INDUSTRY: EDUCATION

The Ultimate Guide to CRM for Education

If you sell services to the education sector or work with pupils and students in education it’s key that you have data structured in a way that works for this sector. There are many CRMs available, but their generic nature and terminology make them unsuitable for Education.

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Introduction

What is a CRM for Higher Education?

There are two types of CRM architecture found in Higher Education, one which serves the Higher Education organisations themselves and one tailored to the businesses that work in the Higher Education space.

CRMs for Higher Education Organisations

An education CRM collects and holds key data for prospective students, current students and alumni. It helps manage and co-ordinate communications to students throughout their learning journey and beyond. Managed effectively an education CRM will provide a single view of the current throughput of students and a rich source of alumni data to build long lasting relationships upon.

CRMs for businesses working in Higher Education

For businesses selling services to Schools, Colleges and Universities an education CRM takes on a different role, enabling businesses to navigate the often complex organisational hierarchies of schools, trusts and LEAs or the formal structures of Universities that have Governing Bodies, Executive Leadership, Faculties and Departments.

Why is CRM Important for Colleges and Universities?

What’s important for Higher Education

Pupils and students rely on digital communication. In order to reach them with timely, relevant communications it’s important that Colleges and Universities adapt and centralise their management of data.

Knowing where a student is in their educational journey is key to providing tailored support and guidance which leads to the best outcome for them. Managing personalised tailored support at scale is a challenge for most organisations; colleges and universities are no exception. A CRM for education is key to achieving this.

What’s important for Businesses in Education

For businesses selling services in this space the same is true but instead of managing a student’s learning journey and communication, businesses need to be able to identify and manage the right decision makers and stakeholders to ensure that they are speaking with the right people, department or faculty at the right moment in the academic calendar. Often roles, responsibilities and emails are shared, making relationship management a key challenge. A CRM for education provides the best possible basis to build a platform for opportunities and sales in the education space.

CRM contact lifecycles and how they differ

Knowing where a student is in their educational journey and where a prospect is in its buying journey are two very different lifecycles and illustrate why a tailored CRM is so important.

We’ve implemented the HubSpot CRM and tailored it speciﬁcally for schools, colleges, universities and businesses that sell services in this space and the results have been transformational.

Student lifecycle

School Leaver

Admissions

Student

Under Graduate

Post Graduate

Alumni

Prospect lifecycle

Contact

Lead

MQL

SQL

Opportunity

Customer

SIX KEY FEATURES

How CRM Transforms Student Recruitment, Engagement, and Retention

The lifeblood of Schools, Colleges and Universities are the students themselves through the successful onboarding of new students and the off boarding of graduates and ﬁnal year students.

1.

A CRM for education ensures that all student data is collected successfully, managed centrally and held securely.

2.

Accurate data ensures that every communication is personalised and tailored to the student and their needs making them feel supported and valued rather than just one of many.

3.

Centralised records of qualiﬁcations and graduations provides a rich database of alumni to nurture and build connections with.

4.

At scale, organisations can analyse data segments and the lifecycle of each student ensuring an up to date snapshot of every student year.

5.

Student onboarding at scale becomes a breeze with accurate data, that facilitates not only the onboarding process itself but advanced segmentation to support changes in course choice or ﬁnding complementary extent options or subjects.

6.

At a granular level faculties and departments can see their current enrolments, course history and even the tutors delivering each course.

CRM transformation for
businesses in education

For businesses selling into this space, the beneﬁts of accurate up to date data are the same, but the ability to make sales outreach calls at exactly the right time to exactly the right decision makers and departments is game changing. The academic year is very rigid.

Traditionally business have wasted signiﬁcant time and energy trying to navigate the complex organisational structures of Education. A CRM for education changes that and helps businesses selling into the Education space close sales and opportunities at a higher velocity.

Operationally, a CRM for education helps businesses manage the after sales and delivery process with a framework that supports the management of contract or projects and crucially customer support after a project is completed.

KEY BENEFITS OF

CRM for Higher Education

For Schools, Colleges and Universities a CRM for higher education provides numerous benefits

The single source of truth for students, alumni and faculty
Functionality to tailor the CRM to the exact terminology used by the organisation which ensures successful team-wide adoption
Signiﬁcant time and cost saving with streamlined administrative processes and automation
Real time tracking of where candidates, students and alumni are in their academic journey
Data driven communication ensuring highly tailored personal communications
Fast and effective onboarding and off boarding processes ensuring increased enrolment and retention
Data prompts to ensure that you hold not only the right data but deep segmentation to help you match student with the right courses, subjects, peers and lecturers
A pre-built platform designed speciﬁcally for education ensures a low total cost of ownership especially when compared with custom built CRMS
Reassurance that through centralised data you’re giving the best student and faculty experience.

