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In this post, we’ll be discussing the best employee onboarding platforms to help you create and deliver smooth and informative onboarding of new hires and materials
Over a third of employees that leave their job do so within the first year at an organization. Further to this, almost half (43%) of those employees leave within the first 90 days.
This concerning trend in employee lifecycles costs organizations across the U.S. billions of dollars a year in recruitment costs.
One of the most effective ways to reduce employee churn rate, especially in those first weeks and months, is by providing them with an effective onboarding experience.
What Are Employee Onboarding Platforms?
Employee onboarding software and platforms are digital enablement solutions and tools that enable your team to create, share, and measure the effectiveness of onboarding materials and resources.
Each organization has its own onboarding processes, so your chosen software has to cater to your individual needs.
Moreover, the best tools integrate with other tools; they should be easy to use, intuitive, assist you in creating engaging materials and resources, and, most importantly, track users’ engagement.
There is typically some overlap with microlearning and knowledge base platforms. This is because it’s beneficial for new hires to be able to ask questions and look at your central knowledge base for answers.
However, the key element is that onboarding platforms help you create and deliver all the information a new hire needs in an easy to digest format.
Why Is Onboarding So Important?
I’m sure we all remember what it feels like to join a new organization. It can be daunting; it feels overwhelming; there’s so much to learn and remember.
Whether the onboarding period is one week or six months, it’s crucial that new hires are receiving all the information they need from the moment they accept the offer to join an organization.
In fact, it’s estimated that organizations with a strong onboarding process improve new hire retention by 82% and productivity by over 70%.
(PRO TIP, Here’s our guide that covers how to create a successful onboarding program )
That can improve the bottom line of a large organization by triple digits or more a year. Not to mention the positive effect it also has on employee morale and brand loyalty. Likewise, the retention and training of new employees are just as essential for small businesses’ growth and development.
If you want to improve your employee retention rate and provide ongoing Salesforce training materials and communications, integrating an employee onboarding platform is essential.
Now, you should understand the importance of great onboarding and the part software plays; here are 9 of the best employee onboarding platforms to consider:
The Best Employee Onboarding Platforms
1. Spekit
Spekit is one of the best digital adoption platforms and is one of the most complete employee onboarding tools on the market. This digital adoption platform software includes a range of tools to help you easily and seamlessly create and share onboarding and training materials.
It’s also one of the only onboarding platforms to fully integrate with and offer Salesforce in-app guidance. If you already use Salesforce, Spekit will automatically sync with it as you go along.
You can create a centralized wiki, individual onboarding journeys, integrate the software with your other tools to collect and manage data, and more.
Pros
- Seamless integration with tools and applications
- Create a centralized knowledge wiki for your organization
- Create and share engaging onboarding materials and track the progress of new hires
- Integrates flawlessly into your employee’s day-to-day workflow
Spekit Pricing
- Spekit Basics: $10/per user/per month. The Basics plan is ideal for smaller teams. Included is free training content, their Wiki knowledge base, Slack integration, and more.
- Spekit Premium: $15/per user/per month This plan includes everything in Lite, along with Salesforce integration, unlimited content, premium onboarding, a dedicated success manager, and more.
2. Walkme
Walkme is a Microlearning and Digital Adoption Platform (DAP). The software’s core strengths are how seamlessly it collects data for you to analyze and work with. Enabling you to then create “walk-Thrus,” which are essentially step-by-step guides.
Through the central dashboard, you have all the tools and features you need to categorize, sort, and work with the data. In addition, you can easily create onboarding materials, a central knowledge base, and other resources for new hires.
Walkme also provides insights and helps identify areas within your processes where automated processes can be implemented.
Pros
- Easy to produce walkthroughs and other step-by-step guides and instructions
- Intelligent AI helps suggest information and identify areas within processes to improve upon
- Intuitive dashboard and UX is perfect for users with no prior onboarding software experience.
Cons
- The workflow builder feels clunky compared to some other software.
Walkme Pricing
- Basic Plan: Quotes on request only. This plan allows you three walk-thrus, up to 5 steps per walk-thru, 300 assists per month, and basic online support.
- Custom Plan: Quotes on request only. Their team can work out a custom plan with unlimited walk-thrus to meet your requirements.
Read our Walkme review or our comparison of Guru vs WalkMe vs Lessonly vs Whatfix vs Spekit
3. Brainshark
If you have a large client-facing workforce, Brainshark is software worth a closer look. Designed for sales and client-facing teams, Brainshark provides all the tools to onboard, train, empower and track your employees’ success. Making it one of the more specialized of the employee onboarding platforms.
Moreover, this software presents a range of tools to help you create and update a training course database that employees can access at any time. The scorecards are worth mentioning as they’re fun and engaging; they also help you diagnose areas for improvement.
In addition, the backend analytics provides some post-sales support and insights into how your resources are being received and how your employees are progressing.
Pros
- Fun and engaging scorecards promote employee engagement.
- Analytics provide actionable insights into individual employee performance.
- Easy to create and centralize all of your onboarding and training resources
Cons
- Its sales-focused solutions are not suited for all businesses.
- Lack of flexibility
Brainshark Pricing
- PRO: Custom quotes on request. This plan gives you access to all of their content and training applications.
- Premier: Custom quotes on request. This plan includes all the features in their Premier plan plus their Coaching and Practice tools.
4. Userguiding
Userguiding is a micro-learning tool that makes creating product walkthroughs quick and easy.
It’s as simple as installing the Chrome Extension, then clicking the templates and elements you want to use as you take someone through a process.
In addition, you can create great-looking onboarding materials, training resources, instructionals, ask questions to gather feedback, and much more.
Userguiding is one of the simplest tools on the market. No coding or technical knowledge is required. Therefore, it may be limited to the range of tools it offers, but what it does do, it does extremely well.
Pros
- Incredibly simple, no coding, technical knowledge, or training needed
- Analytics data provides insight into user actions.
- A wide range of templates and elements help to create nice-looking elements.
Cons
- Onboarding guides may be too simple for some organizations.
- Lacking dedicated mobile support
Userguiding Pricing
- Start-Up Plan: $99/mo. Their Start-up plan enables 2,000 monthly active users and a single team member. You’ll also get access to useful guides, onboarding checklists, and some other tools.
- Growth Plan: $299/mo. This plan increases the active users to 5,000/mo and allows unlimited team members to connect. You’ll also get access to additional tools and features.
- Enterprise Plan: $Custom pricing. In addition, if your requirements exceed 5,000 monthly users, a team member will work out a custom plan to fit your needs.
5. Lessonly
Lessonly says their software is so simple that, “If you can write an email, you can use Lessonly.” It’s software to consider if you want to get started with no prior experience or coding skills.
It’s a cloud-based learning management system at its core. This software enables users to build and create training materials, share them, and track users’ engagement, all from a singular interface.
Moreover, it’s fully compatible with mobiles and other handheld devices, making Lessonly accessible to remote and mobile teams.
Pros
- Very customizable, easy to add your own branding and company look to resources
- Clean and intuitive UI, just as easy for employees to use too
- Cloud-based technology makes picking up and creating content quick and easy to share
Cons
- Knowledge lives outside of the day-to-day workflow of employees.
- Does not integrate with key tools like Salesforce
Lessonly Pricing
- Pro: Contact for a custom quote. This plan gives you access to their intuitive lesson builder, surveys, quizzes, event tracking, and more features.
- Pro + Coaching: Contact for a custom quote. This plan opens up webcam and screen recording, as well as some practice tools and more.
6. Trainual
Trainual is a cloud-based learning management system (LMS). This software provides a range of tools enabling users to create and automate onboarding and training resources.
It also helps organize knowledge, training modules, and other resources in a centralized knowledge system.
You have a good deal of customization over the look and feel of everything you create. Therefore, it’s simple to assign teams and roles to specific modules, and you can track the engagement when resources are viewed.
Above all, this software is a comprehensive solution to automating and streamlining onboarding processes along with many tools and features that make creating and sharing knowledge a breeze.
Pros
- Out-of-the-box templates look great and are easily customizable
- Integrates with a wide range of other tools
- Real-time reporting helps to make informed decisions
- 7-day free trial means you can try the software before committing to a monthly plan
Cons
- Training content lives outside of employee’s workflow
- No Salesforce integration
Trainual Pricing
- PRO: $99/month. Their PRO Plan opens up access to a library of training materials and templates, giving you access to unlimited documentation and other features.
- Premium: $149/mo. This plan includes all the features in their PRO plan, plus phone support and coaching, screen recording, access to stock photo libraries, and more.
7. EduMe
EduMe is a mobile-based microlearning and content creation software. In addition, it’s designed to help small to medium-sized organizations create and share communications and learning materials with remote teams.
Its key features are; creating onboarding and learning materials, sending out organization-wide communications tracking employee productivity, and assigning role-based access.
Above all, as far as mobile-specific employee onboarding platforms go, EduMe has filled that niche.
Pros
- Fully optimized for mobile users and ideal for training remote team members
- The online built-in portal makes it easy to communicate with team members.
- Nice clean, modern visuals are easy to understand and engaging.
Cons
- Limited to mobile use for some of the features
- Overly simple in places, not suitable for medium to large or fast-growing organizations
EduMe Pricing
EduMe has three pricing plans; Starter, Pro, and Enterprise. Moreover, you can try each for free, although you’ll need to contact them for a custom price quote.
8. TalentLMS
TalentLMS is a learning management system. Similarly, it’s designed to help individuals and organizations of all sizes create and deliver engaging online training.
Some large organizations, such as DeLonghi and AOL, trust TalentLMS to help produce onboarding materials. That’s some social proof that it has all the tools and features you need to create your own resources.
The main benefits revolve around how quick it is to start creating and sharing content. Moreover, TalentLMS has a large library of templates and courses in their TalentLibrary, giving you a jump start and speeding up the creation process.
Pros
- The layout is clean and easy to navigate; plenty of drag-and-drop options are nice and simple.
- API and Javascript integrations add extra extendibility
- Integrates with a wide range of tools, such as Shopify, PayPal, and Stripe
Cons
- Doesn’t integrate with a user’s day-to-day workflow, meaning they have to switch apps to find knowledge
- The text and code editors are more complicated than some other software solutions.
TalentLMS Pricing
TalentLMS has several monthly pricing plans to choose from. Enabling you to pay for the number of users you require as follows:
- Free: FREE. You can get started for free with up to 5 users and 10 courses.
- Starter: $59/mo. This plan enables up to 40 users and unlimited courses.
- Basic: $129/mo. This plan enables up to 100 users and unlimited courses.
- Plus: $249/mo. This plan enables up to 500 users and unlimited courses.
- Premium: $429/mo. This plan enables up to 1000 users and unlimited courses.
9. Guru
Guru is an AI-powered knowledge management software that helps businesses capture information, create useful and engaging training resources, and build a centralized knowledge base.
What separates Guru from similar software on the market is its reliance on AI. Instead of searching for knowledge, Guru does its best to make suggestions and present data when you need it.
Ultimately, this adds a contextual element to the software. Meaning you and your team members can carry on with your workflow and use Guru without switching apps.
Pros
- Integrates with a range of popular tools
- Makes organizing, sorting, and using data a breeze
- Backend analytics provides valuable insights into content usage, employee engagement, and more.
Cons
- AI doesn’t always provide the best possible results.
- Lacking the tools to create walk-throughs and detailed step-by-step processes
Guru Pricing
- Starter Plan: FREE. Good for small teams looking to get started and try out Guru’s AI. You get the browser extension, Slack integration, GSuite, and some other tools.
- Builder Plan: $14/mo. This plan includes everything in the Starter plan, along with API access, analytics, knowledge triggers, and some other tools.
- Expert Plan: $24/mo. This plan includes everything in the Builder plan, along with AI, suggest text, and more tools.
Read our Guru review or our comparison of Guru vs WalkMe vs Lessonly vs Whatfix vs Spekit
Final Thoughts
As you can see from our review of the employee onboarding platforms above, there is some smart and effective onboarding software on the market.
They’re not expensive either and will almost certainly justify their cost in time saved and when you see the improvement in performance management, application tracking, and overall employee retention.
In conclusion, each tool has its own pros and cons. Make sure you ask for a free trial or book a demo before committing to a plan.
To see Spekit in action, sign up for a free demo today!
