SMS College Tactics: How to Connect to Students & Families with Text Messaging

It’s the digital age, your prospective students (and their family members) are simply one touchpoint away, making it easier than ever to reach them. If your school is struggling to connect with students in mobile-friendly ways, it might be time to change your existing strategy. SMS college messaging offers an effective and modern way to make convenient contact—for both you and them.

But what do you need to know before developing an entire SMS strategy for your recruitment, admissions, and enrollment teams? How can you apply practical SMS scenarios so that they work for reaching students in your target audience?

If you’ve been waiting for your chance to learn more about SMS marketing in higher education, we’re introducing a roadmap to help you learn, apply, and get started with text marketing quickly.

What is SMS College (Marketing in Higher Education)?

SMS marketing in higher education is the practice of delivering SMS (short message service) or text messages to students and families whose contact information you possess. SMS communications are used for many different reasons, including:

In the context of colleges and universities, admission data continues to prove that text messages have superior response rates, are convenient for students and families, and generate measurable end results (like more applications). OpenMarket reports that 76% of students would prefer to lose calling ability over texting, which shows how texting, in many scenarios, is actually a preferred communication channel.

With a 45% response rate for texting and SMS communications, it’s no wonder that college staff members want to take advantage of the potential. With SMS capabilities, higher education institutions can stay top of mind with busy students and families who might be juggling multiple college applications or research tasks at any given time.

It doesn’t take long to realize that SMS college applications are numerous and that they have game-changing potential.

Check out this roundup of some of the simplest (and most effective) use cases for college SMS communication today.

As colleges and universities move past the pandemic, in-person recruiting events are likely to make a comeback. When recruiters connect with future families in these scenarios, it’s helpful to have a way to stay in touch once the event is over.

Recruiters typically collect students’ contact information (whether on paper or through an online form), and that data gets transferred to the school’s engagement platform or customer relationship management tool (CRM). In the future, recruiters can use SMS messaging to reconnect with students after these recruiting events are over.

Make sure that if a recruiting team plans to text students or families, those individuals consent or understand that they’ll be receiving future text messages. SMS combines branded messaging and relational language to drive recruitment success. 

As an example, recruiters can provide personalized links through text to send future applicants to the right place, without extra steps or hurdles.

Of the college-aged learners who receive text messages from their school of choice, up to 85% report that these messages were helpful and encouraged them to complete required tasks. What better way to improve application and enrollment rates than to deliver timely motivation to students who need a gentle nudge?

It’s typical for students to have multiple applications and enrollment offers taking place at one time. Delivering on-time messages to those students through texts improves the odds that they’ll move forward in registering for classes. 

The goal here is to provide motivating messages that decrease resistance along the path to enrollment.

If there are deadlines that students must make in order to enroll, schedule your text messages in relation to those important dates. Include information on how to get in touch with school personnel if the student or parent has questions about what to do next.

Depending on what type of SMS platform or texting software that your school uses, it’s possible to deliver a live chat experience when students (or their parents) need help when they’re using mobile devices. There are many ways to incorporate this use case into different departments on your campus.

Admissions - Answer questions related to enrollment

Registrar - Confirm that certain steps or documents have been take care of

Financial Aid - Deliver (non-confidential) reminders about payments and deposits

IT - Connect students to help for basic computer or IT challenges

Student Life - Provide basic answers to questions about on-campus happenings

If your SMS platform is set up to operate like a chat system, you may be able to choose whether to have this run automatically (using a chatbot) or to send the message from an actual staff member or representative. When finalizing details, keep personalization goals in mind so that you can continue to prioritize the student experience. 

One additional way to incorporate SMS messaging into your school’s marketing plan is to use it for campus events and invitations. You might use creativity in your texts to advertise campus tours, admissions fairs, family days, and community news.

Integrate your texts with a calendar tool or booking platform to help students easily commit to specific dates. You can also include personalized RSVP links to help students register for a visit, while feeding that information over to the specific department that’s hosting the event. 

Because of the high open and response rate for SMS campaigns, this could be a particularly helpful tactic to try if your aim is to increase attendance and connect with families. 

Getting personal starts with your students - find out how to deliver what they want through SMS with our guide.

Even though text communications are a powerful way to increase interest, every school has to play by the rules in order to fulfill certain requirements. There are a number of privacy and data-related policies to know before you start creating text and SMS campaigns at scale.

FERPA – The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act protects students from having their information shared with other parties. Parents can gain access to student data by completing the right processes, but this doesn’t happen automatically. Before you text families, you must ensure FERPA compliance. The difference with prospective students is that they are not subject to FERPA texting guidelines prior to enrollment.


TCPA – The Telephone Consumer Protection Act is a longstanding federal legislation that helps govern telemarketing and other forms of phone marketing. Although this isn’t an SMS-specific policy (it was instituted before the use of mass text messaging), its principles highlight the importance of user consent and providing a choose to subscribe. 


CTIA guidelines – The Cellular Telephone Industry Association is a body that provides trade-related policies and recommendations for text communications. The CTIA sets the foundation for safe and secure text policies, which can include who receives those messages and from what numbers those messages are sent.

Working with an established texting platform can help you determine which SMS college policies are relevant for your specific uses. It is, however, wise to err on the side of caution when respecting the digital privacy and communication rights of applicants and families.

Leverage SMS for Personalization this Year

No matter what marketing strategy or communications tactic you try, the goal should remain the same—providing students and families with a personalized experience that makes their journey easier. By using the capabilities that SMS provides, schools can often succeed in connecting with students, building better one-on-one relationships, and achieving results that benefit both students and staff.

SMS communications should always be used in ways that align with your school’s overall brand, mission, and personalization goals. 

At Element451, we’ll equip you with the tools and strategies you need to deliver an impressive experience this year—and in the semesters to come.

SMS College Tactics: Connect with Students

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