
• Course marketing
• Teach Hub

Benefits

New features for course creators

Multiple editors in learning paths

Pricing

Coursera is one of the best education platforms that partners with top universities and organizations to offer online courses that anyone can pursue.

Features

Benefits

• Professional service
• Flexible timetables
• A variety of features to choose from
• Professional degree

New features for course creators

Pricing

• A seven-day free trial is available.
• The course costs are dependent on the subscription and range from $39 - $79 per month.

E-learning has been picking up pace over the past few years, and the current pandemic situation has changed the way of looking at the course management system. The course management system has enabled students to take up a course that might help them pursue a hobby/ interest, learn a new skill, get certified in a new skill that improves their chances of grabbing a better job, and much more. The course management system covers the entire cycle of managing a course. A course management system offers courses in various subjects for students and working professionals enabling them to pursue skills/ subjects of their choice without worrying about time management.

Each course has details on course content, course information, the time required to complete, details on instructors, and tons of resources(learning materials). It also includes assignments, grading, peer group review, and tons of other features that help students complete their courses and evaluate their performance through assignments and an online quiz. On the other hand, the learning management system works as a complete package that offers a solution to all the challenges faced by the learning and development teams of businesses small and large.

Training materials, attendance, evaluation, feedback system, new hire orientation, soft skills training, and all the other training needs of an organization, along with evaluation, analytics, and reporting, can be managed effortlessly, thanks to the learning management system. The training materials are available online and offline and enable employees to manage their work time and provide feedback at its completion. There have been a phenomenal amount of students that have not been able to pursue a course/skill of their choice either because they could not afford it in a regular educational institution or it was unavailable where they resided.

The course management system has solved that problem and added tons of other exciting features that enable students to take multiple courses. Users get tons of learning resources, manage assignments, take online tests for assessments, get their performance analysis, share their scores with a peer group, and interact with an instructor. Users can manage time, track their progress, attend a live class, and get a certification after their course. Many working professionals lacked the opportunity to pursue a new skill or upgrade the existing ones either because of time/cost constraints.

Thanks to the course management system that enables them to follow the course/ skill of their choice with online and offline learning materials, assessments, and feedback systems that help them get certified in their favorite subject and make career advancement. In detail, we have discussed some of the best course management system providers in the market, their features, pricing plans, and benefits of using them to enable users to make a well-informed decision. There are tons of providers in the market, and each of them offers exciting features and competitive pricing policies.

However, it is essential to choose a CMS that best suits the user requirements in terms of the course content, certification, duration, real-time classroom, offline content, online tests/ quiz, and assessment. Making a list of the key takeaways, affordability, and other requirements, conducting thorough research, and making the right decision would be a great idea to make the best of pursuing a course online through a course management system.

Questions asked while looking for course management system: