Learning Platform Pricing Comparison
Let’s conduct an learning platform pricing comparison. We review the four major costs involved in online learning platforms and how Tribal Habits provides clear and affordable options for each.
Upfront costs
Online learning platforms may impose several upfront costs – costs you incur before creating any online training or even enrolling a single person.
Set-up costs. Some older learning platforms can require considerable effort to provision a new organisation portal while some online learning vendors use set-up costs as a way to improve margins (particularly as a way to coerce organisations into longer contracts to ‘spread set-up costs over many years). Set-up costs for these learning platforms can range from $500-$25,000 or more.
Implementation fees. Many complicated online learning platforms may require an implementation fee. This may include costs for upfront training of staff, help from the platform provider in setting up parts of the platform or ‘consulting’ services which are required to otherwise use the platform. Implementation costs for these learning platforms can range from $500-50,000 or more.
At Tribal Habits, there are no upfront costs. There are no set-up costs, no implementation costs, no cost for admin training sessions and no branding costs. It is completely free to set-up your Tribal Habits portal and initial admin training sessions are included at no cost.
Subscription costs
Online learning platforms typically use a subscription model. This means you pay a regular subscription to maintain access to your online platform. Subscriptions should eliminate large upfront costs and incentivise the online learning platform to maintain a high support standard and provide regular improvements.
Package costs. Package costs are on-going online learning costs associated with the features of your learning platform. Some online learning platforms have one package – you receive all features, all the time. Indeed, this may make sense for some platforms which have a defined (limited) feature set. Alternatively, some online learning platforms allow you to select only the features you need. For platforms with more extensive feature sets, that can help make your online learning costs more efficient.
At Tribal Habits, you can select from two different packages and combine them as you require.
- CREATOR which gives you access to our powerful training creator and full LMS admin capability. It’s perfect for converting existing training, creating induction programs or selling training content.
- CREATOR + LIBRARY which unlocks the full power of Tribal Habits. It’s perfect for organisations needing compliance training, building internal training academies or looking for a complete solution.
Plan costs. Plan costs are on-going online learning costs associated with the volume of activity in your learning platform. Essentially, plan costs are the second component in your on-going subscription – they are the ‘multiplier’ of your package costs. The most common plan cost is ‘per user per month’ charge. There are two ways to count ‘users’ – active and stored. Many learning platforms use ‘stored’ users. They count every user in your portal regardless of whether that user has even accessed your portal. This method is simple but can be very inefficient if the majority of your users are not accessing your portal every month.
At Tribal Habits, we use ‘active’ users (or actual users) to calculate your subscription rate. In this case, only users who log into your Tribal Habits portal are counted. This method most closely aligns the value you receive with the costs you are paying. If users are not using your portal, they will not be counted towards your plan and you will not pay for them.
Subscription terms
Once you have finalised your subscription, most online learning platforms will offer choices on your subscription terms. Your first choice will be the frequency of payment. Most platforms will offer monthly and annual subscription choices.
Monthly plans should be ‘no-contract’ plans, which give you maximum flexibility in payments. However, the ‘per user’ cost of monthly subscriptions will be higher as a result. So monthly subscriptions tend to suit smaller organisations, organisations who are just getting started (ramping up) or organisations with very seasonal/irregular usage.
The Tribal Habits monthly plan starts at $7.50 per active user per month for the CREATOR package with a minimum of 5 active users per month. A credit card is required and subscriptions are charged on the 1st of each calendar month. CREATOR+ LIBRARY start at $10 per active user per month. As your usage increases, the price per active user drops.
Annual plans allow you to pay for 12 months of usage upfront. This commits your organisation to an agreed number of monthly users (or stored users, depending on the subscription). Annual plans offer a discounted ‘per user’ rate, so they can be more cost-efficient. They also require only a single internal approval and the cost is known – which may be important considerations for budget approvals in many organisations. If you select an annual plan, there is often a second discount available for larger plans. Most online learning platforms will offer increasing discounts on the ‘per user’ rate for larger annual plans.
