[civsa] BEWARE! Virtual tour request

Wed May 25 10:13:29 CDT 2016

Hello CIVSA Members,

I hope this message finds you well. Some of you may have recently received an email from Georama about scheduling a virtual video tour of your campus. I wanted to take a quick moment to speak about Georama, their business model and how you can use the technology to benefit your prospective students and families at no charge.

Georama provides real-time, interactive video tours so students/families can receive a personalized and authentic experience when they cannot physically travel to campus. The tours can be general campus, specific departments, facilities, neighborhood and even campus events. Schools receive the benefits of providing increased campus access to out-of-state and international students, sign-in data, interaction data as well as survey and poll results. All the live videos are recorded and available for on-demand viewing.

Georama actively markets to students and counselors worldwide to provide live video tours of campuses. When Georama receives inbound interest in a school not in their network, they reach out to the school to determine interest in facilitating a live tour with their technology and thereafter give the institution an option to do an ongoing pilot. Some of you may have recently received this initial correspondence.

Georama’s goal is for institutions to receive value from the live video tours for enrollment and marketing objectives during the pilot. The pilot term is 6 months and there is no charge to the institution or student/parents during this period. After the pilot, institutions may choose to be part of the network by paying fees. Georama does offer the flexibility for cash-strapped institutions interested in providing the service to have the students/parents pay a nominal fee directly to Georama.

If you receive communications from Georama, you and your institution are welcome to respond to Georama directly or ignore their requests altogether.

If you have further questions or concerns, I invite you to visit the Georama representatives while you are at conference. If you will not be at conference, I encourage you to visit their website<http://www.georama.com/campus-tours/> to find out more information.

Best,

Jaime Rensel, M.Ed.
Associate Director of Student Engagement, Admission Services
CIVSA<http://civsa.org/> President
Arizona State University
Enrollment Services
Phone:  (480) 965-2628
jaime.rensel at asu.edu<mailto:jaime.rensel at asu.edu>
http://visit.asu.edu/
P Go Green, please consider the environment before printing this email.
[PF_IAmASunDevilFan]

From: listserv [mailto:listserv-bounces at civsa.org] On Behalf Of Alyssa Gunderman
Sent: Monday, May 23, 2016 11:06 AM
To: listserv at civsa.org
Subject: Re: [civsa] BEWARE! Virtual tour request

Thank you for sharing everyone !  I had this set up for our tour guides and just canceled.  Thank you thank you!

On Mon, May 23, 2016 at 1:57 PM, Boehm, Andrew <boehmaj2 at miamioh.edu<mailto:boehmaj2 at miamioh.edu>> wrote:
Thank you for sharing Brandi,

We got this request as well.  I am obviously familiar with Georama and their products being sent several sales pitches in the past.  They told me this was not a sales pitch and that they didn't know of me receiving any marketed offers in the past.  But when I looked back through my inbox and saw several sales emails from the same individual who was asking for this "virtual group visit".

I had all the same concerns that you did Brandi and am very glad that we passed based on the findings of your research.

Thanks again,

Andrew

Andrew Boehm

Associate Director - Campus Visits and Events

Miami University Office of Admission

301 S. Campus Avenue - 41 CAB

Oxford, OH 45056

513-529-2580<tel:513-529-2580>

On Mon, May 23, 2016 at 12:54 PM, Brandi Underwood <bunderw3 at mail.wvu.edu<mailto:bunderw3 at mail.wvu.edu>> wrote:
Hi, all:

I just wanted to make everyone aware of a company, Georama, who recently submitted a request with us to do a virtual group tour of our campus. They indicated that the virtual tour would be a way to connect out-of-state and international students to our campus who do not have the means to travel to campus themselves, but neglected to mention that Georama was a tech company who currently has patent-pending software and a business model to charge for the “virtual campus tour” experience. Essentially, they want to send college Visitor Centers video technology they created (the rep I spoke to one the phone said that the college campus would be able to keep the technology ‘for free’ after the first tour) and use our tour guides to provide a virtual tour experience to prospective students who would in turn PAY GEORAMA for providing the virtual tour.

Here’s the text they used in their request:

I would like to set up a tour for 10-12 out-of-state and international students interested in WVU that cannot physically visit the campus due to financial and visa reasons. The tour would be done via live video where the students can interact with the tour guide. We will provide the technology to you free of charge so the student guide can deliver the tour.

We would like to schedule the tour in early/mid June based on your availability. Please let me know when you have a chance to talk to your team so we can discuss to coordinate.

Thank you for your help!

I’m sure that most of you would agree that allowing others to use our tour guides and campus to profit for “virtual campus tours” is an unfair business model and a risky road to go down. Also, their language in the request was very innocuously worded and certainly wasn’t a fair explanation of what the company was ultimately trying to accomplish. I just wanted to make everyone aware of it to be on the lookout for future requests from Georama.

/ Brandi Underwood
Admissions Counselor, University Relations
West Virginia University
(304) 293-8446<tel:%28304%29%20293-8446> office
(304) 573-3609<tel:%28304%29%20573-3609> mobile
Brandi.underwood at mail.wvu.edu<mailto:Brandi.underwood at mail.wvu.edu>

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--

Alyssa B. Bleakney (Gunderman)
Assistant Director Campus Visit Programs
Temple University Welcome Center
1101 West Montgomery Avenue
Philadelphia, PA 19122
Phone: 215.204.7415
GO OWLS!!

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