How Wiley streamlines back-to-school prep with in-app content

These days, college students and professors can prepare for the school year from the comfort of their couches. Students build their schedules and buy school supplies online, and professors set up courses and create assignments on WileyPLUS’ online teaching platform.

Put that way, it all sounds easy. Yet behind the scenes, the WileyPLUS team is working their hardest to help instructors prepare for the school year. “Back-to-school season is our superbowl. It’s all about instructor preparation,” said Alison Stanley, WileyPLUS’ senior marketing manager. 

Heading into the new academic term, instructors needed to follow a specific course setup process. Their instructors wanted to do this on their own schedule—and if courses weren’t ready by the first day of class, the student experience would suffer.

One checklist to rule them all

To keep everyone on task, Stanley’s team created a one-stop checklist with everything needed for a successful term. The marketing team promoted these resources via email and live training, but instructors were enjoying their summer breaks—not checking work emails. On average, 24-25% of their instructors opened these emails, and only 1% of that audience clicked through to the checklist.

“Instructors wouldn’t engage with our emails over the summer. They just weren’t ready to start planning out their school year,” Stanley explained. “These would turn into another deleted email, and with only a few days left until the first day of class, instructors panic because they don’t know how to get started.”

“We were putting so much time and effort into these emails, and we really weren’t seeing the results we needed,” Stanley explained. So instead of relying on email, they pivoted to an untapped marketing channel: In-app messaging.

Increasing content click-throughs by 1250%

WileyPLUS already used Pendo In-app Guides to help their instructors and students use their platform effectively. “Historically, WileyPLUS wasn’t as user friendly as it is today. Guides helped the user experience, and in many cases, replaced the need for one-on-one user training,” Stanley said. 

In addition to onboarding and walkthroughs, guides helped the platform connect instructors with their back-to-school checklist and improve engagement. “In-app Guides help us reach users at the right moment for them,” Stanley explained. 

After switching from email to guides, 14 out of every 100 of instructors clicked through to view the checklist. We’ll do the math for you: That’s a 1250% improvement over email. 

“Pendo gives us that safety net of knowing, when instructors do log in, they’re getting all of the materials they need to start.”

Alison Stanley, senior marketing manager

“If all instructors do is complete our checklist, we’ve succeeded. Pendo is the mechanism for that, because our messaging appears at the right time in the user journey,” Stanley said. 

Lead with in-app messaging, not email

The impact of in-app messaging has radically changed Stanley’s approach to communication. “We’ve flipped our communications strategy. Now, we lead with Pendo and stop wasting time and efforts developing a series of emails,” she said. 

Yet reducing content and developer resources hasn’t been the only win for WileyPLUS and Pendo: Stanley’s team has refocused their entire marketing strategy to optimize impact. 

“These results have gotten us to reduce our social media footprint, focus less on our community efforts, and instead use guides as our primary way to connect with customers,” Stanley explained. 

“Guides have turned into our primary marketing channel.”

Alison Stanley, senior marketing manager

For all of her fellow marketers on Pendo, Stanley has some words of advice: “Don’t ignore in-app communication. Lead with Pendo, and let this transform how you prioritize your other channels.” 

Taking the pressure off customer support

Other Wiley teams love Pendo, too. Back-to-school training and instructor preparation used to fall squarely on the shoulders of their customer success managers (CSMs), but no longer. “Guides have helped us depressurize this time of year,” Stanley explained. “If one of our instructors is ready to get started at 9 p.m. at night, they’ll still get the resources they need. Our CSMs love it.”

“Our instructors and WileyPLUS staff felt so much pressure around the back-to-school season, and everything can be solved in one simple Pendo post.”

Alison Stanley, senior marketing manager

No matter how many emails WileyPLUS sends (or doesn’t send), the team can rest easy knowing their instructors have all the resources they need.

Before this story comes to an end, Stanley wanted to give a special thank-you to Pendo’s support team: “It’s been really lovely to partner with everyone and I’ve learned a lot and always got the support I needed.” Thanks, Wiley, for all of your continued innovation and partnership!