The Top 5 Most Important Slingshot Blogs You May Have Missed

Should higher education look more like Netflix? Is it better to build course material fees into tuition? Did the pandemic put your campus store’s market share in quarantine?

If you aren’t caught up on Slingshot’s latest disruptions of the course materials industry, we’ve got you covered. Here are the top five must-know topics you may have missed from our blog.

5

Yes, Equitable Access still offers academic freedom for faculty, student choice, and institution-level billing!

Not to be mistaken for Inclusive Access (IA), Equitable Access (EA) is centered on each individual student’s needs. Student choice is a key component of EA and levels the playing field at many institutions. Where Inclusive Access is often 100% digital materials for eligible courses only, EA can offer various material formats for all courses, ensuring they are affordable and delivered before the first day of class. Unlike IA, EA doesn’t require that faculty use only digital materials and won’t eliminate student choice at your institution.

Learn more about the differences between IA and EA here.

4

We believe your campus store and course materials delivery should look more like a box on your doorstep than a mall parking lot. 

Take a look at how your services stack up against big marketplace competitors like Amazon. Are your materials as cheap or cheaper than Amazon? How fast do your students receive their course materials? Do you offer a delivery service or do students need to stand in line in the campus store to pick up and return materials?

Find all of the questions to evaluate your auxiliary services here.

3

The top complaint you hear about course materials is actually about friction.

It’s true—the best thing you can do to improve customer experience is lower the friction people experience in the process. With course materials, that can involve auto-fulfillment programs, savings that beat other online sellers, auto-adoption software, and first-day guarantees. Slingshot offers all of these solutions for friction and more.

See where else you can remove friction from course materials here. 

2

It’s possible to create financial and operational efficiencies by merging some of your auxiliary services.

Slingshot recently began partnering with institutions to create one-stop-shops at their campus store. We specialize in merging course material delivery, merchandise sales, print, and mail services into one centralized location. Centralizing your auxiliary services can drive foot traffic to your campus store and revive struggling revenue-generating services. It can also help consolidate staff and management, leading to cost savings and a potentially smaller footprint in your institution’s facilities.

Learn more about combining print and mail services into your campus store here.

1

On average, we find traditional college bookstores only have a 25% share in the market.

Between the increase of digital content in the classroom and the impact of COVID-19, it’s possible your market share has decreased. We have discovered that switching to an equitable access model can actually increase the percentage of your market share. Our Slingshot Premium model offers several benefits, including one predictable flat fee for course materials and our first-day access guarantee. We’ve found our Premium option could increase the campus store’s market share to up to 95.5% when switching from a traditional counter service model to Premium.

Get all the details about increasing your market share here.

Still want more? See what else you may have missed on Slingshot’s website at slingshotedu.com/news.