#learnpipe

The Open College - run by Joe Walsh and based in Leopardstown are Ireland's largest provider of FETAC courses and I am delighted to announce Pubble's Social Q&A Platform has been added to their site.

We have been working with The Open College for a few years now with our sister company learnpipe so it was a natural progression to introduce our Social Q&A Platform.

You can see our Soical Q&A Platform on a selection of course pages, here are some examples:

FETAC Certificate in Special Needs Assisting

FETAC Certificate in Early Childhood Programmes

FETAC Certificate in Teaching Assistant Skills Level 6

We have also added our Course Search App to The Open College Facebook profile. Every Course is available via our app, clicking on the course title will bring you to the course description page on The Open College's website where you can make your enquiry via our Social Q&A platform - neat!

It is with great joy I pen this blog to confirm that the Institute of Technology Blanchardstown have added our Social Q&A Platform to their entire catalogue of courses.

Initially, I.T. Blanchardstown started off with our Social Q&A Platform on a select number of courses. This grew to all Part Time courses and now you can see our Social Q&A Platform on every course offered by the Institute - Part Time/Full Time/Undergraduate/Postgraduate - the lot!

Further to that, learnpipe released "Version 2" of our Facebook Course Search App last week - you can see the Institute's Facebook app here (click "Course Search").

You can search for every course offered by the Institute from their Facebook page. In the search results, clicking on your chosen course will bring you to the course description page on their website where you can ask your questions via our platform. A very cool & clever solution!

The Grimsby Institute are the latest college to add learnpipe's Facebook Course Search App to their Facebook page. 

The Grimsby Institute - incorporating both Further Education and Higher Education (among others such as Adult Courses and Part-Time Courses) have added learnpipe's app for both sets of courses.

Check them out here:

Grimsby Institute Further Education Courses Facebook App

Grimsby Institute Higher Education Courses Facebook App

So whatever courses you are looking to study in Grimsby, you can now search for them from the above pages where you can also ask questions about the courses that interest you - all from our app.

See here for more information about learnpipe's Social Q&A Platform.

Kearney Training & Consultancy Ltd (@KTC_Safety) have been clients of @learnpipe since January 2011. I am delighted to announce our Social Q&A Platform is now live on their website and Facebook Profile Page and is performing extremely well for them.

Following our agreement to go live, David Kearney Jr. had these works to say about #learnpipe:

"Kearney Training & Consultancy (KTC Safety) Ltd has been using learnpipe since January 2011. learnpipe has generated enquiries, leads and most importantly sales for my business. The team are always striving to improve and update their service. The aftercare service is second to none with regular emails and phones calls. I would highly recommend learnpipe because it really works"

High praise indeed which we are always greatful to receive!

Our Social Q&A Platform is now live on all courses offered by KTC Safety, here are some examples:

360 Excavator Training and Ticket

Safe Pass Course

Location of Underground Services (LUGS) Course

learnpipe is delighted to announce our partnership with the UK Open College - @ukopencol - who have implemented our Social Q&A Platform to their website and facebook profile.

In a short space of time, our Q&A platform is proving to be a big attraction for prospective students of the UK Open College who have been using it in large numbers. You can see our solution here :

(i) Teaching Assistant Course Level 3

(ii) Teaching Assistant Course Level 4

(iii) Child Care Level 3 Course

(iv) Dress Making Fashion Design

Ever stop to analyse just how much money is spent by Universities & Colleges on their printed prospectus and then analyse just how effective they actually are ?

I had a very interesting conversation with the Deputy Principle of a Dublin Secondary School over the weekend - he had some insightful observations to tell me about where these prospectus actually end up. Yep - unfortunately the vast majority end up in the bin. Even for those that do get brought home, chances are these students are only interested in a select number of courses per college (3/4 approx) which spans 6 to 8 pages of up to and over 100 in each prospectus. 

How much time and effort has gone into the prep/printing/distribution etc of each prospectus, not to mention the cost? Waste of money?..I'm afraid so.

It's time to fully embrace the power of social media, its benefits, its potential and how learnpipe fits in here like a glove.

Here are just some benefits of social media :

Increased awareness of your University/College

Increased traffic to your website - the primary source of information for prospective students

Better understanding of prospective students perceptions of your college - recent survey of students found 96% will use a college website to source the information they require about the college/course/student life/sports etc that they are interested in - however - shockingly only 46% said they were satisfied they found the information they required

Increase in new student sign-ups = $$$$

Even at this stage of the social web era, some individuals get it, some just don't and some take longer to convince - but can they afford to wait ?

When does it start to make sense for colleges to look at online alternatives that provide real benefits on a cross platform basis (versus the printed prospectus for example)? learnpipe has developed our Social Q&A platform to ensure universities website/facebook/blog all work in unison. 

You might be thinking...learnpipe has been around for a while...I know what they do....why are they writing a post titled: What is learnpipe?

Well 6 months ago we began our pivot from course search engine to an education based social network that makes it incredibly easy for colleges and students to interact.

We call it social Q&A for colleges. ‘Social’ in that our platform brings social media type functionality to college web sites (following, commenting, sharing, social authentication, etc.) 

And ‘Q&A’ is the mechanism through which the colleges and students interact. 

For colleges, learnpipe solves two key problems:

1. Making college information available where potential students live online (think Facebook, Tumblr, Wordpress);

2. Making it incredibly easy for students and colleges to interact, cleverly.

Why is this important? Well research has shown that 96% of students research colleges by visiting their web site. College web sites are STILL the primary information for prospective students. 

However, 48% of them said that the information provided on the college site did not meet their needs. 

With learnpipe deployed, college channels work in unison – a question asked on Facebook or Tumblr enhances the course page on the college site. 

UCC International Facebook Page

What's cool is that students can post their questions to current students, lecturers and even friends and family. This results in a live college site that is continually enhanced by both the college and the community of students and alumni. 

learnpipe Explained