For businesses selling services in the education space a CRM for education transforms their sales and operational processes providing:

A single source of truth for prospects, leads and opportunities
A predictable revenue pipeline which helps businesses forecast where revenue will fall in relation to the academic year
A data structure that enables the proﬁling and segmentation of the addressable education market
ABM tools to help target and nurture the right contacts, departments and faculties
Lead management and productivity tools to help sales reps manage their book of business and co-ordinate onsite school or college visits
Buyer proﬁling to ensure that reps are speaking to the right people
Centralised data to ensure that closed won opportunities are correctly and efﬁciently passed on to onboarding, delivery and customer success teams

MUST HAVE FEATURES IN A

Higher Education CRM

We’ve implemented HubSpot’s SMART CRM for numerous businesses working in the Education sector and for organisations delivering higher education and the key requirement in every case is a CRM data structure that represents the type of data that educational organisations hold and a naming convention that is recognisable and understandable.

Terms like Contacts, Companies and Deals aren’t appropriate in this sector, instead CRM objects like Student, Alumni, Faculty, Department and Campus are recognisable and instantly accessible. Courses, Qualiﬁcations and Certiﬁcations provide deep insights into where a student is in their educational journey, where they have been and what possible opportunities lie ahead for them. For businesses delivering classroom graphics or AV solutions for example, the organisational structure of School, Trust and LEA is far more effective than Contact or Company.

A tailored and relevant CRM architecture is a must have in a Higher Education CRM, it provides the foundations for accessible and intuitive data and a solid basis for HubSpot’s productivity tools.

In addition to a tailored data structure, in our experience a CRM for education must provide.

Student application and enrolment tracking
Automated personalised responses whether that’s email, SMS or Chatbots
Complete student lifecycle tracking and management
Functionality to integrate with an external LMS or SIS
Functionality to create login portals for students, staff and parents
AI powered insights to help interpret and manage student data at scale
Advanced reporting that can surface key information from custom architectures like those mentioned above.

For businesses requirements are similar but more focussed on a commercial lead and opportunity management process.

ABM tools to manage the maximum addressable education market
Lead management and buyer proﬁling
Playbooks to guide sales execs in the most effective method of outreach
Opportunity pipelines to manage the movement of opportunities and sales
Email automation and sequencing to help outreach at scale
A tool kit of resources to support the sales process including (Case studies, trackable documents and snippets)
In app quoting and proposal creation

HOW TO CHOOSE

The Right CRM for your Institution

The selection of any CRM system should always start with your data. Can the CRM that you are considering hold and structure your data in an easy and accessible way? Can it present it using the terminology you are used to and with the associations that you need. So often we see educational organisations struggling with the adoption of new CRM systems purely because users found it difﬁcult to use and alien to the way they work.

The same is true for businesses selling services in this space, a CRM that only holds Contacts, Leads and opportunities has little relevance when the business sells to Academies and Trusts.

Once you’ve established that the CRM can accommodate your data, ask yourself the following ﬁve key questions.

Five key questions to ask yourself

Is it easy to get data in and out of the CRM

When you’re considering a CRM pay special attention to data import and export. You need to be able to easily get data in and out of the CRM whether that is through bulk import, form submission and api. The movement of data is key to implementation and the ongoing effectiveness of a system
Is the user interface easy to use

A successful CRM is used daily and in order for it to be used daily it needs to have an easy and intuitive user interface where users can quickly ﬁnd and access the data that they need.
Can the CRM grow with your organisation?

The needs of your organisation will likely change over time as educational institutions merge or businesses grow. Can the CRM accommodate changes in data structure and team size. Is it easy to make these changes yourself or will it require developer support.
Should the CRM be Cloud-Based or On-Premise?

More and more businesses are opting for Cloud Based CRM solutions that are accessible anywhere. Is this the right choice for your organisation or would an on-premise solution provide better control over your data. Does a Cloud Based solution offer more ﬂexibility for future growth. What are the management implications of the two routes.
What does implementation and training look like?

Do you have a team that will implement the CRM and provide training or would you outsource this? If you outsource would you want an implementation partner to implement everything for you or would you want to be guided and your team implement it. If you are considering an implementation partner, have they completed a project like this before in the education sector?

Typically CRM implementation can take anything from 90 days to a year. Implementation is often delivered remotely or onsite or a combination of the two. CRMs typically require a signiﬁcant investment so it’s important that you achieve the fastest time to value. As a guide Monday onboarding is three to 6 weeks, HubSpot and Zoho onboarding is typically 90 to 120 days, Microsoft Dynamics and Salesforce onboarding is six to 12 months. Implementation time depends on the complexity of the requirements and most implementation partners provide guided and hand-on options. For particularly complex implementations look for implementation partners that offer Process Discovery and CRM Architecture Development. This will ensure that you get your data architecture conﬁgured for success from the outset.

THE TOP TEN

Best Higher Education CRM Systems

There are a number of software vendors that offer CRMs designed for Education.

As HubSpot Partners we specialise in the conﬁguration of HubSpot and have completed a number of implementations for organisations that work with students and also businesses that sell services into this sector.

