Facing a dramatic drop in the traditional, college-aged population coupled with declining demand for higher education, university enrollment offices are looking to the graduate and transfer markets with unprecedented urgency. But identifying prospective transfer and grad students at the intent stage can prove challenging.
That’s why Capture Higher Ed’s marketing automation platform, ENGAGE, allows institutions to identify website visitors from other higher ed institutions (e.g., your regional competitor, your local community college, a university from which you draw many grad students) and deliver actionable transfer- or graduate-specific messaging to them.
Through ENGAGE, you know in real-time when someone visits your .edu site, what pages they’re looking at, and the IP address from which they’re visiting your website. Thanks to a recent product enhancement, you can now match that IP address to the name of its network. Through this translation, you know if your web visitors are coming from, say, any organization that has the word “college” or “university” in it.
When you know your visitors are coming from a different college or university — and they are looking at admissions-related pages or graduate programs — the chances are good that they are considering a transfer to your institution or exploring a graduate program at your institution. With this information, you can automate messaging through dynamic content that is appropriate to the prospective student’s behavior and nudge the next action toward an inquiry.
Furthermore, you can see if these website visitors applied to or expressed interest in your institution during a previous cycle. Your prospective graduate and transfer students are often previous prospective students who chose a different institution. Maybe they are having second thoughts or are considering your institution for their grad studies. You can then email them information reemphasizing your value propositions and even honor previous scholarship offers.
Knowing in real-time when unidentified web visitors visit, what they are visiting on your site, and, yes, where they are visiting from … This is the kind of insight that helps you give your grad and transfer prospects what they need to make an educated, timely decision. Hopefully, that decision leads them to further their studies at your institution.
By Rajeev Arora, Chief Product Officer, Capture Higher Ed
