Virtual College actively supports children s charities and over the years has donated over 180,000 via the Safeguarding e-academy.

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2 Virtual College is one of the UK s leading e-learning providers with over 1.7 million online learners across both public and private sectors and established as a major force in e-learning for over 19 years. With a team of over 100 people, Virtual College is growing strongly and is an Investor in People, a Microsoft Certified Partner, a CPD Member and has successfully completed an Ofsted inspection. The establishment of dedicated teams into sector-specific e-academies has ensured specialism and great customer service in the areas of Apprenticeships, Healthcare, Lean Healthcare, Housing, Manufacturing Productivity, Councils, Schools, Trades and Safeguarding Adults and Children. Virtual College actively supports children s charities and over the years has donated over 180,000 via the Safeguarding e-academy. We are proud to have a wide variety of customers and partners. The following are just a small selection: The majority of Virtual College courses have been independently certified as conforming to universally accepted CPD (Continuing Personal or Professional Development) guidelines. The CPD Certification Service is an independent body operating across all market sectors and in support of all professional institutions, bodies and societies. Its certified CPD quality mark is a recognised symbol of quality-assured training. 2

3 The Virtual College Resellers scheme is an easy way for you to resell e-learning by adding an extra element to your web presence. How can you do this? Virtual College has developed a unique system called Promote, which enables Resellers to sell access to a suite of e-learning courses to their customers via a set of white label webpages. Resellers can choose from a range of over 250 courses, covering a wide range of subjects including Business, Management, Health & Safety, Food Safety, Healthcare and Working with Children / Adults. The courses available have been created by Virtual College alongside subject specialists to ensure that the courses are relevant and up to date. In recognition of this many of our courses are accredited by Awarding Organisations. And it doesn t stop there; Virtual College is continually developing and publishing new courses to expand the range in its portfolio. When a Reseller signs up to the scheme, Virtual College provides a series of pages which appear on the Reseller s own website. These pages are designed to reflect the branding of the Reseller s original website, whilst being hosted and maintained by Virtual College. The Reseller chooses which courses to sell, creates links to the pages from their own website, and promotes the courses through their existing marketing channels. Customers visiting the Reseller s website then can choose to purchase courses and undertake training using the branded learning management system that is included with the Reseller site. At the end of each month Virtual College reports on sales and pays the Reseller a commission for every course sold, this is typically around 17.5% of the value of the course. If you already have a website and want to make e-learning available to your customers then, yes! Still not sure? This pack aims to provide you with the information you need to enable you to make an informed choice regarding becoming an Approved Virtual College Reseller. 3

4 This booklet contains information about how the Resellers scheme works. Please refer to the relevant section for more information. Table of Contents What is Virtual College?... 2 The CPD Certification Service... 2 Virtual College Resellers... 3 Contents... 4 What is e-learning?... 5 What is a Learning Management System?... 6 What can becoming a Virtual College Reseller offer?... 8 How is commission paid?... 9 How much would this cost my organisation? What support is offered to Resellers?... Error! Bookmark not defined.11 What e-learning support is available for learners? What customisation is offered? What is the process for becoming a Reseller? FAQs - Frequently asked questions Error! Bookmark not defined. 4

5 Quite simply, e-learning is web based electronic learning, which means using a computer to deliver part or all of a course, whether it's in the comfort of a learner s own home or at their place of work. e-learning courses are structured learning packages that contain a series of information screens, video and audio content along with exercises and tests that ensure the learner understands the materials. Learner activity on courses is reportable so managers can monitor progress as and when required. There are many benefits of using e-learning for both your business and your customers, these include: Reduces the cost of delivering learning no room hire, trainer or travel expenses Secure access 24 hours a day, 7 days a week Ability to control pace of learning progress at the learner s own speed Automatic course bookmarking allows learners to take a break and return to the learning at the point they left off Learners are in control of their own learning which increases motivation, engagement and retention of learners Engaging interactive multimedia learning experience Ensures that content is fully understood through online assessments Up to date industry standard content A consistent message is given to all learners Certificate of achievement with every course City & Guilds accredited courses available 5

