The User Experience (UX) Service recently built and launched our new Effective Digital Content course. Along the way, we learnt a lot about the wider challenges of digital projects. Here are six top tips and insights we wanted to share with anyone preparing to create online learning or other digital resources.

Be open to trying new tools and approaches for better results

The tools or approaches you usually rely on may not suit every project. Being willing to experiment and upskill is often essential.

In our case, that meant exploring options, making use of free trials, and learning what was possible across different tools. We eventually settled on Articulate Rise 360 and used it for the first time to build the course.

When it couldn’t support the kinds of learner activities we wanted, we created a downloadable workbook to dovetail with the course. This was new territory, so we blocked out time to experiment, test, and refine the idea until it worked. Stepping into the unknown gave us a solution that turned out to be a much better fit for learners.

Plan extra time to produce quality work

Big projects almost always take more time than expected. There are more moving parts, more feedback to process, and hidden complexities that only emerge as you work.

For us, usability testing revealed areas to improve in several sections, leading to multiple rounds of iteration and long to-do lists. Breaking the work into stages and setting milestones kept us on track and gave a sense of progress, even in a resource-heavy project. Taking the time to refine content thoroughly made the final course much stronger, so building in extra time is essential for producing quality work.

Collaboration is key – people are happy to share expertise

When you’re building something new, it can be tempting to try to figure everything out yourself. But often, the knowledge you need already exists within your community.

Throughout this project, colleagues with expertise in content, accessibility, and pedagogy generously shared their time and insights. Simply asking and being open about what we didn’t know unlocked support that made the course stronger. We also drew on external expertise from Effortmark, who helped us identify the most common content issues to target in the course. Incorporating these perspectives improved both design and learning experience, and reminded us that expertise is rarely siloed.

Plan for maintenance to make future iterations smoother

Launching a project isn’t really the finish line, but the start of its life. One key question to ask: how will this be maintained over time?

For our course, we had to decide how much customisation to build in, balancing the benefits of interactivity against the need for manageable updates. A course that’s too complex to maintain quickly becomes outdated. We designed the workbook and course structure to be editable and flexible, so future iterations and improvements could happen easily without starting from scratch.

We’re holding regular team check-ins to review the workbook and log any future changes, keeping maintenance an ongoing, collaborative process. Choose approaches your future self and team can handle without difficulty.

Embed accessibility from day one to save time and improve usability

Accessibility works best when it’s a guiding principle, not an add-on. Making it a core part of the process from day one strengthens content for everyone and avoids costly fixes later.

From the start, accessibility informed our decisions, improving inclusivity and overall quality. We took practical steps such as:

• structuring headings logically to support navigation
• preparing descriptive alt text for images
• testing early and often using tools like JAWS and keyboard navigation

Explaining accessibility concepts in the course also helped us reflect on our own practice and apply these principles more intentionally across all content.

Be ready to cut, tweak, or rework content as needed

The other big takeaway from a project of this scale was to practise non-attachment. It’s natural to feel protective of your work, but to create something that truly works for your users, you have to be willing to change or even discard ideas.

Usability testing made this very clear. Sections we thought were solid turned out to be confusing or clunky for learners. That feedback, though sometimes tough to hear, was invaluable in helping us reshape the course into something better. Sometimes we had to cut or completely rework content, even material we were proud of. Being open to feedback and letting go allowed us to iterate effectively, seeing the real impact of our design choices.

Final thoughts

A key theme across these six points: stay flexible

The best outcomes happened when we were open to change, whether trying new tools or refining content. Our Effective Digital Content course is live, but it will continue to evolve. Being willing to adapt not only improves the course itself, but also strengthens our skills and approach for future projects.

Our blog series on Effective Digital Content

In earlier blog posts, we shared more details of the journey, from rethinking our approach to training, to building in Articulate, and what usability testing taught us. You can explore specific parts here:

• Part 1: Developing our Effective Digital Content online course 
• Part 2: How usability testing helped us to design our Effective Digital Content online course 
• Part 3: How we chose Articulate as the platform for Effective Digital Content 
• Part 4: Building our Effective Digital Content course in Articulate 
• Part 5: Accessibility testing our Effective Digital Content online course 
• Part 6: The new Effective Digital Content online course is now live