5 Marketing Strategies for Recruiting Undergraduate Students
Every year, universities and colleges all over the world face the same problem - at one point or another, every student graduates.
Higher education institutions must find ways to continually attract new students to their programs. But with so many other schools vying for students’ attention, universities and colleges must find ways to show prospective students that their school is the best place for them.
In this blog post, we’ll outline 5 tips that higher education institutions can use to make their recruitment process a little easier.
Don’t miss our other posts on higher education digital marketing.
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1. Meet Students Where They Are
This might sound obvious, but one of the most important things any post-secondary institution can do is market to students on platforms that resonate with them - namely, on social media.
As mentioned in our blog post on Marketing to Gap Year Students, almost 99% of Canadians between the ages of 18 and 24 are on some form of social media. That’s why it’s so important.
Social Media Presence
The first step to harnessing the power of social media is solidifying your own presence on popular platforms. By having a solid presence on social media, your institution enables itself to reach a much wider audience.
If someone likes a post, they’re more likely to share it with their friends through their stories or direct messages on Instagram than through word of mouth. People will see that their friends are following your account, which makes them more likely to check it out for themselves. Social media advertising will bring visibility to your institution on a wider scale.
What does this mean for recruitment processes?
Social media does change the dynamic of the recruitment process - but in a good way! Institutions now have a chance to win over students through their social media pages. Social media is a great place to showcase student life, highlight unique programs and opportunities, and convince students that your institution is the place to be.
Some great tips for reinforcing your social media presence include:
Respond to Comments
People like to see that their opinions are being acknowledged. See a comment on your latest post that makes your school look great? Be sure to like the comment and respond to it. Even responses as simple as a smiley face emoji can make someone’s day - and, more importantly, make someone remember that you paid attention to them.
It’s also important to reply to negative comments. Acknowledging negativity or complaints on your social media pages shows professionalism and poise. It demonstrates to students, both current and prospective that your institution is willing to address issues and concerns upfront.
Post Consistently
We live in an extremely fast-paced world. Sometimes everything we do feels like it’s moving at lightning speed, and when parts of our lives don’t keep up, we tend to forget about them or put them on the back burner.
This also applies to how we consume social media - when we’re scrolling through Instagram, and we don’t see a post from a certain account for a long time, we end up forgetting about that person’s account altogether. To make sure that your institution’s accounts stay on students’ radars, set up a consistent posting schedule. Be consistent in the amount of content you post on a given day, as well as how many times you post during a given week.
Hold Raffles or Contests
What better way is there to grab someone’s attention than to offer them free stuff?
In all seriousness, though, contests and raffles are one of the best ways to boost engagement on your social media pages. People love to participate if it means they have the chance to win something, even if the prize is something as small as a $5 gift card.
When you hold your contest or raffle, you can make entry requirements like:
Like this post
Comment below
Tag 3 friends in the comments
Repost this on your story
Follow our account
These requirements both boost your online engagement and follower count, giving you greater visibility among those who enter your contest and everyone that follows them.
Keep Optimizing
Setting up your social media strategy is the first step, but in order to keep audiences engaged, you have to continue to update your content. Your feed should be a reflection of what’s going on at your institution at any given moment. Make sure to update your content plan on a regular basis so that your social media pages stay up to date with your institution’s social and academic calendars.
Another important thing to remember is that your posting schedule is not set in stone. While it’s important to have a predetermined content calendar, you can absolutely deviate from that schedule. Sometimes, current events take precedence over planned posts, and that’s more than okay! All that matters is that your institution continues to maintain a positive presence on your social media pages.
Remember Your Students
One thing you should always keep in mind is that your best marketing might not be done by your institution. A lot of the time, your university or college will get the most exposure from current students’ social media pages.
Whenever one of your students posts about an event they attended or geo-tags your campus in a selfie, everyone following their account will see your institution. You can continue to encourage student posting by starting a hashtag for your institution and posting about it on your story. With this hashtag, you can start to build an online community for your university or college, which is sure to assist in visibility among prospective students.
Using these tips, you can start to build and preserve a solid appearance and reputation on your social media platforms of choice.
2. Remember the Parents
Parents can be a massive influence in many students’ lives. They go on all the campus tours with their kids, they read through all the admissions materials, they help their children make their pros and cons lists, and sometimes, they end up paying for their child’s education. Their opinions matter, but many times, universities and colleges forget to include parents and guardians in their marketing plans.
Parents will take note of an ad they see that interests them. They’ll tell their children to look at a specific university or college when they see an advertisement that interests them. They’ll push their children to pursue programs that value their interests and time. That’s why it’s so important to include messaging within your advertisements that speak to parents.
