Director of Marketing at Rowan University in New Jersey, Ed Ziegler gave a great keynote speech about “The Rise and Fall of Marketing on College Campuses” this morning at Salisbury University.
According to Ziegler, now is probably the best time to do marketing in higher education as many institutions have decided to maintain or increase their budget in this area. At the same time, many marketing initiatives conducted in colleges don’t seem to follow a well-thought strategy.
“For most people in our field, marketing is reduced to its promotion/communication component (…) Every other part of marketing has been skipped.”
In higher education, there is a tendency to focus on what institutions want to sell, and not what our customers – students, donors – want to “buy,” while marketing is supposed to be “a market-oriented, institutional planning process” as defined by Kotler.
After a quick review of Kotler’s four P’s (Product, Price, Place and Promotion), Ziegler added that tracking, converting, retaining and keeping customers (prospective and current students, but also donors) engaged for life should be the real goals of higher ed marketing.
Colleges and universities need to provide potential customers with relevant info to raise their awareness, pique their interest, influence their decision and motivates them enough to act, hence following the AIDA model:
Awareness > Interest > Decision > Action
While mass communication is definitely the better way to raise awareness, person-to-person communication is proven to have increasing effects on people moving along this process . “As a person-to-person medium, the Web should help web visitors make their decision and take action,” insisted Rowan University’s Marketing Director.
So, whom should we market to?
For most admissions offices, the answer is “the Millenials,” born between 1978 and 1997 who:
- are affluent and demanding
- never shared a room in their life (which can be a challenge in dorms)
- think that anything can be fixed and should be (websites aren’t exceptions to this rule)
- seek counseling and career advice
- are impatient and poor readers
- go to college to get a job (which explains that they are very interested in what opportunities are available and what grads are doing)
- have helicopter parents hovering over them and playing a very big role in their college decision process
- value other students’ opinions and advice about colleges as well
Ed Ziegler also reminded the main findings of Teens Talk, a study about teens and the Web:
- they prefer a balance of good looks and simplicity with helpful information
- they don’t like a barrage of flashy but useless media
- they don’t care about technology and will quit when they have trouble rather than fix it
- they do have problems on the Web, too
- they need content – not meaningless “stimulation” via graphics or flashy animations – to keep them interested
The most important thing for teens is that the website works and gives answers to their questions.
Finally, Ziegler shared the results of high school students’ focus groups conducted by Rowan University:
- Their first click on a college/university website is going to be to find information on majors, tuition and scholarships, average SAT score, proximity to a major city
- 50% uses the search box, while 50% don’t because they think it rarely works
- They don’t use their real names or email addresses when asked to register to view content
- They don’t take virtual tour (it takes too much time), but like to browse lots of pictures
- They read testimonials
- They don’t like sites too dense, but love Fast Facts page
- They visit college directory websites to find institutions that match their interests and requirements.