If you’re leading a B2B team that’s doubling every year, “just figure out onboarding” stops being good enough. Suddenly, the Google Docs graveyard and random Zoom calls won’t cut it. You need employee training software that keeps pace with your growth—without driving your team (or yourself) up the wall. This guide breaks down what matters, what doesn’t, and how to choose a tool that actually fits. We’ll get into Lessonly and its main competitors, but the real goal: help you dodge buyer’s remorse.
1. Get Clear on Your Real Needs (Not the Vendor Hype)
Before you start demo-ing platforms or reading comparison charts, get brutally honest about what your team actually needs. Here’s what to figure out first:
- What’s broken now? Is it new hire ramp-up? Product updates? Compliance? Sales playbooks? Write down the top 1–3 things you need this software to fix.
- How big is your team now, and how fast is it growing? If you’ll double headcount in a year, you need something that doesn’t break at 50, 100, or 300 users.
- What systems do you already use? If your team lives in Slack or Salesforce, integration isn’t a “nice to have”—it’s non-negotiable.
- How tech-savvy is your team? If half your folks still ask how to unmute on Zoom, skip the fancy bells and whistles.
Pro Tip: Get input from actual users—frontline managers, trainers, and even a couple of new hires. They know where the process is painful.
2. Must-Have Features (and What’s Mostly Fluff)
Every software vendor will pitch you a hundred features. Most don’t matter. Here’s what’s worth caring about for fast-growing B2B teams:
Core Features That Matter
- Easy content creation: Can a manager build a training in under 30 minutes? If you need an instructional design degree to make a lesson, run.
- Tracking and reporting: Who’s completed what? Where are people getting stuck? If you can’t pull basic reports without a PhD in Excel, keep looking.
- Search and organization: As content piles up, can people actually find what they need?
- Integrations: Does it plug into your HRIS, Slack, Google Workspace, or CRM? If not, you’ll end up with more manual work.
- Mobile or remote-friendly: If your team isn’t chained to desks, make sure the platform works smoothly on phones and tablets.
Nice-to-Haves (That Sometimes Matter)
- Quizzes and knowledge checks: Useful for compliance-heavy roles, sometimes overkill for fast-moving teams.
- Role-based learning paths: Handy for bigger teams with multiple job types.
- Gamification: If your team responds to badges and leaderboards, great. If not, ignore this.
What to Ignore (Unless You Have a Niche Case)
- VR training, AI content generators, “social learning” feeds: Most teams never use these. They look cool in demos but rarely deliver value, especially early on.
3. How Lessonly Stacks Up
Lessonly (now part of Seismic) gets a lot of love from fast-growing sales and support teams, and for good reason:
What works: - Super simple lesson builder—drag, drop, done. - Clean interface that non-techies can figure out quickly. - Good reporting, especially for tracking onboarding and compliance. - Integrates with Salesforce, Slack, and a handful of other popular tools. - Solid support and onboarding help (not just a chat bot).
What doesn’t: - Price can climb fast as you scale, especially if you want all the integrations. - Customization is limited—you can’t always tweak things exactly how you want. - Not the best fit for super technical training (e.g., engineering deep-dives). - Some users report it feels a bit “locked down” compared to open platforms.
Who it’s for:
If you want something plug-and-play for onboarding, sales enablement, or support training, Lessonly is hard to beat. If you need deep customization or tons of technical training, you might outgrow it.
4. Honest Look at the Main Alternatives
You should never settle for the first tool you try. Here’s how the popular competitors stack up against Lessonly, with no sugarcoating:
1. Trainual
- Strengths: Extremely easy to use. Great for documenting processes and SOPs. Friendly pricing for small teams.
- Weaknesses: Can feel limited for complex training or larger orgs. Reporting is basic. Integrations aren’t as deep.
- Best for: Startups or smaller B2B teams that just need the basics.
2. TalentLMS
- Strengths: Customizable, works for both employee and customer training. Good automation and reporting. Decent mobile app.
- Weaknesses: Interface can feel clunky and dated. Some setup required. Support is hit-or-miss.
- Best for: Teams with mixed training needs (internal and external).
3. WorkRamp
- Strengths: Modern design, lots of integrations, flexible learning paths. Good for sales and customer-facing teams.
- Weaknesses: Pricey. Overkill if you only need simple onboarding. Occasional bugs reported.
- Best for: Larger, fast-scaling teams that want a polished experience.
4. Docebo
- Strengths: Crazy powerful—tons of features, automation, and analytics. Scales to thousands of users.
- Weaknesses: Overwhelming for smaller teams. Requires serious setup and admin work. Expensive.
- Best for: Enterprises, or teams with full-time L&D staff.
5. Google Classroom / Docs / Sheets Frankenstein
- Strengths: Free or cheap. Everyone knows how to use it.
- Weaknesses: Total mess at scale. No tracking, no reporting, and nothing is organized.
- Best for: Absolute shoestring budgets, or teams with less than 10 people.
Heads-up: There are dozens more platforms out there. Most are either clones of the above or niche tools built for compliance-heavy industries. Don’t get distracted by shiny logos.
5. Test Drive Before You Buy (And What to Watch For)
You wouldn’t buy a car without a test drive. Same goes here. Most platforms offer a free trial or at least a live demo. Here’s how to make it count:
- Build a real lesson: Don’t just click around—try to create an actual training module your team would use.
- Invite a few real users: See where they get stuck, bored, or lost.
- Pull a report: Can you see who finished? Who didn’t? Is it obvious?
- Try integrations: Connect it to Slack or your HR software. Does it work, or does it break?
- Mobile check: Open it on your phone. Is it usable or a hot mess?
Watch out for:
- Sales reps who dodge your specific questions. - “Custom” pricing that jumps when you add integrations or users. - Features that only work if you buy the most expensive plan.
6. Don’t Overthink the Rollout
You’ve picked a tool—now don’t let it sit unused. Here’s how to keep things simple:
- Start small: Roll out to one team or process first, not the whole company.
- Get feedback fast: Ask what’s confusing, what’s clunky, what’s great.
- Tweak as you go: Don’t try to perfect everything before launch.
- Document the basics: Record a quick video or create a cheat sheet for managers.
You can always add more bells and whistles later. The key is getting people using it, not chasing feature lists.
Wrap Up: Keep It Simple, Iterate Fast
There’s no perfect training platform. The best one is the one your team will actually use. Start with your real-world needs, ignore the vendor hype, and focus on tools that make your job easier, not harder. Test-drive a couple options, get real feedback, and don’t be afraid to switch if it’s not working. The faster you get something working—even if it’s a little rough—the faster your team will ramp up, and the less you’ll have to babysit every new hire.
Keep it simple. Iterate. And get back to growing your business.