Best Higher Education Marketing Agencies and the Top Problems They Solve

The best higher education marketing agencies are being invited by their college and university clients to solve a spectrum of challenges and achieve a set of goals  – from the very routine to the most sophisticated ones.

Over the last 25 years, in serving over 100 colleges and universities, we have solved the following challenges for numerous clients:

Enrollment Challenges

Since most college are primarily tuition-driven, they want to grow their enrollment. Elite colleges want to shape their classes. These goals come in several flavors.

Undergraduate Programs

How to recruit undergraduate students by undertaking the following:

• Grow inquiries
• Increase college visits
• Improve our college visit experience
• Grow applications
• Get inquiries and applicants from new geographic markets
• Make us more selective and allow us to shape the class
• Improve college yield rate
• Reduce summer melt
• Grow international applications
• Turn parents, teachers, high school counselors and principals into recommenders
• Reduce transfer out rates
• Increate our transfer in rates
• Shape our incoming class

Online Programs

Offsetting the decline in undergraduate population due to the upcoming demographic cliff, how to recruit online students by undertaking the following:

• Grow inquiries and applications
• Grow international applications

Graduate and Doctorate Programs

Offsetting the decline in undergraduate population due to the upcoming demographic cliff, how to recruit graduate students by undertaking the following:

• Grow inquiries and applications
• Grow international applicants
• Make our college more selective and allow us to shape the class

New Programs

Given that more than 50% of new programs fail to launch and it costs more than $2M to launch a new program over a 4 year period, how to:

• Successfully launch a new academic program

Reputation Challenges

How to create a reputational lift by undertaking the following:

• Rebrand our college/university
• Make us look like a college of consequence
• Situate us on page 1 of Google
• Expand our reach into new geographies
• Project our thought leadership far and wide
• Let media find our subject matter experts
• Improve our US News and other rating agency rankings
• Expand the reach of our brand beyond our alumni and friends
• Weaponize our publications on digital channels
• Grow attendance in our symposiums, conferences and workshops
• Increase attendance in our arts and cultural events
• Transform us into a regional economic development engine
• Market our new centers of excellence

Giving Challenges

Since giving scholarships and attracting higher talent are both funded by income from endowments, there is an arms race to grow college endowments. In the face of declining giving rates, how to:

• Create a culture of giving
• Increase the annual giving rate
• Reduce the rate of donor attrition
• Market the capital campaign
• Create a perpetual online giving engine
• Find mission-aligned mega-donors, foundations and government partners

Placement & External Relations Challenges

In the face of dwindling government R&D funds, the era of academic capitalism is here. Most colleges want to:

• Position us as indispensable R&D partners
• Attract corporate recruiters
• Find mission-aligned trade groups, foundations, corporations and government partners
• Deepen ties with our trade groups, foundations, corporations and government partners
• Find funding partners for our labs and centers of excellence

Faculty and Staff Talent Recruiting Challenges

• Let prospective faculty and staff know about our open positions and motivate them to apply

If you are seeking higher education marketing agencies for your college or university, view our higher education marketing capabilities and consider partnering with us.