CRM for Higher Education: One Size Does Not Fit All

© 2010 Intelliworks, Inc. and DemandEngine. All Rights Reserved.

CRM FOR HIGHER EDUCATION

A WHITE PAPER BY

INTELLIWORKS & DEMANDENGINE

ABSTRACT

CRM is fast becoming a competitive necessity for colleges and universities

looking to improve student engagement and deliver a better experience

throughout the student lifecycle. Already, many institutions have derived

great benefits from CRM and are eager to expand their initiatives across

campus.

In an effort to reduce operational and support costs, many higher

education IT organizations are considering an enterprise approach to CRM.

Oftentimes, institutions take a “technology first” approach and in so doing

confuse enterprise technology with enterprise strategy. Such an approach

can have downstream effects that limit the institution’s ability to deploy a

CRM that will meet the needs of the entire organization.

Ideally, an enterprise CRM strategy improves the student experience while

ensuring that technology and processes are scalable and configurable

enough to meet the needs of both traditional and non-traditional

enrollment departments.

Unfortunately, enterprise CRM deployments often default to the needs of

the undergraduate admission office, ignoring the nuances and

complexities of graduate, executive and continuing education units. As

such, the pursuit of enterprise technology rather than enterprise CRM

strategy limits the potential gains in service and productivity and may not

produce the anticipated return on investment (ROI).

The end result is an endeavor that’s more focused on implementing

technical features and less so focused on meeting precise business

objectives.

ONE SIZE

DOES NOT

FIT ALL

This white paper will

identify:

Key drivers leading

institutions to

consolidate their

CRM efforts

Why existing

systems are not

meeting the needs

of most institutions

Best-of-breed

alternatives to

investing in legacy

technology systems

Communal best

practices for

approaching an

enterprise CRM

initiative


TABLE OF CONTENTS

SECTION ONE

A CRUCIAL POINT IN TIME

THE PATH TO CRM SUCCESS IS WELL-MARKED

A COMPETITIVE NECESSITY FOR HIGHER EDUCATION

THE NEED IS THERE, YET ADOPTION IS LOW

SECTION TWO

CRITICAL CHALLENGES AND CONSIDERATIONS

PROS/CONS TO CENTRALIZED CRM

LET CRM STRATEGY DRIVE CRM TECHNOLOGY

SECTION THREE

KEYS TO CRM SUCCESS

CRM AND ENROLLMENT MANAGEMENT: A BUSINESS CONCERN

RECOMMENDATIONS


SECTION ONE:




With competition for students among institutions increasing at a global level, budgets declining and

student demographics shifting, colleges and universities today are faced with more complex relationship

management challenges than ever before. Additionally, student expectations have also evolved in

terms of what it means to be a “consumer” of higher education, and they have become more discerning

in terms of value proposition from institutions. As a result, institutions are more focused than ever on

delivering a memorable student experience at every stage of their interactions with students.

There are many touch points that feed into the student experience at an institution, including the web,

social media, events, online chats and campus tours. For many institutions, CRM technology has become

the hub for managing these interactions and leveraging these data points in order to create a more

customer-centric approach to managing communications with students. These tools have provided

institutions with a wealth of information on how students are interacting with their institution.

However, technology alone cannot answer the call. Institutions must find the right people to carefully

craft a CRM strategy that not only determines how students are interacting with their institution, but

why. This requires that institutions avoid looking at CRM primarily as an IT initiative and begin to look

at it as a means to empower institutional representatives to deliver better customer service to students

and prospects, and reinforce the institution’s brand.

Knowing how and why a prospect engages with your institution could make all the difference in whether

they decide to apply to your school, or opt for another school. Additionally, progressive institutions are

now even starting to leverage pre-enrollment data to inform their student success and retention

strategies, as well as alumni development and advancement.


THE PATH TO CRM SUCCESS IS WELL-MARKED

CRM has been evolving in the business or corporate world for more than 20 years. Beginning in the late

1980’s, CRM technology was nothing more than an electronic database to more directly communicate

with customers. In the mid-1990’s, it morphed into a tool that could be used to increase loyalty. In fact,

this is when hotel and airline reward programs came of age.

