Social media is everywhere. Everything is hash tagged, tweeted, followed and liked. The upcoming generation of students has been inundated with social media since their adolescence. It is a generation of students who are used to being constantly “plugged in”. Social media is all about the quick update. 140 characters to tell your deepest thoughts, updates that can be sent by phone; these examples of instant gratification mean that students have shorter attention spans. If you are trying to grab their attention and get them interested and on board with your university, merely sending them a brochure in the mail or inundating their inbox with form emails is no longer effective.
Being on the forefront of social media marketing can yield impressive results. It can also lead to marketing faux pas that can cause more harm than good to your university. Don’t Automate Your Posts It can be an attractive option to automate all of your social media posts. And for some instances it can be an effective way to get information across (announcing the application deadlines for example), however too many automated posts will begin to come across as more SPAM than useful information and with the amount of college SPAM potential students are already receiving, your ploys will fall on deaf ears. Social media is a great way to write an essay about your university and connect with your potential students. It allows a way to present a unique voice that lets students relate to your university. This does not mean that you need to have highly personal insights on your pages, but having a university blog that discusses issues that most student face when entering college for the first time is a great way to build a relationship with potential students. Linking your social media to real time events and happenings that you want to promote is another way to effectively use social media. Keep it Relevant Jumping on to the latest internet meme bandwagon can be a tempting idea, but you should also be keeping in mind that you are a university with a reputation to uphold. You want to keep a professional persona to your posts. This does not mean that you have to post only those things directly pertaining to your university and keep all personality out of your posts. It means using good judgment and posting those things that are both relevant to your school as well as those things that can help promote your university. Social media is a great tool to gain exposure and connect with a wide variety of students, but, if used incorrectly it can be a way to shoot yourself in the foot. Use it
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Every year the cost of attending a standard four year university rises. At the same time, the value of a standard four year degree is decreasing. More and more, employers are seeking those with master's degrees. So the question then becomes – how do you make the cost of an undergraduate degree worth it for students?
Parents, traditional students and non-traditional students (those, perhaps returning for a second degree) are looking for a way not just to complete a degree, but have a degree that gives them practical knowledge for today’s job market. The best thing that you as a university can do is to offer your students an education that they can take into the real world and apply in a job setting. Connecting them With Job Data By integrating job search criteria and putting focus on determining their desires and skill sets and how best to use them, students will spend less time aimlessly taking classes and more time working toward a definite goal that will allow them to continue to build their career. Likewise, students will also be able to focus on continuing their education if their goal is to continue on with additional schooling. To do this and make it something that is university wide and therefore marketable as a structure of your school, you will need the buy in from administrators, faculty and parents. Getting this buy in will be easier for some groups than from others. The Role of Parents Parents understand that having a career focused education can lead to a solid occupation that will bring success for their children and help build a solid future. Parents will be the easiest to bring on board with this. Having a career focus may even make your university more attractive to parents, especially when you present them with the cost of the education compared to what their child will be walking away with. The Role of Administration Administrators are one of the most powerful allies you can have when pushing a new focus at a university. If it doesn’t go from the top down it can easily fail before it even gets fully started. By presenting your marketing ideas in a cost-based analysis of how this new focus will bring in more prospective students and will boost their non-traditional student population, you can breed the excitement and buy in that will allow for further marketing. The Role of Faculty Faculty, particularly tenured faculty, are notorious for only wanting to do things one way, their way. If what you are advocating does not fit with their individual approach, they may not support it and that can put a wrench in your plans since, ultimately, if they aren’t putting those ideas into practice in the classroom, the goals will not be met. Getting faculty on your side may take some schmoozing, but if you can figure out how to line up your goals with theirs, you will have an easier time getting their buy in as well. The overall goal of any university it to turn out students who are successful and who can compete in today’s global market. By pushing your university to focus on these goals, it will help your students create realistic plans and allow them to head in exactly that direction. Don’t Underestimate the Importance of Alumni in Student Recruitment and Fundraising Success8/9/2017 “Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn.” —Benjamin Franklin
From the moment we leave high school and college, we inherently and immediately become a walking marketing resource for the school of which we attended. By being able to provide a wealth of knowledge to prospective students and speak on behalf of our beloved alma mater's, alumni are arguably one of the most influential and highly-respected aspects of the referral and decision-making process when it comes to selecting a school to attend – directly impacting your student recruitment efforts. Having said this, alumni are also one of the most underestimated, and at times, under-valued assets when it comes to the promotional, recruiting and fundraising opportunities of high schools and universities. When most of us think of alumni relation programs, the first thing that comes to mind is usually fundraising. However, a strong alumni relations program can be much more impactful from a marketing perspective than what you may initially expect. Alumni engagement is a key component of establishing effective marketing results. If there is no alumni engagement, success will be limited in establishing a strong alumni relations program. Graduates cannot knowledgeably represent a university if they have not been informed of or kept up on the school’s recent events, development and growth. Consistent communication about the school’s successes, philanthropic growth, and alumni engagement opportunities helps create a strong alumni relations program for former students, and forms a pipeline for successful school recruitment and fundraising as well. Successful alumni relations programs can be compared to successful companies that employ strategic marketing and communications to create strong and lasting relationships with their customers. By utilizing newsletters, e-marketing, direct mail, web-based tools, social media and networking events, alumni programs can flourish and maintain communication between schools and alumni, creating a successful alumni database for on-going communication and growth. Encourage alumni to build a successful network of individuals by getting involved with their alma mater and keep in touch with old classmates, friends and faculty to maintain social relationships, and establish great working relationships. In turn, this will create areas of opportunity to keep your school top-of-mind through ongoing communication and networking. Use social media to your advantage. These days, everyone is connecting via the web, and social media forums like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn can help you keep alumni engaged through events, classmate forums and news updates about your school. Finally, encourage alumni to get involved in planning events such as reunions, job fairs and homecomings. Social and networking gatherings provide a venue for alumni to reconnect and to continue building a successful network of alumni, while keeping their alma mater top-of-mind for volunteerism, donations, and referring future students. The bottom line is find the marketing tools that work best for your program and implement them to keep alumni engaged and willing to assist their alma mater. What tools have you found to be successful in keeping alumni engaged? What tools do you wish you had? |
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