In today's competitive college market, getting students to choose your college over other colleges is more nuanced than ever before. Fortunately, college admissions consultants can help boost enrollment by focusing on building relationships with prospective students.
Providing Actionable Steps
The college application and decision process can be overwhelming. When you interact with prospective students and their parents, it's critical to provide actionable steps that give a tangible sense of progress.
Application Status: it's easy to email or text someone a link that shows their application process is pending. However, you can help a prospective student and their parents feel like someone is invested in their journey by personally reaching out to them with specifics about the progress of their application. For instance, you might share the details of their financial aide and/or scholarships when they become available, even if the application/admission decision hasn't been made yet.
Networking: putting prospective students and their parents in contact with your college's network of professionals can help them feel like they're a part of your learning community. An actionable step in this process might be putting them in touch with your community living coordinator to complete and review housing details. Involving other members of your learning community in the recruiting process can be valuable for everyone involved.
Creating a Narrative
So much of what a college student is looking for is modeled on what they see on social media. Engaging them where they build their perceptions about college can help make your recruiting efforts more engaging and targeted.
Curate: developing social media accounts that showcase the experiences your college offers students is a must. This curation process should have multiple accounts, specific to a variety of majors, sports, clubs, and programs offered by your college. For instance, you can create an Instagram account that combines the collective output of several of your sports for prospective student-athletes looking at your college. You can create even more authenticity and engagement by having these accounts run in part or in full by students at your college. Although you might need to go over social media etiquette, NCAA limitations, and/or school policies related to social media accounts, your college students can become recruiters and ambassadors for your college. When a prospective student comes to your university, you can have them connect with these social media savvy students to answer questions from a student's perspective. This can be particularly effective if you're not active on social media yourself.
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