A How-to Guide for Higher Education Marketing Strategies
Marketing is a staple for all businesses in all sectors. Its fundamental purpose is to create awareness of a brand, product, or service and create sales.
Like every business, higher education has a target audience, and implementing the correct marketing strategies can make or break a campaign and directly contribute to increases or decreases in admissions.
But what are the components of a successful marketing campaign? Read below to find out the elements higher education marketers need to make an impact.
What is a marketing strategy?
A marketing strategy is a long-term approach to making sure an organization or business achieves its future goals. These goals are mapped out by gathering data to understand the target demographics’ needs and wants.
Marketing strategies are incredibly diverse as they are dependent on the specifics of each business, brand, product, and service. They often showcase the competitive advantages over a rival’s offering.
What is the focus of a higher education marketing strategy?
It is now common-place for people from all backgrounds and ages to apply to be a student, which means the target audience of potential students is much wider than it used to be. Not only that, but these students are looking for key features that will serve as determining factors as to what university choice they make.
The focus of most higher education marketing strategies is the goal to recruit students through encouraging them to pick one grad school over another.
Experience, location, and the institution itself are all prioritized when prospective students are making a choice, which is why higher education marketing should emphasize these areas in a campaign to appeal to their audience.
Data is the lifeblood of marketing, especially with the proliferation of social media platforms. Institutions are increasingly turning to a specialized Higher Education Digital Marketing Agency to obtain the best data to inform their marketing campaigns.
What should a higher education marketing strategy include?
There are some core elements when it comes to marketing strategies that tend to work across all business sectors.
These include:
A website and online presence
A website and online presence are now the fastest ways to reach prospective students, as a lot of research is conducted online. Members of Generation Z also hold brands and institutions accountable and want to know how these businesses feel about real-world issues to make sure their value systems are a good match. Having an online presence is a great way to showcase an institution’s values and ethos.
Using a blog is a great way to do this, but make sure it is search engine optimized so your target audience can easily find the content they are looking for.
A mobile-friendly setup
Mobile’s share of organic online searches has climbed to over 50%, which means that it is crucial that a website and other information is mobile-friendly, working to the best capacity possible. For this not to be implemented in a marketing strategy means a business would lose over half of its potential students.
Mobile setups should also include institution-specific apps, portals, and mobile-friendly course content.
