Chatbots in Higher Ed—What You Should Know

As colleges and universities strive to expand and increase enrollment, typical processes and automations have to keep pace. Modern technology allows colleges to offer customizable experiences without all the manual effort. What’s the secret?

Personalized and automated chatbots for higher education.

Before you get too skeptical about running your admissions marketing initiatives with autoresponders, we’ve got reassurance for you. The best chatbot tools on the market are now innovative, conversational, and driven by powerful artificial intelligence (AI) modals. This means that you can still reach those big goals without leaving your students to the whims of a robotic voice on the other end of the line.

If you’re interested in saving time and valuable resources with chatbot technology for higher education, this post is for you. We’ll take a look at current examples, popular use cases, and even tips for implementation.

Let’s start with the basics. A “chatbot” refers to any tool or technology that uses automated artificial intelligence (AI) language processing to deliver real-time responses to individuals, customers, or students. 

For higher education institutions, the foundational AI-fueled chatbot technology is the same as it is in other contexts and industries. At colleges and universities, chatbots replace some of the more routine and predictable communication that happens among students, staff, and even recruiters. 

Most chatbots rely on natural language processing (NLP), a system that supplies common language responses through a text-based interface. These exchanges or conversations can happen online in a browser, via text message, in-app, or even within a specialized chat-based engagement platform.

Common Higher Ed Applications and Use Cases

Once a college or university decides to implement a chatbot platform or service provider, there are many ways to put that tool to work. Some of the most common use cases, which span different departments and team members, come from the list below.

Website lead generation. An intelligent chatbot quickly connects with new website visitors and captures important contact information or other data from prospective students. These tools also help colleges and universities deliver instant information to leads by pointing future students in the right direction, especially if they’re looking at specific degree options.



Student experience and service. Chatbot software also delivers round-the-clock service and support to students in higher education when they have needs or questions. There are numerous examples of this level of support, including within an admissions office, financial aid or administration setting, IT ticketing system, and more. 



Data collection from inquiries. Because of the AI technology that powers them, chatbots are constantly taking in new data and using it for future exchanges, interactions, and analysis. Schools can directly benefit from this incoming information by using it to improve the inquiry experience, discover common pain points, and alleviate roadblocks during the enrollment process. 

Advantages of University Chatbots on Your Campus 

For institutions that have flourished without the use of chatbots in the past, implementing a new AI tool could seem like a big risk. Making such an important investment is not only a consideration for internal staff, but it also has the potential to change student-first experiences. Despite these considerations, there are several perks to introducing chat-based tools in your admissions or enrollment workflow.

Expanded student service options. Chatbots give students access to additional services at all times of day—not just when their school contact is online. Chatbots also offer a high level of detail for student inquiries, making the experience even better.

Cost savings. Many bottlenecks, delays, and communication gaps can be prevented with automation. Over time, the savings in manual effort and resources add up. 


Reduction of mistakes and clerical errors. Chatbot experiences rely on learned and stored data. The responses that students receive are less likely to be affected by human mistakes, basic administrative errors, or mix-ups between individuals.

Learn how to connect with today's students amidst one of the largest shifts in the history of higher ed.

Swipe, Tap, Submit: The College Experience Goes Personal to Boost Enrollment

As EdTech Magazine points out, the college-level conversation around AI has become increasingly prominent in the past year, particularly with the launch of ChatGPT. While many of these conversations center around AI ethics and questions in an academic context, the focus is certainly on conversational artificial intelligence now more than ever before.  

In some examples, chatbots in higher education became necessary in order to deliver academic services throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. Without in-person interactions or classroom instruction, schools needed to communicate clearly and quickly. Automated tools and machine learning made these goals more realistic, even when budgets and staff resources were cut for a time.