6 A Learning Management System (LMS) is a software application that contains, runs and administers both e-learning and offline learning. It tracks learners progress online and as well as recording any face to face courses your learners attend. Used internally by organisations for their employees, a good LMS enables efficient administration, documentation and reporting of training programmes. As part of the Reseller offer all Resellers have their own branded LMS created and linked to the Promote Pages. When a learner purchases a course from the Promote pages they are automatically setup within the LMS with their chosen course with no administration required by the Reseller. As with the Promote pages, Virtual College hosts and preconfigures the LMS enabling you and your learners to get up and running straight away. Resellers have the access rights to review all learner activity on their LMS, which means the Reseller can not only monitor the courses sold and completed, but they also have the ability to directly communicate with each customer using the messaging system built into the E nable platform. 6

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8 The benefits of the Reseller scheme are twofold; firstly you gain an immediate e-learning offer without the time and expense of developing and delivering the courses yourselves. Secondly, as each course sold earns you commission, using the Reseller scheme offers the opportunity to generate another valuable income stream. Virtual College courses are priced according to their level and length; as such each one carries a different commission rate. For an indication of the amount of income that can be earned please refer to the table below, for detail of specific courses offered please refer to the Reseller Course Directory. 8

9 We have two processes for payments available. The first is a manual system, whereby we inform the Reseller of the total sales made during the month and request that the Reseller raise an invoice. On submission of the invoice, Virtual College pays the amount by BACS. The second process is self-billing. Self-billing is designed to reduce the administration needed by you as a Reseller, as with this option Virtual College takes care of the process and all a Reseller needs to do is sign up and renew the agreement each year. This is a payment method regulated by the HMRC (Her Majesty s Revenue and Customs). The process of payment for self-billing is simple; at the end of every month Virtual College generates a sales report detailing how much you have sold. An automatic bank transfer payment is transmitted to your account within 30 days of the month end. On transmission of the payment, we issue you with a Self-Billing invoice (a sales invoice in your name), which is used to evidence your output tax that will be payable to HMRC via your next VAT return (if you are VAT registered). Learners are automatically ed a VAT receipt from the Promote system to be used to evidence VAT paid. The VAT on courses sold via the Promote system is accounted for by Virtual College. The commission earned from sales made is accounted for by Virtual College via either the invoicing or the self-billing process described above. 9

10 In order to set up and administer the Reseller scheme on your behalf, we do need to levy a one-off charge. This charge will depend on your specific requirements. Please contact Eamon Marren on or eamon.marren@virtual-college.co.uk. The setting up of the Reseller site includes: Bespoke design and setup of the series of web pages and LMS, branded to reflect your existing site s design. Configuration of your course list to your specification. Setup of the online payment system, linking to your existing website, Training in LMS customer reporting and Promote Reseller tools Ongoing learner support so that any queries connected with any aspect of the learners training is handled by ourselves. Ongoing maintenance and support for the Reseller systems including all hosting and technical support. When you sign up, we assign you a dedicated Account Manager who is your first point of contact and will support you throughout your time as a Virtual College Reseller. Your Account Manager will liaise with you to collect the information that Virtual College needs to be able to build your site to your specifications. As a guide, we will ask you to choose your range of courses, ask for your logos and details about the design of your website to enable us to produce a design that reflects your existing website and populate it with the courses appropriate to you. We will also ask you to set up a subdomain of your web. Throughout your site s build, you will be able to view its progress and ask for changes before it goes live. Ongoing, we will be providing maintenance and support to the Promote and E nable systems, including all the dedicated hosting and technical support. While you are signed up to the scheme, you will receive regular updates about new and updated courses and updates to the Promote system. If you would like to add or remove courses from your list at any time, your Account Manager will be happy to arrange this for you. 10

