Training without an LMS: named learners, certificates and records from a share link

Most training tools assume you have a learning management system. Synthesia, HeyGen and Colossyan make the video; an LMS is expected to hand it out and keep the records. For a large company with an L&D department, that is fine. For a 40-person business, a franchise, or an agency training a client's staff, buying and running an LMS just to find out who watched a video is a lot of overhead.

There is a simpler option: let the player keep the records.

What an LMS actually does for you

Strip away the course catalogues and the admin screens, and most small teams use an LMS for five things:

1. Assigning training to specific people.
2. Controlling access so only those people can open it.
3. Recording results: who completed it, their score, and whether they passed.
4. Evidence, usually a certificate or an exportable record.
5. Chasing, seeing who has not started yet.

If the training player can do those five things, you may not need the LMS at all.

How tracked share links work

A share link is a web address that opens the training in any browser, with no app and no account. On its own, a share link is anonymous: you know how many people opened it and which answers were clicked, but not who clicked them.

The change is making the link know who is watching. On Reigniter's Interactive Training and Agency plans, each module has three access settings:

The third setting is the closest to an LMS. Each invited person gets a personal link that acts as their sign-in. It lists the modules assigned to them, how they did, and their certificates.

Setting it up, step by step

1. Add your people

Add learners by hand, or import them from Excel, a CSV or a pasted list, with the columns worked out for you. If you train people for several organisations, file each person under a client.

2. Choose who can open each module

Open the module's access settings and pick one of the three options above. For staff training with a known list, choose Only people I add and select the learners.

3. Set the rules

Three controls turn a video into an assessment:

• One attempt. Once a learner finishes, the module closes for them and their result stands.
• A timer. A countdown from the limit you set. If time runs out, the attempt is marked as failed.
• A pass mark. The score, as a percentage of questions answered correctly, that counts as a pass.

4. Invite

Send invitations by email, or copy each person's personal link and send it however you like. Anyone without an email address can be given their link directly.

5. Watch the results come in

The training dashboard shows who is taking a module right now, and for each person their answers, score, time taken and whether they passed. People who were invited but have not started show that too, which makes chasing easy.

6. Export the records

Download results as CSV for your own records, a spreadsheet, or a client report. Each learner can print their certificate, or save it as a PDF, from their own page.

Training clients' staff: the agency setup

Agencies and consultants have an extra problem: several clients, each with their own people and their own modules, and none of them should see each other's.

Filing learners and modules under a client solves that. Each client can be given one page that lists every module anyone at that client may open. Invited-only modules stay on each person's own page. The Agency plan includes up to ten client workspaces, and because Reigniter also makes adverts and brand assets, the same account can deliver a client's marketing video and their staff training in their brand. The campaign series page shows the marketing side of that.

When you should still use an LMS

A tracked share link is not a replacement for every LMS. Keep or buy one if:

• you need learning paths across dozens of courses from many vendors,
• your organisation requires single sign-on into training,
• HR systems need to read training records automatically,
• a regulator specifies a particular system or format.

If you do have an LMS, export the module as a SCORM 1.2 package instead, optionally with xAPI to your own LRS. We compare the two standards in SCORM vs xAPI for small teams.

Making the training worth tracking

Records only matter if the training asks something. A few rules that make results meaningful:

• One objective per module, written as "by the end, the learner can…".
• A checkpoint every two or three steps, testing a decision rather than a definition.
• Wrong answers loop back to the scene that teaches the point, so a learner who gets it wrong sees the step again and tries once more.
• Keep it short. A few focused minutes beats a long module people abandon.

If your training starts life as slides, PowerPoint to training video walks through turning a deck into a module with checkpoints.

What it costs

Tracking (clients, named learners, invites, one attempt, the timer, live results, records and certificates) is on the Interactive Training plan at $149 a month with 238 credits, and on Agency at $199 a month with 318 credits. Interactive Training also includes unlimited SCORM 1.2 export, with no sales call. Credits pay for making the video; every action shows its credit cost before it runs, and failed jobs are refunded. See pricing, or the employee training page for the whole training product.