Higher education marketing is somewhat different from traditional marketing. If you are in a higher education marketing team and would like to elevate your school’s visibility, increase the number of applicants or simply give your school a larger pool of students that they can choose from, it may be time to revise your marketing efforts. With a unique targeting approach and new marketing channels, it may be time to relearn strategies for effective higher education marketing.
Photo by Susan Q Yin on Unsplash
Why Should You Market Your School?
Higher education should come without any marketing. However, as more and more private schools enter the higher education field, it is necessary to market yourself, so your school would not be forgotten. Giving high-quality education and relying on the alumni network for expansion and sustainable enrollment is one thing, but marketing and expanding is something entirely different. Marketing your school can offer the following benefits:
- Great school visibility,
- More awareness of the school,
- More applicants,
- Higher pre-enrolment income (as in paid campus tours, paid entrance exams, etc.)
- A bigger pool of students to choose from,
- A better selection of students and an increase in your average aptitude.
How to Market a Higher Education Institution?
Once you know which benefits marketing can offer to your school, you should ask yourself how to market your school the right way. Good marketing courses can help a ton, but the very fact that schools are so different from other services and products you may try to market says that you should be taking a different approach.
Firstly, when marketing your school, you should know that you basically have to address two audiences at the same time: prospective students and their parents. Addressing these two at the same time can be challenging, especially as:
- They belong to different age groups,
- They have different world-views and belong to two essentially different cultures,
- They may have different priorities,
- They have a very different purchase power and belong to different income brackets,
- They are essentially in opposition when it comes to choosing the best school.
With all this in mind, you may want to organize two different marketing campaigns and air them on different media. While the younger generation spends most of their time on social networks and streaming platforms, their parents may spend more of their time in front of the TV and reading blogs. Whatever approach you may take, it pays off to market to students more. After all, the upcoming generations are more self-reliant, some make their own money, and they are collectively less prone to be influenced by their parents' views.
Higher Education Marketing Strategies
Now, with a good segmentation and basic discerning of your target audiences, it is time to check out some higher education marketing strategies. Bear in mind that different countries, language groups and even areas within one and the same country will necessarily mean that you should change your marketing efforts. What is presented here are the bones that you should enhance with life for a successful marketing campaign.
Know What to Track
Knowing which information to track is a must in a good marketing campaign. Simply deciding on the target group is not enough, as the data about students' geography, interests and previous education all have to be tracked. Students are probably the most mobile of all generations, so having a thorough understanding of their habits is a must to better understand how their habits change and how you can use this to your advantage.
Know What to Market
Knowing what to market is another of our essential tips. Students love good education, but it has come to be a kind of unspoken rule that a University or a College provides good education. Understanding what other needs of your students you can satisfy can help a ton when it comes to marketing your school. Here are some more things that students want to see in an ad:
- Opportunities for travel,
- Opportunities for employment during studies
- Great online and social presence,
- Great chances for professional development,
- Amazing alumni network,
- Clubs and other social places and events,
- Flexibility of curricula, and
- Low commute time.
Know Where to Market
Knowing what to market is only one side of the coin. Knowing where to market is something entirely different. As prospective students spend huge amounts of time on social networks, this is the best possible place to market your school. TV, newspapers, and blogs are simply not going to cut it. Consider hiring some influencers to ‘spread the word’ or try to learn if you have influencers on your school ground already. You may be surprised to find out that some may be willing to film more about the school and on the school grounds.
Automate Your Email Marketing
Being able to notice patterns that you can use to increase your conversion rates is of paramount importance. Your website and funnel channels should all contain a “subscribe” button, where prospective students will be given a chance to leave their email. This is your direct path to their inbox, so ensure that you use it right.
Work on Your Website
Working on your website is another important thing. Ensure you include contact details, educational blog posts for students and even some freebies. Do not forget to keep your contents public for all users, so everybody could get informed and get a peek at what life on your campus is like.
Offer Freebies
Offering freebies, such as free online courses, e-books and printables, is a great way to boost interest in your school. Some may frown and say that these cost a lot to make and should not be handed out for free. However, hiring ProEssaysService ensures high quality content at affordable prices. Bear in mind that it is these freebies that will bring in students to your University and this is the ultimate value you may be looking for.
Photo by Charles DeLoye on Unsplash
Final Considerations
Marketing a higher education institution is not as difficult as it may seem, although it does carry some specificities. Being able to build upon the unique character of prospective students is a perfect chance that many wait for a long time to grab. With our tips and tricks for a higher education marketing campaign, there is no reason to fail.
Joanne Elliot
Joanne Elliot works on her programming skills around the clock. She is great with Python and hopes to use her talent to open her own coding agency. She loves to spend her free time reading and hanging out with her friends, traveling being their favourite way to spend their summer.
