Do you remember what it was like to apply for college? Think way back (yes, waaaaaaaay back) to the paperwork that never seemed to end. Between the applications, transcripts, SAT scores, ACT scores, confirmation letters, and whatever else you filled out, you were probably responsible for your own dead tree (a small tree). You applicants were giving admissions departments a lot of mail to sort through, and that was back when there were only what, about a hundred people on the earth (by my estimates)? Now compare that to today. Although most applications are now submitted electronically, admissions departments are still getting thousands of corresponding pieces of mail per week from which they must derive pursuable leads, and fast. Sometimes, the best way to do this is by outsourcing some of the admissions process.
Every prospective student wants to attend a school that they know churns out successful alumni, and every school wants that reputation. However, those top candidates everyone wants have piles and piles of brochures laying around from every school in the nation. As colleges and universities are competing for the most promising students, it’s important to sort through incoming mail quickly so they can be the first to start building relationships with those candidates. Meanwhile, the demand for higher education continues to grow, and processing this large volume of applications and credentials with existing resources becomes increasingly difficult. This is where the outsourcing comes in.
Outsourcing the paper-intensive processes of admissions and implementing content management and business process automation solutions has proven to be highly beneficial to many schools.
Here’s three reasons why:
1. High-volume conversion of paper documents into electronic files allows data to be rapidly extracted and indexed.
2. After employing these types of services, universities have reported turnaround times decreasing from 2 weeks to 48 hours and data accuracy increasing to over 99%.
3. Outsourcing some of the enrollment services enables admissions departments to process a much larger amount of mail with the same level of staffing so they can contact and nurture leads much sooner, giving them an advantage over competing schools. The same application and admissions process can still be practiced, but it’ll be a lot smoother and more efficient.
Outsourcing in higher education can not only mean a happier admissions experience for both students and staff members, but a better chance of enrolling more of the high quality candidates that schools desire. To learn more about how DataBank can help meet and exceed admissions goals, connect with one of our business process experts below!
