Higher Education Lead Generation: 3 Tips to Boost Enrollment

Students have many options when they decide to enroll in higher education, which is why it’s crucial to make your school stand out against the others.

Marketing in higher education is competitive, which means it’s difficult to stand out against your competitors.

Is it best to use your marketing resources to create and share content? Or should you put your entire budget into paid advertising? Or perhaps you’ve considered completely revamping your website, so it’s better equipped to attract new leads.

With so many questions, it can be hard to decide where to start.

The truth is that no two lead generation strategies will look alike because no two institutions of higher education are exactly the same.

Your strategy should be unique to your facility. And the best lead generation plan involves a lot of moving parts that can help you succeed. Keep reading if you want to learn more about higher education lead generation.

Or, give us a call at 888-601-5359 for a professional lead generation strategy.

3 higher education lead generation tips that work

It’s important to remember that there isn’t a cookie-cutter strategy that works for every school in higher education. Your strategy will depend on your budget, your goals, and your prospective students’ needs.

Check out the following tips for lead generation for higher education, and decide which is right for you.

1. Offer valuable content

Downloadable, high-authority content gives your prospects useful information that’ll help them make the decision to enroll. This is a great tactic to use for initiating contact.

You build trust when people appreciate and value what you offer for free. And the best leads often spring from this type of relationship.

You should have a blog by now, and you should also branch out from there and offer different types of content. Here are a few others to consider:

• Infographics. Infographics are used to display facts and statistics in a visually appealing format. Readers are more likely to digest and retain the information on an infographic, making it a great way to spark interest in your school. People often enjoy sharing infographics on social media as well, meaning you can spread brand awareness and get great returns for your effort.

• Newsletters. The beauty of a newsletter is that it gives you the opportunity to deliver a piece of content that’s packed full of information that your readers can’t typically find together in one place. Ask prospects for their email addresses on your site and follow up with newsletters. When you cover a variety of topics that are relevant to your readers, they will appreciate you for it.
• Webinars. A webinar is a live meeting or lecture that takes place over the Internet. You can offer a presentation, live discussion, demonstration, or any other kind of instructional session. Think about a common question or series of questions that new students have, and create a webinar that explains them thoroughly.
• Ebooks and other downloadable content. Downloaded content comes with many benefits. First, it fills a need for your prospects. They appreciate the information and because of that, they learn to trust your brand. It’s also beneficial because you can ask for an email address in exchange for the download. Securing that email address allows you to continue reaching out to your new lead, which you can do with newsletters.

With this content on your side, you can effectively turn prospective students into qualified leads.

2. Create quality landing pages

A landing page is a page on your website that’s accessed by clicking a hyperlink from another webpage. Sometimes they’re used with paid advertisements to make sure people who click ads are taken to the appropriate spot on a website.

Here’s an example: If you create an ad for your culinary program, you wouldn’t want those who click on it to be taken to a page on your website about your massage therapy program. A tailored landing page will ensure your leads are taken to the page of your website that’s relevant to what they need.

In the same way, someone searching for information about undergraduate degrees from a state university probably isn’t interested in learning about Ph.D. programs. A landing page will ensure web searchers end up on the right page of your website. Instead of getting lost, they will quickly find relevant information.

3. Advertise on social media

When it comes to lead generation for higher education, social media is one of the best channels.

With social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn, you can reach future students, professors, and staff members. Using video, blog posts, pictures, and testimonials, you can build awareness for your school and drive applications, campus visits, and more.

Posts on your profile, however, aren’t always enough.

Many social networks, including Facebook, prioritize content from a user’s friends and family, versus content from the businesses, artists, and colleges a user follows. That’s why many organizations advertise on social media — and you should too.

With social media ads, you can create campaigns that use the following targeting features:

• Location
• Interests
• Remarketing
• And more

These hyper-targeted campaigns can help your educational facility reach users with the most interest in your organization. You can advertise to users that visited your website, for instance, or to users that came to your campus during a tour day.

Take advantage of social media and start using it to generate leads for your organization.

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FAQs about lead generation for higher education

Learn more about higher education lead generation in our FAQ!

What is lead generation for higher education?

Lead generation is part of the marketing process. It’s an early part of your strategy where you try to spark interest in your institution.

For institutions of higher education, this means gaining the attention of the right prospective students, so you can guide them to enrolling. The strategies you use to make that initial point of contact are known as lead generation strategies.

Why is higher education lead generation important?

As you know, convincing someone to enroll in your school is about building a relationship, showing them what you have to offer, and earning their trust.

If you want to build a strong relationship and encourage them to trust you, you must understand their needs.

You also need to decipher between prospective students who are only browsing your site and those who are genuinely interested, which you can do with analytics data from your site. The right lead generation strategies will help you hone in on the right prospects, so you can get the most value out of your strategies.

Before digital marketing, you couldn’t target your prospective students based on their needs and wants. Instead, you had to use a handful of campaigns that attracted new students based on vague criteria.

Today, however, you can separate leads and target them differently based on analytics data. This will provide you with a better return on investment of time and resources.

Our digital marketing campaigns impact the metrics that improve your bottom line.

See More Results

WebFX has driven the following results for clients:

$6 billion

In client revenue

24 million

Leads for our clients

7.14 million

Client phone calls

Work with one of the best higher education lead generation companies

At WebFX, we know how difficult it can be to generate new leads, especially when you run a college, university, or trade school. Fortunately, our team of lead generation experts knows exactly how to get new leads for your higher education institution, so you can enjoy more enrollment and more students.

Contact us today to create a lead generation strategy specific to your business and learn why we’re one of the best higher education lead generation companies!

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