Step 4 – Single Sign-On. Eliminate log-in frustration. Single sign-on is a very easy way to unify the user experience and funnel end users to the portal. With single sign-on, students log onto your branded portal and with one click can access all the applications your institution utilizes. It is a simple technology that eliminates the time-consuming and frustrating process of having links redirect students away from your brand and your control where they need to reenter their credentials.
Step 5 – Targeted messaging. Communicate effectively with end users. Today’s students suffer from email overload, and communicating only by email, or worse, snail mail, will undercut your efforts to engage your students and keep them excited about being a student. Your students already have enough distractions and will simply begin to ignore an endless stream of emails from the administration, clubs, classes, housing and more. Instead, create targeted messages in the portal that cut through the clutter and deliver a tailored experience to specific groups of students. The short-term benefit is getting the right information to the right people. The long-term benefit is increasing engagement by ensuring your communication channels and your messages are branded and driven by your institution.
Step 6 – Mobility. Support mobile users through responsive, adaptive, and native mobile apps. All campus stakeholders are becoming increasingly web-centric and tech savvy, and a huge factor in this is mobility. According to a comScore report, smartphones and tablets now account for 60 percent of all online traffic, and a Campus Computing survey found that 83 percent of campuses had either activated mobile apps or were planning on doing so as of fall 2015 to engage the 83 percent of students who regularly use their smartphones. While these native apps are important—and need to be branded—institutions just beginning to enter the mobile game can begin by making their public-facing website, and then their intranet, easy to use on mobile devices. Consider the importance of this: a potential student sees a number of “likes” for your institution on Facebook and clicks on the link to view your homepage. Will your public-facing website look appealing on a mobile device? If not, you have work to do.
Consistent and effective branding of your web portal has the power to increase your perceived value as an institution and thereby increase retention rates and new student applications. Fortunately, it is now relatively easy and affordable to transform an aging student portal into a hub of engagement and marketing.
Anjli Jain is the executive director of CampusEAI.
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