What is the best digital messaging tactic to drive enrollment among prospective undergraduates?

Pursuing a higher education degree and where is one of the most significant decisions a high school student must make. This decision includes a myriad of considerations, expectations, and a circle of opinion influencers (both in-person and digital) that the prospective student will consider.

High-performing and honor students will consider university reputation, rankings, and grants heavily. Other students will be swayed by location and student life. In contrast, others want to get as far away from their hometowns as possible.

Public universities rely less on paid tactics and lean on their reputation and traditionally lower attendance costs to draw enrollment. On the other hand, competition among for-profit universities and programs leads to increased costs per conversion. The methodologies to convert prospects to enrolled students might differ between public and private, but ultimately the goal is the same.

So many questions come to mind as we look at current and possibly future digital tactics.

Should enrollment efforts have a dedicated social media identity? Websites are great at explaining the admissions process, but are they pulling their weight to answer lingering questions? How can we leverage digital data and offline behaviors to optimize enrollment marketing?

I’ve asked six higher education professionals to help me piece together an answer. Their answers intersect and at times vary, providing valuable insight from different areas of higher education communications and marketing.

Jody Glassman

Assistant Vice President of Enrollment & University Admissions at Florida International University

What we have found most successful is when a recruiter starts their own organic Instagram and encourages students to follow them. It’s more of a mix; the recruiter shares not only admissions-related content or university-related content, but a look at the college search and selection process as a whole, a look at the city, etc.

Additional Thoughts by Jody

Email Messaging

According to Ruffalo Noel Levitz (RNL), a leader in higher education strategy and research, 96% of families involved in the college search and selection process still prefer email. In addition, the RNL study found that as high school students progress through school they want more communication.

Dedicated Social Media for Enrollment

I don’t necessarily believe enrollment messaging should have a dedicated social media identity. Prospective students care about academic reputation, the strength of programs (rankings, ratings, etc.), community and campus life, as well as what makes the school different. These posts will most likely come from a main institutional account.

Enrollment accounts or department specifics like housing, admissions, and financial aid, will post deadline reminders, tips, and repost from the main institutional site. They are harder to manage and the college admissions profession, as a whole, is transient; therefore more difficult to have a standard look, feel, and strategic plan for social media unless there is dedicated funding and a dedicated position. This isn’t something that can be “added duties” to a recruiter.

Admissions Websites

In regards to admissions websites, students and parents are using them for specific tasks such as the cost of attendance calculator or to watch a video. Portals are fine but must be less used until a student is committed to an institution.

Marketing Mix & TikTok

I think we need a mix of marketing communication to meet the needs of students and meet the student where they are. For example, phone calls make a huge difference to a senior who has questions about a program, financial aid, or something they received in the mail; a freshman in high school will just feel awkward. TikTok is for my friends, let’s not use it for something serious that we’re trying to convey. Or if we’re trying to convey something serious like a deadline, then do it in a fun way. We need to understand our place in their lives.

Maydel Santana

Associate Vice President for Media Relations and Communications at Florida International University

I share my thoughts as the mother of a current college student who went through the recruitment process. Recruitment needs to start in middle school or at least in 9th grade. Not a pitch to enroll but an awareness process that happens mostly on social but email can be deployed selectively as well.

Additional Thoughts by Maydel

Role of Parents and Influential Adults

Another important part of recruiting students is recruiting their influential adults – parents, teachers, and guidance counselors. These adults need to be educated about what a university has to offer. In our case, because FIU has developed so aggressively over the past two decades, it is not their parent’s FIU and that message needs to be communicated artfully.

Dedicated Social Media for Enrollment

Enrollment can have its own channels to communicate to students who have applied or just got admitted. Those channels can carry nuts & bolts messaging like deadlines and such, while still reinforcing what a great choice you made/are about to make. This is probably the place to answer questions and address issues. I see enrollment-focused social media accounts playing the customer service role.

Recruiting as a University-Wide Effort

Recruiting needs to be a university-wide affair on social media. Basically, everything we put out can/should be seen as a soft recruiting piece, with specific, targeted recruiting pieces sent by email or snail mail. Getting something in the mail today is such a rare event that I think can be very effective when linked with QR codes or other ways to engage digitally. Enrollment websites are mostly for holding information and linking to other resources.

Tailored Messages

We need to give prospective students an opportunity to share with us their preferred field of study. This way, we can start targeting tailored messages to them. Say they are interested in the arts or STEM, we send emails/pieces about those things. I think social can and should have been posted on all the disciplines. That way students get a full sense of what the university has to offer. Pride, affinity, and endless choices/opportunities.