Fast forward to the year 2010 and we see the transformation of CRM into a strategic approach designed

to improve the customer experience. This is accomplished through increased engagement with the

constituent and the use of analytics to both measure and provide results. CRM technology in higher

education has emerged as a flexible web-based software application suite that supports CRM at all

institution and departmental sizes.

CRM’s track record has not been universally positive. Over its history, failure rates have been reported

to be as high as 70%, as companies are disappointed by their actual business results and the resulting

poor return on investment (ROI) for their CRM initiatives (see figure 1).

Despite the spotty track record, history provides a well-marked path toward success. The real question

is not “should we do CRM” but “how can we do CRM right?”


What leads to such common failure? Causes include:

using a technology first without an overarching strategic vision

organizational resistance to change

internal ownership difficulties with customer definition and data ownership

difficulty integrating CRM with other applications

adopting only partial solutions

underestimating the impact on people and underlying work processes.

CRM can drive significant value if the focus moves beyond technology to the consideration of the

business-driven benefits it can provide, like increased conversion, better yield and improved customer

satisfaction.


A COMPETITIVE NECESSITY FOR HIGHER EDUCATION

Gartner1 predicts that by 2013, an institution will be at a competitive disadvantage for recruiting without

this type of relationship solution in place. Why? The reasons vary based on your institution’s location

and the market you’re serving.

For example, many undergraduate institutions, particularly on the East Coast, are faced with

demographic shifts that are resulting in fewer high school graduates after a peak of almost 3 million

graduates nationwide last year. This number is expected to decline until about 2015. For some, this

could result in fewer applications and less selectivity.

This challenge has created an interesting dynamic whereby institutions that once limited recruitment to

their region now have to expand the reach of their recruitment and enrollment management efforts just

to make up their next incoming class.

However, even in the undergraduate world the picture is not black and white. Those familiar with the

recent budget cuts in the state of California know that many institutions are struggling to keep up with

demand and are in fact having to turn away qualified students. As a result, California has become prime

hunting ground for private, public and for-profit institutions around the country looking to fill seats in

classrooms.

Regardless of the situation, these institutions are faced with the need to either grow or shape

enrollment in order to sustain their operations.

Meanwhile, due in part to demographics and the recent economic crisis, institutions are seeing a boon

in enrollment from adult learners. In fact, the majority of students enrolled in both full-time and part-

time post-secondary education today are non-traditional adult learners, and they are the fastest

growing demographic at many institutions.


According to the National Center for Education Statistics, between 2006 and 2017, enrollment is

projected to increase:

10 percent for students who are 18 to 24 years old;

27 percent for students who are 25 through 34 years old; and

8 percent for students who are 35 years old and over.

Institutions are learning quickly that these adult students are motivated by a completely different set of

factors than “traditional” students. As such, they require a completely different recruitment approach.

Having a CRM strategy in place can help institutions identify an individual’s motivation for seeking an

education, and allow the college or university to leverage that information in order to have an informed

dialogue with students about their unique needs. As institutions are faced with a more diverse student

population and continued financial restraints, they must pinpoint student motivations in order to deliver

contextually relevant information about their programs that will encourage people to enroll and

hopefully persist.

THE NEED IS THERE, YET ADOPTION IS LOW

Despite the need for CRM in higher education, adoption has remained low. According to Datmonitori,

institutions are “seeking to address the need for improved access to data and operational efficiency,

institutions find out-of-the-box SIS integration, online application submission and reporting and

analytics particularly attractive CRM capabilities.” While institutions have identified the need for CRM

capabilities, pre-existing technology and business processes at institutions have often slowed CRM from

gaining widespread adoption. Still, Datamonitor advises that institutions consider CRM that will scale

across the organization:

As the number of students entering higher education declines, it will be increasingly important for

institutions to recruit and retain students, which will require CRM solutions to have advanced

functionality and features, such as the ability to reach out to more non-traditional students. As

their recruitment strategies change, institutions will expect their CRM vendor to frequently add

new features and enhancements…Another essential function that CRM must incorporate is the


ability to scale up. Institutions generally adopt CRM to be used within their admissions group, and

as need arise, deploy it within other departments

While Datamonitor is right to suggest that institutions look at CRM beyond the admissions office,

institutions must be careful not to confuse enterprise CRM strategy with enterprise CRM technology.

