At Real Projects we use Articulate Storyline 360. t is an excellent development tool and works for all of elearning development requirements and the majority of our clients are using it. There are multiple elearning development tools available so its not just as simple as saying we like it. When reviewing a development tool you have to consider why you are going to select it? We have to go through a development process to understand why we would we select Articulate 360.
In 2010 we were looking for a development tool after using HTML5 for several years. Our elearning development team has been using HTML 5 and was looking to move to a dedicated elearning tool
Out team had worked with HTML for developing content management systems, course builders, update systems and elearning courses. The entire process was slow, inefficient and difficult for the client.
For custom elearning projects HTML was an excellent option but increasingly when we were looking to develop our own course library and re-use modules for custom projects, often who have restricted budgets and tight timelines we needed to move towards a dedicated elearning tool.
Impotant in the move to a new tool was an elearning review process. We needed to understand how we would use the tool, how it would function and how it would support out requirements – a review process would be vital.
Moving to Articulate Storyline
We initially looked at Articulate Studio but quickly moved over to Articulate Storyline developing in versions 1,2,3 and eventually working in 360. We are now working extensively in 360 and the majority of our clients are working in 360.
Storyline works for us and our clients, it allows for efficient and reliable development that we can share.
When we meet clients for the first time the majority of the them are already working in Articulate 360, specifically Storyline and this was another reason we moved to Storyline. We wanted to support the clients who were developing projects using Articulate Storyline.
After 10 years working in Articulate Storyline we have now become experts in the tool, developing complex solutions in multiple languages and we have won over 20 awards including a Hermes Creative Platinum. Our development team have really pushed all elements of the tool to get the most out of storyline, developing what the experts would call ‘next/click’ courses to complex innovative branching courses.
Storyline allows us to quickly develop course content and also to continue innovate, offering a range of functionality and features, including AI and translation. The programming functions provides a platform for the development and interactive teams to meet the requirements of our clients and our internal who come to us with ideas. Storyline comes with a number of in-build players, assets and themes but for the advanced developers you can work from scratch – ideal for the projects that we are working with.
Colloboration and Support
During our software review, we wanted a software company that would support us if we came across a problem. Articulate not only has an excellent user community that provides ideas and support but a support team that are on hand to help.
The Articulate team collaborated with our development team when we needed to build a custom navigation menu, providing their insight to help us to complete the menu and this was free. This type of value is often overlooked when you are looking which software company to use.
We developed a procurement funnel looking at all of the requirements that we needed, including those of clients and Articulate Storyline was coming through top each top. Some of the factors we included were well-established company, large development community, an excellent user community, quick response times to queries, regular software updates and robust software.
So why do we like Articulate Storyline 360?
Articulate has allowed our courses to develop and grow and we’ve pushed our content and interactive beyond the boundaries of what we thought Storyline might be actually be possible! Like any tool there are boundaries and we will receive requirements that might be difficult to accommodate, but within the development tool we can often come up with a workaround or an alternative.
Increasingly we’ve found that our clients are using Storyline and they have found it easier to update courses and upload it to their LMS or LXP, we’ve become experts and it is easy for us to help them with their elearning journey.
This has become an important factor for clients as they ask what types of content can they include in their LMS or LXP. The constent upload and low number of failures within Articulate 360 updates has been a significant consideration for us when we consider our development tool choice.
It could be helping them with courses that they are developing or after we’ve handed over courses. Storyline allows you to get up and running with no software training and develop complex courses if you want to understand it in more detail.
Storyline has its critics like and software tool and we’ve been waiting for some software updates over the last ten years, but it’s a robust and stable piece of software.
They are open with the development roadmap and you can actually speak to them at conferences and exhibitions – the real people that you chat with in the forum!
Do you need help developing with Articulate Storyline 360?
We now use storyline to develop our custom elearning and also to support our off the shelf elearning courses. These courses are developed in English and Latin American Spanish and we have no problems developing 15 courses a week. Our graphic and interactive team find the software easy to understand and have been able to design compelling and visually stunning graphics for our projects. Storyline has been designed in a manner that allows the designers to understand which buttons, states and shapes that they need to provide and this has been a massive help to our workflow.
Get in touch with us to discuss your Articulate Storyline project we’ll be happy to help.
