How standard operating procedures can help you grow your education agency

Stefan

It’s not just about documenting your steps — it’s about your ed. agency’s growth

I built an education agency business from the ground up. There came a time when I realised, I couldn’t do everything myself. That’s when I took a deep breath and decided to hire other education counsellors to help. Great decision – but done the wrong way.

When it came to training the new counsellors for my education agency business, I went with the show-and-tell method. I thought and hoped they would learn by copying me. It would have been great, if I could remember everything off the top of my head, and also hope they wouldn’t forget either. We all know that’s not how the brains work though.

The whole exercise ended up in a self-made chaos.

Sometimes I would cringe when I would see them interacting with students. Other times left me wondering why they would call me to ask for basic instructions when they could have been able to figure it out themselves. Everyone was frustrated.

Instead of taking advantage of the opportunity to train and empower people, I disempowered them by having an attitude that would send the wrong message: if you want something done right, do it yourself.

What are SOPs?

You can’t imply expectations. You have to clearly tell people what’s expected of them and give them the support and resources they need to meet the expectations you set. This would mean transferring best practices from head to paper.

As an education agent, when you hear of the term SOP, you would most likely think of Statement of Purpose. It’s a professional defect, I know… In this case though, the term SOPs refers to Standard Operation Procedures.

Standard Operation Procedures help everyone get on the same page about what to do, when and how to do it, and why. It’s not only about documenting the steps – it’s about your business growth.

A simple definition of standard operating procedures would be: SOPs are step-by-step processes required to complete specific, repetitive tasks.

Here are some examples of when you might need some SOPs :

      • Student services functions like onboarding and offboarding students

      • HR functions like recruiting new education counsellors

      • Operations like creating and processing applications

      • Accounting tasks like invoicing

Good SOPs clearly show whose responsibility is to complete certain tasks. They state the goal of the process, when it needs to be done, the steps involved, and what resources are available to complete the process.

In a nutshell, SOPs help you transfer the best practices knowledge you developed in your head, to documented processes. Once those processes are documented, the standard operating procedures allow someone else to complete those tasks at the same standard as you would be doing them yourself.

The benefits

You might think it will feel rigid to have SOPs for all the processes in your business however, in reality, standard operating procedures are the first step to enable you to start working ON your business and not just IN your business.

Before you start creating standard operating procedures, think about why you are creating them. Here are a few of the benefits you’ll notice in your business:

1. Enable business growth

The more students you recruit, the more your team will grow. By your team I’m not only referring to employees. It can mean anything from outsourcing tasks to freelancers to employing permanent staff. Having SOPs means you can serve more students by scaling replicating processes and maintain quality.

Standard operating procedures will also help your team grow. They won’t be wondering anymore if they’re doing things right.

2. Make processes more efficient

Standardizing and systemizing your education agency will help you see where every process fits in, how well the process fits in and if there’s a better way to do it. You’ll begin to see how each process improves your education agency, or not. It’s not only about documenting your processes; it’s also about ensuring those processes are right to begin with.

Once you manage to standardize and document your business processes, it will be easier for you to find solutions to automate those processes. For example, if there’s a process that involves moving information between apps that you have to do frequently, you can explore automating that process.

3. Scale your training

SOPs can become training manuals. When a new staff comes in, they’ll be able to catch up without you micromanaging.

4. Maintain quality standards

If you want your education agency to give your students the same quality consistently, you will need a framework in place that ensures that everyone provides a uniform service even in your absence.

Why hire staff if you’ll be doing everything yourself? Having SOPs in place will make sure everyone gave students the same high-quality service every time.

5. Have a holiday

Don’t feel guilty when you take a holiday. If you feel like things will fall apart when you’re gone, work towards changing that. That should be enough incentive to get those standard operating procedures in place.

How to write an SOP that improves your education agency

Focus on the benefits of creating SOPs. Here’s a guide to how you can create SOPs that will help you get on a nice holiday:

Identify core processes that need to be standardised

Which tasks in your education agency are repetitive: you do them a lot, and they need to be done in the same way every time, with little or no variation? You won’t need to have SOPs for little things – only processes with lots of steps.

Map and document the processes

Write down the processes in clear, simple and short sentences. Flow charts help too. They don’t add the context, but they can be a great first step for anyone first learning process. If you already have a team, include them in this process. Don’t create processes that people don’t identify with. Your team might have already figured out a simpler way of doing the same process.

Implement the SOPs and communicate the processes

Everyone on your team will need to be on the same page regarding the documentation. Don’t just assume your team will notice the tweaked process you did in order to streamline it, communicate this to them.

