UCAS: more than just an application body a summer series episode with Stephen Cleal

In our latest Housed Summer Series episode we chat with Stephen Cleal, Customer Success Director, UCAS. With over 20 years of industry experience and having spent 11 years at UCAS, Steve brings a wealth of knowledge to the sector and heads up the Accommodation and Real Estate team as they continue to support students as they transition into higher education or apprenticeships and move away from home.

Some of the topics we covered in this informative episode:
🟣 Key insights from university clearing and student application numbers
🟣 The importance of UCAS data in PBSA and how some operators can use it more effectively
🟣 The increase in the interest of apprenticeships and how we need to support this demographic
🟣 UCAS being more than just an application body - Stephen gives overview of all of their services
🟣 The latest on their Journey to A Million campaign
🟣 Supporting International Students
🟣 Why the UCAS accommodation portal is closing down in October
🟣 The impact of the new government for UCAS

⭐ PLUS an exclusive announcement - listen to find out more!

Each week, Sarah Canning, Deenie Lee of The Property Marketing Strategists and Daniel Smith of Student Housing Consultancy will be delving into a wide variety of subjects and asking the questions that aren't often asked. This podcast is for anyone who works in Student Accommodation, BTR, Co-living, Operational Real Estate or Shared Living.

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are the personal views of the individual hosts.

Transcript

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SPEAKER_03 0:00

Hello and welcome to this very special episode of How's the Shared Living Podcast, the summer sessions. This is a mini-series of special episodes with some very interesting and relevant guests to get you through the summer. Hopefully you've caught up with our episodes that we've already launched with Hannah Schapat, our bumper episodes where we teamed up with fellow industry podcasters and experts, Rebecca Rohair, Jenny Shaw, Laura Bosworth, Richard Stopp. And of course, last week's episode with Honor Barrett of Birch Grove on later living being the sexy part of the shared living sector. If you haven't, you can of course catch up with them in all the usual places wherever you get your podcasts. So on with the show.

SPEAKER_02 0:43

I'm Deanny Lee from the Property Marketing Strategists.

SPEAKER_01 0:45

And I'm Sarah Canning from the Property Marketing Strategists.

SPEAKER_03 0:49

So this week it is the turn of GCSE students to receive their exam results. But last week it was A-Level Results Day, last Thursday. And that is obviously a big day for the student accommodation sector and one that really sets the tone for the year to come. It means a lot of scrabbling around for a lot of operators in different locations. So we are delighted that even after a very busy week, we have the co-manager of Southern League football team, Morvantown FC, also known as Stephen Cleal from UCAS. So you'll probably know him as the customer success director of UCAS, and he is here to give us an insight into clearing this year and hopefully do a bit of crystal ball gazing, and I'm sure he'll talk about his FA Cup success as well. We'd like to welcome Steve to the podcast.

SPEAKER_00 1:36

Delighted to be here. Thanks for inviting me.

SPEAKER_03 1:38

Before we get into it, the question everyone wants to know about what insight we can gather from clearing this year. It'd just be good to hear a little bit about your role at UCAS. I mean, how does that support the university accommodation and PBSA sector? And what is it that you do, Stephen?

SPEAKER_00 1:53

Yeah, so I head up the real estate and accommodation sector at UCAS, and you know, are primarily there to support largely PBSAs in understanding and identifying markets and opportunities, and obviously getting their kind of student accommodation in front of the eyes of the would-be students, and and ultimately from a university point of view as well, it's again that information advice and guidance and helping them to again get their properties in front of you know the students they're looking to recruit and and obviously hope to deliver them for a number of years. So it's different roles. Obviously, marketing is a bit a big key of ours, as you know, we work with some of the biggest PBSA providers and helping them to you know get their buildings out there. But also the the biggest thing which we've kind of got in our armory, which we probably don't use as much, we talk about a lot with you guys, is this kind of the data side of it and being able to identify opportunities and talk about you know what we expect the market to look like. And I think you know, we're we're seeing different trends emerging, which I'm sure we'll get into in a in a bit. But I think yeah, the biggest thing we do as a team is really we're there to support the sector and obviously help them, whether that be student recruitment or whether that be kind of understanding opportunities in new areas to invest or or new areas to kind of look to develop or where there's a relevant student need, really.