Make sure that your next ad campaign includes messaging about scholarships, school rankings, and other highlights that parents pay attention to. You want your marketing materials to show parents that investing in your institution will be the best decision they could possibly make for their child.
Not sure where to start with your marketing campaign? Looking for guidance on the perfect messaging for your institution? Noetic Marketer is here to help. Visit our digital marketing strategy for higher education page to learn more!
3. Create a Brand
Establishing a unique brand is one of the best ways to ensure your institution is memorable. You want your school to live in the back of prospective students’ minds, and to accomplish this, your institution needs to stand out.
To help your school showcase its vision and authenticity through the content it puts forward, you can:
Utilize High-Quality Graphics and Video Content
Your website and social media pages should have eye-catching designs, detailed illustrations, intriguing photographs, and creative video content. Statistics show that more than 90% of people’s first impressions of a website are based on the page's design - and a big part of the site’s style has to do with images and illustrations.
You want to draw the attention of prospective students with visuals and graphics that validate what you’ve been telling them through your copy. Talking about campus life or student opportunities is valuable, but backing your statements up with pictures of students on campus or videos of student interviews is a way of providing social proof to your prospective students.
Give Your Institution a Personality
When students pick their university or college, they tend to choose a place they feel fits their personality. Your institution should feel alive. Its character will allow your institution to resonate with a much wider pool of prospective students.
How you convey this character is through how you present your institution online. Students should be able to visit your website and get a feel for your school. This can be accomplished with little design details, like:
Showcasing a school mascot (and maybe even having an animated version of it!)
Using a website theme that highlights school colours
Hiring student representatives to participate in promotional materials (this is an excellent project for your marketing students to work on!)
These small features will help you showcase why your school is unique, which will help convince prospective students that your institution is the right choice for them.
4. Consider International Students
During the 2015/2016 academic year, Canada had over 60,000 international students enrolled in college programs. By the 2019/2020 school year, this number had increased exponentially, with more than 150,000 international students enrolled in a Canadian college program. Canadian universities also saw an increase in international student enrollment, growing from more than 160,000 enrolled students to more than 235,000 international students in the same 5-year period.
International students make up a sizable portion of the available market, so our marketing campaigns must reflect that. It’s essential to create advertisements that incorporate messaging pertinent to international students. Your ads should show them what advantages and unique opportunities await them at your institution.
Ads targeting international students can include:
International scholarship programs
Bursary opportunities
International exchange programs
Student groups focused on international student experience
Campus and/or residence tours
Interviews with or testimonials from international students
By incorporating these aspects into your advertising, you’ll let prospective international students know that their experience matters to you, which can make all the difference when it comes to application season.
5. Organize Events
One of the best ways to let students know that they are valued is to get them involved! Making people feel included is important when marketing a higher education institution, as one thing higher education students are looking for is an environment where they feel welcome and comfortable.
Setting up seasonal open houses, departmental mixers, student panels, sports matches, and other events that are open to high school students will show them that you want them to participate on campus, which can end up being a deciding factor when hitting that final acceptance button. Host get-togethers that allow prospective students to meet each other and make new friends.
Possible events could include:
Meet Your Professors Night (department specific)
Student Panels
Varsity Sports Events
Student Society Information Events
Prospective Student Mixers
Campus Tours
Open Houses
Prospective Scholarship Student Events
In Summary
These tips will help you bolster your undergraduate marketing efforts, in turn contributing to lead boosts and increased enrollment!
Remember - your institution is what matters most, so if your marketing materials are true to your school’s vision and atmosphere, you’ll attract the best possible undergraduate students for your programs.
PS Download our infographic below to help you remember these five tips!
Schedule a Consultation!
Have more questions about boosting undergraduate leads? Schedule a free consultation with a Noetic Marketer expert today!
Who We Are
Noetic Marketer is a full-service digital marketing agency with roots in both Ottawa and the GTA. We specialize in creating and optimizing digital marketing campaigns for higher education, e-commerce, professional services, and contractors. As digital marketers, we strive to find solutions to every company’s lead generation challenges, creating personalized marketing strategies that suit the specific needs of our clients.
About the Author
Juliana Stacey
Juliana Stacey has always had a passion for stories. Luckily, the time she spent reading in the dark (with a flashlight, of course) far past her bedtime when she was little has paid off; she’s taken that love of literature and language and turned it into her life’s work, studying English and Professional Writing & Communications at the University of Toronto. As a Copywriting & Content Marketing Strategist at Noetic Marketer, Juliana has had the opportunity to apply her studies in writing and editing to content creation and copywriting for a variety of industries, and she loves being able to help different companies convey their messaging and stories in ways that are accessible for all readers. When she’s not writing or editing, Juliana loves to play the violin, catch up on the latest bestsellers and Netflix shows, and absolutely spoil her two dogs.
