By Brian Fisher, AdmissionsQuest

Everyone on campus or in your office conveys messages and sells the school or your services. We all think we practice pretty good customer service. Do we?

Beth Black, Cherokee Creek Boys School, made the case for service in her presentation, “Everything I learned About Marketing, I Learned from a Mouse.”

In schools we assume our customer service is pretty good. But, in my school experiences, we never sat down and worked through constituent/customer service from beginning to end. What does it mean and what do we need to do make sure that we respond as well as possible in every situation?

Bluntly, we never had customer service philosophy or plan. We just assumed that everyone had good sense of customer service- responding to families in the best, most effective way.

Black took participants through the eye opening exercise of customer service from the customer’s perspective and the ways in which organizations can define and build systems and philosophies that keep the customer at the fore of every employee’s action.

The bottom line, “Quality service lives in the hearts and minds of the staff.”

Schools tend to become wrapped in their routines and daily events. Consultants with solo practices or small shops sometimes forget about a clean parking lot or warm entryway. We let our external connections slip.

Customer service basics weigh heavily in the equation; returning phone calls and returning e-mail matter more than ever.

The best anecdote of the meeting- the school maintenance man who greeted campus visitors and was equipped to provide an introduction to campus. The family- purposefully visiting this campus unannounced- appreciated the warm greeting. Their student enrolled.

Why customer service here and now? It’s a topic/concept that we often let slip in education. Education sells itself right? Not necessarily.

By Brian Fisher, AdmissionsQuest

The first official morning just concluded. Formats and offerings have changed and that’s good.

I talked with Mark Sklarow from the periphery of the Speed Meeting sessions to get his take on the conference and the new approaches.

In a word, there’s more meat. The conference has tightened its focus on professional experiences and information. There’s still networking to be sure, but serious education and professional development are in the fore here in Charlotte. As Mark said, the conference priorities have shifted from “a little education with a lot of networking to a lot of education with a little networking.”

Mark found that schools and consultants were looking for more content- more return on their conference experience.

The pre and post conference workshops now book-end the conference with intense detailed presentations covering serious topics and current research.

Check back soon to see video conversation recorded at the Speed Meetings. We’ll work hard to post them as soon as we can (we recorded 17 so it may take a bit, but be patient).

by Mark Sklarow, Executive Director, IECA

Late last week we noted new independent research stating that 26% of high-achieving high school seniors hired independent educational consultants for their college search and application process. The research did not examine students whose scores were below the 70th percentile, and we don’t know whether the percentage there grows, or, as we suspect, is a bit lower. In either case, the study has affirmed what IECA has been stating: there is significant growth nationwide of a nature that can fundamentally alter the view of this profession.

In sending out our media release yesterday, more than 100 press contacts have opened and read the press release, as well as admission representatives from over 100 colleges and universities, and hundreds among the public that viewed the release on the IECA Web site and Facebook page. The release was among the top three viewed pages on the IECA Web site both yesterday and today. And, a number of IECA members have posted the press release to their Web site or blog.

In addition to this blog, the Washington Post’s Admission 101 blog has reported the story and invited readers to offer opinions as to whether educational consultants are “worth it.” A few responses to that blog are reprinted below:

“Sharone2” noted, “We used a college planning service for my daughter, and it was very helpful, particularly in guiding her to make a list of activities she needed to do, month-by-month and providing that external prod to get it done.”

When someone wondered why anyone would pay for a consultant with so much free information available on the Internet, “qrcxx3” responded with an analogy that some can relate to: “To me, it’s like hiring a personal trainer. Yup, I can read manuals and search the internet for information on exercises, technique, etc. But there is nothing like that real-life person standing there correcting my form, suggesting specific exercises, and pushing me…”

“nonook44” spoke from a fresh experience, “I just went to a high school yesterday with a senior class of 1,000, with one college counselor. One parent thought her son was procrastinating, but the truth was he didn’t know where to begin. A couple hundred dollars for peace of mind? To know that you went the extra mile at the end? Totally worth it.”

When some made the assertion that consulting must be just for the wealthy (something the 26% use figure alone would dispute), IECA member Emily Snyder responded “If those using my services are any indication…some can afford the fees private consultants charge, but I, like a significant number of my peers across the country, have worked with those who struggle to do so. There will always be those who step up to the plate to offer [these] service to those who would go without.”

If nothing else, the Independent Educational Consultants Association is at the forefront of helping the public understand the breadth, value, and service of educational consultants, and how the profession is expanding to better serve the needs of students—across both the economic and achievement spectrums.

by Mark Sklarow, Executive Director, IECA

I have noted, on several occasions in the last few months, that IECA’s membership—and the numbers of educational consultants—is growing quickly. As this growth occurs, families will increasingly look toward IECA membership as the truest test of whether a consultant has the knowledge, skills and ethical guideposts to be of service to their children.

As I look more deeply into the growth of the profession it’s clear we are expanding our presence in more states and communities domestically, and seeing a significant growth in the field internationally, with new professional and associate members from South America to Africa. However, we continue to see much of the growth in major metropolitan areas, affording us a great opportunity to begin to explore establishing IECA REGIONAL GROUPS. Without the need to be formally developed, I see these regional groups as a way for members to share information, develop support networks, and bring in speakers: admission representatives, psychologists, media specialists and others. I can easily see such groups developing in cities from Boston to Atlanta to Seattle and LA where a dozen or more IECA members—and even non-members—could gather periodically to visit campuses, explore community service, host seminars and reach out to the community.

IECA wants to help make this happen. We can provide members interested in starting regional groups (and let’s remember several, like Tri-state have existed for years) with contact information for IECA professional, associate, student, and non-member consultants; contact information for schools and colleges, with possible speakers, and much more. Interested in starting a regional group? Let us know. Post something on our Facebook Page, recruit other interested folks through our TalkList. There’s much we can be doing in communities across the country in educating consultants—and consumers—alike.