Make it clear why they need to follow these procedures. People are more inclined to take SOPs seriously if they understand the significance of the documentation and how it will help the business.

Monitor and review your SOPs regularly

Just like business plans or marketing plans, it’s easy to create SOPs, feel a sense of accomplishment, then let them collect dust.

When I open a box, I toss aside the user manual and only consult it when things have gone wrong. SOPs are not like that. They are living documents that you need to update whenever something changes in the workflow or when you find new ways to do things more efficient.

Automate anything you can

The aim in SOPs is to find processes that can be fully automated.

Automating processes will save you and your team valuable time to focus on doing work that will give you a competitive advantage, delight your students and encourage growth. The exercise of creating SOPs, you’re basically reviewing all your education agency processes and will figure out which ones you can automate.

If you have the right processes in place, you’ll be able to scale your education agency and open more locations. If you believe you’re stuck, standard operating procedures are an easy way to get back on track.

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5 hints that it’s time to move from spreadsheets to application management software

Stefan

Spreadsheets are great when you make calculations – but they’re not the best for applications management.

However, many education agency businesses still use spreadsheets to manage their entire application cycle (from prospective student, to quoting, to reporting and everything in between). This brings about a common set of challenges that can cause inefficiencies, frustration and lack of insight.

Inteleagent’s application management solution has helped many education agencies create more efficient processes and experience increased productivity and profitability.

Here’s a list of five signs that show your education agency could improve results by switching from spreadsheets to application management software:

1. Your team of education consultants work with multiple versions of application data

If your education agency uses a system of multiple spreadsheets, this means it lacks a central location to store application-related data and documents. As a result, information is stored in multiple locations, such as various worksheets, cloud storage and email.

Your education consultants spend a lot of time searching for the right information related to an application or a student. On top of it, it’s hard to make sure the information you find is accurate.

Information in spreadsheets is easy to change and spreadsheets are prone to formula or data entry mistakes. No wonder research shows 88% of spreadsheets contain errors.

An application management software provides one central location to store all application related information. Your team will have easy access to the correct information and your database stays accurate and secure.

2. You lack visibility into application progress

Knowing the progress of each application you process is essential for running a successful education agency. Having visibility into where each application is in its journey enables you to identify potential problems and make necessary adjustments to increase the application turnaround times.

Spreadsheets are time consuming to maintain and don’t reflect the correct information or provide a picture in real time of how your applications are progressing.

If you’re finding it difficult to understand the status of your applications (for example, if your education consultants are running at capacity), it’s most likely because your spreadsheet system doesn’t provide an easy, real-time visibility into the progress of the applications.

Inteleagent’s pipelines and filters provides you with a clear picture of your applications status and keeps your finger on the pulse of your education agency.

3. You don’t have the right insights to make informed decisions

The quality of data you have access to, about your education agency business, determines your ability to make informed decisions. For example, producing an accurate report about the number of applications managed by your education consultants or the revenue each education consultant generated for your agency in particular quarter, requires that you leverage data from all your applications.

Aggregating data from multiple spreadsheets is a manual effort and it’s time consuming. It also requires an amount of expertise with data analytics. If your data contains errors, the reports you generate from your spreadsheets are likely to contain errors. This reduces the validity of your insights.

If it’s difficult to get the right insights you need, when you need them, it’s definitely a hint that you need the benefits an applications management software offer.

One of the best parts of an applications management software is the ability to use applications data to efficiently generate reports (for example, Inteleagent reporting features enable you to customise reports and get critical insights into almost every aspect of your education agency operations). If you have access to better reporting tools, you will work smarter and get necessary insights into productivity, performance, workflow and profitability.

4. Your education agency lacks process consistency

There are many ways you can organise, format and display information in a spreadsheet. Spreadsheets are designed to be customisable. This might be useful for financial modelling however, it’s a challenge in creating a repeatable process and consistency across your organisation.

Education consultant teams that use spreadsheets for application management often find it difficult to maintain process consistency or might end up with very complicated workflows.

Inteleagent is designed to standardise the way your education agency tracks applications progress, so you can increase efficiency and produce reliable results.

5. You want to increase efficiency and improve education agency performance

While spreadsheets may have helped you get your education agency operations off the ground, they fall short when it comes to key functionality to manage applications efficiently. As a result, inefficient application management can limit your skills to take your education agency business to the next step in its growth.

If you want to grow your education agency, it’s important that your core systems and processes are scalable to support your success.

Inteleagent provides your education agency with an easy way to capture and leverage student data, sync across other tools (such as marketing automation software) and continually improve operations.

Making the switch

If your education agency is experiencing some or all of the challenges mentioned above and you’re ready to learn more about making the switch to Inteleagent’s application management software, we’re here to help.

