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Integration with Finalsite CMS

Claire Frank
  • Updated

Overview 

Finalsite's CMS and EMS can be connected to share data from Finalsite Enrollment into your Finalsite CMS database to facilitate communications from the Messages and Workflows modules.

The goal of this integration is to use both systems for what they are best at. Finalsite Enrollment is your central hub for admissions and enrollment management (EMS), while Finalsite’s robust communication tools can be used to push inquiries through the admissions process (CMS).

There is no charge for this integration!

In this Article

Terms used in this article

To streamline this article, you will see two terms used to refer to our two systems

CMS (Content Management System) - This refers to Finalsite’s website, marketing, and communication tools (known as Finalsite Composer, Messages, and Workflows).

EMS (Enrollment Management System) - This refers to Finalsite’s admissions, enrollment, and tuition management platform.

How it works

When the integration is enabled, parent/student data will flow one way from EMS into CMS. The sync will run hourly to update the information in Finalsite, with a full refresh nightly.

EMS CMS integration graphic.png

Constituent Manager

When the parent/student data first comes over from CMS, they all land in Constituent Manager. It's not likely that you'll need to use this in your day-to-day work but you may need to come here if you notice anything off in a student's data that you'd like to adjust.

GIF of locating the list of EMS contacts in Constituent Manager

Group Manager

You'll also find the students and parents listed in Group Manager. Here they will be listed based on the status of the student. Additionally, there will be a corresponding group for relatives of those applicants, to facilitate targeting the parents/guardians with your communications.

Good to know vocab: "Contacts" and "Students" in CMS

In Finalsite Composer, you'll see the groups divided into "SchoolAdmin Contacts" and "SchoolAdmin Students". 

  • Contacts are the parents.
  • and Students are the students.

So, when you are building a contact list in Group Manager, if you pull in "School Admin Contacts", you are pulling in a list of the parents.

GIF of viewing groups in group manager.gif

You can add groups within Group Manager so that you can use dynamic filters to narrow down your pool of contacts in order to more effectively engage with them. For example, you may be building a group of Inquiries who are also International students so that you can create a drip campaign in Workflows specifically targeted to nurturing International students to apply. 

Data Notes

  • Users from the Finalsite Enrollment integration will not automatically merge users already in Finalsite. If a user from Finalsite Enrollment already exists in Constituent Manager, a duplicate user will be created. You can clean up CMS duplicates on your end, or you can reach out to CMS support if you need a hand!

  • If you adjust the statuses configured in Finalsite Enrollment, please reach out to Finalsite Support to re-align the mapping, so the sync will continue to work as expected.

  • We treat the student/parent data going from EMS to CMS cyclically. The intended purpose is to populate and update the data throughout your admissions season, then purge and start fresh at the beginning of the next season.

Best practices

  • Create a Leadflow form to add to your Finalsite website. Use this form to gather prospects that will be sent to EMS.

  • Use your Finalsite website to drive interested parties to your Finalsite Enrollment inquiry form, where they will be “picked up” by the integration.

  • Nurture those inquiries using Workflows or Messages and get them to apply using your Finalsite Enrollment application.

  • Follow up with those applicants using Messages or Workflows.

  • Create targeted segments with the data you have available to tailor information specifically to the recipient. 

EMS to CMS illustration.png

Setup and deployment

If you are interested in this integration, please reach out to the CMS Finalsite Support team or your client success manager to work with a deployment specialist who will walk you through the necessary steps, including:

  • Granting access to the Finalsite Enrollment API
  • Configuring the data mapping
  • Verifying the data (on a clone site or live site)
  • Enabling and automating the integration on your live site 

We have a wide range of datapoints available that can be mapped into Finalsite, according to your needs. The best practice is to only import data that is required — like ImportID values, first and last names, email addresses, relationships — as well as data that is useful for your communication efforts and allows you to filter for segments you want to target (such as grade applying for, financial aid requested, or custom fields).

Also during the deployment process, you may want to work with our team on configuring your workflows or mailing lists to ensure they are behaving as expected.

Important notes

Constituents and groups created from the integration are largely hidden in Finalsite. This is intentional, as we don’t want constituents to be treated as portal users or to be manually edited in Finalsite.

Likewise, the groups that the integration creates should not be edited manually, as it can compromise the behavior of the integration. Groups should also not be created in the same “nodes” as the system-level groups the integration created.

These groups can be used for mailing list targets or to create other groups via dynamic filters, however, as your organization requires.

Please note: If you wish to utilize Finalsite Enrollment data to update your active Parents and Students, this can be done in an automated fashion, although it is a different approach than the integration described in this article. Please reach out to your Client Success Manager, who can connect you with Support for deployment of this integration.

If at all possible, we do not recommend that you utilize an SIS integration for this purpose, but we understand that, sometimes, Finalsite Enrollment will have the best data.

As admissions seasons can vary from school to school, we urge you to coordinate with our Finalsite CMS Support team at the end of your admissions season to clean up the data in CMS and prepare for the next admissions season.

Users who are removed from Finalsite Enrollment can be removed from Finalsite using our Off Feed Utility and the automation option.

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