In one of my latest articles, I talked about my adventure attending Albertus Magnus College to study English as a second language.

 

But before arriving in Connecticut, I had to endure a long, messy procedure. We are talking around the early '90s. Around 1990 my parents agreed that it would be a nourishing experience for me to leave home for a while and learn something new. I had to track down first how to study abroad. Found a little office here that offered some study programs, but since I was only 17, I was not allowed to enroll (Chicago, or New York, for example). Imagine all of the paperwork I had to do only to find the right school for me! How easy it seems to do that task now still amazes me!

 

In 1992, I decided to come back to the US as an international student. Before arriving, there was a lot to do in my home country. I contacted several colleges and universities - by phone, not mobile! - to find out about their programs, how to enroll, and then mailed ( and I'm talking about snail mail! Remember that? ) a request for them to send me a book with different educational programs, requirements, enrollment, and housing costs, etc. Oh! And kept my fingers crossed that the brochure wouldn't get lost at the post office.

 

I feel flabbergasted every time I think about what a long road we have walked since those days. Let's imagine there's a way to link prospective learners to your university in one marketing platform. Imagine no more! I'll tell you all in the next paragraphs!

Integrating Drupal and Salesforce

Salesforce is a Customer Relationship Management solution that brings your university and students together. Drupal, on the other hand, is a Content Management System. Together they make an explosive marketing platform. When potential and actual leads (or students, in this case) are hosted in a CRM, you can get a crystal clear view of all of the information and follow-ups. The information, for example, can be shared data through forms, interactions with marketing campaigns, interactions with client service, etc.

 

These are some of the benefits you gain by integrating Drupal and Salesforce:

• You'll never miss a prospective student due to instant email notifications. It doesn't matter if you are not at working hours. You can receive those notifications on your mobile and act accordingly to capture those leads.
• Easy to create, share and update data through Drupal and Salesforce. This way, you can build better relationships with potential leads and act accordingly. When Drupal and Salesforce interact with the data, everything is updated. You don't need third-party applications to help you with the commercial side.
• Marketing automatization: This allows you to send automatic personalized emails to the prospective students (or leads) and also get a lead scoring to detect who is more prepared or qualified to receive a concrete offer. Also, you can get a better segmentation with demographic data based on sex, age, location, etc., which is a big plus. For example, while reading the given data, you realize there are people from a specific country browsing your website. You can start an advertising campaign specifically for that country and gain international students (like me).
• Connect to other social media apps and handle those accounts together.
• User-friendly: Not only for the administrative staff but for students too.

And there are more benefits!

The integration of Drupal and Salesforce not only helps your marketing platform. As an extra, it will empower your campus experience.

 

Cornell University created a Student Opportunity Marketplace that allowed students abroad to navigate through different departments and across platforms, promoting opportunities for them and streamlining a funnel into the unique application process for each program. They have hundreds of unique opportunities available, from study abroad programs to internships and beyond. Until recently, students had to go through each department’s list to find one that fit their needs. Now they have all the information centralized.

 

“ Students come to our site to find things and to do things,” says Rebecca Joffrey, Cornell's IT innovation officer. “ Drupal is good for finding the information needed, the first part. When students do something and take an action, we want to leverage Salesforce to personalize the engagement. ” Feedback from students has been overwhelmingly positive. One student said: “ This is the most elegant and useful website I’ve ever seen at Cornell. ”

 

At Awkbit, we strive to provide the best digital experience for your university's needs. Are you ready to take your website and marketing platform to Prom? The limo pick-up is on us. Let's dance, shall we?

 

+1 (786) 321-3247 Mara Destefanis - Marketing

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