Case

Coventry University – Moving with the times

Coventry University, the fastest growing higher education institution in the UK, serves over 30,000 UK students and 15,500 globally. As a major local employer, it contributes more than £82 million annually to the UK economy, nearly half retained in Coventry. To improve student Clearing communications, Conscia and Cisco implemented Webex Connect within a tight two-week deadline, enabling efficient WhatsApp messaging for prospective students. Over five days, 10 agents managed thousands of messages through a single platform, significantly enhancing responsiveness and reducing wait times. Positive feedback has led the university to explore expanding this service across other teams and communication channels.

3 minutes read

Conscia UK

Keywords

Collaboration

Coventry University – Moving with the times – featured image

As the fastest growing higher education institution in the UK, Coventry University now teaches one in every seven HE students in the West Midlands. The university currently has more than 30,000 students across its UK campuses and an additional 15,500 students worldwide.

The university is one of Coventry’s biggest employers, bringing skills and education to the region, growing spend in the local economy, and creating jobs alongside its graduate success.

Coventry University employees inject more than £82 million into the UK economy, of which almost half is retained within the city.

“Working with Conscia and Cisco to implement a Webex Customer Experience solution within a very tight deadline went very smoothly – with everything set up, agents and admin staff trained, all in less than two weeks. Using Webex to manage WhatsApp messages exceeded my expectations. Although only used for a short campaign, feedback from our agents and students was very positive. We now have other teams within Coventry University looking at how they can utilise the service with WhatsApp and other communication channels.”

Adam Measey – Voice Solutions Architect

The challenge

Clearing is a vital time in every university’s calendar. With each student worth about £27,000 over three years, it’s important to gain the right students for any unfilled courses.
The highly charged nature of clearing requires additional staff to answer phone calls with plenty of support to ensure things operate efficiently. Even with extra staff, call wait times can be very long as each call can take some time.
This stressful and inefficient process is not fit for today’s students who expect quick and seamless access, in a way that suits them.
The university had previously attempted to offer contact via WhatsApp using WhatsApp’s own tools. This proved unfit for purpose, as it was difficult to manage and provided no insight into user engagement. They needed a solution that was easy to administer and analyse, and that was integrated with the general clearing experience.

Outcomes

Conscia worked with Coventry University to plan for:
- 10 agents to be solely aligned to WhatsApp channels
- Each agent taking up to 10 engagements at a time
- The service to be offered over 5 days during the busiest Clearing period
It took just one week to establish the platform and get it set up for service.
All WhatsApp messages were received into the Webex Customer Experience platform and delivered directly to agents via a dedicated agent desktop. This was a cloud solution with no dependency on hardware or location.
Administration and reporting was made easy due to a single dashboard.
Agents were able to work anywhere and at any time.
Over the five-day period, 5,744 messages were received, 5,695 messages were sent, and over 150 places offered.
The university is now looking at how it can expand this service to other areas and with other digital channels.