SPEAKER_01 3:02

And Steve, who are your kind of typical clients regarding data? Who who really benefits from it?

SPEAKER_00 3:09

So we're we're seeing more and more of the kind of real estate, you know, the colliers, JLs, people like that that want a fusion group, the people that want to understand potential markets and opportunities. But I think one of the biggest things we we do have is when we do speak to PBSAs and we do give them the data, they kind of look at it from a different lens. They're looking at it to see, you know, from a pricing strategy lens, from a you know, an opportunity lens, that is it, you know, it they they obviously need it as well to kind of inform their investors. So when something's not quite right, that there's an opportunity there for us to help them to identify and understand some reason why they are struggling to fill that building, or some of the reasons why there might not be the need that's there. You know, we can obviously see as the uh sort of timeline progresses, as the student numbers progress, we know where they're going and where they're looking to go. So we can identify from a kind of earlier lens, which we can't always share, obviously, like where there might be something that's not quite as expected to fly off the shelf as what previously did previous years did.

SPEAKER_03 4:07

Yeah, five years ago, pre-COVID, there were a lot of cities where it was it was like shooting fish in a barrel for PBSA operators, they were filling no matter where you put the beds. Seems like it's a lot trickier now, partly because the pipeline's creeping up and obviously the student numbers have shot up as well. I can imagine that that data is incredibly important, and I've I've seen how important that data is to investors and developers in particular, who are really looking for one source of truth. And you know, they might go to their agency, whether it's Colliers or Night Frank, Savils, JLL, whoever, but then they're looking at students or student crowd, and of course, more recently as well, UCAS, because what we really want is that one source of truth, and we want to know exactly how many students are going to apply or have applied, what those trends are looking like, you know, the postgrad, undergrad split, international domestic split, and of course, that's you know, you can offer a little bit of crystal ball gazing, then of course the universities have to pick that up as well. But in terms of being that one source of truth, of course, as the applications body for the UK universities, is there ever going to be a time, do you think, where UCAS may deal with all applications, not just you know, domestic undergrads and some internationals, but all postgrads, all PhD students, all undergrad students.

SPEAKER_00 5:26

Do you think that's ever feasible? I think it's feasible. I think, but I think in in reality, you know, one of the things that our our new CEO, Joe Saxon, is very keen on is keeping the main thing the main thing. And obviously, we've done UK undergraduate for a number of years, and you know, we do it really well. And I think one of the things that we want to ensure is we keep that consistency, we keep the that being that opportunity, like that sort of body for the students to come to and and really help them inform choices. You know, the apprenticeship uh area, something we've grown recently, and I think it you know, I think if I look at the the recent, I think there was around 80,000. I think there was hits on apprenticeships searches this year on on clearing on clearing day, which again is is you know more than what there was last year. So I think I don't think we're ever going to do the whole kind of post-grad PhD. I I don't think that's in our remit to do it. We did look at postgrad a number of years back, um, but again, there's so many kind of anomalies in there, and I think is I think the undergraduate areas where we we really shine. So I don't think we're ever going to be able to be that one source of truth from a data point of view, but I think what we can do is offer you know the largest insight and the best insight and the most relevant insight into the student application numbers from an undergraduate perspective. And I know some of our PBSAs and some of our investors need to know the kind of whole picture, but I think if you use some of our historic data to make some of that kind of assumptions, you're not gonna be far wrong because the the source of truth was accurate at the date that it happened. So you know, 2023 numbers were accurate in 2023. So if you kind of use that as a bit of a tool to look ahead as what the second year cohort's gonna look like this year, you won't be far wrong.

SPEAKER_03 7:03

I I agree with that. It it would be lovely to have the the silver bullet that gives you all of the data that you need at any given time, but of course, I think there is still going to be the need to have data from multiple sources, and and and whilst one source of truth is good, there's no harm in making sure that you've you know you've you've corroborated everything with multiple sources. So I suppose the big question on everyone's lips how has clearing gone this year from a from a UCAS perspective? Because I'm sure you haven't got much sleep, but how are we looking in the UK from a from a student perspective?