Changing the way you run your education agency business can be daunting however, with the right support and assistance, you’ll experience the benefits and improved application management in no time.

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What is a quotation? The importance of accurate quoting for your education agency

Stefan

Producing accurate quotations is one of the most important aspects of running an education agency and key to successfully closing an international student application.

Quotations are essential to winning a student, and convert that student into a successful application.

However, education agents often underestimate the costs of an application to a student, missing out on disclosing the costs of application fee, health insurance, visa application fees, tuition fees, initial deposits, service fees, etc… Underestimating the costs can and often do lead to losing the student’s interest.

In this blog post, we provide an overview of quotations for education agencies and explain why accurate quotations are so important to improving results.

What is a quotation and the difference between an estimate vs a quote?

Oftentimes, the terms ‘estimate’ and ‘quote’ are used interchangeably, as they both serve a similar function and require a similar costing process to complete; however, they have one key difference which is important to outline:

A quotation outlines the exact price that the student will pay for the application, including additional costs that the student will incur apart from tuition fees. Upon acceptance, the education agent is contractually obligated to provide the service at the specified price based on the terms that are outlined in the quote (unless the scope of the work changes and a new quote is presented and agreed upon.)

An estimate, on the other hand, is not contractually binding. Students understand that the prices outlined are subject to change as the application progresses to reflect a greater level of detail about required resources, scope, or timelines. 

Using a software such as an application management system to manage and track your applications will help you not miss any of the components of a quotation and will enable you to create an accurate quotation for your students. 

Accurate quotations start with accurate data

The key to creating accurate quotation is accurate data. Using a quotation software designed for education agencies, such as Inteleagent, will ensure your data is stored and used in a proper way, and your quotations are accurate.

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How to use online marketing to grow your education agency

Stefan

The mistake most education agents make when trying to sell their services online is that they send the traffic straight to the offer…

It’s proven that most students take 5-12 interactions before they decide to purchase. Sending cold traffic directly to an offer will not bring you the results you wanted.

By having a channel such as email or social media to reach out to your students again, you can then deliver value and build a relationship with them. As a result, they are much more likely to come to you next time you send them an offer.

Use an all-in-one CRM such as Inteleagent to manage new students, their applications, automate the follow-up, track student applications through their lifecycle, report on profitability, and more…

Try this email course to learn how to onboard new students once they go through the funnel.

Keeping track of student information

Stefan

Any of these sound familiar?

  • It feels like you’re always millimetres away from missing a student visa deadline
  • Responding to student emails and remembering to follow up with students sometimes slips through the cracks
  • Student info is just in too many places – Excel? Google Sheets? Actual PAPER?! – and it takes forever to find what you need
  • You just can’t afford hiring a virtual assistant to keep you on top of things
  • You just can’t keep track of every communication channel you use (Emails, phone calls and in-person meetings)

What do you think all the above have in common? I’ll help you out. They all come down to one thing – being organised.

These issues are not affecting only education and migration agencies. According to IDC, a research firm in the field, poor efficiency costs companies anywhere between 20% to 30% of their annual revenue. Most of these inefficiencies are related to client information.

Manually tracking student information is no easy fit, but once you address these challenges, you’ll be able to:

  • avoid getting in touch with the student too often (and sounding unprofessional)
  • reduce the margin for error by bringing student information all in one place
  • understand the student you like working with and the ones you don’t (those you should avoid working with)
  • keep your head above water

This article will address how to address the most common challenges that stop you from keeping track of your student’s information.

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1.How to keep track of student’s information

Alright, so you have X number of students, each of them with basic information like…

  • Name
  • Email
  • Phone number
  • Address

And then you have everything else, such as financial info, the progress within your pipeline, etc…

The biggest challenge of staying organised is getting all student information stored in one place. Who wants to keep track of all this information in his head or on paper? You don’t want to have a paper trail that can further lose you more student information.

Resolving this challenge requires… *drum roll*

A CRM!!!

A CRM?! What is a CRM?

What is customer relationship management and how should you choose the right CRM solution for your business?

‘Customer relationship management’ or ‘CRM’ for short, translated to an education agency, refers to the technology and processes that a education agencies use to manage their students and relationships, both external and internal, such as:

  • Email subscribers
  • Student leads
  • Student applications
  • Education Institutions
  • Offices
  • Employees

Don’t be tricked by the word ‘customers’ in the term: although one goal is to use this customer data to build and strengthen relationships. CRM can also be used to manage relationships with individuals at all touchpoints.

A customer relationship management tool (CRM tool) for your education agency keeps track of all your students (new, warm, hot, and cold) as well as current students. It’s the best way to keep track of students.