Often, the best way to implement a system-wide CRM initiative is by embracing de-centralized systems

and processes.

Analysts, including Datamonitor and Gartner, estimate that CRM adoption at colleges and universities is

somewhere in the range of one-quarter to one-third of all institutions. However, it appears that

primarily larger institutions that have deployed a CRM. Of those, the majority of institutions have

implemented it primarily at the undergraduate level even though non-undergraduate programs tend to

generate considerable revenue for their institutions.

According to the National Center for Education Statisticsii, “Despite the sizable numbers of small degree-

granting colleges, most students attend the larger colleges and universities…40 percent of institutions

had fewer than 1,000 students; however, these campuses enrolled 4 percent of college students. While

12 percent of the campuses enrolled 10,000 or more students, they accounted for 54 percent of total

college enrollment.” This means that 88 percent of undergraduate institutions are competing for less

than half of the student population.

Budget constraints have made it particularly difficult for resource-strapped institutions to keep pace

with the continuously evolving enrollment management landscape.

This distinction between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have nots’ is certainly correlated with how institutions

have adopted CRM. Large institutions with the means and resources have acted, but the large costs and

time associated with taking on a CRM project have kept resource-strapped institutions, and even some

well-financed institutions, from doing so.

Even institutions that have CRM functionality in place through other systems of record, such as their

student information systems, are often dismayed at how difficult it is to perform basic tasks that have

come to be expected from a CRM, such as:

Updating and configuring student/prospect contact record fields

Automating recruitment and marketing workflows


Leveraging data to execute multi-channel communications plans

Generating reports of data in real-time

Managing the ongoing relationship with enrolled students

Lacking the technology feature set to manage marketing, recruitment and service efforts, individual

enrollment departments are often left to fend for themselves and cobble together systems to support

their business requirements. This results in many “rogue” departments within an institution operating

independently from central IT.


SECTION TWO:




The need for CRM has prompted many college and university CIOs to consider a centralized approach.

Non-technical campus administrators have spoken and are pursuing a CRM strategy in one form or

another, with or without the support of their IT departments. However, the long-term implications of

having several disparate systems on campus have made many CIOs nervous about having to support

such an infrastructure.

There are many reasons why an IT department would want to consolidate/centralize an institution’s

CRM, including:

Reducing costs: As they look to expand the CRM footprint on campus beyond individual

programs and departments, CIOs are now actively negotiating with vendors to find economies

of scale that will provide them with access to CRM across the enterprise.

Reduced burden on IT support: The idea of having one “garden to tend” is an appealing one to

IT departments that are already dealing with multiple systems, such as student information

systems and learning management systems, and their associated vendors. Having a CRM

vendor responsible for the entire campus reduces the number of touch points needed to get a

system up and running at an enterprise level.

Integration with other campus systems: Ultimately, whether CRM is implemented at a

departmental or institutional level, the need to integrate with other systems on campus

becomes necessary. CIOs want assurance that all the systems they have in place will be able to

“talk” with one another.

Control: IT departments do not want to be stuck supporting systems that they did not have any

input in designing or purchasing because they know that if something goes wrong they will be

the first line of defense to help fix the problem. They want to make sure that the proper due

diligence is put forth when investing in a CRM.


PROS/CONS TO CENTRALIZED CRM

While the rationale behind a centralized approach to CRM is certainly valid, the means by which

centralization is pursued are not always ideal.

The reasoning outlined above (along with sunk cost) can also result in excuses that lead to institutions

deciding on legacy providers to take on their CRM projects rather than having best-of-breed solutions.

This “one size fits all” mentality is exactly why end-users are frustrated in the first place, because the

systems in place are not making their lives easier.