SPEAKER_00 7:34

No, again, you know, we've had a record number of applicants placed again, you know, I think as it currently stands, five days after results day, we've got around sort of 468,000 placed students, which is up around about sort of 2% this time last year. International students are pretty static. There's around 54,000 placed international students as we currently stand, which again was very similar to last year. But I think one of the biggest things and one of the most notable changes for us is you know, Joe Saxon, one of the things she introduced first was the sort of waiver of the fees for free school meals, and that's had a significant impact. We saw an increase of sort of seven percent of sort of underprivileged children applying to university and getting placed at university for the first time this year, which is you know it's around sort of 28,000 of them have been placed at university, which is up seven percent year on year, and it's up four percent on the highest ever year, which was I think it was 2016. So I think things like that where we can have an impact and really make a difference to a sort of student's life, really is what you know UCAS wants to be known as. You know, ultimately you want to try and make university accessible for everyone, and to achieve a kind of result like that from just doing something quite simple, it is is brilliant. And I think you know, one of the things we need to keep doing is making sure that the choice is there for every student. I think as I said, you know, we had sort of 3.6 million hits on the UCAS.com dashboard on A-Level Results Day, you know, 80,000 views on the apprenticeship search page, which means you know that choice is there for them. You know, 1.1 million searches on the course landing page. You know, these are all figures which it's such a huge significant day for UCAS, and kind of all of our you know, we we joke in the office is we have meetings upon meetings before, and it's like you know, Happy Christmas Eve, we're saying on you know, on Wednesday the day, you know, and then you know people are coming on with sort of Christmas hats on, but ultimately, you know, the the the point of A results day is huge, and I think the more we can do to it inform and help inform students, and and you know, we've we've had a very successful A results day from our point of view, and the numbers reflect so Steve, just playing in Devil's advocate a little bit here, did it frustrate you and the rest of the UCAS team?

SPEAKER_01 9:42

Because I feel like all of those positive stories aren't necessarily reflected in the press. We often see you know, this number down, that number down. Is are they just grabbing hold of like a tiny, tiny, you know, section that has gone down and making that the headline when actually all the things that you just talked about should be the headline.

SPEAKER_00 10:02

Yeah, it's frustrating. I mean, you know, but ultimately the good news doesn't always sell. So they are gonna look at it's like you know, if you look at the Chinese number applicants this year, they're down year on year, you know. But I think like I said, the positivity around the sort of free score meals and the the the good news stories we've got from that and the opportunity for all is it should be the headlines, but ultimately, you know, people are gonna look at where there is a gap and try and you know not exploit it more, but promote that more.

SPEAKER_03 10:30

You've got to find that balance, I think, between delivering the good news and also making sure that it's really clear as to what the impacts are of you know the Chinese students potentially being down. Because with PBSA, the moment that there's any movement in in Chinese students, everybody runs around like their hairs on fire because we've built so much stock for Chinese students. We're brilliant at building premium studios because that's what make the numbers work. And and I think that, yeah, you're right. Quite often a lot of the good work that UCAS is doing that I think people would often say is sort of outside their remit. I mean, you're there to process the applications effectively and work with the universities, but no, there's a whole different beast and machine behind UCAS as well, which is also commercial in nature, too, of course, with the data sales and various other elements as well. But but I think you know it there are so many positive news stories that you are able to cover there in terms of the it's a banned word now, but leveling up, as it were, I think you know, more disadvantaged students than ever going to university, easing that process for them to do it. I think that's absolutely key, and certainly something that we should be celebrating. And and UCAS has gone beyond just being the application body. I think it's it's really evolved into something that is going to benefit and is benefiting both commercial entities and PBSA operators, for example, but also the students themselves as well.

