The College that Converts: How the College of West Anglia (CWA) is Reverse-Engineering Student Engagement

At the recent College Marketing Network’s (CMN) conference, we shared a story titled "The College that Converts." When you see a title like that, you might expect a giant hockey-stick graph showing a 500% increase in enrolment since last Tuesday.

But the reality of transformation in Further Education is different. As Michelle Blake from College of West Anglia (CWA) admitted, at the time of delivering the presentation, the college was actually about a week away from full technical integration. However, the journey taken over the last year has been about more than just a marketing funnel or a final student number; it has been a "conversion" of the college itself.

Here is how CWA, in partnership with BabelQuest, is transforming its systems, its executive mindset, and its student engagement strategy.

The Challenge: Admin-Speak and Siloed Data

Like many mid-sized FE colleges, CWA faces a competitive landscape, fighting for market share against local sixth forms. The internal challenges were significant: data was messy and siloed, and the college was communicating with students in "admin-speak" rather than human language.

Furthermore, the digital landscape is shifting. AI is fundamentally changing online marketing, and colleges can no longer rely solely on website traffic, which is already in decline as AI has disrupted the journey from search to website visit. To survive, CWA realised they needed to own their audience, move beyond simple email blasts, and integrate multiple communication channels, such as WhatsApp, RCS and SMS.

The Strategy: Reverse-Engineering the Solution

A common trap colleges fall into when implementing a CRM is starting with the data fields - creating a "spreadsheet from hell" that lists every possible requirement, resulting in a system nobody wants to use.

Everyone who is asked to contribute their requirements has a very limited view of the whole solution needed. It’s a bit like this maze:

There is only one path to the finish. Starting blindly at any start point gives you a 10% chance of success. Start at the Finish, you can only arrive at the correct starting point.

Together, BabelQuest and CWA flipped the model. We got together in an onsite workshop with key stakeholders from the exec team, marketing, admissions, student services, IT and finance and used a Reverse Engineering approach - we started at the finish line: the Outcome.

1. Outcome: What is the specific revenue number and student count promised to the Governors in the plan?
   
   
2. Activity: Working backwards, how much activity (open days, interviews, applications, RFIs, leads) is required to hit that number?
   
   
3. Insight: What processes, reports, and automations create the triggers for those activities?
   
   
4. Data: Finally, what data points fuel those insights?

By stripping out the clutter, we only gathered the data we actually needed, creating a "clear path" for the student to enquire and apply, which aligns with the overall goal of student numbers and revenue over time.

Thinking outside the box, or working within it?

Back in the breakout room at the CMN conference, the first moment that got the whole audience grabbing their phones to take a photo of the presentation was when we presented ‘the box’.

Scoping out the requirements for a CRM in an organisation as complicated as a college is a huge task. We simplified this by showing there were 3 sides to the box that were already in place and did not need to be redefined, and one that deserved all the attention:

• Governance and Compliance. No option here, these are the rules that underpin the college and they’re non-negotiable.
  
  
• Existing tech stack. There are non-negotiables here - IT governance rules (your non-functional requirements) are standards - high standards - but easy to comply with.
  
  
• Brand / Identity. The college’s brand and reputation, your content, courses, and everything that goes to make up your story and history. We need to work with this, but the CRM won’t require changes to that for the implementation.
  
  
• Finally, the Student Journey. This is the CRM's primary focus. Managing Relationships with Customers means having a relentless focus on the communications with the student. This is what’s likely fragmented and currently impossible to manage. This is where the focus needs to go to give you the best CRM implementation in the fastest time and with the most value for money.

The combination of starting with the end in mind, and a clear vision for how CRM completed the digital transformation for the college, made it far easier for the CWA exec team to align a multi-year strategy for growth with a scalable licence, implementation and support model that reduced up-front spend and maximised growth ahead of cost for the long term. The college had moved from stuck to unstuck in a matter of days.

The Tools: Service Hub as an Insight Engine

With the roadmap defined, the box laid out, and the contract signed, CWA implemented HubSpot’s Marketing, Sales, and Service Hubs. While many view Service Hub purely as a support tool, for marketers, it acts as a valuable insight engine.

Natalie from CWA highlighted several key wins the team has achieved even before full integration:

• AI Chatbots: Installing a chatbot was easy; by inputting the college’s knowledge base, the AI-powered HubSpot Customer Agent can answer student queries instantly, while allowing the team to add personality - whether witty or professional - to the bot’s character.
  
  
• Feedback Surveys: These real-time feedback mechanisms capture the "voice of the student" and identify pain points that prevent students from moving forward in the application process. This is a critical advantage that educational institutions have over many others - you get to engage your customer (students) on a daily basis for years, and hear directly what they need and how you meet their needs.
  
  
• Internal Help Desk: CWA is also using HubSpot as a portal for staff to log and manage marketing requests, streamlining internal operations.

This setup provides a unified view of the customer, allowing CWA to build smart segments and craft targeted messaging that speaks to student needs at the right time.

The Future: Loop Marketing

As we move forward, we are preparing for the end of the traditional "funnel." In the era of AI disruption, where attention is scarce, we are moving toward Loop Marketing.

This involves four stages CWA is currently navigating:

1. Express (The Brand): Clearly articulating the college's culture and story. This involved defining the college's purpose in relation to the personas of the target audience. Completed 
   
   
2. Tailor (Personalisation): Using AI to move beyond "Hi [First Name]" to create dynamic and personal content based on exact user behaviour. Smart content tools in HubSpot enabled much more advanced personalisation at scale, also making it far easier to manage a smaller number of core marketing assets, crucial for a small team with lots to do. Completed 
   
   
3. Amplify (The Channel): Meeting your audience where they live - for 16-18 year olds, that’s on channels like WhatsApp and, increasingly, RCS (the next generation of SMS). For B2B outreach and adult learners, email remains crucial, but engagement is growing on mobile chat channels here as well. Prepared and ready to launch 
   
   
4. Evolve (The Learning): Using data to constantly refine the message in an infinite feedback loop. The ‘voice of the student’ engagement data here is an incredibly valuable resource to learn and evolve from. Next Step
   

Conclusion

The journey to conversion isn't just about the marketing funnel or clever software; it's about converting the Executive Team from saying "No, that’s too expensive" to "Yes, this is strategic and how we will thrive".

By pooling data, leveraging AI, and reverse-engineering their processes, CWA is building a machine that allows them to evolve as the market changes.

This blog has been co-authored by Eric Murphy, BabelQuest; Michelle Blake, The College of West Anglia;  and Natalie Metcalfe, The College of West Anglia