The technology solution
While it’s unfair to cast all the blame on college administrators for these student withdrawals—well-known issues with admissions criteria help explain why retention rates are so disappointing—it is almost certainly administration offices that will bear the brunt of the criticism. Fair or not, they are on the front lines and must take the first steps to resolve student attrition.
Despite what people might think, reducing tuition costs is one of the least effective methods of increasing student satisfaction. What does make a difference is spending on instructional/academic support and student amenities, both of which fall under the category of “customer experience.”
Administration officials, academic counselors, and financial aid representatives want to be helpful, but their efforts are often undermined by the sheer number of students they work with. Similarly, frustrated students who spend hours waiting in line to just submit paperwork are unlikely to feel positively about the institution that wasted a chunk of their day. That’s why many of them look at the lines snaking around the block and just walk away.
Digital to the rescue
Customer experience management (CEM) software can make a big difference in keeping students enrolled. By using modern technologies such as mobile check-ins, customer surveys, and data analytics, schools can foster meaningful connections by reducing the frustration, stress, and anxiety.
In addition to tracking interactions, customer experience management is powerful because of the feedback mechanisms it enables. In the private sector, managers use CEM software to capture and analyze data to improve their service as they interact with customers, leading to greater alignment between customer needs and the business’s offerings. That agility is only possible because this data is integrated within the same systems that also perform marketing, sales, and customer service functions.
In the context of a university administration office, this kind of feedback mechanism might look like a short survey immediately after the completion of an appointment. Since it integrates naturally into the overall experience, people are more likely to make use of the function, making this a great method of finding out what’s working and what’s not in the words of the students themselves. In this way, CEM technology can help administrators collect real-time feedback by making it a seamless process, unlike traditional surveys that make respondents feel like they’re doing you a favor.
Embracing technology
Attrition is a serious obstacle for many colleges’ financial futures, with no easy answer. However, universities may underestimate how much the inability to easily meet with advisors and other staff negatively affects the college experience. By incorporating modern mobile technologies, higher ed institutions can make measurable advances in the fight for student retention.
Alex Bäcker is founder and chief executive officer of Qless, whose mission is to eliminate waiting in line from the face of the Earth and serves on the California Institute of Technology’s information sciences and technology board of advisors.
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