Texting is the quickest and the most cost-efficient way to reach out to students. But educational institutions cannot simply blast texts to their student database without a proper plan and strategy. Let us visit a college campus with Mark, a Sr. Marketing Executive, and get a first-hand understanding of the kind of challenges a premier educational institution faces while drafting a successful Texting Strategy for Student Engagement.

1. Challenges faced by Educational Institutions
in executing a successful texting Strategy
Your one-stop shop for Business Texting

2. Mark’s first day as a Marketing Executive at the university
Mark, a seasoned Marketing Executive, was ecstatic about his new job at an elite higher education university in San Francisco. On
his first day of the job, he arrived a bit early and was more than impressed with the magnificent architecture. Groups of students
gaily chatting away, lush green lawns and booklovers sitting under the shade of high reaching pine trees made Mark nostalgic.

3. Observing college students
Mark was quite fascinated with the students on the campus, who were completely engrossed in their mobile phones and were
tapping at lightning speed. Mobiles were not so ubiquitous during Mark’s college days.

4. As he breezed past the classrooms, he heard some voices in the distance. They seemed to come from the admin office. He went
closer to find out. He saw some students surrounding the admin officer. The students were putting forth their complaints all at
once and the man was trying to pacify them.
Students putting forth their concerns
I am a part of the soccer
team but I did not receive
any message for the free
tickets that the college
distributed for sponsoring
the state level soccer match?
The college organized a
seminar on ’Careers in
wildlife conservation’
and didn’t even inform
wildlife enthusiasts?
I have paid my fees for all
the semesters in advance.
Why am I perpetually
bombarded with fee
payment reminders? It is
so annoying!

5. The distant clock tower struck ten. Mark suddenly remembered about his meeting with the new team. He quickly rushed to find
the conference room.
The clock strikes ten

6. Once there, he was greeted by a young and dynamic looking group of Marketing Executives. The admin officer was also there.
After exchanging pleasantries, Rob, the head of the department, started his address. “We have gathered to discuss some urgent
issues that have come up. Mark, I will bring you up to speed on this.”
Meeting the new team
We have all
gathered to discuss
some urgent issues
that have come up.

7. Texting for student engagement
“Almost a year ago, our team was looking for ways to meaningfully engage students in order to reduce the student drop-out rate.
Besides the multiple channels that we were already using to communicate with our students, we introduced texting, one of the
most cost-efficient communication channels around. We were among the first educational institutes to use texting for student
engagement.”

8. Benefits of using texting
On one hand, we were able to reach out to a huge database quickly, on the other hand, the students were quite appreciative of
the college’s modernized approach to communication.
Thanks to texting, the
university was able to
reach out to 10x more
number of students
with lesser effort.
Students found it
most convenient to
reply to texts and we
could save all the
communication into
our CRM. This was
most helpful in
gathering feedback
on proposed policy
changes.
Automated
communication led to
an increase in
operational efficiency
for our staff.
SMS has a 99% open
rate. Therefore, we
are assured that our
texts are being read
by the intended
audience.
Real-time information
sharing on class
cancellations and
other notifications
were welcomed by
the students.

9. Challenges in implementing the texting strategy
The admin officer, Tim, who had been at the direct receiving end of student’s complaints pointed out, “Students feel that we are sending them
texts that are not relevant to them for e.g. The simple way to send fee payment reminder is to send a message to all the students and append the
message with the statement ‘Please ignore if already paid’. Those who have already paid the fees are finding such texts annoying.”
Although we can see that
students are happy with our
strategy, we can also see that
their expectations have risen
manifold. They want us to know
their hobbies and interests and
customize our texts accordingly.

10. Addressing challenges head-on
Mark recounted the student complaints that he had overheard while walking for this meeting. He said “What if we had not missed sending the free
soccer ticket related texts to the sports enthusiast? We would have given him a memory of a lifetime and earned his loyalty for the college! I feel
what we are going though are some initial challenges in optimally and strategically using texting to get the most out of it.” The team was silent.
Looked like Mark had just hit the nail on the head.
See if there are 100 students in a
class and only 15 are defaulting in
payment, we are sending
irrelevant texts to remaining 85.
We are clearly wasting precious
time & resources!

11. Facing flak from team members
When the admin officer, Tim, asked some pointed questions, Mark enquired “How are we sending these texts to students?” Tim replied “Through
the CRM.” Mark said “What if our CRM is periodically updated so that it gives us all the information about student’s interests, hobbies, fee
payments etc. We will, of course, have to systematically collect these important pieces of information over a period of time.” Tim looked anything
but convinced. He scoffed “Mark I appreciate your enthusiasm on your first day at work. However, what you are saying is easier said than done.”
What you are saying makes
complete sense. But how in
the world are we supposed to
know that who is interested in
Shakespeare and who is a
sports aficionado?

12. Chalking out a concrete solution
By now Mark had understood that he would have to lay out a detailed plan to convince this team that their ‘One Size Fit all’ approach to texting
would not work. He asked for some time so that he could chalk out a detailed plan to find concrete solutions. Rob’s and Tim’s expressions conveyed
that they had the least amount of optimism in Mark’s approach. Mark could also see the scepticism in his colleague’s eyes. Will Mark be able to
come up with a solution that impresses all. Let’s read his eBook to find out.
Looks like I will have to
come up with a detailed
plan to convince these
people…
Mark has created an eBook
to bring home the point that
the first step towards
creating a successful SMS
strategy for Student
Engagement is Data
Collection, Creation and
Segmentation. Do you think
that through this eBook,
Mark will be able to persuade
his sceptical team members
and win their confidence?
Read your copy to find out.