After creating student contacts, a customizable CRM lets you create pipelines that show students’ progress through stages such as: new, warm, hot, or cold, as well as pipelines that tracks their applications through stages such as: Created, Submitted, GTE, Offer Letter, CoE, etc…

This type of flow for keeping track of students helps you keep them from “slipping through the cracks.”

Convinced that adopting CRM software is the next step in your growth plans? Then your first task is to figure out which one will work best for you and your team, and then to evaluate the benefits of using a CRM.

There are a few things you should consider:

  • Ask yourself if you really need a CRM tool
  • Do your homework before you start CRM shopping
  • Keep your key CRM stakeholders in mindStudent applications

Small education agency owners may also want to look at CRM providers (like Inteleagent) that cater to the small education agency model. Some CRMs may offer more features than you may use in your education agency. So, you should consider both your budget and expected needs when choosing a CRM.

2. How to get the information you need from students

Before starting to do the work for your students, you need to get information from them.

Your students have the information you need to get started, but sometimes there are roadblocks such as:

  • Getting students to reply to you at all
  • Getting students to trust you with their information

Trust is huge with students and their parents. Whether they are a current student or a new one, students and their parents always need reassurance that they can trust your education agency with their information.

A survey done by Label Insight found that 94% of the 2000 people surveyed said they would be more loyal to a company if the company would be more transparent with them.

The best way to get information from students and their parents is to be transparent about how you care for their personal information. There are a few ways you can do it.

  • Put into writing exactly what you’re doing with their info once it’s in your possession (don’t let the assume)
  • Use tools like custom fields, phone calls, and onboarding emails to convey trust and get useful information

3. Knowing when and how to follow up

Once you have students, how do you stay in touch with them? How do you keep up to date with their applications?

I bet the following are not new for you, if you’ve been an education agent for a short while:

  • Just checking in to see where my application is at
  • When do you think you’ll be able to have this for me?
  • How come I never heard back from you?
  • Per my last email...

How do you follow-up and how do you keep track of follow-ups?

Too much contact and you’ll come off as spammy and clingy. Not enough and you could loose them. You need to set expectations early so clients know what their relationship with you looks like.

This takes planning and planning takes organisation.

Lack of organisation sends the message that your follow-up procedures are inconsistent. Once you get to that stage, you’ll start seeing students falling through the cracks.

The last thing you need is to forget to make a follow-up call, send a check-in email or miss a booked appointment and loose a student.

When you keep in touch with students, you want to actually connect with them. That means you need to send emails and schedule calls at times when they will answer them.

To nail down your timing, consider:

  • how often a person is willing to hear from you before they label you ‘high maintenance’
  • what tools can help you communicate successfully

You can use a CRM like Inteleagent to keep track of what stage an application is in, then use the information to follow-up with the client accordingly.

Now you need something to help with the actual scheduling. You need a system that tells you when to follow-up so that you don’t lose track of all students and applications to follow-up with.

You can use the task management system Inteleagent offers to schedule reminders to follow up. You’ll be notified via email a day before your task is due, so you know what you have to do.

4. How to invoice your education providers for your agent commission

Next to personal information, money and financial information are some of the most important things.

Unless you want to get back to the Flinstones era of chiselling on stone, you need a system that can be kept up manually and automatically.

To make it easier, use Inteleagent’s automatic invoicing system. When ever you get the Offer Letter for a student application, create instalments in Inteleagent. All you need is the instalment due date and the instalment amount, Everything else will automatically be calculated by Inteleagent. The system will even remind you when you need to raise the invoice. You’ll be able to generate a pdf invoice in Inteleagent at the click of a button and you can even set it to be sent automatically to the education provider.

Conclusion: How to keep track of student information

Students require a lot of attention and upkeep, and without organisation, you’ll constantly be on edge making sure everything is covered.

Education agency owners have to play several roles and balance multiple tasks efficiently. If you’re systems are not properly organised…

Tasks and stress pile up

Students can get lost in the shuffle

You waste valuable time

Having good organisational systems to help you keep track of student’s information will let you breathe a sigh of relief.

5 education agency challenges and how to address them

International student recruitment challenges
Stefan
International student recruitment challenges

International student recruitment challenges can make it difficult for you as an education agent, to find students. Learning about challenges in international student recruitment and different ways to mitigate them can ultimately help you attract more international students and increase your commission.

International student recruitment challenges

Working as an education agent is an exciting career. In fact, once you get in the industry, you are likely to stick to it for years to come. Most education agents I know have been in the industry for at least 10 years. But exciting careers come with challenges of their own. Most of these challenges can be addressed by implementing a policy to use software for educational consultants to process applications throughout your education agency offices.