The latest chatbot uses have also allowed schools to move away from single-use bots into something more nuanced, personalized, and customizable. An artificially intelligent chatbot is highly adaptive and productive, which works well for a generation of students known as “digital natives.” Modern learners are not only familiar with this type of communication technology, but there's a growing need (on the institutional side) to help today's students embrace that knowledge as a way to persist to graduation. 

How to Successfully Implement Chatbots at Your School

As with any other technology tool, automation, or marketing initiative, understanding what (and why) you’re actually launching is the key to success. If you plan to put chatbots in front of students, fine-tuning your process is critical. 

Although your specific chatbot strategy might depend heavily on the direction of your school’s leadership, here are a few tips to follow if you want to achieve success. 

Tip 1: Have Your Chat Tool Engage Personally and Emotionally

In some cases, AI chatbots and other AI technologies have gotten a bad reputation for being distant and impersonal. But some of these common complaints are fading away as technology changes and improves. These advancements are often directly related to the ability of chatbots to communicate personally and empathetically. EdTech Magazine describes the changes as follows:

“As more universities have engaged with more students, chatbots have grown smarter and gotten better at building the kinds of relationships that have proved critical in driving retention, reducing summer melt and improving graduation rates at universities that implement them effectively.” 

Your chosen chatbot solution should take personalization into account. Even though you’re implementing automation to accomplish faster (and hopefully better) results, students should walk away from these encounters feeling supported and confident.

To be as effective as possible for diverse student populations, higher ed chatbots also need to be smart and adaptive. Not only do these capabilities allow chatbots to reach underserved or hard-to-reach student populations, but better integrations make them easier to use, which can increase student engagement.

For instance, a chatbot may need to have secure access to other platforms that a student uses in order to answer questions accurately. One example is if the chatbot requires secure access to the student’s portal in order to provide answers on an account, registration, enrollment, or other administrative question. 

It’s crucial to maintain a chatbot’s other non-negotiable features, too.  

Chatbots should offer multi-channel communication, meaning that students can connect from a variety of devices or platforms as they seek accurate answers.

All chatbot data must be highly secure to provide assurance when it comes to student privacy and protection.

Multilingual chatbot features expand access to support for diverse student populations; as the technology continues to evolve, it should also eliminate bias.

Tip 3: Define Your Strategy, Plan, and Boundaries 

Because artificial intelligence is still gaining steam on college campuses (in both positive and negative contexts), having open and honest conversations about different versions of implementation is crucial. 

Defining your college’s chatbot strategy, major goals, and benchmarks can eliminate internal friction and provide better student experiences.  

Campus leaders should also seek buy-in for chatbot tools, since usage has ramifications for more than one team or department. For example, a marketing team might rely on a website bot for initial inquiries, but those contacts get passed to recruiting. There should be alignment between teams so that collectively, the campus works toward common goals through chatbot expansion and maintains certain boundaries, when and if those are needed.

At Element451, we believe that generative AI is here to stay—especially on diverse, inclusive college campuses that want to leverage the gold standard in technology. We’ve developed two essential technologies—Bolt Copilot and BoltBot—to drive your student engagement strategies even further this year.

Bolt Copilot helps college teams streamline the creation and editing process for new content. It’s an all-in-one copywriting and editing tool (powered by OpenAI) that enables marketing and admissions teams to dish out compelling content across channels and platforms.

BoltBot gives institutions a better way to respond to student needs 24/7. Prospects receive instant communication and response, and students get the personalized support and attention they deserve.  

Revolutionize your work and support students with Element451's BoltBot. It works 24/7 and understands the context and meaning behind every question providing accurate answers — every time.

Regardless of how you choose to communicate with your student population, the non-negotiable rule is to create a plan for active engagement. Because students are up-to-date with modern technologies (including chatbots), it’s wise to incorporate these features into the holistic recruitment and enrollment experience. 

Element451 aims to be on the leading edge of these exciting new developments and latest trends in technology by helping colleges and universities adapt the right way. 

Chatbots in Higher Ed: What You Should Know

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