You’ve heard it before, but it bears repeating that we are in truly unprecedented times right now, particularly for higher education and enrollment management. While there is no shortage of content speculating about how the coronavirus will impact higher education, there is only one true consensus – there will absolutely be an impact. And while no one can truly predict what the future will bring, if there’s one thing we do know, it’s that the most important step any school can take right now is capturing as much timely information as possible as events unfold over the coming months.

Here’s how you can start:

Track the Impact with Point-in-Time Enrollment Information

The TargetX CRM now offers date fields enabling you to track point-in-time information for every stage of the enrollment funnel. As students begin to receive their admission offers and make their decisions about their educational journeys for this fall, the role coronavirus plays in their decision to send in a confirmation deposit or change their enrollment plans over the summer cannot be underestimated. By implementing these date fields now, you can ensure that you’re capturing the detailed level of information you’ll need to be able to evaluate the impact of coronavirus on your particular school – from admission to confirmation through summer melt to fall enrollment.

Remember: Events Don’t Just Have to be In-Person

If you’re not already using the TargetX Events tool to track your digital events, now is a great time to get started. If you are, there’s no doubt that digital events in this season will look a bit different from your digital events of seasons past. The Events dashboards in Insights can give you an in-depth look at attendance patterns, attendee information, and the impact of your events on driving applications. Because our Events dashboards are organized by dates, you can zero in on the dates that are most important to your campus to be able to make real-time adjustments to your events programming as you learn more.

Pay Attention to Specific Populations

Certain populations at your school may be impacted by coronavirus in different ways, and those population groups are worth paying attention to in detail. Insights allows you to filter data by individual values or saved groups of values to keep an eye on those subgroups and how they are affected by coronavirus. Some groups to potentially be watching are:

  • Campuses, either by physical campus or if your school has a digital campus
  • Residential versus online programs
  • High risk programs that may need to reach a certain enrollment level to be viable
  • Programs related to public health, medical professions, mental health, etc.

Additionally, the geographic impact of coronavirus is one that deserves special attention. The Student Demographics dashboard gives you a detailed look at where your prospective student pool is located, by county, state, and country. Filters can also be applied to this dashboard to make those connections about the impact of geography on specific subpopulations.

Bring Home the Application Season

Now more than ever, building a strong application funnel is of vital importance. And as coronavirus news is changing rapidly, keeping an eye on how the activities of your admissions counselors are driving those application numbers is necessary to do in real time. The Counselor Dashboard offers a week-by-week look at new application activity, so that any strategies your counselors are utilizing to drive those application numbers – calling campaigns, email outreach, virtual meetings – can be tracked, and best practices can be shared across your team.

Ready to find out more about TargetX Insights? Watch the demo video!