Have a look at the following international student recruitment challenges and possible ways to solve them.

1. Competition

You might find the right student and match him with the right course, but chances are you are not the first. There are a lot of education agents out there, and many are reaching out to the same international students as you. You might find it difficult to cut through the noise and catch the attention of genuine international students. Especially in geographical areas such as the Subcontinent, Asia, or South America, there are hundreds, if not thousands of education agencies competing for international students.

According to the Australian Government – Department of Education and Training, based on Agents or Agencies who have created CoEs between  04 April 2012 and 12 September 2018, there are 10,626 Agencies and 26,565 Agents in the world.

Solution: Take advantage of international students’ referrals. Nothing catches the attention of an international student like a friend advising them to contact you. When you successfully place international students, ask them to refer you. People often listen to those they know. Your software for educational consultants would have a reporting feature that would give you an insight into the percentage of international students recruited through referrals. Aim to increase that.

2. International students receiving several Offer Letters

Because the demand for genuine international students is high, many students can afford to be selective. They often have multiple offers to choose from and are likely to accept the most competitive option. You might put a lot of time into moving an application through the recruiting pipeline, only to find they’ve accepted an offer letter elsewhere. When students receive several offers at once, it can be easy to lose them to another education agency.

If your student chooses another offer, you might need to go back to previously declined applications. Those students have likely moved onto other opportunities as well, so you might need to start the process over.

Solution: To stand out from the competition, create a great student onboarding experience. Start with building an effective onboarding experience in your software for educational consultants. Be sure to note the benefits, outcome, and study experience your education institution offers. Be clear about the necessary academic and English entry requirements. Listen to your students throughout the enrolment process. If the education institution extends an offer to your student, be enthusiastic about it and explain the next steps.

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3. College / university partner moving slowly

The longer it takes to get a letter of offer, the more strain it puts on your education agency and your students. Education institutions want you to source quality, genuine students and your student wants their applications to be moved through the application process quickly. Accomplishing both tasks simultaneously can be one of the biggest challenges in the international education agency business.

Sometimes, a student might not understand the application process, or they might get sidetracked during the enrolment process. This can slow an education institution extending an offer, causing you to lose the student through these cracks.

Solution: Use a student application management system or a software for educational consultants to streamline your process. You can enter and organize student data at every stage of the recruiting pipeline. You spend less time searching for information and more time talking with your student. And, the software helps you follow the application’s journey, so the process can move forward faster.

4. College / university offer is poor

There’s nothing wrong with wanting to recruit genuine students. International students are a huge factor in driving the success of an education institution businesses. But if your education institution partner wants to recruit the best, most genuine students, they need to be willing to up their offering.

Scholarships, perks and innovative approaches to programs delivered are all huge details in an international student’s decision. If your education institution partner doesn’t have a competitive offer, it will be hard to source top genuine applicants.

Solution: Talk to your education institution partners about the importance of having an attractive offering. Show them examples in the industry. There’s no need to reinvent the wheel. Your college / university partner might need to get creative when it comes to international student perks. For example, they could offer flex timetable, scholarships, or discounts at various partner businesses.

5. Low international student retention

It’s more common than ever for international students to jump courses. When this happens, your college / university partner might question whether you’re able to find the right students for their programs.

International student retention issues can hurt your education agency reputation. You find an international student and your education institution partner onboards the student. After a few months, the new student finds a course that is cheaper elsewhere. You have to start the application process all over. Or worse, the student doesn’t even choose your education agency for their application to the new program. This can quickly become one of your biggest international student recruitment challenges.

Solution: Start by sourcing international students with a high potential to complete the course. Ask behavioral questions during interviews to screen for loyalty. Also, make sure your college / university has a strong culture and onboarding program. And, check in with your student once they begin their studies. Find out if they have any concerns, and resolve issues early on.

In summary, detecting these risks early in your education agency life can make all the difference between success and failure. Consider them early in your education agency’s journey and mitigate the risk.

5 Tips for designing landing pages that convert international students

Stefan

If you’ve been looking at generating new international student leads by leveraging the power of digital marketing, there are high chance you have stumbled upon the term “Landing Page” by now.

But what is a landing page?

Landing pages are valuable marketing channels that can benefit your education agency. Whether your goal is to grow your list of students, promote a particular course or a scholarship offered by an education partner, landing pages are a great way to get new students to get in touch with you, educate potential students about your services, and drive conversions.

The website’s homepage (generally designed to provide an overview of your business) is different from your landing pages. A landing page focuses on a specific short-term goal, and helps you build student loyalty and increase profits. Setting up landing pages for a marketing campaign, a particular audience, event or promotion, provides international students with a clear call to action and makes it easy for them to get in touch with you.

