March 07, 2025
The Product Assembly Challenge
How do you assemble content from multiple sources for a unified experience?
This is the third blog in a series that addresses key challenges reported by educational publishers and edtech providers. The first two are listed at the end of this blog.
Today’s topic: Some publishers may already have content delivery platforms or modules in place but lack an efficient, automated workflow for content assembly and publishing. This blog explores this challenge of product assembly to ensure a unified learner experience.
THE PROBLEM
For clarity, by "Product Assembly" we mean the assembling of content into next-generation digital products. Content can be in the form of existing libraries of legacy learning objects, interactive course elements, rich media, eBooks, assessments, and more.
Assembling these pieces of content refers to the process of organizing these content elements into a structured format, complete with tagging, alignment metadata, and business rules that enable the creation of next-generation interactive experiences.
In an earlier blog, we had covered an end-to-end scenario for the entire product lifecycle —including product assembly, publishing, and delivery. We called that the Product Extension Challenge and you can read about it here if you would like.
We understand, however, that some publishers may already have content delivery platforms or modules in place but lack an efficient, automated workflow for content assembly and publishing. So, what is required is specifically the assembly of content to create a unified experience.
This often becomes complicated due to multiple authoring systems, legacy formats, and manual or engineering workflows needed to assemble content into a deliverable format. The absence of automation slows down time-to-market and increases the risk of errors during the assembly process.
THE SOLUTION
So, how do you take content from multiple sources and assemble that content into rich, immersive learning modules that are then ready to be plugged/integrated into a variety of delivery systems or an LMS?
Our solution has been to design an engine that acts as an independent service that optimizes content production workflows. Focusing on "assembly" workflows, this engine is designed to integrate with existing and legacy CMSs seamlessly. It connects to these systems and content libraries, setting up automated pipelines for tasks like format conversion, tagging, and more. This allows publishers to continue leveraging their current CMS platforms and vendor workflows.
We call this engine the “comproDLS Builder” and it empowers editorial and product teams to independently manage the entire digital product assembly lifecycle. For example, it enables publishers to scale the creation of new courses or eBooks rapidly.
Once assembled, the content can be tested, verified, and published with a simple "build" click. Live courses can be edited or updated using the same workflow without technical or engineering involvement.
And finally, once the the assembled content is ready, it can be delivered via a variety of delivery systems or LMSs.
If you are facing a product assembly challenge, let’s talk. Meanwhile, be sure to follow our blog for more challenges that we encounter in educational publishing and how they can be resolved.
Earlier blogs from the “Challenges in Educational Publishing” series:
The Product Extension Challenge
How do you extend product functionality with minimal disruption?
The Interoperability Challenge
How do you connect disparate platforms & products without fragmenting the learning experience?