SPEAKER_00 11:50

One of the things that is worth mentioning when you say that, Dan, is the fact that you know we're able to offer the free school meal waiver because of the fact that we do from a commercial point of view. You know, UCAS is funded in three ways. We've got a number of students that obviously pay an application fee, we've got a number of universities that are members, but then all of the money we make from UCAS media sales, so the data sales, the advertising, the kind of events we do, all gets gift dated back to the charity, which allows us to be able to do the things above and beyond just processing applications. So I think it's really important that you know businesses understand that when they do work with us on a partnership or you know, that from a kind of data sales point of view, the end goal for us is always with the student in mind and making sure that the accessibility is there for all.

SPEAKER_02 12:32

I totally agree, and I just think that everything that you've said in the last 10 minutes is so valuable to everyone in our sector, and you are the start of someone's journey into their future, whether that's going to be an apprenticeship route or a degree, uh a traditional university degree route, and everything you're saying is going to change the homes that need to be provided for these people, and hearing that from you and hearing those changes and hearing just youCast making that one small change about actually waiving those fees is making a big difference and making a big impact. But I guess what is really important that we're all listening and reading that and understanding that because we need to make sure that those students, well, all students succeed, but particularly those students, because they're not going to find it that easy in a world where we've got rents where they are and we've got a cost of living crisis and all prices are going up. And you know, that came across in our recent youth forum where students are saying they don't know enough information about budgeting. So I think there's there's so much gold dust that you have from that kind of early indication of what's happening that really helps us build not just the right homes but the right support for these students to actually enable them to achieve what they need to achieve.

SPEAKER_00 13:43

No, I think you're absolutely right, Dean. I think you know that we we should have more conversations around you know these types of things and how we can help support these students through their next steps, you know, through their accommodation, through their university life, you know, it it's it's alright for us to kind of waiver that fee and then them to be placed at university, but it's what happens next. It's what what what how does that journey, like you said, look for them after that? And how do we as UCAS help to support the people that are going to be taking that student on the next steps of its journey?

SPEAKER_01 14:13

Just out of interest, when you're talking to your clients about data such as this, do any of them challenged you that data? Do any of them ask that question about what is the makeup of those students? So they might have said, you know, what does the future of Birmingham look like in the next five years? And you give them the data. Do any of them want the micro data about? Well, what do the students look like? How many students from underprivileged backgrounds make up that number? How many have you know applied had had come through your your first or three UCAS applicants? Because that's that's the the nitty-gritty, isn't it? That's that's very, very different to saying there's all these students, and and even within that, you know, how many are staying at home? Because that eradic that you know eliminates it from the accommodation numbers. You know, how many are actually really interested in the numbers that will make a difference versus the headline numbers that paint maybe a rosier picture back to their investors?

SPEAKER_00 15:15

I think you guys already know the answer to that. You know, not enough, not enough people ask the the nitty-crusher questions. They're more than happy to accept the headline because the headline they can explain, you know, and it's either good, bad, or it's indifferent. You know, when you start looking at the actual numbers and the impact on what it can potentially have to their their stock or their universities or their you know what the makeup of the person going into their buildings looks like, they they almost close off, but they they they don't want to know that that they just want the top line, they want to know because that's the easiest answer for them. You know, we've got we've got as you all allude to all the time, we've got shed loads of data that can help to identify and understand and really you know help to put some of those things into context and help them to make you know better decisions, informed decisions, which should inevitably help them in their kind of student recruitment numbers future on from both university point of view and also from a kind of PBSA accommodation point of view. You know, it it but it's it's frustrating, you know. But most people just want to know the top top line headlines.