Here are 5 tips you can use to build and design landing pages that convert

1. Consider your goal

As with every project, before you get started, you need to figure out what you want to achieve with a landing page. You might want to get a student to get in touch with you for a specific promotion you run, so you will need to setup a sign up landing page. Or maybe you are looking to grow your newsletter list, so you’ll need to consider a landing page that sells your newsletter to interested international students. Whatever your goal is, first thing is first: you will need to figure out what you would like to achieve with a landing page.

2. Decide on your audience

You will need to be aware of your audience and the message you would like to convey in order to increase the relevance of your landing pages.  Rather than using generic landing page templates and messages, try creating more landing pages, each reaching a portion of your audience.

For example, if you run an education agency that sends international students to various countries such as the US, Canada, or Australia, you could design a landing page that promotes each country as a study destination, to make sure you reach a larger portion of international students that might not be interested in Australia only.

3. Write compelling copy

Another aspect of having a successful landing page is a thoughtful copy that is concise, on-brand and relevant to your international students.

The headlines need to grab students’ attention as soon as they land on your page. The body message needs to be simple and informative. If you are promoting a scholarship, make sure there’s a sense of urgency in your copy. If you want students to provide their email addresses for your newsletter, make sure you are straightforward about why you are asking for their details and what they should expect to receive from you. Your call-to-action (CTA) needs to be clear and actionable. You will need to understand what stage your students are at in terms of their decision to study, and tailor the CTA accordingly. Make sure you include your contact information in the footer so students won’t have any trouble contacting you if they have any questions or concerns.

4. Use beautiful
images

There are many free image databases out there, so there’s no excuse not to use beautiful images on your landing page. They say an image says more than 1000 words. If that’s the case, it might be a good idea to use more images, without overusing them, of course.

Checkout resources such as Unsplash, Pexels, or Pixabay.

5. Build trust with reviews

If you are in the habit of reading reviews before making a purchase, then you already know how important reviews are for a business. People care what other people think. According to BrightLocal, 85% of people trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations.

Take those positive feedbacks you have on Google, Facebook, etc… and display them on your landing page. They can help you advertise your services to international students and may be the nudge you need for a student to choose your agency over another

Conclusion

Landing pages are a great way to drive conversions and with these tips, you are well placed to build amazing landing pages that get more clicks, more signups, and more students for your education agency.

Marketing Automation in International Education

marketing automation
Stefan
marketing automation

Every education agency in the international education industry, has one thing in common: the desire to recruit more students and achieve higher revenue faster. Where most education agencies fail though is in aligning their people, processes, and technology to achieve these objectives.

 

What is
Marketing Automation?

A rough definition of marketing automation would be: the technology or software that empower companies to streamline, automate and measure marketing operations, tasks and workflows, so they can increase the efficiency of their operations and grow faster. Marketing automation is driven by data.

What are the features of
Marketing Automation Platforms?

There are certain features that set apart marketing automation platforms from other platforms. You recognise a marketing automation platform by the following features:

  • email marketing
  • landing pages
  • campaign management
  • marketing programs
  • lead generation
  • prediction/scoring
  • lead management
  • CRM integration
  • social marketing
  • resource management
  • marketing analytics

Why is Marketing Automation so hot right now?

Marketing automation is not a new concept. The term was first used in 1980, according to Google Ngram, started to gain traction in the 1990s and peaked around 2004. It started to decline in usage and reached a low point in 2007 before rising again. Today, it’s used as much as back in 2004.

The rise of the Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) solutions drove marketing automation to become a hot trend again.

A case for education agencies using marketing automation to increase revenue

There are three core benefits to marketing automation:

  • Save time and money
  • Measure and optimize marketing investments
  • Faster revenue growth

Most education agencies today operate in batch email mode, leaving them in the dark when it comes to tracking the effectiveness of its marketing content. On top of that, because of such a diverse student base, the sales cycle could range from just a few days to four years. Education agents need flexible solutions that provide detailed insight into student behaviour and the sales pipeline.

The marketing automation platform that is perfect for education agencies has to have the ability to provide first-hand insight into how potential students progress through the website, interact with the landing pages and how they respond to marketing campaigns in real time.

By using marketing automation, education agencies can gain deep, actionable insight to determine the content that has the most immediate impact on lead generation, open rates, conversion rates, and enrolments. As a result, agencies will be able to move potential students through the application cycle faster, and at the same time, lower the cost of marketing. The ability to measure ROI will be dramatically improved and this in turn, will allow Marketing to become the driver for higher revenues.

