Transforming the international student enrolment experience through innovative #EdTech

Proodle Solutions’ University App Aims to Transform Student Recruitment

Proodle Solutions has developed the latest innovative product in education technology to transform the international student enrolment experience for both higher education marketing and recruitment teams, as well as the next batch of intelligent prospective students.

The company was launched in 2017 in response to universities’ growing need to provide prospective students with an enrolment process experience unmatched by their existing recruitment methods. Proodle is comprised of an international team who faced many problems themselves when applying to universities in the UK, including a lack of personalisation in marketing materials, slow communication with recruitment teams and difficulty in finding information.

But most importantly, they felt the universities’ lack of digital mobile presence made it harder to establish a meaningful, ongoing connection with them.

With the current generation of students all being digital natives, the company’s CEO, Shrenik Paras Parmar, saw an opportunity to build a unique mobile platform to maximise their satisfaction with the university enrolment process through a uniquely designed mobile application which allows universities to make their mark and stand out as the best institution in a highly saturated market.

“Universities in the UK and abroad only provide a website as an official channel to their prospective students for their entire enrolment process. I thought wouldn’t it be great if we could build a unique app that would allow any university to tap into the world of technology that students are familiar with, achieve their enrolment objectives with higher conversion rates and stand out as the best institution in a highly competitive market,” Parmar explained.

Using tools to personalise messaging, analyse user behaviour and update content in real-time, universities can reshape their entire relationship with prospects through optimising their enrolment experience and increasing satisfaction levels like never before.

In discussing the entirely university-branded mobile app, Parmar stated, “Other online recruitment platforms either act as a marketplace or provide SAAS solutions that are used by university professionals and still communicate through emails.

“We haven’t come across a single platform that offers a holistic enrolment approach, and that provides an official university platform for students to interact, engage, apply and enrol.”

In the past year, Proodle Solutions has seen exponential growth in both the development of their app and the list of contacts interested in their product.

Successful entrepreneur, Alan Morris, the co-founder of Retail Assist Limited, joined as an advisor to the company, aiding them in implementing effective growth strategies. The team also secured the mentorship of Mujeeb Rahman, the Director of SIRIO Business Transformation and has made close links to Richard Baker, the Director of Baker Baird Communications. Most recently, Proodle Solutions has established connections with the esteemed Sir John Peace, the Lord-Lieutenant of Nottinghamshire.

Proodle Solutions has also been the recipient of numerous awards. At the Ingenuity International Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition 2018 in the UK and China, Proodle won the Entrepreneurial Visa Award, and at the Ingenuity18 event, they earned the Enterprise Grant Award and Asia Business Grant Award, worth £9,000.

In addition, Proodle Solutions scooped three major awards at the Ingenuity19 Competition worth £9,500: the Santander Enterprise Award, the Experian Commercial Potential Prize, and the Sainsbury Management Fellows Award. The company was also shortlisted for the 2019 Santander Universities Entrepreneurship Awards Central Semi-Final in June. These wins resulted in the brand recognition and added capital they needed to steer the progress of the product in the right direction.

Currently, Proodle Solutions is in the negotiation stage with the Chief Marketing Officers of three Russell Group Universities, who are interested in piloting the product to enhance their international student recruitment efforts. They continue to attract the interest of senior management teams of higher education institutions with two other top-tier universities recently expressing an interest to work with the company.

This year, the team has expanded both domestically and internationally; the company has recruited a team of top-quality professionals to enhance the product development and marketing activities in the UK and in India, Proodle Solutions relies on a group of experts who are talented in using stack technologies to progress the product as an app that the company is confident enough in to push into the market.

Much of the recent success of Proodle Solutions is the result of the ongoing support provided by the Ingenuity Lab at the University of Nottingham who have provided the company with a vast amount of resources, such as a free office space, business surgeries, networks, contacts and internship contracts.

“They have created a product that will offer greater reach, better communication, and drive more talent to come to the UK and benefit from our education and overall appetite for innovation. The University of Nottingham has embraced this project, an example of forward thinking Edu-Tech, as we see the potential of the product and its founders,” Steve Chapman, the Head of the Ingenuity Lab, stated.

Proodle Solutions also joined The Big House Accelerator programme, a high-quality, learning, mentoring and support system from top digital innovators in the UK, to add value to the business.

Next, Proodle Solutions look forward to seeing their product in use in the market.