CRM in Education

To many institutions, the concept of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is an exciting one, especially as the education market becomes more competitive. Deregulation and a blurring of the boundaries, coupled with increased competition on the international front are forcing institutes to reconsider the mechanisms they use to attract and retain suitably qualified prospective students and forge relationships with corporate clients.

Institutes are also looking to improve their conversion ratios, from prospect to enrolment and reducing the number of lost applicants/opportunities.

However, for many answering the question “so where do we start?” is a daunting one.

If you have recently considered CRM as a must do, then some of the following questions will probably have crossed your mind:

• What is it that we really want to achieve with a CRM solution?
• What are our needs and requirements?
• Everyone is so busy at the moment, who can lead the charge on such an important project?

Even if you can answer these questions then chances are you will get to the next level of detail, the how to, and realise that there is very little information out there about evaluating the value-chain in an educational context.

Many institutions unwittingly make a false step before they even start; believing that the first move is to find a solution, but this is not the case. In every instance the first thing you must do is to identify and define the need, and what it is you want to achieve. Without a clear picture of where you have started, the CRM journey makes little sense; it becomes very hard to work out where you want to go, how you are going to get there, and especially what to look for so that you know you’ve made it when you arrive.

At S1 Consulting we are experienced at working with customers to uncover a CRM strategy that drills to the very heart of the institution’s value chain and your competitive advantage. We can help you to locate hidden attributes within your organisation, compare and contrast those to your service aspirations, locate points of improvement and growth potential.

The outcomes of a successful CRM strategy reads like the ‘holy grail’ of the education sector, increased applicants, reduced turn-around times, reduction in administrative overhead and improved conversion ratios for commercial opportunities. However the flip-side can be a nightmare; wasted system and implementation costs, disillusioned staff, and market back-lash are all ready to trap the unwary.

We can help you to increase the effectiveness of your marketing budget and reduce the cost to administer your CRM strategy by undertaking an appraisal of your CRM readiness, identifying requirements and opportunities for improvement, and linking those back to a clear CRM Road Map and action plan.

At S1 Consulting we have very specific local knowledge in educational contact centres, campaign management, international and domestic student recruitment, commercialisation of intellectual property, vendor solutions, etc.

For more information, email info@s1consulting.com.au or telephone +61 2 9887 3980.