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Organise your students’ applications into a repeatable, automated process that will save you time
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What is the relationship between marketing automation and CRMs?

Many CRM systems have a module for marketing, but CRMs are designed and optimised for a very different scope. CRM systems in general do not provide functionality for things like email marketing, prospect behaviour tracking, and marketing program management. While the business goal for a CRM system is to track opportunities and pipeline, manage contact and account information, the goal for marketing automation is to develop customer relationships, automate marketing programs, and measure marketing ROI.

What is the relationship between marketing automation and email marketing?

Email marketing still works really well, but the world is changing. Marketers have to deliver their relevant messages in more formats to multiple devices, more frequently. Gleanster Research says “Marketing automation solution delivers essentially all the benefits of an email marketing solution along with integrated capabilities that would otherwise need to be cobbled together using various standalone technologies.”reached a low point in 2007 before rising again. Today, it’s used as much as back in 2004.

The rise of the Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) solutions drove marketing automation to become a hot trend again.

What is inteleagent?

The question that rises is: is inteleagent a marketing automation platform? The simple answer is NO. inteleagent is an application management system built around the process of tracking the applications through pipelines, manage student details, and account information. 

The focus of inteleagent is primarily sales and sales management, as well as some marketing. Inteleagent can help your agency streamline the business operations of your education agency, track your student applications through customised pipeline stages, generate invoices and keep track of commissions, as well as many other features that will improve the way you run your business, all for a low monthly subscription.

How to build your brand presence with LinkedIn

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Stefan
LinkedIn brand presence

If you want to build your brand, LinkedIn is the largest professional network platform in the internet, with more than 400 million members in more than 200 countries and territories. The solutions it offers expanded beyond hiring and networking, to include robust company pages, highly targeted advertising solutions, and a publishing platform.

 

Build your education agency brand presence

Education agencies can build a profile on LinkedIn, that showcases products, employee networks, blog posts, upcoming events, and status updates. Users can follow your profile to learn more about your agency, just like on Twitter or Facebook. You can also advertise job openings on LinkedIn and search for potential candidates. This makes LinkedIn and great place for recruiting talent.

As an education agency owner, you should encourage your education counsellors and branch managers to participate on LinkedIn, so they can promote your brand and their own personal brands. Asking your education advisors and managers to share your education agency’s posts, and join and participate in relevant groups will build your brand’s presence in the international education industry.

In order to establish a strong LinkedIn presence, you will need to leverage different aspects of the social network, and these include:

Groups

These are communities formed around topics of interest, industry, title, professional organisation, brand, etc… In groups, users can share articles, post jobs, and exchange advice. Groups can be a strategic way for your education agency to create a community of international students, gain insight into their pain points, and develop relevant conversations.

LinkedIn offers a variety of functionality controls in groups. For example, you can choose to have an open or closed group, turning on or off the ability to post jobs, etc… These settings will need to match the goals of the community you are trying to build. You can use Groups to locate potential customers. All you have to do is make a list of keywords that relate to your international students or countries you are targeting, and run a search for any LinkedIn Groups related to the keywords. Once you find the right groups, you can participate in discussions, ask questions, and make connections.

Content sharing

You will be able to share posts on your education agency’s LinkedIn page. If you want to build followers, posting on LinkedIn is the key. LinkedIn is perceived as a professional network, therefor your content mix should be fairly professional and engaging. Educational posts perform very well, because members are on LinkedIn mainly for professional purposes.

If your purpose is to expand your personal brand and thought leadership, LinkedIn Pulse is the latest offering by LinkedIn. You can publish to LinkedIn Pulse and, if you get enough readership and distribution through their own network, LinkedIn will share it broadly across the network which in turn, will increase the visibility of your post.

If you want to build your education agency’s brand, cultivating a set of thought leaders in your company will definitely be beneficial. By using LinkedIn Pulse articles, you will increase your inbound links, support your thought leadership platform, increase the followers on your education agency’s profile page, and boost your social following on other social platforms.

Showcase Pages

These are extensions of your education agency’s company page designed to highlight specific services you offer. Showcase pages are useful when your education agency offers multiple solutions with different types of fans and followers. For example, if your company offers education counselling services as well as migration advice, you can build separate showcases that highlights these solutions to your target market. Having these segments will allow students as well as potential migrants, to follow the part of your business they are interested in.

Profile page

This is where your users land when searching for your education agency or clicks on the logo from a user’s profile. Profile pages are a free LinkedIn service for any user looking to start one on behalf of their brand. This is the primary, branded landing page on LinkedIn so make sure your give it a careful thought about the images and messages you will use, because they will represent your brand.

