How Can We Integrate CRM? You're Asking the Wrong Question

With competition, rapidly changing demographics, and the need to be more productive with scare resources, many higher education institutions are looking to CRM as a competitive advantage.

Commonly known as Customer Relationship Management, Constituent Relationship Management, or simply as Relationship Management, CRM investments at colleges and universities are growing. Datamonitor projects technology spending on CRM in the markets of the US, UK, Germany, France and Australia will grow from $184.9 million in 2007 to $324.5 million in 2012.

CRM is a professional interest of mine since the early 2000’s. I had an opportunity to help lead a corporate global CRM initiative in 2001 and I consult with higher education institutions on the topic today. Given the range of technology investments already made over the last 10-15 years within higher education, I often hear the question, “how can we integrate CRM with all of this?”

In fact, this is the wrong question all together.

Conventional Wisdom: CRM is a Technology

The underlying misperception is that by purchasing CRM technology your college and university can do CRM. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Unfortunately for those that take this approach, the investment result of thousands of dollars represents nothing more than a glorified contact management system. How do we know this? While CRM is a relatively new concept in our industry, the road is well-paved  - with success and failures - in the corporate world.

What’s Wrong with "CRM is a Technology" Thinking

Three reasons come to mind:

1. It’s About Interactions, Not Transactions
Unlike the transactional student information, financial or human resource systems on campuses today, CRM technology supports interactions between the institution and people. Often the strategy and supporting processes that define how a college or university attracts and engages constituents across communication channels are rarely intentional. Transactions are fairly standard from institution to institution.

• Run payroll? Understood.
• Process an application for admission or financial aid? The steps are clear.
• Respond to a parent or student? Call or write three colleges or universities and see for yourself.

2. The Benefits Accrue to Management
Consider CRM for the admission office. Wouldn’t you like to know the up-to-the minute status on interactions and activities with your high value student segments? As a VP of Enrollment or Dean of Admission, this information could provide leading insight into how your class is shaping up beyond traditional funnel metrics as well as demonstrate admission resource and team productivity.

There’s one problem.

The folks you want to measure are also the ones who will bear the lion share of tracking. It’s one thing to have the ability to track people and it is something else entirely to do it. If the all of the perceived benefits accrue to the management team, your front line staff will revolt.

3. It’s a Selfish View
With CRM technology, we can target our students and push more of our messages to them across a variety of communication channels.

This is an inside-out view of the world.  Instead, consider how your institution might improve the enrollment experience for prospective students, their parents, and key influencers. In other words, CRM works best when you start with goals – your constituents, not yours.

Enlightened Thinking: Higher Education CRM is a Strategy First

CRM is a philosophy and strategy, supported by people, processes, and technology, designed to improve your student and key constituent interactions. From a recruiting and admissions perspective, a CRM approach encompasses the activities your college or university uses to understand, target, and respond to prospective students and key constituents across online and offline communication channels as well as internal service departments. Done correctly, CRM can significantly improve the quality of relationships with students, and their influencers at every point of the student lifecycle, from the prospective student applying for admission to a lifelong learner.

Ask the Right Question

So what is the right question, when considering a CRM project?  What is our CRM strategy and what tools do we need to support it?

Without a strategy, CRM can be hijacked as another IT transactional system project that puts the implementation of the tool, ahead of the core business needs. 

Successful CRM initiatives start by identifying what (the strategy) you are trying to achieve, define how (functionality, information, infrastructure, process) you will achieve it, and finally evaluate the results so that you can continue the ongoing process of maturing your institutional CRM capability.

Comments

[dissertation writing help]

Excellent Blog every one can get lots of information for any topics from this blog nice work keep it up.