This is why institutions must also weigh the cons of a centralized CRM technology approach:

Focus on technology rather than strategy: When IT departments are tasked with making the

purchasing decisions for a CRM; the driving factor will, not surprisingly, always be technology.

However, this focus on technology can constrain evaluators and have them be more focused on

support and integration rather than identifying ways to help achieve their functional or strategic

objectives.

The tail wags the dog: As mentioned previously, the largest departments on campus (generally

undergraduate) are those that are viewed as the top priority when investing in “enterprise” wide

solutions. However, institutions that do this exclusively do so at their own peril. For while brands

are still built at the undergraduate level, today’s student population means that revenue is being

generated by other parts of the institution, such as graduate, continuing and executive education.

Any CRM investment must take their needs into account.

Distracts from other mission-critical projects: Like any IT project, CRM requires a delicate balancing

(some might say juggling) of priorities. Worrying too much about getting the technology up and

running could distract from other critical systems being supported by IT.

Limits the role of IT: When CRM purchasing decisions are made without the involvement of other

departments or functional users, it relegates the IT department to a tactical role on campus rather

than that of strategic partner.


As Harvard Business School’s CIO, Stephen Laster points out in a recent Campus Technology interview,

“Higher Education IT in the ‘New Normal’,” perceptions range from one of IT as an operational /

commoditized “keeper of electronics” on campus, to one as a highly strategic, senior-level advisor that

assists the provost or president in making long-term decisions.

The “keeper of electronics” perception is an unfortunate one, which can cast IT in the surprising role of

being a gate-keeping impediment to progress. In many cases, this is unfair and fails to acknowledge

either:

a) IT’s resource constraints (this department seems to be ground-zero for the “do more with

less” mantra of recent times); and

b) the burdensome risk-management responsibilities which IT shoulders.

At the same time the departmental or “functional users” of any given institution have an increasingly

strong voice in technology selection and purchase – due in large part to the emergence of cloud

computing and software-as-a-service. But, this appears to be less driven by a decentralization of buying,

and more by an ever-increasing appreciation that the people who are actually going to be using a

software solution should have a strong say in selecting that system.

Additionally, this trend has been bolstered by the increasing availability of solutions that do not require

(as much) direct IT involvement to deploy.

In any case, IT appears to increasingly be playing a collaborative or supporting role in vendor

evaluations; rather than being the lone or leading decision-maker.


LET CRM STRATEGY DRIVE CRM TECHNOLOGY

A well-defined enterprise strategy drives the business requirements for CRM technology. CRM success

is primarily a function of people and process and clear business goals and only secondarily about

enabling technology. In their work, Forrester Research found that technology-driven CRM upgrades are

not enough to justify the cost. In contrast, upgrades driven by the need to achieve business benefits

(and also including IT cost savings) are financially attractive.iii

Consolidating disparate technologies across campus and linking business units to a one-size fits all

sounds like a good idea in theory. In practice, this technology-centric approach, more often than not,

degenerates into basic process automation with systems integration as the primary goal. While possibly

reducing support costs, this approach ignores the various pathways to enrollment that prospective

students must follow and the corresponding nuances from undergraduate admissions to continuing

education.

The potential of CRM lies not in technology itself, but in the process of using technology along with an

in-depth understanding of your desired students to drive unique, valuable interactions and respond at

the right time to student needs. The guiding principle of a value-based CRM strategy is ultimately to

improve the student experience – across the institution through the identification and implementation

of methods through which customer interactions can be made more effective and profitable. To be

truly successful, a CRM program must be guided and managed according to a detailed strategy based

on this principle.

A CRM strategy begins by changing your vantage point from internal to external concerns. If you

could change the enrollment experience for your students, removing any internal or external barriers,

process inefficiencies, what would that look like for students? The question is how to move from a

vision of a new enrollment experience to reality. Creating a value-based CRM plan definition begins by

identifying clear enrollment or other business goals and supporting objectives across the enterprise.

From these goals and objectives, it should be possible to drill down to a set of performance indicators

and specific initiatives, which can be prioritized into a phased implementation plan encompassing all of

the planning, people, process and technology enablers to support the strategy.