SPEAKER_03 16:19

Yeah, I it it's it still blows my mind that I'm getting sales brochures and feasibility studies come across my desk which are saying to buy and build in places where I know that there is that's it, that is a very mature or even oversupplied market. I think I can actually say oversupplied now. And it's because a lot of a lot of developers and investors, we've got some really good institutional investors, and we've got some smaller developers and investors that are very focused on that data. They know that it's not just the total number of students, you know, against the number of PBSA beds that gives you your supply-demand ratio. It's it's got to be granular, and that data is is absolutely key. And and I think that the more we can show people that that data is available, and you can go and see the trends and see the patterns, and then you can speak to the university if you really want to. I think that's that's where UCAS can certainly come in. And I just want to labour that point on the commercial nature of UCAS now, and and I think it's really helpful the fact that you can show that you're having a positive social impact uh across the UK within higher education by getting more underprivileged students to university through these various elements. Because all a lot of PBSA operators in particular see are how much is a UCAS mail out, what's the UCAS marketplace, how much does it cost to go onto there, etc. And and I think that you know, fully understanding that there is a commercial side to UCAS, but there's you know, it's not like there's someone sitting in their ivory tower counting the money. That money is getting plowed back into international and and UK higher education. So I think that's a really good, really good point to make there for sure.

SPEAKER_00 18:01

And I and I think it's one that not many people know, Dan. Sorry. That's the other thing, you know, that's why I wanted to labour that point, and I'm glad you picked up on it, because some people know it, some but some people think, you know, like they said, we are just there making money in their ivory tower accounting the money. But it's definitely is about the student, and and you know, that's one of the biggest things that Joe Saxton, our new CEO, has impressed on everyone, and you know, it it has to make the main thing the main thing and be it with the the student in mind everything we do.

SPEAKER_03 18:28

We know that we've got an increasing cohort of 18-year-olds as we approach 2030. We'll have more 18-year-olds than ever. So we're through that demographic dip, as we called it in BBSA, which which was quite tricky for certain locations. Now, we've read all your essays on the journey to a million, and and if any of our listeners haven't, just visit the UCAS website. Journey to a million is effectively a um a collection of essays talking about how we can get to and and what things will look like if a million uh students a year apply to university. And uh and you know, ultimately we want to it's a good opportunity to crystal ball gaze and start thinking about what the impact of that that would be. So, how how are we tracking that in terms of are we on the still on course for the journey to a million? How are things looking with regards to this year compared to your um forecast, etc.? And you know, how much of a talking point has the journey to a million been for you guys and and your conversations with universities and and the private sector?

SPEAKER_00 19:33

Um I think I think we are still on track to get close to a million students. I don't think we're tracking as as you know, high we're not as confident or as that you know, some of the earlier kind of indications we spoke about about getting a million applicants through has changed slightly, but I think still we're still gonna get the record number year on year. You know, the the application numbers are going up. The more we can do to support applicants and applications, that's gonna naturally increase. I think with some of the international dips and some of the kind of you know the challenges that we should we say about cost of university, and that has had an initial impact. So I think we but we are still tracking to get around sort of 9.30 would be the but it's not as kind of sexy as we say as a journey to a million, journey to nine thirty hasn't got quite got the same range to it, has it?

SPEAKER_03 20:19

But but that's that's good to know, and it's good that you can give us that kind of insight as well. Because I I've had a lot of investors talk to me and say, hey, look, the fundamentals look incredibly strong because we know that at this point it will be uh there'll be a million applications. But my question back to them is always that's great, but how many of those are going to be domestics, and therefore are you building the right stock for them? And I think that's something that we really need to be be focusing on.

SPEAKER_00 20:45

I think the international market is a is a kind of you know it's a tricky one in the sense, and you know, we are seeing less EU applicants. I think choices are becoming more and more, and I think we did we had a round table discussion, which one of the things we talked about was the international cohort and what the kind of future for them looks like, and we've got a series of webinars that fall off the back of that. And I think one of the things that we need to understand more, and I think one of the biggest challenges we've got is helping as international students to really land in the UK and have the support to make them want to tell their friends about how good it is in the UK. Because I think one of the things we talked about in that time frame we had was the fact that you know we we're happy to help and support a student who's moving from say Plymouth to Liverpool, who knows the country, who knows all the railroads, who knows all the kind of road transport networks, speaks the language, has got the money in their pocket, but we expect someone to fly in from India, Africa, Nigeria, wherever South America, and just land and be left. And I think we need to do more as a UK university, we need to do more as UK PBSAs and and you maybe as UCAS we need to do more in supporting the international students when they kind of start their journey with their group to their degree.

