Schools often ask us about how marketing and admissions teams can use HubSpot alongside existing systems such as iSAMS and SIMS. Here are the answers to some of the most frequently asked questions!
HubSpot is a CRM and digital marketing platform that provides a wide range of marketing, sales, admissions and service tools designed to help you convert more leads, improve your communications and streamline your processes.
When we speak to schools we often find that they are relying on point-solutions and edu-specific systems that do day-to-day school management very well, but communication features are usually limited and they rarely connect to other digital tools. School marketing and admissions teams are often frustrated by the time they are spending transferring prospect data between systems, their reliance on spreadsheets, and a disjointed approach to marketing and admissions.
We have lots of information on HubSpot and why independent schools use HubSpot.
We are firm believers in finding 'the right tool for the job' and whilst school student management information systems (MIS) are great at important tasks like timetabling and behaviour management, they are usually lacking in connected communication tools and time saving features for marketing and admissions teams (hello automation!).
All of the schools we work with use a dedicated MIS system for their enrolled students and day-to-day school functions; HubSpot is primarily used as a tools for marketing, admissions and communications teams who often have a range of digital tools that they use and want to work in a more connected and intuitive way.
There's a wide range of tools that HubSpot offers, a few of the most exciting (and most popular with schools) are:
As a team passionate about streamlining processes and reducing the workloads for school marketing and admissions teams, we are definitely with you on this one! It is really important that any digital tools you have are working for you (and not the other way around!), there are many ways to manage this relationship, here are a few of the most popular approaches:
The simplest and most popular approach for schools is to use HubSpot for the start of your customer journey, then choose at which point your processes switch over to your MIS. Many schools handle all of their marketing and admissions efforts in HubSpot and only move contacts over into iSAMS/SIMS at point of enrolment. Other schools use HubSpot up to application only, others only use HubSpot for marketing... We recommend that you define the journey in the way that best suits your school's unique admissions process and team.
Once the HubSpot part of the journey is complete, data can easily be exported to CSV and added to your MIS system. For most schools this is either a manual exercise, alternatively some MIS systems allow you to pay their development teams to import CSV files for you. The good news is that even if manual, it will likely be a much smaller number of enrolling students than the enquiries/leads you have in HubSpot!
HubSpot has an open API which means that it can be fully integrated with most systems (in fact, there are hundreds of off-the-shelf integrations in HubSpot's ecosystem and this is growing by the day).
Update: we are working on something exciting! Register your interest in the world's first HubSpot and iSAMS integration! 👀
Most schools get started with HubSpot and factor in a future integration once they are familiar with using HubSpot.
If you want to use the HubSpot communication tools and marketing for enrolled families then this is definitely possible. Some schools become so impressed with HubSpot's features that they decide to use it for some of their communications beyond enrolment, either exporting 'current parent' email addresses periodically and importing them into HubSpot or asking parents to opt themselves in to specific newsletters using a dedicated HubSpot form. This is also helpful when considering retention of families.
There's no doubt that the tools in HubSpot are perfect for your marketing team to embrace, but we often see a wide range of teams using HubSpot. Below are just some of the most popular multi-department use-cases for HubSpot in schools:
.... and if you have something more complex or bespoke you could even consider creating a custom object (available in Enterprise subscriptions) that will allow you to handle any data that your school handles. This would enable your facilities team to track minibus bookings, IT to manage staff equipment hire.... anything you can think of!
We are HubSpot for education specialists and have implemented HubSpot in a wide range of school, college and university settings. We are also Platinum HubSpot partners and inbound marketing experts so are perfectly placed to help you weigh up whether HubSpot is the right solution for your school.
We would recommend booking a demo so you can see the tools for yourself, we can provide you with predicted costs and answer any questions you have at any point in your decision-making process.
Learn more about our new HubSpot and iSAMS integration!