SECTION THREE:

KEYS TO CRM SUCCESS


KEYS TO CRM SUCCESS

A critical element of a successful approach is developing the metrics and supporting mechanisms and

processes through which the business results of CRM can be continually evaluated. This provides the

necessary insight to optimize existing student-focused initiatives and to plan follow-on initiatives.

Based on research and experience, the following requirements should be addressed by any CRM

technology business case:

1) Inquiry/lead management―The ability to create and manage online forms that may be

imbedded on the website as well as campaign landing pages; integration of social technologies;

score and route inquiries; and the assignment of lifecycle roles and stages.

2) Workflow management―Automating processes whereby records and tasks are assigned or

transferred from one user to another for action according to a set of predefined rules.

3) Lifecycle management―Capabilities are incorporated to manage the nuances of institutional

enrollment paths or lifecycles.

4) Contact management―Management capabilities adopted, to include: contact creation and

definition; creating hierarchical relationships (company - subsidiary); and assigning follow-up

tasks.

5) Web-based self service management―The ability for students to complete routine enrollment

functions online.

6) Case management―The capability to log and track interactions or multiple touches throughout

the enrollment lifecycle and manage service requests.

7) Campaign automation―The ability to automate campaigns based on a number of variables

including life cycle stage (e.g., acquisition, conversion, and yield).

8) Program management―The capability to manage online applications, payment gateways, and

program capacity (e.g., capped enrollment programs).

9) Analytics―The usage of flexible dash boarding and reporting capabilities.


10) Scalability― To ensure fast and scalable deployments across their institutions, colleges and

universities should look to leverage cloud-based or software-as-a-service solutions. These

solutions can help make CRM accessible and more widely available to all parts of your

organization in much less time than traditional, on-premise solutions.

According to Datamonitor, “Another essential function that CRM must incorporate is the ability to scale

up. Institutions generally adopt CRM to be used in their admissions group, and as the need arises,

deploy it within other departments. Adding new users can be extremely difficult with an on-premise

solution, but SaaS vendors make this process a non-event.”

CRM AND ENROLLMENT MANAGEMENT:

A BUSINESS CONCERN

There is little argument that managing enrollments is a business-driven concern often led by senior

leaders within the college or university structure. Effective enrollment management begins with

planning and is supported by strategies to connect students to educational opportunities. These

strategies may be executed by the admissions office, student services, or academic departments, each

with its own business-led incentives (e.g., job security, budgets, academic program survival).

At the same time, CRM in higher education has primarily been viewed as a technology, often times

delivering capabilities not found in institutional legacy student information systems.iv There is confusion

in the marketplace today of the linkage between enrollment management and CRM, as well as

ownership of CRM initiatives. In fact, enrollment management and CRM should be tightly linked.

Enrollment management is defined as an institution-wide, systematic, comprehensive, research-driven

discipline designed to locate, attract, and retain the students the institution wishes to serve. v While

traditionally considered the purview of the undergraduate admissions office, the enrollment

management paradigm applies equally to organizations that serve adult learners through credit or non-

credit programs delivered online, offline, or at a distancevi.


Enrollment management may be thought of as an inside-out view of the potential education

marketplace. An institution desires to provide its educational programs and services to target groups of

students or businesses. Thus colleges and universities employ plans and policies to acquire, enroll and

retain these populations.

The concept of CRM begins with a different vantage point from enrollment management. CRM in

higher education is fundamentally an organizational philosophy and guiding strategy, enabled by

people, processes and the effective use of technology, to improve the student or constituent

experience. CRM is an outside-in view from the student’s vantage point.

It would be difficult at best for institutions to meet enrollment goals without effectively supporting

interactions with students or to realize value from CRM without developing a strategy for managing

recruitment and retention.vii

Managing enrollments by the various intake points – from undergraduate to graduate and

professional continuing education – should be considered an important sub-component of an

institutional CRM strategy that can help inform longer-term relationship building with students and

alumni.


