Simplifying business operations: One Education’s transformation with a CRM

One Education provides many professional services for schools, academies, and multi-academy trusts. Their team of specialists comprises education experts, including former head teachers, teachers, and school business managers, together with highly qualified and practised professionals.

Their specialist services aspire to create a significant, positive impact on children’s and young people’s education, improving both pupil outcomes and the learning experience in schools and academies.

A quest for the perfect CRM

Mark Seddon, Director of IT and Business Development at One Education, said, “Originally, we were using Sage CRM. However, it was a limited product, and we struggled to get everyone to engage with it, so we looked for a CRM that was simple to use and gave us the support we required for the way we wanted to work.”

After doing some research online, Mark found SpotlerCRM. “Once I contacted SpotlerCRM, it led to a face-to-face meeting with Lisa Kilmister, Account Manager and their CRM Customisation Manager.”

The initial meeting highlighted the CRM’s capabilities, giving Mark and his team confidence that SpotlerCRM could be customised to meet their needs.

Mark continues, “Soon after meeting the team at SpotlerCRM, we started using their CRM. The product then grew from a case management need for the Education Psychology team to onboarding the HR team, and the decision to move away from Sage CRM. Once that worked well, I then brought in the Sales and marketing teams.”

From there, various CRM customisations have been built for different departments within the business. Some have been quick ad-hoc fixes, others have been more bespoke and In-depth customisations. That’s been the key to it all – an easy-to-use CRM with the ability to customise has made all the difference.”

One Education came to us with a unique problem related to case management, and together, we worked really hard, including a site visit with our Development Manager, to create a bespoke solution.
Lisa Kilmister, SpotlerCRM Sales Manager

Bespoke integrations, CRM customisation

One Education faced a challenge in managing contracts across departments. Mark explained, “Historically, we hadn’t been able to manage the service contracts efficiently, resulting in duplication of work and valuable time being wasted on manual processes. Alongside this, our contracts lacked uniformity as multiple teams generated them, each providing different products and services.”

To overcome this, the team at SpotlerCRM implemented an online document signing tool with a customer user interface. With everything in one place and online, the teams at One Education can now have a complete end-to-end view of the whole contract lifecycle.

Mark added, “The SpotlerCRM has allowed us to simplify our contract management process and centralise the information where the whole business can utilise it. Our contract administrators now have instant access to important information and up-to-the-minute contract status. They can now easily run CRM reports on where customers are up to with their contracts. A year ago, that would’ve been difficult and time-consuming, and we would have often had to contact each customer individually.”

Our growth and future plans are intertwined with the SpotlerCRM. It’s not only a great product to work with, but the team has been a great organisation to work with.
Mark Seddon, One Education

Ongoing custom work

SpotlerCRM continues to work closely with Mark and the team at One Education, where customisation opportunities are regularly reviewed and implemented to improve their work. SpotlerCRM is now working on a project to link One Education’s Sage Accounts programme to the CRM, so a complete sales lifecycle process is in place.

Once this work is completed, further projects will continue to tailor the CRM specifically for One Education’s needs.