7 Tips and Tricks to Help Manage International Training Sessions

Recently, Fresh Egg delivered a number of training sessions to members of one of our Australian client’s blogging and social team.

The three bespoke training sessions were delivered by members of Fresh Egg UK’s content and social team, and provided guidance on content strategy, production and promotion from both a content creation and social media point of view.

The training sessions were delivered by social media strategist Susie Cox, senior content marketing specialist Matt Long, and me (Fresh Egg’s online content creator). We were in our lovely Worthing office, while the client’s team were in their Australian office, along with the Fresh Egg Australia team.

Running successful training sessions can be tricky enough, even when everyone is in the same room. Delivering a series of fairly in-depth workshops across time zones – hemispheres, even – brings a whole host of other complications.

Here are some of the things we learned that helped make the training sessions a success.

1. Collaborating to give the client what they need

The client required tailored training sessions to help make its blogging and social team create and promote effective content for its recently launched blog, previously created by Fresh Egg.

Right from the off, it was clear that it was not appropriate for these training sessions to be solely the responsibility of the content team. How can you research and plan content without using some of the brilliant social monitoring tools available? How can you facilitate the social sharing of your content without ensuring proper technical implementation of social buttons? How can you measure the performance of a piece of content without reporting on social media activity? The short answer is you can’t – not properly, anyway.

Fresh Egg’s social media and content teams worked in a truly integrated way, with representatives from each team present at every training session, to ensure the guidance given was appropriate from a digital marketing point of view, not just a social media or content point of view alone.

2. Flexible working hours

When we presented the sessions, the time difference between the UK and Australia offices was 10 hours. So, presenting at a reasonable hour of the working day UK time, would mean keeping the client’s team up all hours of the night.

So, with bleary eyes and lots of coffee, we arrived at the office for 7am every Monday for three weeks. A slightly earlier start for us meant that we could offer the training within the client’s working day, making it easier for as many people as possible to be present.

3. Having Fresh Egg reps on the ground

The remote training sessions we delivered were able to run smoothly thanks to the support, presence and organisation skills of the Fresh Egg Australia team, who were present in the client’s offices during each of the training sessions. Having an office in Sydney for the Fresh Egg Australia team to call home means there’s always a direct point of contact for our Australian clients, supported by the Fresh Egg team here in the UK. Our senior SEO engineer and account director also spend a lot of time working in our clients’ offices, helping build the important relationships that success depends on.

4. Skype video calling

Without the appropriate technology, delivering the remote training sessions would have been impossible. Using Skype video calling and screen sharing program, we were able to see and hear the training attendees, and they were able to see our presentation clearly and hear what we were saying. This meant any questions raised during and after the training session could be answered there and then.

5. Testing the connection beforehand

As with all forms of technology, there were some connection hiccups along the way. However, because we’d tested the connection between Fresh Egg’s UK office and the client’s office a few weeks before, we were able to iron most of these out before the training sessions properly began. This meant we knew what would work and what wouldn’t, and what we needed to do to make it work, in plenty of time, making it much less stressful for all involved.

6. Delivering multiple training sessions

No one is pretending that a comprehensive content and social strategy for a blog is a quick and easy thing. As we wanted to help the client as much as we could, with everything from research and planning to social promotion, there was a lot to be gone through. We wanted to avoid information overload, so decided on delivering three sessions over three weeks. This meant the sessions were broken down into more manageable chunks, and gave breathing space in between each one for questions and feedback.

7. Recording the sessions

Helpful for both remote and typical training sessions alike, recording each of the sessions meant that the client had access should they wish to share it with the wider team, or revisit any of the points made.

Whether you’re in Australia, the UK, or anywhere else in the world, if you’d like enlist the help of Fresh Egg’s digital marketing teams, contact us today.