To help you in your selection of a CRM for education we’ve summarised 10 potential education CRMS for your consideration.

by Techosolutions

Campus Management

CRM	SUITABILITY	CORE STRENGTH
CRM Hubspot CRM	SUITABILITY Custom CRM architecture and easy to use UI	CORE STRENGTH Easy setup & communication
CRM Salesforce Education Cloud	SUITABILITY Large Multi Departmental Universities	CORE STRENGTH Enterprise scale
CRM Element451	SUITABILITY AI Driven Engagement	CORE STRENGTH Automation & personalisation
CRM Slate by Technolutions	SUITABILITY Admissions/Enrolment Management	CORE STRENGTH Deep admissions workﬂow
CRM Blackbaud CRM	SUITABILITY Alumni & Fundraising	CORE STRENGTH Advancement & Donor Tools
CRM TargetX	SUITABILITY Salesforce based enrolment success	CORE STRENGTH Education workﬂows & Analytics
CRM Campus Management	SUITABILITY Campus operations & management	CORE STRENGTH Broad Institutional Management
CRM Ellucian CRM	SUITABILITY Institutions with Ellucian SIS	CORE STRENGTH Uniﬁed Student Data
CRM Creatrix Campus	SUITABILITY Integrated CRM + Campus Systems	CORE STRENGTH Automated workﬂows & Analytics
CRM SchoolMint	SUITABILITY K-12 Enrollment	CORE STRENGTH Simple enrolment and family comms

IMPLEMENTATION GUIDES

How to Successfully Deploy a CRM in Higher Education

Whether you are migrating to a new CRM or setting up an education CRM for the ﬁrst time there are a number of key steps that we recommend you take to ensure success.

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Know your data

Data is the foundation of your CRM so it’s crucial that it is structured in the right way.
Consider what data sets you work with and how they are associated with one another. If your organisation is a college or University you will likely need to segment Enrolments, Students and Alumn but you will also need to track Departments, Faculties and Teaching Staff.

For businesses selling services into the Education sector, you will likely work with Schools, Academies or Trusts or at the higher education level Governing Bodies, Executive Leadership, Faculties and Departments. Sketch out a simple mind-map or Miro Board to record your data sets and how they are associated. Create a shape for each data set and draw links between associated sets.

Establish how easy it is to get at that data

When you embark on a CRM implementation of migration, your existing data will need to be imported into the new CRM. Look at your existing systems and evaluate how easy it will be to extract the data and its associations. Is it a simple process or does it require development support to perform look-ups on that data.

Document your processes

Your day to day processes sit on top of your data. By analysing your processes it will help you see if there are any gaps in your data but will also help you determine what works really well and what you would like to improve in your move to the new CRM. Most CRM implementation Partners will ask to see your processes so it’s important that you document them, even if they are going to change. Think about the enrolment process, graduation day and alumni off boarding. For Business selling into this space what steps does a lead in Education go through before you classify it as an opportunity.

Create a CRM project team

Build a team of individuals to work with you during your evaluation of education CRMS but also during the implementation phase. The team need to have a full operational understanding of your existing data and processes and be able to make decisions during the conﬁguration of the new CRM. Keep the project team nice and lean with a maximum of 5 members and look to appoint one member as the project manager. Most CRM implementation partners will have their own project managers but it’s important that you have a project manager on your team to co-ordinate tasks within your organisation.

Be realistic about workload and time commitments

Implementing a CRM is a signiﬁcant task for any organisation. Don’t underestimate how much time and resource it will take and ensure that the project team have the capacity within their day to day roles to take on the project even if you are using and implementation partner.

Avoid committees

When building your project team, look for team members that can answer fundamental business questions without having to seek approval. CRM implementation partners typically ask a lot of questions and propose a variety of solutions. If approval has too be sought via committee it will slow your implementation and hinders effectiveness.

Select the right implementation Partner

Choosing the right implementation partner is key. Look for a Partner with experience implementing CRMS but also implementing CRMS for Education. Ideally you want a Partner that can join your project team and ﬁt in as if he or she were employed by you. Chemistry is key so look for a partner that will work collaboratively but will also add value by challenging you and your team.

Think about team adoption from the outset

Migrating to a new CRM is a big change. Think about how this will affect your team. Consider developing an internal adoption comms strategy to document how this change will affect users at each level of the organisation. Also consider the best way to train the team, would small users groups be more effective than large groups, would in person training be better than remote training, if training is remote can training calls be recorded? Ask your implementation partner for support in developing this strategy.

NEXT STEPS

See the HubSpot CRM tailored for Education

Book a free discovery call with one of our CRM managers and ﬁnd out how HubSpot can be tailored to your educational setting. During the discovery call we will

Show you a HubSpot CRM tailored to Education
Advise on your speciﬁc use case
Provide detail pricing & next steps

YOUR QUESTIONS ANSWERED

FAQs

Detailed below are questions that we often get asked about CRMs for Higher Education, but if you have a speciﬁc question that is not answered here please don’t hesitate to contact us and a member of the team will provide an answer for you.

What’s the difference between a Higher Ed CRM and a traditional CRM?

This is very much dependent on the CRM that you select and the implementation partner undertaking the implementation. See section ‘How to Choose the Right CRM for Your Institution’ which has an implementation guide for each CRM. For HubSpot CRM we typically implement it within 90 to 120 days.

How long does it take to implement a CRM for a university?

Can a CRM integrate with existing student information systems (SIS)?

What’s the typical cost of a Higher Education CRM?

How does AI enhance CRM capabilities in higher education?

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