Reflecting the increasingly competitive and commercialised nature of higher education, Coventry University has ambitious expansion plans with a strong focus on international recruitment.
Brilliant!
Steve Humber, Chief Digital Information Officer, Coventry University Group
The Challenge
Coventry is one of the UK’s top universities and is among the top 600 globally. It has around 35,000 students in the UK, and a further 16,000 studying abroad. Its student body is diverse, with more than 150 nationalities represented.
When Coventry got in touch with BrightGen, they had ambitious expansion plans with a strong focus on international recruitment. They needed the capability to deliver targeted marketing campaigns that would represent their world-class institution accurately. They needed a customer relationship management (CRM) solution that would allow them to remain competitive in a difficult and often crowded market.
Need for improvement
The university had a CRM solution which met their basic needs but offered limited scope for improvement. It was technically complicated and needed significant IT support even for simple day-to-day activities.
An even bigger concern was the real and imminent risk of the software provider failing to keep the system running. Recognising they needed an urgent CRM replacement which offered a robust and integrated solution that they could rely on, the university called in BrightGen to help them move to Salesforce.
Foundations for the Future
BrightGen recommended that the university adopt a two-phase approach. This would remove the immediate threat of losing their CRM altogether, while creating the space to think about longer-term requirements.
Having implemented Salesforce in more than 1,000 organisations and recognised for its project management service, BrightGen quickly got the university up and running with Salesforce. BrightGen configured they system to meet their specific requirements, all within agreed budget and timeframe.
Thanks to BrightGen’s advice and guidance, the university could continue to develop Salesforce in the future as they grow their longer-term student engagement plans. Even better, the university would be able to save money with significantly reduced licensing costs.
Equipping Users
A priority for the university was allowing their CRM users to be more self-sufficient with less reliance on IT support for basic tasks.
With training from BrightGen, users across the university are confidently getting the best from Salesforce. Additional training for a network of non-IT ‘super-users’ means a team of experts can deal with any day-to-day problems without relying on IT support.
Looking Ahead
The university is one year into a three-year strategy that will see them cement their position as a truly global university. With the adoption of Salesforce, they have the digital capability to achieve their ambitious goals.
BrightGen continued to support the university into live operation, and user feedback showed that it went well. So well, in fact, that the university’s Chief Digital Information Officer, Steve Humber, described the whole project as “brilliant.”