Bringing Prospects to Campus

If we follow the marketing funnel, as students start considering colleges —say grades 10 or 11, we need to bring them on campus. Offer them summer opportunities related to interests or potential fields of study so they get a sense of what we do. Maybe even for college credit.

Gustavo Mosquera

Assistant Teaching Professor at Florida International University

Unfortunately, a “one size fits all” marketing approach is flawed because it assumes all customers purchase in the same way. We’re living in a customer-oriented era where access to information has never been greater. That said, all types of communication efforts should be data-driven. Analyzing the buyer’s persona and understanding their journey as buyers will shape the message, and the platform.

I don’t believe is a matter of one or another medium of marketing communication, but one and other mediums of communication based on their buyer’s journey. For example, to increase reach you could social media. However, to increase conversion (assuming the potential student has engaged with the institution within social media and showed interest by visiting the website and requesting more information), a marketer can use email marketing to increase conversion rate by customizing a message based on the customer preferences.

Nicole Valle Cuadra

Brand Marketing Manager at Florida International University

TikTok is a huge and underutilized recruitment tool. It’s a quick, creative, and catchy way to share what’s important to students. Getting in front of where they are doing their research on universities like U.S. News & World Report, optimizing your websites and programs SEO, etc.

Additional Thoughts by Nicole

Building Awareness Earlier

When it comes to the younger generations higher education marketers really need to take into consideration how they are consuming information. Attention spans are becoming shorter.

When you look at a customer journey map the consumers have multiple touchpoints and in my opinion, the most important is the awareness phase. This is because you can’t be considered if they do not know who you are. You also need to start the recruitment process at the right time and this could mean when they’re in high school or even middle school.

Recruitment Emails

Relying on email to help student recruitment is not as effective as it used to be. It’s a great way to communicate how to get ready once you’ve already been admitted or when the students are in the decision phase.

Delivering The Right Messages

However, students are looking for more than just financial aid and academics. They care about student life, research opportunities, and academic and honor societies, and what better way to show that than through multimedia and simply being present in spaces where these students spend their time.

Daniel Díaz

Marketing Professional | Web 3.0 Enthusiast | Metaverse Marketer
Central Communication Manager at Florida International University

To reach prospective undergraduate students, social media can serve as an effective first touchpoint. Today, younger generations expect to be able to connect with brands on social media, so it’s important that you also engage via responding to comments and/or direct messages. In those responses, you can share dedicated landing pages or request an email address to continue to move the prospective student through the funnel.

High-achieving students need to hear that if they come to FIU they will find other high-achieving students in the Honors College. A university should look to validate a student’s choice by showing other high achieving students making the same choice and having exceptional opportunities during their college years. Study abroad, research, internships. All these things need to be highlighted through social and direct messaging aimed at high-achieving students and their influential adults.

Carl-Frederick Francois

Senior Multimedia Producer at Florida International University

To drive enrollment among upcoming students, I wouldn’t get rid of email marketing since some students still rely on their parent’s final say and it cost the least. But enrollment messaging should have its own voice and platform with the focus being student language especially since that tends to be different from the overall voice of the university. As to the customer service aspects find a platform where you can resonate with them, and they can feel in a safe space to ask questions. This would help drive communication between that generation and the university. Ideally meeting the prospects on platforms they are already frequenting and are comfortable with would be the logical and fluid approach.

Final Thoughts

There is consensus that the late middle school and early high school years are critical for building awareness and social media should have a protagonist role in this stage. Email marketing, websites, and focused social media (housing, campus life, etc.) play a bigger role in the consideration and later funnel stages.

The lowest hanging fruit opportunities are dedicated staff to run social media admissions channels or topics. Dedicated staff can answer questions via direct messages and comments which represent an often-disregarded avenue of direct student contact. All the contributors to this article agree that universities must meet prospects where they are.

We must have a holistic view and cater to parents and alumni with content specifically created to raise their awareness or update their views or preconceptions about a university. Parents who are alumni often serve as brand ambassadors and universities should tap into that connection.

Ideally, all prospective student communications should be handled from one CRM system that integrates touchpoints from social media, website activity, email, and even snail mail and telephone calls. Platforms such as SparkCentral by Hootsuite allow for this and might be a solution to unifying systems and providing a more custom experience adapting to the prospective students’ communication preferences.