How Colleges and Universities are Boosting Student Enrollment With FormAssembly

More than one year into the coronavirus pandemic, the concern of declining student enrollment numbers at higher education institutions continues to surge. To date, colleges and universities across the country have seen the greatest enrollment decrease in a decade, with no clear end in sight. 

As many higher education institutions continue to restructure outdated processes—from marketing to admissions and class registration—it’s clear that the pandemic era has brought many underlying issues in higher ed to the surface. Moving forward, we’ll see more and more universities going online, in everything from marketing to online learning. With this shift, colleges and universities must work to transform traditional recruitment and enrollment processes in order to boost enrollment analytics in higher education. 

In this blog, we’ll explain how better data collection with FormAssembly is helping higher ed institutions boost enrollment, with real world examples. 

How good data collection can affect enrollment

From admissions to graduation, understanding why data collection is important is a crucial element of providing the right tools and resources for long-term success. Data provides insights into all facets of a college or university’s recruitment and enrollment processes. It can determine to college admission data analysis which types of marketing efforts are needed and provide critical feedback on how students respond to these efforts.

The better the data, the more strategic the efforts of your higher education organization. And better data starts with a better data collection process. Using a powerful platform like FormAssembly can be the difference between not meeting annual enrollment goals and surpassing them (as seen in the case studies below). With a campus connected through our platform, processes become more efficient and you can focus your efforts on providing an engaging experience for students, from the first touch to enrollment.

→ On-Demand Webinar: Learn How to Increase Higher Education Enrollment With Salesforce-Integrated Tools

Real-world success stories

FormAssembly has worked with hundreds of higher education institutions worldwide, including the following colleges and universities.

Maryville University

Before turning to FormAssembly, Maryville University was struggling to streamline time-consuming, outdated manual data collection. Incoming students were burdened with complex processes and a disconnect in communication. To ease frustrations between students and administrative staff, Maryville University turned to FormAssembly to help provide a more connected, student-centric experience. As a result, Maryville University saw a 15% increase in student enrollment, with a strategic projection to reach 10,000 students by 2022. Read the full case study here. 

“If you’re a prospective student and the university can’t get you to the right person, it can turn you off to the university,” said Brian Heger, Associate Director of Communications at Maryville University. “FormAssembly solves a lot of headaches.” 

USC Marshall

University of Southern California’s Marshall School of Business (USC Marshall) is a leading higher education institution that was plagued with outdated manual data collection. Their application process specifically was complicated and disconnected for both students and administrative staff. With help from FormAssembly’s data collection platform and automated connectors, the university transformed their applicant experiences with a reliable and time-saving web form system. 

USC Marshall staff saved up to two hours per form by switching to an automated email response strategy to student inquiries. Currently, the university has over 40 active forms and collects over 10,000 applications yearly. The university plans to continue using FormAssembly to provide even more personalized and secure enrollment processes for students applying to specific degree programs. 

Cornell University

Before eliciting the help of FormAssembly, Salesforce administrators at Cornell University were struggling to streamline the admissions processes for the SC Johnson College of Business and its five academic departments. The team was burdened with building and maintaining forms on the backend. With FormAssembly, they were able to turn a complex, time-consuming situation into a streamlined and automated process. 

With FormAssembly’s robust Salesforce integration and easy-to-use form builder, they created fully custom forms to meet the needs of their complex admissions process. Since implementing their new forms, Cornell collected an additional 220 application responses in five months. Read the full case study here.

Cal State East Bay

Prior to adopting a CRM and integrated platforms, the team at Cal State East Bay was burdened with manual paper processes and outdated technology. Cal State East Bay decided to simultaneously invest in Salesforce and FormAssembly.

Since switching to these modern platforms, the campus staff has significantly improved many processes for students. Using FormAssembly forms, the team has been able to increase communication with students, distribute better resources, and provide a more user-friendly and helpful experience overall. Since 2014, they have created over 100 web forms and have seen a 700% increase in leads, with 95% of course enrollments managed with FormAssembly.

“FormAssembly came to the top of the list for a website form builder that could make all these crazy connections between our website, all the forms we used, and Salesforce,” said Dan Bellone, Marketing Director at Cal State East Bay. “People were wanting more information, wanting to ask questions, and didn’t have a way to do it before. Now, the power behind that is FormAssembly.”

Start boosting enrollment with FormAssembly

FormAssembly’s powerful web form and data collection platform has made it possible for many higher education institutions to completely revamp their admissions processes. Our platform is GLBA, GDPR, and FERPA compliant, with adherence to data privacy regulations to keep sensitive student data secure. 

With our robust Salesforce integration and drag-and-drop form builder, creating the custom web forms you need is seamless and simple. Our newest feature, the Salesforce Admissions Connect package, simplifies the process even further with EDA Ready templates and onboarding assistance specifically built for higher education. To learn more about FormAssembly for higher ed, please reach out to our team!