Q&A: What happens if my learning technology doesn't scale?

Reader's letter

We're about to launch a huge marketing campaign and we are expecting somewhere between 10,000 - 25,000 learners to join us (based on previous experiences). But we're worried that our LMS won't scale after reading some of your articles. How do we know if our technology is ready to scale?

Plume's answer

First of all, congratulations on finding a marketing strategy that reliably brings in decent numbers of new learners! Now you need to make sure that your tech is up to the challenge.

When we talk about scalability, we are typically referring to how well a learning application can handle an increase in users. 

Some technology does not scale as well as others. When you approach your technology’s scalability limitations, your tech becomes a barrier to the growth of your company. At this point, your technology is failing frequently, causing new and existing customers to look to alternative providers.

A lack of scalability isn't a issue that presents itself immediately; it creeps up on you. Luckily, there are some early warning signs that indicate that your technology won’t scale... here are just a few:

• Load times slow to a crawl, particularly at peak times
• Your tech suffers frequent downtime (meaning that your technology is inaccessible)
• An increase in bugs and critical errors that stretches your support team's resources
• Your team are spending more time firefighting as opposed to making meaningful improvements to the product
• Common processes require a lot of human input, such as enrolling new users or generating reports
• Server-intensive operations cause the application to slow or go down
• Low customer retention (due to frequent issues or a lack of product innovation)
• Scaling simply costs too much with large per-user-fees or when your needs of a SaaS solution edge you towards "enterprise" pricing brackets

To learn more about scalability and what you can do to avoid your growth becoming your biggest enemy, read our free e-book: "5 critical LMS scalability mistakes and how to avoid them"