11 Virtual College offers a complete support package to support both you as a Reseller and your customers as learners. Virtual College allocates an Account Manager to each Reseller. Your Account Manager will be the first point of contact for you as a Reseller and will work with you to ensure your site is working as you need it to. Training is configured on an individual basis so that it can be customised to your own specific requirements. Delivered online via a live GoToMeeting session, training takes place at a time convenient to you at your own desk so no travel costs are incurred. All initial training is included in your setup fee. We are constantly updating our Directory with new courses and updating our existing courses in line with legislative and industry requirements. You will be notified of any updates to existing courses or new courses as and when the situation arises. We understand that a consistent reliable service is important to all of our customers and as such, we schedule any necessary downtime on our part to minimise disruption. to the System will be undertaken outside the normal working hours of 8.30am 5.30pm to minimise any impact on learners. will be given of any downtime to the System due for technical updates. Notices will be posted on the login page of the Learning Management System % is targeted at 100%; over the last 12 months Virtual College achieved 11

12 Our dedicated team of highly experienced UK based e-learning support staff offer the following support to your learners: Dedicated learner support is available between 8.30am and 5.30pm, Monday to Friday. We try to ensure that all calls to the service desk are answered within 8 seconds. 95% of incoming calls received can be resolved without further action. We aim to respond to all s received at the service desk within 2 hours, if received during working hours. If the is received outside of normal working hours a response will be sent on the next working day. 80% of all support s are answered within 2 hours. correspondence. 95% of s are resolved without the use of further Virtual College keeps all data secure in line with the Data Protection Act Our registration number is Z Evaluation and feedback on our courses and systems is very important to us at Virtual College. We review all evaluations and feedback collected from our learners and use the information gathered to drive continuous improvement in both our courses and systems. 12

13 We understand that your branding is important to you so, as part of the customisation process, we work with you to ensure that your look and feel is maintained through to the Virtual College hosted pages. We produce a template page reflecting your existing site style and design; these templates are then used to host the course information, payment and course delivery pages. These pages are hosted on our secure server and are seamlessly linked to your own website, providing an invisible service to your customers. Customers browse, pay for and receive their learning though the Learning Management System (LMS) pages, which are branded as your organisation so that customers continue to identify their learning with your organisation. This seamless customisation continues with your customers receiving a certificate branded with your logos on successful completion of their courses 1. If you would like to view examples of existing sites or would like a mock-up of a Reseller site creating based on your website, please contact us. 1 Dual branded City & Guilds Courses are not possible due to Awarding Body restrictions. 13

14 The process for becoming a Reseller is a simple 7 step process, which can be completed, subject to contract, in less than four weeks. 1. Contact Virtual College who will complete a Reseller Approval Criteria Audit. 2. Decide which courses you want to sell from the Reseller Course Directory which we will supply on request. 3. Sign the Reseller Agreement and pay the initial set up fee. 4. Set up a sub domain of your website e.g. to the parameters Virtual College will provide. 5. Provide Virtual College with your organisation s style guide, logos and subdomain information. 6. Virtual College will set up your branded webpages and LMS, where the learners will reside, and teach you how to produce reports. 7. The pages are approved by you and can be made live when you wish. To discuss any aspect of our Reseller scheme, please contact Eamon Marren on or eamon.marren@virtual-college.co.uk. 14

15 Promote is the brand name given to our automated online Reseller system. E nable is the brand name of our Learning Management System. A short telephone audit which allows Virtual College and the Reseller to ensure that they both benefit from being a Virtual College Reseller. A contractual agreement between Virtual College and you as the Reseller covering the Price and Payment arrangements, Termination details, Contract Management, Confidentiality & Data Protection, Intellectual Property rights, Liabilities and other general issues. An LMS branded organisation is a unique place in the Virtual College hosted Learning Management System where your learners will be registered. This will have dual branding, both yours and Virtual College s. From here you will be able communicate with and track the progress of learners who have bought courses from your Resellers site. As the LMS is hosted on our servers, there are few requirements. It is essential however that you own your website and are able to set up a sub-domain of that website. The subdomain can be anything you would like to name it for example it must be set up within your site s DNS with an A record change to point at our IP address. It is worth checking with your webmaster or designer that this is possible on your site. If your site is hosted externally you may need to contact your hosting company to check if this is possible and if they will make the change. For us to set up your branded pages we require you to send us a copy of your organisation s logo for the website and for the certificates generated for successful learners, colours used on your site and any graphics that you would like to be used. 15

