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For tuition-dependent colleges, enrolled students hold the key to their survival and prosperity. Student deposits are moments of truth for presidents and vice presidents of enrollment. Cash coffers are either replenished or not. Last minute surprises arising from unexpectedly low yields can cause a ton of angst. This is why successful colleges employ intentional strategies to woo students and increase their admissions yield. “Admissions yield” is the percentage of admitted students who enroll at a university. Prestigious colleges have yield rates ranging from 55%-85%, while the national average for college yield hovers around 30%. However, yield rates have been declining across the board with the implementation of platforms like the Common App, which allow high school seniors to apply to dozens of colleges by simply checking off boxes. With skyrocketing tuition, parents are increasingly comparison shopping for the best financial aid package for their children. Here are 12 strategies that can help colleges improve their admissions yield: 1. Creating Conditions … Continue reading
Posted in: Admissions Marketing, Admissions Yield, Enrollment Marketing
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A colleague of mine spoke a phrase several months ago that won’t stop ringing a clear and undeniable truth in my ear. After I showed him video from a flash mob brand launch, he said, “I hate that kind of fake energy.” That bell rang again for me this week as imposter birthday greetings between dropping through my apartment door mail slot. Nice to hear from you, chiropractor I saw once and then ran from in horror. You too, hair stylist who binges a little too hard on caffeine and can’t stop her scissors from shaking. Welcome, dentist who bought one of my best friend’s once-thriving practice only to run it into the ground with incompetence. And let’s not forget you good neighbor State Farm agent who ceaselessly tries to upsell me renters insurance no matter how often I refuse. Anyone with access to a birthdate now feels emboldened to enter your private space without so much as the courtesy of knocking; to pose as a kind of trusted, intimate friend knowing full well … Continue reading
Autumn is right around the corner, which means another exciting college football season is not far from kick-off. For many colleges, football is an integral part of the campus experience and with rabid student fan bases and celebrated traditions, it should be highly considered in higher education enrollment marketing strategy. More and more schools are fielding inaugural football teams and university administrators are hoping to embrace the tradition and excitement of game day Saturdays as a way to elevate their school’s profile, compete for higher enrollment, solidify alumni and financial relations and create a more exciting and tight-knit campus community. The National Football Foundation reported that in 2014, the number of schools across all NCAA divisions and the NAIA offering football grew to an all-time high at 767. Last year, Limestone College and seven other schools entered into the growing fellowship of college football and fielded inaugural teams. Joining Limestone College in the class of 2014 was Paine College which relaunched its football program after a 50 year … Continue reading
Posted in: Enrollment Marketing
We recently met around the conference table at Elliance to discuss the pros/cons of pursuing an RFP opportunity — a major state research university wanting to sharpen its brand focus and tell a better capital campaign story in order to raise a nice round $1 billion dollars. Needless to say, with that kind of money on the table, stakes are high — for the customer, of course, but also for Elliance. Although the four senior people around the table could claim a combined 70-plus years of higher education marketing and higher education branding experience, none of us had ever worked on a capital campaign of this magnitude. The RFP spelled it out clearly: “significant demonstrable, direct work experience and expertise in the field of fund raising consulting and projects related to fund raising for institutions of higher education is essential.” My colleagues read this as a well-manned checkpoint and major obstacle. Their body language suggested skepticism and discouragement. I leaned … Continue reading
While your faculty and students may have taken the summer off from their college assignments, you know that the work of higher education brand building never ends. Today, and every day, your college brand continues to do its daily work — on your website, social sites and across the continuum of digital and human conversation. As new and returning students unpack in residence halls and faculty reclaim their offices, it’s a good time of the year to ask: What can we do to renew our college brand for the 2014-2015 academic year? We offer five steps forward: 1. Begin investing in first impressions. That could mean redesigning an initial search mailing aimed at rising high school juniors, or rethinking training for new and returning student tour guides. First brand impressions hold great potential — but can also be overlooked. Given the number of campus visits that students (and parents) make, it’s worth preparing your student guides. Can they really translate … Continue reading
