OMG! If You Are Not ‘Tweeting’, You’re a Bad Enrollment Manager!

Twitter and Facebook … the future of enrollment marketing and management for prospective students … or as some would have you believe. 

Consider the following excerpts from higher education vendor email messages I’ve received in the last two weeks.

In message 1, we discover that if we are not ‘tweeting’ we are SO old school:

… we have been big fans of the stunningly simple micro-blogging tool Twitter for a long time. In fact, when we first started posting about Twitter we received some very strange “virtual blank stares” from our higher education colleagues. But no more, suddenly higher education is embracing Twitter in a big way, professors are responding to Tweets in lectures, thousands of institutions across the globe have established Twitter accounts, and smart associations are using Twitter keep us engaged.  Wake up, if you aren’t Tweeting, you are SO old school….  

In message 2, an email vendor sent out a message to reinforce the use of social media and email to manage yield:

We think a combination of social media and more persistent email communication is the best and most effective way to accomplish this at this point in the recruiting cycle.

What's it all mean? What could work well? 

1.) Get on/Stay on Facebook.
2.) If your audience is on Twitter, start following them and participating there.

Email? It’s a fundamental, proven interactive marketing channel that unfortunately most colleges and universities use poorly.  Unfortunately, the latter vendor did not respect my unsubscribe request from over 2 years ago.

Facebook? I personally have a profile and I believe it has utility in college recruitment.

Twitter? It's a medium that tends to be more event driven.I've seen it work well during large conferences to engage participants.

Here’s my problem though:

Facebook + Enrollment Management = ?

1)    Get on/Stay on Facebook ... and do what? In recently released research by DemandEngine, they found that the number one reason prospective students 'friend' college or university Facebook profiles is to meet other classmates.

Do you know what students said the second highest benefit was?

Nothing.

This was true of Facebook profiles created and maintained by institutions as well as those run by students.

Twitter + Enrollment Management =?

2)   If you're not 'Tweeting' ... The Nielsen Company recently reported that more than 60 percent of U.S. Twitter users fail to return the following month, or in other words, Twitter’s audience retention rate, or the percentage of a given month’s users who come back the following month, is currently about 40 percent.

As of the date of this blog post, I’m not a Twitter user but my lovely wife is. We’ve talked recently about how she has stopped following some people because they are running out of things to say and instead resort to tweeting updates on their morning coffee.

In my last post ‘Tweeting’, ‘Friending’ and other Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, I wrote about the undeniable interest and hype in Twitter and Facebook.  I also shared some insight on how sophisticated corporate marketers are approaching the use of interactive marketing channels.

It comes down to content and value. If you have something interesting, relevant, and unique to say, people will follow it, read it, consume it. If you don’t, they will not.

Using Twitter in Enrollment Management?

At the end of the day, all of these social technologies are merely tools. 

The important point is to let your objectives, how your audience uses these technologies (or not), and strategies drive the selection of tools.

My advice ... ignore the advice from the 'experts' and carefully consider how these channels will help drive your objectives. Otherwise, it's simply another tactical arms race to drench prospects with more irrelevant marketing blasts.

Too often, we chase the tools and simply end up with more complexity, not measurable results.

Comments

[Jim Fong]

This is a great posting (among your other great postings)! Trend or fad, but more importantly as you put it, it is merely a tool, but for many college and university marketers, it is a distraction from strategy. As you put it, do it if it makes strategic sense and can be justified through metrics. Thanks for your continued insight Tim!