Why Enrollment Marketing Software is the Secret Weapon for Every University and College

Today’s enrollment, admissions, and recruitment teams face many challenges while attracting the next class of prospective students. Even though matching the right students to their future school is a significant accomplishment (and extremely rewarding), school staff are responsible for a growing mountain of student data.

How can enrollment officers use and leverage this data in the admissions process more efficiently, and how do students benefit when institutions have a better grasp on what qualities students are searching for in a college or university? 

The answers to these questions lie in having an enrollment process that aligns student needs with a school’s best academic, social, and community offerings.

In this post, we’ll unveil your secret weapon to overcoming real enrollment challenges—a comprehensive enrollment marketing platform. 

What is Enrollment Marketing?

Enrollment marketing is any marketing-related activity designed to attract new students through common student recruitment processes. According to Rob Moore of CASE, student enrollment is often a core predictor and driver of a school’s financial status and budget options. 

As a result of the financial significance, enrollment marketing is often a high priority for all types of higher education institutions, including two and four-year public and private schools. Enrollment marketing efforts are geared toward highlighting a college or university’s brand, primary academic offerings, and other extracurricular perks that serve to attract new students.  

Practically, enrollment management uses many of the traditional tools and strategies that are employed in marketing for business. This includes content marketing, email nurturing, customer nurturing, and campaign management. Admissions teams can use these features to connect with applicants and streamline workflows.

What Can Educational Institutions Accomplish with an Enrollment Management Platform?

From a school’s perspective, staff members in recruiting and admissions can reap numerous benefits from digital marketing efforts and admissions software.

Enrollment management is a “secret weapon” for colleges because it houses all of your school’s most important enrollment tasks under one roof. 

You don’t have to endlessly search for the data that’s most relevant to enrollment. Instead, a platform makes it easy for enrollment employees to reduce repetitive tasks, manage separate accounts, provide follow-up, and create nurturing efforts.

Ease of use makes it easier to track, find, and engage prospective students. Not only is the user experience helpful on the staff member’s side, but it’s also useful for potential students who may forget to complete important milestones (like making financial deposits) and need that extra piece of encouragement.  

Advantages of an Enrollment Platform

When your school invests in an enrollment platform, there are several ways staff can reduce manual work, free up resources, improve student outcomes, and accommodate new students through the use of more reliable and accurate data. 

All of these results end up serving and supporting the future growth of a college or university. With declining enrollment and admissions challenges, the choice to invest and make critical changes is an easy one.

The benefits of enrollment management include developing better processes, using limited resources more effectively, and the prioritizing of key student recruitment tasks. We’ll take a closer look at these perks below. 

Reduce Manual Data Entry within Educational Institutions

Student recruiters, admissions officers, and enrollment team members collect a substantial amount of information in the scope of everyday work and could be juggling multiple tools, software solutions, or extra tasks. Additionally, you may need to double or triple the amount of data entry just to stay ahead in the admissions process.

Unfortunately, disconnected manual efforts lead to scattered student higher ed data, one-size-fits-all marketing campaigns, and too much time devoted to fixing or adapting software that wasn't designed for universities. 

The results lead to less than stellar enrollment results that have implications for future terms and semesters.

Develop Personalized Processes for Students and Staff

One of the most important aspects of enrollment is personalization. This involves catering campaigns and messages to each individual student or future learner. On the other hand, “batch” marketing takes a large-scale approach that assumes most students want or expect the same type of message or offer. 

A full-fledged enrollment marketing platform personalizes every interaction based on who each student is, how they found your school or university, and how they've interacted with your enrollment team in the past. Personalization can help students feel valued and important, which can in turn influence admissions decisions and foster better enrollment metrics.

Improve Student Nurturing 

In general, one of the goals of management software is nurturing important relationships. People rarely make significant life decisions (like choosing a college or university) in a short amount of time. Instead, they want to research and establish trust long before they land on an important choice.

Enrollment platforms can ease the burden of manual nurturing by transforming it into automated workflows and follow-ups. This prevents anyone from slipping through the cracks and ensures that a college or university stays top of mind during the consideration phase of the student lifecycle. 

Which Platform Features are Most Important?

The specific features your team needs from an enrollment platform depends on the size and scope of your enrollment goals. The beauty of finding an enrollment platform is knowing that you can tailor it to your specific needs, expectations, and incoming student body. 

To establish an optimized enrollment marketing foundation, it’s helpful to look for management software features like:

• Website forms for lead intake
• Landing pages (without coding or expert design skills)
• Automation and personalization 
• Email and digital campaign tools
• Microsites (for enhanced targeting and content delivery)
• Campaign tracking and customized reporting
• Event management tools
• Live chat or support options
• Marketing attribution to measure statistics like return on investment (ROI)

How to Select an Enrollment Management or Marketing Platform

Because it’s a secret weapon in the effort to attract, win, and enroll prospective students, selecting your enrollment platform is a major deal. When you consider your options, the following questions can help you make an informed decision.

• Is the platform easy to use, manage, and operate?
• How much training, onboarding, or support is available?
• Is the solution secure, and can it be trusted with students’ confidential data?
• Does the solution work throughout the student lifecycle?
• Are the results from the platform measurable and trackable? 

Overcome Higher Education Enrollment Marketing Challenges 

As enrollment processes change, schools need practical and reliable methods for addressing modern education challenges. It’s difficult to address issues like declining admissions and enrollment when you don’t have the tools in place to address, fix, and improve the situation at your particular school.

That’s where Element451 comes in. You’re never alone when it comes to nurturing potential students. In fact, we can make it easier, simpler, and more stress-free than ever before. 

Book your Element451 demo today to see how a student engagement platform can give you the tools you need to help modern students along their journey.