Best practices in continuing and executive education websites:
Course listing pages
The purpose of course listing pages
The purpose of a course listing page is to help prospective students identify courses they want to learn more about and navigate toward specific course detail pages. There are several ways to list courses, but I will refer to such pages collectively as course listing pages. In other industries, these types of pages are called “category pages” or “product listing” pages.
Course listing pages are essentially filters that group courses in ways that make sense to the audience. With a click, large numbers of unwanted courses can be pruned away, freeing visitors to look more closely at those that interest them. It’s all about refining a large number of choices down to a reasonable number, so the visitor can eventually choose one to enroll in. For example, here is a hypothetical dialog between a website visitor and a well-built set of course listing pages:
You want to see our dance courses? Here you go. You want to see only evening dance classes? No problem. Here they are. You want to see evening dance classes that start on Tuesdays in February and cost under $150? Sure thing. Here’s the list!
Goals
Well-built course listing pages are nearly invisible to visitors and help them move quickly toward more specific information. Depending on where the visitor is in the selection process, their intentions can vary, but the course listing pages must cater to each of them.
- Visitor wishes to further narrow the list of courses
- Visitor wishes to see the courses in a particular order
- Visitor wishes to see more in-depth information about a particular course
- Visitor wishes to enroll in a course immediately
To motivate visitors to take their next step, course listing pages must successfully:
- Present courses in an attractive, appealing manner
- Provide enough information to interest visitors
- Distinguish between various offerings
- Allow visitors to sort and filter courses using criteria important to them
- Provide a clear path (call to action) for the next step
Common issues with course listing pages
Not providing enough information
Many sites only list the title and dates on course listing pages. However, many visitors use other information to choose courses of interest. Base the content of your course listing page on the behavior of your visitors, not what you think they might want to see.
Course listing pages often lack flexibility
Course listing pages can miss the mark by not providing adequate filtering and sorting options for visitors. Even when visitors find the correct category of courses, they may need to further filter or sort course options to find the specific course or courses that interest them. A category containing 50 courses, for example, may need further filtering options to narrow choices for visitors.
Not showing a comparative price when you offer discounts
People like to believe they are getting a deal. If you offer discounts, such as early bird or discount codes, show visitors the original retail price alongside the discounted one.
Not creating a sense of urgency
If a course is approaching its maximum enrollment, displaying the number of remaining seats gives visitors a sense of urgency that may keep them from delaying their enrollment decision. It also shows visitors that the course in question is a popular course which may influence their enrollment decision.
Providing too much information
Course listing pages can easily become cluttered. Balance usability with the desire to show lots of detail and make sure that visitors can use all the information you display. I’ve provided some examples of what could appear on your pages in the next section.
What to include on course listing pages (Content)
The perfect course listing pages balances simplicity and complexity to display only pieces of information that visitors need to choose courses of interest. If you provide too much information, the course listing page becomes cluttered. Too little information forces visitors to work harder to locate courses of interest. Essentially, the courses listing page must provide visitors with enough detail to differentiate between the listed courses, but no more. Below are recommendations for elements to include:
Content
Essential: course name, start date, start time, price
Recommended: end date, instructor name, add to cart button
Optional: instructor credentials, course images, course description
Note: Many sites only allow visitors to enroll in courses from their detail pages, and for some sites, this is the appropriate approach. There are people ready to order when they arrive at your site. They only need to locate the particular course of interest to them. If many of your visitors would be willing to enroll based on the information available on the course listing page, let them jump directly to your registration section without first visiting a more detailed page about a class.
How to filter course listing pages (Filtering)
Filtering courses is arguably the most critical function of course listing pages and the more extensive your course list, the more valuable filtering becomes. The most basic example of filtering is by topic area (e.g. listing courses on project management, creative writing, wine tasting, and financial planning on separate pages). However, there are many other ways to filter.
First, you can list courses by multiple levels of granularity such as program, category, and sub-category. You can also filter courses by instructor, start date, date range, and a host of other criteria. The chart below shows several:
Example filter criteria |
Applied example |
Hierarchical listings: Program, category, and sub-categories |
Computer training courses, MS Office training courses, Excel training courses |
Instructor |
Courses that will be taught by Jon Horn |
Date range |
Courses starting between 6/1/2009 and 8/1/2009 |
Day of the week |
Courses starting on Tuesdays |
Location |
Courses at the Alpharetta, GA location |
Search results |
Courses related to the term “pivot table” |
Time of day |
Courses starting after 6PM |
Price range |
Courses between $100 and $300 |
Hierarchical listings
Hierarchical pages are useful for subdividing a large number of courses into programs, categories, and/or sub-categories. They proper way to group courses depends on many factors, including the quantity and variety of offerings, and is often unique to a particular program. However, a good general rule is to have no more than 8-12 areas within each grouping.
Here is am example of hierarchical listings’ advantage over search engines. Someone seeking a class on Adobe Dreamweaver would find a search feature to be the most efficient way to locate the class online. However, someone new to the web design field may not know that Dreamweaver is a popular web design software. In this case, a listing of web design courses would allow them to explore a school’s offerings and choose an appropriate class.
A note on course searches
Interestingly, course listing pages and search components serve similar and complementary purposes. Search engines help visitors locate courses by filtering using a word or phrase included the course title or associated with the course. Course listing pages help visitors locate courses by filtering on other characteristics. However, they are essentially the same functionality and often share the same functional technology on a website. For example, you might want the results of a search to contain the same information as a course listing page and allow searchers to further filter or sort the resulting search results. In other words, searches usually work better when visitors know terms associated with what they are seeking. Course listing pages work better when visitors who don’t know exactly what they are after, but can start to hone in on it by choosing a topical category or other defining characteristics.
I’ll discuss course searches in more detail in a later article.
How to sort course listing pages (Ordering)
Many of the same factors used to filter courses can be used by visitors to sort your courses. For example, your visitors may wish to sort course listings by name, instructor, price, start date, etc. depending on what criteria they are using to select courses that interest them. Price conscious visitors may want courses sorted from least to most expensive, while a returning student might want to sort by instructor name so they can easily locate the courses being taught by their favorite instructors.
How to display course listing pages (Layout)
Condensed listings
If you offer a large number of courses, displaying the full course description on course listing pages can be overwhelming for visitors. Condensed listings that show only the course title, instructor, price, and dates give prospective students enough information to determine whether they want to learn more about a course.
Expanded listings
Expanded listings fall somewhere between condensed listings and detail pages in the amount of information they include about courses. They often include the course title, course description, instructor, price, date, and time. However, the often leave off student comments, learning objectives, and other voluminous details.
Comparison listings
Product sites often allow visitors to select 2 or more items and then view them in a comparison grid. This feature is rare in the continuing education field, but can reduce customer service calls by allowing website visitors to more easily see differences between similar classes. For example, if you offer courses titled “Advanced Excel” and “Business Analysis with Excel”, visitors could compare course objectives or outlines to figure out which course would best meet their needs.
Calendar listings
Calendar listings are an interesting way to list classes. As you can see in the example below, it helps prospective students plan classes around their schedule.
Conclusion
Think of course listing pages as a hallway between your homepage and the detail pages of your site (or even between one detail page and another). They serve as an interactive index of your website, allowing your visitors to filter and sort courses as they narrow in on a small group of courses that interest them.
In my next article, I’ll focus on the destination toward which course listing pages point your visitors: the course detail page. We’ll explore how they differ from course listing pages and to design course detail pages that improve conversion rates, reduce customer service costs, and increase enrollment!
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