RECOMMENDATIONS

The global economic crisis, shifting demographics and increased competition from for-profit educators

have made the challenges of shaping and growing enrollment on campus more difficult than ever

before. CRM can help address some of the challenges facing today’s colleges and universities.

Start with a Clear CRM Strategy

If the institution doesn’t know which constituents (e.g. business community, current or prospective

students) are important and how their behavior or treatment should change, it’s difficult to deliver

strategic value with CRM. It’s often helpful to engage a consulting firm to help set strategy and to

build organizational consensus. Demonstrated CRM experience and higher education domain

expertise is a must. Establishing the metrics and the initiatives to support business-driven goals

and objectives is akin to writing your CRM project success story – before the investment begins.

Understand … and Avoid What Leads to CRM Failure

Don’t get lost in the technology of CRM and forget about the process and the change management

issues. Too often too much money is spent on technology without a clear plan to get the benefits

from the investment. And if all the benefits of CRM accrue to institutional leadership, the people on

the front lines will only see another technology system they have to master. A one-size fits all

technology approach will particularly discourage users that support enrollment that falls outside of

the ‘traditional’ campus system.

Take an Incremental Approach

Don’t try to do everything at once. The best CRM projects are incremental — by enrollment

department, student segment or process area. Find areas with eager users and clearly defined

processes for initial projects to build support for broader initiatives.

Demand Technical Flexibility and Scalability

It would be naïve to think that anyone system can be the end-all-be-all solution for most colleges

and universities. The reality is that today’s CRM providers must be able to cohabitate in an eco-

system that includes a variety of technology solutions, including ERPs, SIS, CMS and various Web

properties. Fortunately, many providers that offer access to a robust application programming


interface (API) make tying these solutions together a seamless process. However, integration is

about much more than just passing data. Look for providers that offer guidance and best practices

on leveraging your data across the student life cycle.

If executed properly, a CRM initiative should enable your institution to provide your institution with

growth, efficiency, quality and intelligence.


ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Tim Copeland, General Manager, DemandEngine

Tim Copeland is the managing partner for DemandEngine, an interactive enrollment marketing

consulting and services company for higher education. His experience spans corporate marketing

management and consulting and higher education enrollment management.

Daniel Obregon, Vice President, Marketing, Intelliworks

Dan is vice president of marketing for Intelliworks, a leading provider of relationship management

software and services for higher education. Intelliworks works with a broad range of educational

institutions to help market their programs, grow enrollment and drive tuition-based revenue. Dan is

responsible for guiding all marketing efforts at Intelliworks, including product marketing, branding,

market research and online interactive marketing.

ABOUT DEMANDENGINE

DemandEngine is an interactive enrollment marketing consulting and services company for higher

education. Combining talent, strategy, and technology, we help colleges and universities intelligently

uncover demand and engage their students, influencers, and other constituents to reach desired

enrollment and business objectives. Our customers appreciate our strategy-first approach.

ABOUT INTELLIWORKS

Intelliworks enables enrollment and admissions professionals to make purposeful connections with

students through its Web-based relationship management, marketing and recruitment services. Leading

institutions around the globe leverage Intelliworks’ relationship management solutions for higher

education to increase enrollment, enhance marketing performance and improve operational efficiency.


END NOTES

i Datamonitor, “Business Trends: Understanding Your Education Technology Customer,” 2008

ii National Center for Education Statistics, Digest of Education Statistics, 2009

iii Band, William. The ROI of CRM Upgrades. Forrester Research. March 2009.

iv Student information systems serve a primary role of managing transactional data such as application processes

as well as serving as an institutional repository of academic history. These systems were not originally designed to

manage ongoing interactions and communications and often lack easy-to-use analytics and reporting capabilities.

v A standard definition widely attributed to the Noel-Levitz company. Retrieved July 15, 2009 from

www.ewu.edu/groups/academicaffairs/.../EM_White_Paper_9_06.pdf.

CRM for Higher Education: One Size Does Not Fit All

Education

national center

admissions office

vantage point

crucial point

student experience

admissions group

enrollment management

business concern