For a number of years, leading education institutions have been using cross-channel marketing campaigns to help boost student recruitment and improve conversion ratios. The next logical progression is the implementation of trigger-based, nudge campaigns.
The student application cycle is one of the lengthiest sales cycles that we deal with – a 12-18 month cycle, fraught with periods where students may drop-off, tempted by the lure of another Institution, or because they have second-thoughts on further education altogether.
The implementation of IFTTT (If This Then That) marketing automation campaigns allows you to keep your institution at the forefront of each student’s mind, nurturing them along the applicant cycle and ensuring that you are first choice at seminal moments of truth.
An example of this could be:
A student attends an open day, receives a follow up email, then visits a personalised website – if they complete each of these actions, they then receive an invitation to a VIP open evening, specifically for the course they are interested in.
However, if a different student attends the open day, receives the follow up email, but does not engage with the email, then their data is passed over to the outbound admissions team to get in touch with the student over the phone to see if they can help or provide further information.
By developing these IFTTT ‘nudge campaigns’ that nurture prospective students into applicants by analysing bottlenecks in your student recruitment initiatives and giving you the insight to make more informed decisions, it will help you allocate your institution’s marketing budget into the channels that lead to the highest return for you.
