“ It’s important in the fast changing, technological age we live in that our school stays relevant and in touch with what’s going on in the outside world. Parents and students alike are looking at these types of things to give their children the best possible chance of success. By showing them an integrated system such as ours with its obvious benefits of information exchange, security and truancy control we offer them a fantastic springboard for their daughters and peace of mind for themselves. „

- Rathika Suresh, Director of Information Technology, Pymble Ladies College

Challenge

The College’s primary challenges are attribution and retention, with the website being a driving force behind both of these. Aside from its school community comprised of parents, students, teachers and alumnae, PLC receives attention from people from more than 55 countries in any given month via its website.  Unfortunately, the legacy website had a shelf life of about 3 years and was not consistent with the College’s brand; while the former CMS was due for an overhaul following several years of upgrades.  

PLC was also seeking a fresh, unique look and feel with relevant and meaningful imagery and content that was consistent with its corporate brand and was keen to use innovative technology in order to establish the College as a leader in the learning and education industries.

It was imperative that the new site fit into their overall strategy and important factors included ease of use, customisation, greater integration with backend systems, support of the new brand, more engaging for the end users and more support for content contribution from a wider range of authors.

Solution

In the evaluation process Gruden identified that Sitecore’s CMS would allow PLC:

• To group and de-duplicate website content items
• To improve search results
• Provide a consistent experience for all visitors to the website
• A flexible and easy management of website content
• Improved data capture, management and reporting of website data

Over-arching these was the innovative, contemporary look and feel. Sitecore’s CMS offered PLC a good mix of a solid technical platform, ease of use and support for marketing needs as well as integration with MAZE, Active Directory, Student database, timetabling and sports calendars.

The virtual tours and testimonials were greatly enhanced to show all of the College’s fantastic facilities with supporting imagery. The site also has a “My Pymble” application that can be synced to smart photos for mobile updates of timetables, events and other PLC activities and announcements.

Result

PLC has seen a significant increase in traffic and enrolments since the new website was launched. Analytics available to PLC has greatly improved.

According to Rathika Suresh, Director of Information Technology , Pymble Ladies College, “It’s important in the fast changing, technological age we live in that our school stays relevant and in touch with what’s going on in the outside world. Parents and students alike are looking at these types of things to give their children the best possible chance of success.  By showing them an integrated system such as ours with its obvious benefits of information exchange, security and truancy control we offer them a fantastic springboard for their daughters and peace of mind for themselves.”

Technical Description

Solution Special Ingredients

• Integration with Active Directory: Single Sign on, carries users login from PLC site through to various external services, such as bookings engine, online payment gateway, other online portals.
• MAZE, Active Directory, Student database, timetabling, sports calendars, are integrated into their back end systems.