How to Better Engage with Prospective Students on Social Media

You’ve probably been told that, in this day and age, social media makes everything easier… that is, unless you’re talking about an institution’s e-recruitment. Sean Carton, a former professor at Philadelphia University and founder of idfive, a company focused on marketing and branding for Higher Ed, recently wrote a guest article for Inside Higher Ed called, “Social Media: You’re Probably Doing It Wrong.” The article reveals the sad truth that “we [the university] want to engage with them, but they don’t want to engage with us.”

The “them” in this case being prospective students. Carton’s article is filled with data pulled directly from a 2014 E-Expectations report, compiled by Ruffalo Noel-Levitz, called, “The Online Preferences of College-Bound High School Seniors and Their Parents.” In this study, 1,000 graduating high school students were polled, as well as over 500 parents, in order to determine just how effective online college recruitment is when it comes to having prospective students choose their college.

Here are some quick facts from Carton’s article based on the study:

• Facebook pages (and their corresponding “likes”) are the least effective way to reach a potential student: in 2014, only 35% of those surveyed admitted to “liking” a page, a drastic drop from the 55% that “liked” a college page during the 2013 admission year.
• 51% of those surveyed, however, admitted to scoping a perspective university out on Facebook, but less than 20% admitted to having a positive reaction.
• 37% of students surveyed followed a college they were interested in on Twitter, a jump up from the 25% during the previous 2013 admission year.
• 75% of those surveyed admitted that the university’s website and the information found there was the most helpful in making their decision.

Yes, those numbers can be considered grim. After all, it makes it all the more stressful for marketing teams working at universities to do their job effectively. Carton poses the question of whether or not social media marketing is even worth the money that universities throw into it. Of course it is—it just needs to be done differently.

Just how differently you ask? Carton outlines some criteria:

• Create content that give people a reason to share.
• Make sure your marketing team is already making the effort to connect effectively with students and alumni. After all, they already have a reason to connect with you.
• Make it easy to share: nice images or having multiple share options on one page may really make a world of difference.
• Consider having a more informal social media page
• Don’t expect people to start commenting on your posts. Align your expectations to, at first, make sure you’re giving them a reason to share. Eventually, a rapport will build itself.

All of Carton’s advice stems from a ShareThis study that found that 70% of millennial users would buy a product based on the fact that their friend shared the product with them. This proves Carton’s point that it’s not that prospective students don’t want to engage with you; it’s just that they don’t want to engage with an entity, like your institution, that they cannot identify with. After all, your university isn’t a peer; to the prospective student, there seems to be no vested interest there.

So, what’s your marketing team to do? They can research as much as they please and still not come up with a solution that could increase engagement on social media.

We have some of our own tips that you may want to consider:

• Engage beyond the tour: Many students will still opt to visit the campus and get paired up with a campus tour guide. While it is customary for the university to follow up and thank the prospective student for coming on a tour, consider taking it from a different angle. As contact information is stored from scheduling a tour, have an automated email sent directly from your tour guides. A prospective student may not pay any mind to an email from the Admissions office, but they will pay attention if it’s signed from a name they recognize. This automated email could contain links to your social media presence or way for them to get in contact with their tour guide if they have any follow-up questions.
• Involve your current students in your admissions campaign: Online engagement with your current students may take different avenues. You may have multiple pages under your university’s umbrella that engage with students. However, have you considered having a separate page run by your students? Similarly to what Carton mentions, it may be useful to consider the benefits of allowing current students to interact with prospective ones. By creating a “Students Unauthorized” page, it will allow prospective students to get real answers from fellow students, instead of from university authority figures.
• Feature your alumni: In a similar vein to allowing students to spearhead an alternative marketing campaign—let your alumni speak to their experience at your institution. Reach out to those that can actually speak to what your institution has afforded them in their post-grad careers; it would be great if your marketing team could turn it into a Twitter Q&A. Many prospective students will no doubt appreciate being told how your institution prepares its students for success.

As Sean Carton points out in his article, engaging with prospective students can seem like an uphill battle. However, don’t forget that you have great tools in your arsenal that could aid you in formatting your marketing campaign; with some time, persistence, and the willingness of people in your university’s family, you can better engage with prospective students in no time!