Project Overview
The University of Essex created a new integrated Student Services Hub, bringing together four teams to ensure students receive help and support throughout their university career. To underpin the Hub, the University needed a modern CRM platform capable of managing student queries, tracking cases and integrating with existing back office systems — all while supporting the University’s ambition to be a leader in student satisfaction.
Building on an established relationship with the University, Transparity delivered a Microsoft Dynamics 365 implementation fully integrated with existing accommodation, financial and student record systems. Staff can now access all relevant information from a single platform, respond to queries efficiently and build a holistic picture of student demand across the institution.
The Challenge
The University of Essex was bringing together four new teams into a single, integrated Student Services Hub. To support the Hub, the University needed a CRM platform that could handle the full range of student queries — from accommodation and course registrations to finances and other aspects of student life — while enabling staff to refer queries to the right experts, track cases and build a picture of student demand.
A key requirement was integration with existing back office systems, including accommodation, financial and student record platforms, so that the Student Services team could quickly access relevant information without having to request it or log in separately.
The Solution
Transparity delivered a Microsoft Dynamics 365 implementation to support the new Student Services Hub, building on its well-established relationship with the University of Essex. Transparity had previously designed and implemented CRM solutions to support marketing, student recruitment and commercial relationship management at the University.
The new solution is fully integrated with existing accommodation, financial, student record and other back office systems. This means the Student Services team can quickly access relevant information without having to request it or log in separately. Staff use the platform to record and respond to requests, efficiently refer queries to experts and track cases end to end.
“This project is a great example of how Microsoft Dynamics 365 fulfils requirements other than pure sales and marketing. In this case, it’s helping to support a student community. It increases the University’s attractiveness to candidates and providing extra resources to make student life easier.” — Mark Scott, Project Manager, Transparity
The Outcome
The University of Essex now has a single, unified platform across its Student Services Hub, giving staff a holistic view of student demand and enabling faster, more efficient responses to student queries across accommodation, finance, course registration and other areas of student life.
The integration with existing back office systems means staff can access all relevant information in one place, without the need to switch between separate systems. This supports more effective case tracking, better referral of queries to the right experts, and a more joined-up experience for students.
The project represents a further step in the University’s broader ambition to make Dynamics 365 the definitive system for frontline customer service interactions across all areas of the institution — supporting its position as one of the leading universities for student satisfaction.
