With traditional marketing methods becoming less effective, colleges and universities are turning more and more to digital advertising to drive student inquiries and applications. This requires developing, executing, and measuring a complete digital marketing plan that influences and encourages prospective students to take important next steps as they explore on your website and engage with your other digital assets.
A complete digital plan includes Search Engine Marketing; Digital Display Marketing; Customized Social Media Advertising; Social, Web, and Email Retargeting; Interactive and Video Ads; and Focused Landing Pages.
Let’s go over each.
SEARCH ENGINE MARKETING
Search Engine Marketing is all about becoming the search destination of your future students and staying top of mind and, equally important, “top of page” when students and families search for keywords and terms that align with your institution and programs. Search engine marketing brings new prospective students to your website and reengages your already identified prospects.
DIGITAL DISPLAY MARKETING
Digital Display Marketing allows you to message your future students wherever they go on the internet by standing out with rich, dynamic display ads that meet your prospective students where they are. Digital display ads result in more inquiries and applications, especially when their message is based on your prospective student’s behavior.
SOCIAL MEDIA ADVERTISING
Social Media Advertising lets you influence your future students where they go to be influenced. But you must be able to connect. This means deploying ads on social platforms based on prospect interests and demographics … engaging them through highly targeted ads that increase your brand awareness and generate inquiries and applications.
SOCIAL, WEB, AND EMAIL RETARGETING
Social, Web, and Email Retargeting allows you to communicate, influence, and help your future students beyond their initial engagement by reengaging your email database as well as website and social channel visitors. You can also segment populations and retarget visitors according to interest and the specific pages they visited on your website and the interactions they had on your social channels. Also, such retargeting allows you to reengage specific prospects within your database through their email addresses.
INTERACTIVE AND VIDEO ADS
Interactive video and animated ads are highly effective attention grabbers and essential to your digital advertising efforts. In fact, 95 percent of people ages 18-29 in the U.S. use and engage with video content daily. Not only are video and animation essential for reaching prospective students on their preferred platforms, it allows you to target specific individuals to view your video and animated ads to move them along their enrollment journey.
LANDING PAGES
Flexible, focused, and fully branded, landing pages generate inquiries, offer financial aid calculators, and facilitate a variety of web forms, documents, and other informational materials. They allow you to influence and encourage students to take important next steps, advancing them through their enrollment journey while you gain valuable profile information throughout the process.
A complete digital advertising plan is now a recruitment and enrollment necessity. Would you like to see examples of these digital ads in action? Contact us today to schedule a 15-minute demo.
By Kevin Hyde, Senior Content Manager, Capture Higher Ed