SPEAKER_02 21:58

And I think coming back to Dan's Point on this as well is that it's not that 930,000 or almost a million um students that are coming is who are they, what are they, what's their requirement. I think overwhelmingly, when we've spoken in the past, you know, it it's always very much that most people want to go away to university and live away from home. Um, there is a small section of that that do want to commute and live close to home. But whilst that is that number's changing, it's not changing exponentially. Most people want to go away, and it kind of feels as a sector. We have a duty to try and help them do that in the best possible way, and that comes to product diversification because as you just said there, Steve, you know, different students from different places, whether that's in the UK or internationally, have different requirements, different needs, and different understandings of what life is like to move out of home, to travel to the UK, to travel in the UK, to budget in the UK, to live in the UK. And I just think that we still, as a sector, don't really get under those nuances and really understand what it is the customer needs to help them to move away to university because ultimately that's our customer, and if they're not moving away to university and they can't do it, then the PBSA sector don't have a customer anymore, and it's it's so important.

SPEAKER_00 23:15

And I think one of the frightening things is when when I speak to some of my clients and I say to them, you know, who is in your buildings? And you know, the answer they they give is like students, and it's just like, but yeah, but what does that what is what's the makeup like? You know, are they mainly international, are they mainly domestic, are they what are they studying? Because again, the more we can understand about the people that we've got in our buildings at the current time and that are going into the that those buildings, we can help them from a marketing point of view to market their services better to the right people at the right time because we know the journey they're going on. But ultimately, if they know the type of student that is needing their accommodation, then they can help them themselves. And it just kind of fries my mind when I do speak to people and they're like, I don't really know who's in my building. And you know, it's not everyone, obviously, it's not you know, it's not a blanket throwaway comment, but I think there are some, and you think, you know, that should be the first point of call, really, to understand who and where they've come from and what they're what they're studying, what they're you know, and their success rate.

SPEAKER_01 24:14

So you know, you you you guys at UCAS have been talking about the journey to a million for a couple of years now, haven't you? You've been building all the insight and everything around it. You know, you're you're looking ahead and you kind of know what that 930 slash a million will look like, I'm guessing, but it feels like the sector, the PBSA sector, the student accommodation sector isn't moving anywhere near quick enough. And I you know, I kind of feel like you know, everybody holds U class in such high regard that that you feel like the the beacon that we should all be following, quite quite frankly. But are you seeing those changes happening? Are you seeing more segmentation of data? Are you seeing your clients talking about oh, that's really interesting, that you think that 2030 looks like this, therefore we need to do this?

SPEAKER_00 25:05

A lot of them are talking about it, a lot of them are kind of inquiring to kind of get that golden nugget information and really understand what it looks like. But then what they do off the back of it is the kind of stumbling point, it's where they kind of, oh, that's really interesting, then they move on to something else because inevitably everyone's got time pressures, and it's like this that it's all about the now, it's like what's happening right now. It's yes, it's good for us to future gaze, and you know, the more we can do it as a sector, the better it will be, and the more understanding as I said, about all of the kind of what's that 930 or a million look like, you know, how many of those are going to be apprenticeships because that is again a potential growing market. But do we just look at apprenticeships as people that will only stay at home, or is it gonna be a start of a journey where maybe someone might you know offer accommodation to apprenticeship to be able to then move to a a new city to explore new avenues and have that kind of you know, that university lifestyle, as it were, but obviously have a you know a job in a town they don't live in and then go to university in a town they don't live in. So where do they stay? Where do they live? You know, is that going to be a growing trend? And it's kind of there's a number of different questions that we kind of start throwing out there and start our our research and development looks at, and it you know, it can go one of you know if you look at our Uni I tool, it's kind of got sort of three elements to it. It's kind of the you know, the the best case scenario, worst case scenario, and the kind of the means in the middle, which is the the kind of projected trajectory. But I think it's it's alright having the conversations, it's it has they have to develop further, they have to be more kind of succinct with everyone. I think they have more people have to get on the journey and and have the conversations around it, and I think that's certainly over the next 12 to 18 months. One of the things me and my team want to look to do is to kind of get more conversations around what the future looks like and what it means for the sector, which is why we're doing some of the things we've done. You know, I'm trying to set up a data discussions group, which I think I spoke to you guys about before, is and just to have understand what people really want to what they want to know and and see if there is a way we can help them to understand it better and and do something about it, I think is the biggest thing.

