Choosing an online course platform that’s not merely viable but actually best suited to the needs and requirements of any organization can be tricky. Deciding from amongst a wide array of options is often a daunting task. The importance of selecting the best option for upgrading or launching an online course platform can hardly be overstated.
No one could ever possibly know everything there is to know with regard to the available platforms. Nonetheless, it’s important to work out an evaluation process that represents an informed decision.
For example, you can deliver business value faster with enterprise-grade project and portfolio management. Oracle Fusion Cloud PPM training is the next generation of project portfolio management (PPM) software, providing a unified platform for managing all types of work.
Also, two platforms consistently rise to the top in any evaluation process. As they both tend to represent the most extensive and substantial online course creation spaces, it only makes sense to compare and contrast Teachable vs. Thinkific. Decision-makers will quite naturally want to know how these two differ from each other and which one is the system that best caters to the needs of specific users. People often compare Teachable and Thinkific but the two platforms have some significant differences.
Thinkific: A Feature-Rich System That Offers a Test Drive
Thinkific’s mission is to fuel the teaching capabilities of its audience, focusing primarily on professional course designers that are passionate about teaching and providing an educational value to their learners.
Thinkific helps entrepreneurs such as speakers, writers, subject matter experts, and coaches by providing support as they go about expanding their online learning businesses through the impactful delivery of training content.
As an online course platform, Thinkific boasts up to 30 desirable features that Teachable doesn’t offer. Using Thinkific, an organization can start off on a free plan that includes unlimited students. By comparison, the Teachable free option functions more like a trial period, and only 10 learners are able to participate. If taking a system for a test spin helps your evaluation process, you’ll enjoy more flexibility starting off with Thinkific.
Teachable: Catering to Online-Only Trainers
“Everything is Teachable.” That’s the Teachable motto. It’s intended to suggest that any real-life skill can be converted into teachable content. It can then be shared with the world using their online course platform.
Teachable clients come in all shapes and sizes. Many don’t have an existing bricks-and-mortar business.
Thinkific and Teachable both make it easy for users to create professional courses online. Both platforms provide unrestricted storage for videos, PDFs, and text, as well as the ability to organize your material into lessons and chapters. In spite of these similarities, the platforms differ from each other in many respects.
Online Course Platforms: Comparing and Contrasting
Thinkific sets one or more lessons as prerequisites within each course to prevent students from skipping ahead. Students cannot unlock advanced sessions without first completing the prerequisites. This locking feature is not currently offered by Teachable.
Secondly, quizzes and exams offered by Thinkfic are of an advanced level and include interfaces that can include multimedia, be graded, keep track of several completion attempts, offer explanations of correct responses, and be drawn from a randomized question bank.
Designers can also integrate Thinkific courses with a third-party exam provider if desired. They can also use the built-in Survey tool to generate long-form, teacher-graded exams. Teachable, for its part, offers basic quizzes which allow short questions with optional grading.
Both online course platforms offer coupons as an option for course design. Of the two, Thinkific offers a bit more flexibility in the coupon design module.
Site design and customization is another area where Thinkific gains an extra edge over Teachable. Using Thinkific, an online course designer can select from a suite of 10 custom theme presets and have complete control. Teachable, by comparison, currently offers a single default theme.
The last factor you’ll want to evaluate thoroughly is mobile responsiveness and convenience. Teachable is only available for iOS. This will cause problems for students who use an Android smartphone to learn on the go. By contrast, the student experience transitioning from desktop to mobile is more or less seamless.
Summing Up
We all want to get a good return on investment when evaluating an online training system. Software products go through endless upgrades. This is especially true for mobile device support. Use the items listed above as a checklist.
Evaluate capacity and features as you begin the process of evaluating online course platforms. Know your intended market. Write down your objectives for serving that audience. Assume that platforms will change. Keep your desire to best serve your market segment at the forefront of every evaluation process.
