10 Tips for Training Announcement

Planning a training event can sometimes be difficult. One of the hardest parts is letting your team know about this activity and sparking their interest in it. This post will take a look at different tips for training announcement that you can use to get your team more engaged and motivated to participate in your next training session.

1. Let your team know about your training objectives

Training programs are often dreaded by many employees as they often see it as another work task, rather than a strategic initiative that would help them improve and advance their skill set. One way to combat this type of mindset is by communicating with them your training objectives. 

When announcing your training program, make sure to let them know how the training can benefit them and contribute to their career growth. Help them understand the value and goal of the course or program by outlining how the training will allow them to learn new skills or enhance their existing abilities.

Company training software SC Training (formerly EdApp) has put together this helpful article, Designing Realistic Training Objectives For Employee Training, which you can use as a guide if you’re a little lost on how to plan and set your training objectives. You can also check out the article, Examples of SMART Learning Objectives, to find out how to use the Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Timely (SMART) Goals to formulate your training objectives. 

SC Training (formerly EdApp) is one of the top LMS platforms used by industry leaders across the world to train and upskill their workforces. Deliver top-notch training and learning content to your teams using its creator tool, course creation services, spaced repetition tool, AI translator, and more.

2. Use a consistent tone of voice

Applying a consistent tone of voice to your training announcement creates familiarity among your employees. For instance, if your training program is covering more serious and in-depth topics, then you should consider using a formal tone. Proper writing and grammar should be observed throughout the letters, emails, or flyers, with no slang or emojis. 

On the other hand, if you’re aiming for a more relaxed and informal training session, it might be worth using a more laid-back and conversational tone of voice. Casual-informal language and emojis can sometimes be used to create a sense of friendliness. 

Once you’ve established your tone of voice, make sure that it’s consistently used throughout your training materials, including training invitation emails, flyers, and social media posts. This training announcement example gives them the impression that your training is personalized for them rather than being a random course or program you discovered online.

3. Make sure to  send your training announcement to the right team

Before sending out your training announcement, make a list of the people or departments who’d be interested in or benefit from your training program. After all, you wouldn’t want to send a training notice about a customer service training course to your IT department, or a marketing course to your finance team. This could result in a low response rate, leading to a waste of training time and resources. 

Once you’ve identified your target audience, use an email finder to get their contacts and create a message that speaks to them. Use language and terms that they’re already familiar with. If you can send your learner a personalized email or note, that’d help increase your training’s participation rate. This is because your staff would then know that the training is designed specifically for them. 

4. Include all relevant dates and times

Needless to say, it’s essential that your training announcement should include clear information on when the training will take place. 

Make sure to list the date and time for when the training will be available and specify if you’re offering multiple training sessions. For self-paced training formats such as elearning, you need to be sure that your training announcement indicates the deadline for when they should complete their training. This information will significantly help your team plan their schedule accordingly, and make sure that they don't miss any important sessions.

5. Proofread your training announcement

Another vital tip for training announcement is to proofread your email or message. It should be completely free of grammatical mistakes and, if at all possible, plagiarism. Tools like Grammarly, Small SEO Tools, and Hemingway Editor can help you correct grammatical errors and spot plagiarism, making sure that your announcement flows well and is easy to read. This can also help prevent your email from going into the spam and trash folder.

Apart from the technicalities, you can also use this chance to double-check if your training announcement has all the relevant information about your training. The 5Ws (and 1H) framework—Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How—can be used as a guide for your training announcement.

6. Don’t miss a clear call-to-action

Adding a call-to-action or CTA to your training announcement gives your learners an idea of what they need to do next, whether it's to register for the training or click the magic link to access their courses. This tip for training announcement isn’t something to be overlooked. Because without one, you run the risk of losing your learners' interest or, worse yet, having them skip your training completely. 

When deciding on your CTAs, you need to be sure that it’s clear and compelling. It's also important to use words and phrases that create a sense of urgency, like "Check out this course now" or "Sign up today to register". If possible, add a link where your employees will be able to find more information. 

7. Use Eye-Catching Visuals

Adding eye-catching visuals that reflect your training goals, without any doubt, is a good employee engagement idea. This strategy is even more effective if you're planning to design a poster or a flyer for your training announcement. Consider using graphics or videos so your announcement isn’t text heavy. Additionally, it’d be highly useful to use a color palette that matches your brand look, as well as images to highlight the topic of your training. 

8. Post the announcement via primary communication channels

Sending training announcement emails to employees is perhaps the most common and most effective way of informing them of any upcoming training. But apart from using this traditional approach, you can also take advantage of your corporate communication tools like Slack, Microsoft Teams, or Google Chat. As they’re widely used for everyday communication, your training announcement will have a better chance of reaching your learners.

Just a quick reminder to keep your messages short and straight to the point when using these communication channels. A casual, informal tone is also highly recommended to capture the attention of your employees. 

9. Send training reminders through notifications

Notifications are also a great way to inform your learners about upcoming training events and encourage them to register and attend. The premise is simple. Your training announcement will pop up on a user's device, significantly increasing the chance of people seeing your training announcement. This could result in higher attendance rates for your training events.

To effectively reinforce notifications to announce your training, it's a rule of thumb to use attention-grabbing CTA. Use words that are relevant to the training and make sure it accurately reflects the purpose of the message. It’s also important to keep it short and sweet, containing only the most important information such as the main agenda of the training, as well as the time, date, and location of the event. 

Elearning platform SC Training (formerly EdApp) has even adopted the notification strategy to automatically update their learners about new training courses, making sure that they don’t end up missing them. If you decide to deliver your training materials using this platform, you’d be pleased to know that the learners will also be automatically informed of any course updates. Notifications can also be used to remind those who have yet to open and finish their learning materials. 

10. Engage employees with pre-training surveys

And the last tip for training announcement, include pre-training surveys in your training announcement so you can find out what your team expects from the actual training event. You can use the data collected to see if your learners have a clear understanding of the activity, and use it to improve your upcoming training sessions. 

SC Training (formerly EdApp) has an array of pre-training survey templates that you can use to gather the insights of your learners before the training event. Among the most commonly used templates includes the free text survey, which allows learners to freely input their thoughts using their own words. There’s also a multiple-choice survey template that offers a few clickable responses for a higher response rate.

Forget about manually collecting the data. The responses are automatically stored in the SC Training (formerly EdApp) analytics suite for easy analysis. If needed, you can also export your data to CSV or Excel and do even more with your SC Training (formerly EdApp) data.