SPEAKER_01 27:07

I was gonna say I was I was smiling there, Steve, when you were talking about everyone wants the data now. I mean, we've you know, Deanny and I at the property marketing strategist, we we did some work with the UCAS team a couple of years ago, and one thing that we wanted to to try and see happen is people not just rely on you for last-minute email um campaigns during clearing. Has that changed? Or is uh is it still last minute.com from everyone?

SPEAKER_00 27:31

I would love to say yes. I'd love to say yes, and to be fair, quite some there are more people on the journey now where they are understanding that it's the longevity of it and the the importance of having those kind of little and often, but also talk to the right people at the right time. But you still inevitably like we're busy now for a reason because people have gone, oh, we're in the we need bed beds to fill, let's get on to UCAS. So, you know, I think we're not gonna ever get away from that, but I think that the better oper or the not the better operators are the ones who are being more successful who aren't calling us now are the ones who've worked with us for the longer period of time and have got the sort of plans in place. Um inevitably you are gonna have kind of needs around this time of year, but I think again, the the more you can kind of do is that start of the journey that the better it is, and that will allow you then to have the time to be able to do the other things we talked about on this like podcast, you know, the the kind of future proofing. If you've got all of your kind of marketing strategy tied up and it's working well, you can then start to look at you know what the future looks like. So, in in a long answer, which I tried to be short on, but you know me, I talk too much, is um no, no, they are there is still those people that rely on us last minute.

SPEAKER_03 28:43

I've done my fair share of last minute UCAS emailers, uh, and I've I've actually just recommended a few clients to do that too, with some with certain locations that are struggling, shall we say? Leads. Ultimately, uh I I just want to understand. So you've got the you've got the emailers that obviously you can do, you've got the data product. What are the other services that you can offer to PBSA clients, for example? This is a good opportunity for you to hitch your services here, Steve.

SPEAKER_00 29:11

In a traditional marketing channel, through we can do paid social, which you know, people can do their own paid social activity, but because we kind of underlay the verified student data onto it, you're not just buying a e-40, you're buying guaranteed students. We work a lot on our display offering, which is something we need to improve on because you know you alluded to earlier the accommodation portal which you've got live at the moment, that is being decommissioned in October, so it will be it'll be being taken down in October. So therefore, we need to do more on the main UCast.com site to help students and help PBSAs to get their properties in front of the right students. Direct mail still works quite well, believe it or not, for certain clients. I think it's a it's good, you know, the parent pine, as they say, and getting that that you know the the little Johnny and little Jennifer off to university. I want to see where they're going and understand they're going to be safe. So, you know, but I what I would say is we are not an open book, but I think the biggest thing that any PBSA provider out there or any kind of real estate company that wants to understand more about the student journey, come and have a conversation with us. You know, we're always at events, we're always out and about, and you know, I'm always here to talk to people because the more clients we can work with in a collaborative way to understand their needs and their journey, the better it the student experience will be. So therefore, the better, you know, the kind of knock-on effect it is there for all. So I think we've got lots of potential opportunities, the data's the biggest thing, but I think you know we aren't going to go away from the traditional email because it it works, you know, it is it is there for a reason and it's very successful.

SPEAKER_03 30:43

I'm glad you mentioned the marketplace and that you brought that up rather than rather than me. Now that it was a really interesting move uh in the first place, and a move that could have completely changed both the mark the PBSA marketplace industry and driven a lot of marketplaces out of business and totally changed the way students book their entire accommodation. I I think it would have probably given you a probably too much power and too much of a monopoly. And and ultimately, was it did you are you canning that because you feel like it was you know difficult to manage the relationship between universities when you had university accommodation and PBSA providers? Um, or is this is this more sort of Joe coming in, your new CEO, to to say, look, we've got to focus on what we're good at. Let's not have too many distractions and let's make sure that we're really adding value to universities and students' lives.

