• by Ray Schultz , Columnist, September 1, 2017

The cars are pulling up at college dorms, and the new crop of students is moving in. But it wasn’t easy to get them there. It took intense scrutiny — and intense marketing, judging by the “2917 Marketing and Student Recruitment Report of Effective Practices,” a study by Ruffalo Noel Levitz, a provider of technology driven services to colleges.

For example, virtually all colleges send email communications. And the schools are heavy purchasers of email addresses.

But they are also using newer channels, like texting; most are calling students on their cell phones. And not all agree on email’s usefulness.

Private four-year institutions rate email third in effectiveness, behind websites and text messaging. Of those surveyed, 87.3% say email is somewhat or very effective, with 35.7% specifying the latter.

Among public schools, email is rated as effective by 92.9%, putting it in first place. But only 74.6% utilize text, vs. 100% who send emails. Online chat is rated as effective by only 40%. 

Here’s one other finding: 96.8% of the private institutions call students on their cell phones, and 83.2% find it effective.

Ruffalo Noel Levitz surveyed 91 nonprofit four-year colleges and universities that together enroll 557,000 students. The respondents include 63 private institutions and 28 public ones. 

How do these schools find prospects? The top three sources are purchased names, campus visitors and stealth applicants. 

Purchased names were the top source for private schools, accounting for 16%  of inquirers and 20% of enrollees.

In public institutions, purchased names produce 35% of the inquirers and 15% of the enrollees.

The median purchase for private colleges is 80,000 names, compared to 64,000 for public schools.

And how were those students reached? Email was the main vehicle. Of the private schools, 74.1% use email for the first contact with purchased names, and 76.2% for the follow-up.

No other channel even comes close. The second choice, used by 39.7 for the first contact, is self-mailers or postcards: paper mail. And third is paper letters, used by 31.7%.

So old-fashioned paper mail still plays a role.

But email pops up again as the fourth channel — in the form of an email message with a link to a personalized  URL. It is used by 30.2% for the first contact, and 34.9% for subsequent contacts.

In addition, 20.6% make outbound phone calls, and 14.3% employ digital advertising.

The findings are pretty similar for private institutions: 67.9% use email for the first contact, and 71.4% for subsequent contacts. And 32.1% send email messages with personalized URLS for the firs contact, and 17.9% for second tries.

Perhaps the creative could use some toning up. Almost 60% of the four-year schools send the same messages to purchased names as they do to inquirers — and least to a subset. And 50% of the public colleges do the same.  

In some cases, it takes many follow-ups. The median for private colleges is ten email contacts, vs. eight for public schools.

Once the students have shown interest, campus open houses are the most effective events, followed by overnight visits and day visits. The order is slightly different for public and private schools.

So what can we learn from these findings? Here are some tips from Levitz:

• Use multiple channels — ten of the 11 channels measured were rated as effective by a majority in this study
• Don’t scrap print — it’s still in the top five for use and effectiveness.
• Try texting — many say it’s effective
• Make sure that digital advertising is integrated with email and other channels