Do you want to accompany your courses online? Setting up an online accompaniment may initially seem challenging. You might be wondering where to start.

With these steps, you will reach your first online accompaniment:

• Prepare materials

• Define the process

• Insert online content

• Add participants

If you have conducted your course program more than twice, then you have a good idea of which content is particularly important for your participants to practice and learn. This content provides you with a great starting point for your online content. I will show you three concrete examples of how you can accompany your courses online.

Here are three examples of how you can quickly try out what is possible:

Blueprint Course Accompaniment #1: Reflection Questions “Afterwards”

Your training lasts several weeks. Create a schedule for your online accompaniment. Which topics will you cover in the first week? Send your participants a knowledge check for the topic block of the first week every following Tuesday - for example, if you haven’t set a timeframe, over 6 weeks. Ask your participants how their week went with the new exercises and methods. These reflection questions (book section on reflection questions from p. 33) might include: “Did you achieve your course goal this week?”, “Did you encounter any obstacles in implementing the methods? If so, what were they?” or “Which exercise worked particularly well for you last week?”. You will then present the results anonymously during the next in-person meeting and address the transfer obstacles.

Blueprint Course Accompaniment #2: The Sandwich - Knowledge Nibbles on the Go

Create small knowledge nibbles and send these between course dates. This way, your participants are reminded of the content. Select four important aspects of your course. For each of these aspects, create two online contents. In the four weeks following your last in-person meeting, two short knowledge nibbles will be automatically sent to the participants.

Blueprint Course Accompaniment #3: The Personal Guidance - Fully Automated!

Videos are a great medium to present yourself and stay in touch with your participants. The personal contact you build with your participants during the training can be captured in a video. After the course, send your participants once a week for four weeks a three-minute video - fully automated and pre-configured. In this short video, you briefly repeat the most important points on a method and motivate your participants to use the exercises. For this, it’s best to formulate a specific call to action for a specific situation. This way, you support the practical transfer.

To get feedback on your online accompaniment, invite friends, family, or colleagues to your online course for a first trial. Are you eager to try it yourself? Then call us and let us provide you with a test account!

Why Should You Accompany Your Courses Online?

You already have the necessary content to accompany your courses online. To do this, transform your training content into online content and offer these in addition. Your participants want to learn at their own pace (or are encouraged to do so). In your accompanying online course, the course content is always and everywhere accessible. This way, online accompaniment supports or extends your in-person offering.

Good training lives on relevant content, methods, and exercises. In training or seminars, it is not always possible to present and apply all exercises within the allotted time. Thus, participants get the chance to practice with additional methods. When the participants are convinced of you during the training, they are also willing to use your online content. Behavioral changes only occur through repeated practice. During a seminar session, participants get to know your exercises and methods. For these exercises and methods to be applied in practice in many different situations, participants need time to practice. With your online accompaniment, you can support participants during this practice phase. For example, you can send reminders and provide participants the opportunity to give feedback. You can respond to this feedback online or address it in the next in-person session.

Accompanying courses online not only provides added value for your participants, but it also saves you time and effort, as you can reuse content and automate the accompaniment. Communication, notifications, quizzes, reminders, video hosting are not spread across a variety of platforms, which simplifies administration for you. You don't have to worry about your content ending up on the internet. Only the selected participants have access to your online content. Online accompaniments also allow you to create additional offerings for your clients. Just as you adapt your in-person trainings to the needs of your participants and clients, you can also create new online content specifically for your various clients. This opens up new possibilities in designing your training portfolio.

What do you think about the topic of online accompaniment? What experiences have you had? Write us your questions or a comment.