Tribal Habits annual plans start from 100 active users per month. Our creator package for 100 active users per month is $6,600 annually, which is the equivalent of $5.50 per active user per month. CREATOR + LIBRARY is $8,800 annually, which is the equivalent of $7.33 per active user per month. Annual plans then increase in multiples of 50, with increasing ‘per user’ discounts right through to plans covering 10,000 active users per month.
In addition, Tribal Habits offers an additional discount for Not-For-Profit and Charitable organisations.
Hidden costs
When assessing which learning platform to chose, it’s critical that you understand your total cost of ownership. Many platforms provide competitive subscription pricing, but then hit you later with hidden costs.
Online training creation. This is the biggest hidden cost in online training – where will your online training content come from? Almost all online learning platforms are designed only to host online learning content. That means you need to find your online learning modules somewhere else…at an additional cost. Some of these online learning platforms will claim to have the ability for you to create online learning modules, but the tools are simple. They are often nothing more than some basic text, a few images and simple quizzes. This means you will either need to pay for expensive eLearning Authoring software (and learn how to use it, or pay an external consulting to create training for you) or subscribe to a separate online training library (which is often unbranded and time-consuming to integrate).
At Tribal Habits, we have integrated online training creation features. In fact, Tribal Habits was designed as an online training creation platform from the ground up. The ability to create fully interactive online training is included in the CREATOR package while the free FOUNDATION package helps every organisation get started with online training. At Tribal Habits, we have several libraries of ready-made training which are included in our CREATOR + LIBRARY package. Unlike other learning platforms, this training appears in your organisation’s branding and can even be edited by your organisation for a plug-and-play solution.
Online storage costs. Storage costs are on-going online learning costs associated with the amount of content stored in your online learning portal. This is often a hidden and unexpected cost, typically associated with older online learning platforms. Organisations may find that a certain amount of storage is initially free on these platforms. However, as usage grows and more content is added to the platform, a storage fee can suddenly be charged.
At Tribal Habits, there are no storage fees at all. ‘Costs of storage’ are built into the plan costs.
Support Costs. Support costs are on-going online learning costs associated with receiving support for your online learning platform. For most online learning platforms, there are no additional support costs – support is included in your package and/or plan costs. However, some online learning platforms charge extra for certain levels of service. For example, they may provide email support (which can take 2-3 days to respond) for all packages, but more responsive live chat support may be an additional on-going cost (typically a per cent of your overall subscription cost).
At Tribal Habits, we offer the same level of support for all packages with no additional fees. An admin training session is included (for free) with all plans. All admins, on all plans, have access to live chat support, knowledge base articles with search and additional email/Zoom support for complex issues.
"Tribal Habits gives us more control over our content in terms of developing and editing it. It’s much more responsive than other learning platforms we have used before, where you request changes and it takes a long time to be done. We can just make changes instantly now."
"Tribal Habits is unique in the market as it allowed us to rapidly capture and transfer organisational knowledge via text, imagery, video and interactive elements. It also shares tips from participants, meaning the knowledge captured increases as users complete topics!"
"Content creation is easy and fun on Tribal Habits; the system’s built-in structure ensures that content is organised in a manner that enables the final output to be exactly what’s needed. This gives me great confidence that my training will hit the mark."
"It would have taken us up to a year to create the topics using a traditional e-learning authoring tool. With Tribal Habits we were delivering amazing training in three months, and we've estimated the cost has been about 25% of what it would have been had we gone with a traditional solution."
"Tribal Habits' online compliance library has been a game-changer for us. We now have total peace of mind that our people are safe and our brand and organisational reputation is protected. Delivering compliance training online has also saved us a significant amount of time, money and hassle."
"Tribal Habits' video feedback on the topics we created is amazing - really useful suggestions and so easy to follow. People are already loving the training! The system is so easy to use, and the interactive elements have allowed us to make training a lot more engaging. We couldn't ask for anything more."
