Fusion Productions - Integrating Meetings, Learning & Technology

Organization

The National Society of Collegiate Scholars
An honors organization that recognizes outstanding academic achievement among first- and second-year college students, encouraging members to develop leadership skills through community service.

Challenge

• Prior to redesign, the NSCS website consisted of only static HTML pages maintained by limited NSCS staff members. NSCS needed a way to distribute web publishing duties across the NSCS staff to minimize time spent updating the site.
• NSCS needed a way to provide more personalized, engaging information to their different member types (e.g., regular members, officers, advisors, etc.).
• Providing end-users with a single login was critical. Prior to the redesign, members where sometimes required to login separate from the site to third-party applications.
• With active chapters on over 190 campuses nationwide, NSCS needed a quicker and more efficient way to communicate with their membership.

Solution

• Fusion successfully integrated the CommonSpot content management system (CMS) with the NSCSs Association Management System (AMS). Fusion consulted with the AMS vendor to streamline the integration process and strategized the best way to deploy the AMS within the NSCS website.
• Content was aligned with member interests in order to deliver personalized information. These interests were captured and recorded in the AMS to retain a central repository of member information and provide NSCS with the ability to run ad-hoc reports.
• Working with third-party vendors Fusion integrated the web site login with the AMS web interface and NSCS Job Bank in order to preserve single-logon capabilities. Look and feel of the NSCS web site was also retained, providing users with seamless integration between each application.
• Dynamic applications were developed to display Chapter induction, news and event information based on membership. In addition, national NSCS events and news items were integrated with chapter information to give the user a single place to view what was happening at NSCS.

Results

• NSCS utilizes the distributing publishing feature of CommonSpot to provide different departments with the ability to update their own content on the NSCS web site, increasing the timeliness of information posted to the site. In addition to distributed publishing, CommonSpots user-friendly interface allows non-technical staff to make updates with minimal effort.
• As new information is added to the NSCS web site it is tagged according to member interests, creating dynamic interaction between the interests of the member with the content NSCS provides. These interests empower the member to determine the type of content that they want readily available upon login rather than forcing them to search through the site to find what they need.
• AMS tools and features utilized by NSCS Chapter Officers and Advisors are displayed in a special Tools section of the site based on the members profile, while members can update their membership profile, personal interests and apply for scholarship opportunities using the AMS interface. Officers, Advisors, and members alike can visit the Job Target web site to find internship or job opportunities as well as network with their peers in NSCS Communities of Interest web site after logging in, seamlessly navigating through multiple third-party applications with ease.
• The website now has dynamic capabilities by pulling portions of information directly from the AMS and delivering targeted information to specific groups within the NSCS membership. Updated chapter and national event information housed in the AMS, scholar of the day recognition, and scholarship and study abroad opportunities are posted in real-time to the NSCS web site.