Buzzwords, such as “native advertising,” “brand publishing,” “custom content,” “sponsored content” and “corporate journalism” are fresh industry lingo for what advertisers have been trying to do since the dawn of advertising – appeal to potential customers with content. Though the ultimate goal of content marketing has stayed the same, the agencies and mediums of delivery are vastly different. Companies are turning to web content experts to produce ads that reinforce their brands while matching the editorial voice that the site’s dedicated readers have come to expect. Upworthy — a website for viral content started in March 2012 — creates content marketing for clients. They recently created “Watch the Spread of Walmart Across the Country in One Horrifying GIF” and ran it on their site for the AFL-CIO. “Our goal in this process was not to advertise for the AFL-CIO or to promote companies,” said AFL-CIO digital strategies director Nicole Aro. “It was to instigate conversations that are happening around what … Continue reading
With much excitement, we are launching the first inbound marketing web resource for higher education marketers and enrollment marketing teams. It’s free and comprehensive. As the old era of traditional college search comes to an end, inbound marketing heralds the new era of authentic, high-quality, content marketing that deepens brand trust, secures SEO rankings, and fosters social sharing with the spirit of attracting more of right-fit prospects. Colleges are not only recruiting students to meet their enrollment goals, they are also recruiting future brand ambassadors and life-long donors. The Inbound Marketing For Colleges Flashcards website includes five sections: audiences, strategies, tactics, tools and ROI, so those working in higher education marketing can understand how inbound marketing works. Inbound marketing is magical because it’ll impact the shape of the admissions funnel and student life cycle in four different ways: Because prospective students will discover the college using Google search, it’ll bring seekers and right-fit prospective students to your website. These prospective … Continue reading
Clients with limited budgets often ask me, “Which programs should we focus our enrollment marketing efforts on?” The answer, I tell them, lies in the four Ps. People are at the core of any successful graduate and adult program. Engaged students require an engaged faculty. All successful programs have dynamic faculty and always have a program champion. The best program champions carry the torch on all academic and enrollment marketing efforts. Products are the items that satisfy a student’s needs or wants. You must determine how your product – your degree offerings, for example – is unique to the market and who is most likely to want what you’re offering. A great example of this is one of our clients, Concordia University in Irvine, CA, which was the first to market eight years ago with a master’s degree in Coaching and Athletic Administration. Today the program enrolls over 500 students online across the nation. Performance is based on the outcomes … Continue reading
Every day I visit the websites of potential clients who are looking for help with enrollment problems. We all know that the website is your best recruiting tool. It’s an essential part of your institution’s enrollment strategy, for attracting and the recruiting of prospective students. In almost every case, I’m amazed to find problems that most schools would never allow with the coveted print collateral. So I wonder: what makes it ok on your website? Have a look at some of these examples. (And sorry, WVSU, but you are a great example of what not to do. Call me! We’ll talk it over.) 1. Mislabeling or not labeling page or section titles Come on ….Would you ever let this happen to your view book? Page titles are one of the most powerful on-site search engine ranking factors and a guide to students that are navigating your website. A common mistake is having duplicate page titles. This makes it difficult for … Continue reading
Posted in: Enrollment Marketing
We’ve received many calls this year from colleges and universities looking for help in enrollment marketing efforts for traditional undergraduate students. The things that worked in the past just aren’t working. When I ask them about their current enrollment marketing efforts, I often hear the same things. Many institutions continue to use search services like College Board, ACT, NRCCUA and CBSS to market to potential students for their outbound efforts through mail and email. Others pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to companies like RuffaloCody and Royall & Company who apply sophisticated predictive modeling to efforts for which they will charge ten of thousands of dollars. So I ask… Why continue to funds these efforts at the same level with decreasing results? The answer is always the same: “We’ve done it this way for years and it has been our highest yielding effort.” My response is always the same… “It was your highest yielding effort!” So what has changed in … Continue reading