Tips and tricks

Participate

Encourage your staff, education counsellors, managers, etc... to participate on LinkedIn Pulse and LinkedIn Groups to build their network and generate awareness around your education agency’s brand;

Create

Create and build a group for your international students;

Optimise

Optimise your LinkedIn Page for SEO by including your top keywords in your education agency’s description, to see a real impact in search results;

LinkedIn Pulse

Use LinkedIn Pulse to engage with influencers and keep up with the international education industry news.

Free email course

Organise your students’ applications into a repeatable, automated process that will save you time
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Best tools to use when launching your education agency start-up

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Stefan
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GSuite is Google’s response to Microsoft Office selection and can be one of the most useful tools for a new education agency founder that a lot of entrepreneurs out there are taking it for granted. Many well-established unicorns fondly remember using Google Sheets to organise things and keep everything in sync as well as Google Drive for storage when they first put pen to paper.

Launching your first education agency start-up is no easy business, especially if you are not familiar with the international education industry. Sewing together all those bits and pieces of an education agency business can seem a daunting task, especially if you are a first-time founder.

Launching an education agency business will find you managing things like customer services, cashflow, accounting, project planning, team communication, meetings, tasks, … and the list can go on and on.

Thankfully, we live in the information age, and technology start-ups have done the legwork for you by coming up with various tools to make your life easier when starting and managing your business. Most of these tools are free or relatively affordable.

So if you’re an entrepreneur looking to found a new education agency in the international education industry, check out these recommendations:

GSuite – spreadsheets, powerpoints, calendars and more

GSuite is Google’s response to Microsoft Office selection and can be one of the most useful tools for a new education agency founder that a lot of entrepreneurs out there are taking it for granted. Many well-established unicorns fondly remember using Google Sheets to organise things and keep everything in sync as well as Google Drive for storage when they first put pen to paper.

Trello / Jira / Monday – project management

Keeping all your staff in sync with all the projects you are working on can be a tough task, especially if you have multiple offices and branches overseas.

The most common recommendation from established entrepreneurs is to use one of the project management tools under the Atlassian’s umbrella. Atlassian is an Australian team-building software company.

Trello boards are praised for being great for creating personal, business and major projects, as well as keeping you accountable for what needs to be achieved. Trello is great for keeping track of projects and various tasks.

Monday (formerly known as DaPulse) is a great non-Atlassian alternative that is being howled as an amazing visual project management tool. Monday allows you to manage all your day to day projects in a visual way so you can really understand what is blocking the project from moving to the next stage.

Hubspot / Capsule – customer relationship management (CRM) tools

Your education agency is always in one of the two common situations: trying to get a customer and / or trying to retain or manage customers. It is not easy to find a CRM that really works for your business. Hubspot can automatically track your leads from emails or calls, allows you to create email templates to save response times as well as notifying you when people open your emails. Capsule is described as being a light touch CRM by entrepreneurs that used it in their early start-up days.

Slack / Telegram – communication for your team

Slack has become a classic in the tech industry and the application is commonly used by teams to communicate and share documents. It is very useful especially with teams that are spread geographically, such as your education agency branch offices, or subagents you are using to recruit your students.

Appear.In – simple video chat

Skype, Zoom, etc… too complicated. You want simplicity and an application that just works? Appear.In is the way to go. You can create any URL you would like and all your guest have to do is click on that link to join the video chat. If you need to connect with your branch offices overseas in a conference, Appear.In is what you would want to use. It just works.

Canva / Biteable – graphics and videos for your education agency brand

The Aussie company Canva produces beatiful design content for social media, for your website and images.

With Biteable you can make up explainer videos, sales videos and demos. You will get lots of attention and compliments.

inteleagent.io – your agency’s application management system

Your business is growing. Months ago, it was easy to remember each international student application you were sending through to your education providers, because there were just a few of them. It was easy to remember what stage each application is as, what documents are missing, what is the next step you need to take to make it happen, because it was only you with your company. Now, you have loads of applications, staff to manage them, and there is no way you will remember all these details from the top of your head.

In comes inteleagent.io – the only international student application management system you will ever need to improve your education agency operations. inteleagent.io will help you track those applications through pre-defined stages all the way to the end of the application process. Once your application is at the end of the pipeline, inteleagent.io will generate beautiful commission invoices for you, remind you when to send them through to the education provider. It will keep track of your agreements with the education providers and remind you when they are due for renewal. Your team will be able to collaborate on applications, you’ll be able to track actions performed on applications in time with the integrated timeline, and you will be able to generate easy to read reports to help you make better decisions in your business. These are just a few of the features inteleagent.io has packed in for you.

Give it a try now and experience the difference!