SPEAKER_00 31:35

Um I'll I'll be honest, we didn't get it right, Dan. We didn't get it right. We didn't get it right in the fact that kind of it was very sort of tech heavy and and manual input heavy and labor intensive for people to upload their properties, which doesn't work. And then you know, you'll relay that onto the fact that it the the we launched it in COVID year, which we made the decision to do it, and we've kind of put it up there, and you know, it we had some successful you know properties on there, but we didn't get enough of the properties on there, didn't get enough university properties on there, so it wasn't serving the purpose, which it was supposed to be information, advice, and guidance for students to understand and see the potential.

SPEAKER_03 32:14

Honestly, I I think it was definitely worth trying something. It's it's because accommodation is such an important part of a student's experience at university. So I think UCAS has definitely got a place in that. It's it's just a case of what that looks like, how commercial, how can you commercialise that, but without it, then ultimately you know becoming becoming too big a beast, I suppose, and taking away from the um the actual mission. So, in terms of the the new government that's coming, I mean obviously you've got a new CEO, we've now got a new government. So it's all changed for for UCAS, I suppose, but the mission still remains very clear. Do you think the new government coming in and that that sort of review of education and higher education in particular will will impact university applications or the or degrees, or do you think we'll see much of a change from UCAS? And and are you having many uh uh conversations with the government as yet?

SPEAKER_00 33:06

Um the the policy team, as you can imagine, are quite you know on top of it and speed to them all the time and and prior to the election, even though we all knew who was gonna get be our new government, um you know, they they were obviously having conversations with both parties or all parties and understanding what their kind of thought process was on education, and you know, it's largely positive. I don't I think you can't escape the fact of the kind of economic value for the UK economy that universities bring to the sort of table. And I think from a UCAS point of view, you know, I I know we we mentioned previously about kind of a change in the application state and whether people apply after they've got their results, and you know, reform is something which was talked about previously, but I don't think you know anything's going to change radically over the next sort of 12 to 18 months, two years. I I think the reform conversation is something that happened previously, and I think it happened again. I think you know, I've been in in UCAS for about the last 12 years on and off, and I I can't remember a year when they haven't talked about potentially changing the application status and and applying after you've got your results, which is a whole kind of shift change in that would have to happen for that to kind of come to the forefront. So for me, you know, again, it it I don't see there being any kind and I haven't certainly been told of any expected changes to how we do things currently. Um, and I think if it's not broke, then I don't think it necessarily needs fixing. I think it needs tweaking. I think there's elements that they can help to tweak, um, which we all know they are, but I think from a kind of just purely UCAS point of view, I can't see it being changed in the next sort of two years really. Um I have got a little exclusive for you guys actually that we are gonna be launching a report in the autumn which does look at kind of planning and developing and adjusting pricing and structur, you know, it gives you a bit of an tools which we've got in our army from Uniai, we're gonna launch a report around which will help to identify some of the cities and areas where we feel might be worth worth investing in or developing in or kind of planning. Yeah, there's a little mini exclusive for you guys on the housed podcast.

SPEAKER_03 35:14

Look, the more the more data that you can give out the better. And of course, you you know there's a there's a charge for some of that, but those reports are really vital, and that's why Journey to a million or journa journey to 930,000 as as we may call it now, uh that that they were great essays to to read and to understand and to see the impact of of UCAS on student accommodation sector as well as general higher education. So that's great that you guys are really sort of pushing that and and you know, long may that continue. So, yeah, thanks ever so much for joining us today, Steve. It's been a really busy period, really appreciate your time, and thanks for that. Exclusive at Housed. For anyone that wants to catch up with Steve, who's obviously on LinkedIn, and UCAS have a dedicated uh real estate LinkedIn page with the latest insights and stats and webinars, etc. So do make sure that you're following that page or you can visit the website for more. As ever, thanks very much to everyone for listening as well. We look forward to bringing you another episode of Housed very soon.