The context of this activation toolkit, which was formerly called an Executive Sponsor Toolkit, was to provide the folks at the account with sort of an easy menu of ways to create positive psych around using Reforge. These are two different personas: a plan manager can be someone who is the sponsor and the champion of Reforge within within a subscription, or they can be someone who's playing more of an administrative role. The Executive Sponsor or the real champion is possibly someone who they work with and/or work for. 

The further the distance between the person who's assigning seats and the end user, the less that end user had a connection to why they were being given Reforge and what the impact of Reforge might be. We wanted to make it really easy for that plan manager or that sponsor to to be able to engage people and get them pumped about Reforge and introduce Reforge so that they didn't have to start from scratch.

We give the plan manager this toolkit once they have added users to their account and signed up for onboarding, but then we also will send each individual template at the right cadence depending on when they need it so that it's in their inbox and top of mind at a given time. The reason that we have this cadence of emails (and also the requirements) is it's really easy to pick up a template and just hit “send” and not look at the things that might be context for the template or look at the things that people might need to know. 

So if somebody picks up this “Welcome to Reforge” template and sends it to people before they've been added to the account, those users can't log in and it's going to create a lot of spin. That's why we're really explicit around the directions or the requirements that someone has to take before they use the template.

I think anyone working in engagement/activation has to deal with limited insights/metrics when you’re sharing material to be used on a client’s internal communications. You might not have enough access to see email open rates, click-through rates, etc. and have to rely on qualitative feedback and surveys. 

Engaging with and establishing a great relationship with this executive sponsor figure is a huge benefit. If you can ask to be CCed or BCCed on these emails, that’s a huge benefit to help you understand how far users are getting in the process and what you can do to help improve their activation experience.

We built in a manufactured trigger to drive product engagement at a point when users have enough experience on the platform to share not only what they’re learning, but also what they’re doing with it. Presenting these Slack messages can also create social proof that incentivize others to deepen or rethink their engagement and share their experiences.

This 90 day checkpoint is both a litmus test to make sure that teams are getting the value that they that they came to Reforge for and also so we can check in with plan managers and make sure that they're getting what they need out of Reforge. 

It's also our opportunity to engage them on new offerings, engage them around any discussions/insights that we have, but we're also bringing something to the table. At this point, we have tangible data about your team. We can bring you something valuable. And it helps facilitate that meeting because a lot of plan managers are looking for even early indicators of ROI. While a survey doesn't necessarily demonstrate ROI, it least captures the qualitative feedback from folks who they've purchased licenses for.

Ellen Naruse

Kevin Weiss

Judy Merzbach

Built to help onboard new teams to the Reforge learning platform, this activation toolkit guides sponsors/plan managers craft their internal communications from the initial setup phases through the first 90 days after sign-up.

The context of this activation toolkit, which was 

 1-2 days after an account has been activated

You have determined when members will attend live onboarding

 Introduce Reforge platform and set expectation that team members take advantage of the generous opportunity provided.

 - ideally someone senior within the organization who has directly or indirectly sponsored the team membership.

You’ve briefed exec sponsor on their role in this meeting

 Actively endorse Reforge product usage and the commitment to employee development

You have received a video recording of the onboarding session

 Reinforce best practices for using Reforge and share video recording of session.

Your team has a dedicated channel on Slack or Microsoft Teams, where an executive can pop in and send this message

 To create visibility around what team members are learning in the product, and demonstrate how they’re incorporating this learning into their work.

 Solicit feedback about the Reforge experience to-date, so Plan Managers can work with Reforge to address any challenges individual users might be experiencing.

Executive Sponsor Toolkit to Support Activation at Reforge

📅1-2 days after account activation:

📧Welcome to Reforge

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