16 Learners need a web enabled device to run our courses. Our courses will run on Windows, OsX and Linux platforms. All of the e-courses require Adobe Flash player to run, which can be downloaded for free from the internet. Our e-courses check for the presence of Adobe Flash player on the learner s PC and prompt the learner to download the Flash player if it is not installed. As stated earlier, the actual set up fee we will need to charge will depend on your own individual requirements such as number of courses required and any bespoke requirements. Please contact Eamon Marren on to discuss. Yes, the LMS will be branded to reflect the Reseller s website but will feature a Virtual College logo. The Virtual College logo ensures that a learner knows Virtual College are in the support loop and our accrediting bodies know that they are our courses. No, a Reseller is able to select any amount of courses from the Reseller Course Directory and add any new courses that are made available. The Reseller Course Directory will show the Reseller what the commission is for each course. Some courses have a lower than average commission as there might be a number of partners sharing the revenue and/or additional costs e.g. City & Guilds certificate costs. Please note: Some Virtual College courses available from the main Virtual College site are not available, as development partners may not want us to include their courses in the Reseller directory. We do withdraw courses from sale when they become out of date or if other circumstances change, e.g. certification is withdrawn or qualification specifications change. Please refer to the latest Reseller Course Directory for a full list of available courses. Virtual College sets the price for all its products and this is detailed on the Virtual College website. 16

17 Yes, as a Reseller you will be able to select which courses you promote, have an organisational branded section in our LMS, branded course directory and sales pages which are integrated into your website for seamless access for your customers. In addition communications out of the system are all branded and leaners receive a certificate branded by your organisation on successful completion of their courses 2. The Reseller Course Directory provides commission details for all courses. The average commission rate is 20% but does vary so please refer to the Directory when selecting the courses you wish to resell to determine what commission you would make for each sale. The tracking system within E nable can report on many aspects of learner progress. There are a number of automated reports that a Reseller can run to gain more details of learner numbers, learner s progress and evaluations gathered by the system. Using the information in the system and the built in messaging tool a Reseller is able to message the learners directly either individually or en-mass. Learners can get support by using the Help & Support functions built within the LMS. Help and support is available from within the LMS, by and by phone. One of the additional benefits of joining the Virtual College Reseller scheme is that we understand that in some instances you may require additional assistance in ensuring that you make the most of the platform once launched. For this reason, we have produced a series of 5 Reseller Marketing Guides covering key areas as follows ; Guide 1 : Getting the word out. Guide 2 : Promotions & Discounts. Guide 3 : Course of The Month. Guide 4 : Search Engine Optimisation & Pay per Click Advertising. Guide 5 : Social Media. 2 City & Guild Accredited Courses are branded as Virtual College and cannot be dual branded due to restrictions. 17

18 The Virtual College Support team provides all online support to learners if they experience difficulties or need additional guidance. If the issue relates to specific subject matter, then this is passed to the subject expert for guidance (often a Virtual College content development partner). Yes, you will be provided with a named, dedicated Account Manager who is your first point of contact, should your Account Manager not be available any member of the team should be able to help with your query. The Reseller model requires little technical knowledge to set up and operate. At setup, we require a subdomain of your website to be set up and directed towards our DNS. Your webmaster or hosting company can assist you with this. Resellers will need some system training, the level of which will be dependent upon how proactively they wish to engage with learners and the type of Reseller model they adopt. For example, Resellers who wish to track learners progress would require training on our LMS reporting features; this is typically done via an online GoToMeeting training session. System training is delivered on a Reseller-by-Reseller basis so that it can be customised to their requirements. Adoption of new features in the system at a later date will also be supported. It usually takes about 2-3 weeks for us to implement the technical aspects of a new Reseller site, depending on how quickly the Reseller provides the information and subdomain required. However, as we always check that Resellers are happy with the design and operation of their site it may take longer for changes to be made and approved by the Reseller. To contact Virtual College for more details or to discuss any aspect of the Reseller scheme please contact Eamon Marren on

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