A quick and easy onboarding experience for HKBU Business School
Why Unibuddy?
We asked Hong Kong Baptist University (HKBU) School of Business why they were drawn to the Unibuddy platform. They listed the following reasons:
- The power of peer-to-peer
- A structured way of connecting students and prospects
- Ability to attract a diverse pool of students
- Conversational data facilitates a better understanding of prospective students motivations
Alison Li, Executive Officer at HKBU School of Business, said:
“We see the importance of using this channel to retain applicants’ commitment to us during the admission process.”
The onboarding process
PREPARE – 1-2 days
- Send out ambassador materials for selection
- Receive dashboard logins
CREATE – 1-3 days
- Invite ambassadors from the dashboard
- Choose a location for the platform on the website
LAUNCH – 1-2 days
- Review ambassador profiles before going live
- Add an iframe code snippet to the chosen website page
The implementation process
HKBU outlines how they felt fully supported throughout the implementation process.
- We had a dedicated Customer Success Manager – It has been a pleasant journey to work with Unibuddy.
- We were supported by an amazing team of colleagues and with all necessary supplementary materials, such as sample guides, templates, and forms.
- Daily admin time once live is also doable – around 1 hour per week to review the chats and support our student ambassadors.
An ambassador’s perspective:
“I am glad that I am a part of a bigger community and I was able to assist many students from different parts of the world. From a student perspective, Unibuddy is a useful yet, interactive platform to make use of the learning experience of the current students. So, prospective students get a realistic preview on where they are going to study. So far, I have a positive experience in this effort and I believe the University will also be able to attract a more diverse student community.”
Key findings
Alison Li, Executive Officer at HKBU School of Business, recalls her key takeaways since using Unibuddy.
- The excellent performance of our student ambassadors. Our bond with our existing students has become stronger. We didn’t expect such a benefit when we decided to partner with Unibuddy.
- Prospects feel reassured through chatting with our current students. Moving out of their comfort zone to study abroad is a big decision for everyone, by gaining much useful and practical information from our students, prospects definitely feel more assured.
- In the future, we plan to promote the platform further to generate more leads.
A prospective student:
“I had a great learning experience interacting with students from different parts of the world thanks to the Unibuddy platform.”
The impact of peer-to-peer
Hong Kong Baptist University School of Business launched with Unibuddy in February 2020.
After just a year of using Unibuddy, HKBU business school ambassadors have engaged with prospects from 48+ countries and engaged in conversations about all of the 12 courses the business school offers.
About 20% of the current full-time taught postgraduate students had connected with our student ambassadors before joining HKBU School of Business.
Use Cases
Hong Kong Baptist University wanted to attract a diverse pool of students from all around the world and increase student retention rates overall.
Results
After a year of using Unibuddy, HKBU business school ambassadors engaged with prospects from 48+ countries – with 20% of the current full-time postgraduate students interacting with a student ambassadors prior to enrollment.