SecondLook is a monthly segment on The Enrollify Podcast where Zach Busekrus and Matthew Fall, Managing Editor of The Minute, discuss the top trends in higher education marketing that are worth paying attention to.
On this month's edition, we discuss podcast search engine optimization strategies, Facebook limiting the number of ads a page can run at any given time, a merging of audience types within Google Ads, and a recent poll by RNL of 180 graduate programs across the country which uncovered that 47% of leads generated by graduate enrollment teams are from digital advertising and search engine optimization (SEO) efforts.
Tune in for an exciting, enlightening, and tactical conversation!
Transcript of 8 Higher Ed Marketing Trends Worth Paying Attention to This Fall
Zach: Hello friends! It’s Zach and Matt here from Enrollify. Welcome to SecondLook — your monthly briefing on the latest higher ed marketing trends worth keeping tabs on.
SecondLook is the podcast segment where we aggregate and highlight the top trends featured each week in Enrollify’s weekly newsletter, The Minute. Matt is the Managing Editor of The Minute and spends time each week scouring the internet for the trends that are most crucial for enrollment marketers to be paying attention to. Matt, you ready to dive in?
Matt: Let’s do it!
Zach: We’re about to get super meta and talk about podcasting on a podcast…Matt, as someone who records 3-4 podcasts a week, let me be super candid on how scrappy my process is: record an episode, send it to Dan at DD Studio, have him edit it, upload it to simple cast and share it on social media...I don’t spend nearly enough time thinking about podcasting’s effect on Enrollify’s SEO game. You covered podcasting a few weeks ago...can you please school me on how to ensure the Enrollify Podcast ranks #1 for “best podcast ever?!”
Matt: Just like any other form of content, getting your school’s podcast to rank on Google is key. Start by forming podcasts around a keyword (we suggest long-tail keywords to start), and mention your keyword a few times in the podcast itself (search engines can actually listen to your podcast).
Your podcast title and description should always include that keyword or phrase. Lastly, publish a transcript of your episode that’s optimized for SEO with headers and links. You could even consider repurposing the transcript as a blog post on your site!
Higher education is adopting podcasts as a recruitment tactic while also growing thought leadership. But sharing your podcast on social media likely isn’t enough. You want listenership to grow organically, which is why you should start optimizing your podcast for search engines. This can improve the chance that prospective students searching for information related to a topic associated with your program can find your podcast, just like they would your eBook or guide!
Zach: I’m taking all sorts of notes, Matt. “best podcast ever” has an MSV of 1,000 and a KD of 84…but we’re gonna try to win a top 3 position, okay, Matt?! Time to start keyword stuffing my transcripts ;). Alright, speaking of social media, Facebook announced that come February 2021, it will limit the number of ads your page can run at once. Can you unpack this for us, Matt? What is Facebook’s logic here?
Matt: First and foremost, the limit will depend on how much you spend on Facebook advertising in any given month. For example, if you’re a company spending less than $100k per month on Facebook, you’ll be limited to deploying no more than 250 ads at once.
So, Facebook claims that running too many ads at once can negatively affect the “learning phase” where Facebook’s algorithm attempts to collect information about your ad and determine how to optimize it. While not many enrollment marketers will have to worry about these ad limits (250 ads is a lot!), there is a potential positive: fewer ads mean less competition to reach prospective students on Facebook. Plus, Facebook claims your ads will improve as a result of a more optimized learning phase.
Zach: Hey, in a time when media budgets are being slashed left and right, I’ll take any reduction in competition I can get! I think this will be a net positive for the education space...since most institutions aren’t running 250+ ads at the same time.
Speaking of media buys and digital advertising, Google made a fairly notable change to its audience types. Enlighten us, Matt, on these changes and why they matter…
Matt: Google merged its custom affinity and custom intent audiences into “custom audiences.” Marketers can now use custom audiences to reach people with certain interests or purchase intentions and people who searched for certain terms on Google properties. Any preexisting custom affinity or custom intent audiences can be automatically converted to custom audiences as well.
Enrollment marketers can use Google’s custom audiences to target people who have searched for specific terms. Adding search terms like “top MBA programs” to your custom audience will allow you to match your ads with users who have searched these terms on Google or YouTube. Relevancy and personalization in advertising are key, so the ability to deploy an ad for your MBA program to someone who just searched for relevant terms on Google is a huge opportunity.
Zach: Annnnnnd speaking of Google, there was another significant update it made to its reporting tool which concerns the inability to see queries that triggered Google ads if there’s not enough “significant” data on the actual query. Matt, what does this mean and why is change important for enrollment marketers to be aware of?
Matt: Google advertisers will no longer be able to see search queries that triggered their ads when there is not enough “significant” data on the query. Why? To prevent advertisers from using minimal query data to identify users or to have access to personally identifiable information (PII) used in search queries.
Currently, advertisers have insights into search terms with only one impression or click. This allows them to deploy a negative keyword management strategy, where they can prevent wasteful ad spend by excluding irrelevant queries with minuscule impressions or clicks.
If your MBA program is running a Google Ad and the ad shows for the query “undergraduate business school rankings,” you may want to exclude that query moving forward. With Google’s new announcement about limiting query visibility, you won’t know that your ad ran for that query unless it has enough “significant” data.
If Google’s main intention is to reel back a few select sensitive queries, that’s one thing. On the other hand, there are thousands of low-volume queries with zero privacy risk out there that serve real value for advertisers. It would be a huge loss if that insight vanished.
Zach: Seriously! Especially for schools with smaller budgets and niche programs...the MSV might be small comparatively, but for a school with a PHD program looking to garner a handful of students from a paid campaign, this could be catastrophic. I’ll be very interested to see if Google repeals this change or not in the months ahead.
Matt, totally changing gears here, I’d love for you to share about the recent survey conducted by Ohio State on “jargon”...
Matt: A study from Ohio State gave one group of participants this jargon-filled sentence to read: “This system works because of AI integration through motion scale and tremor reduction.” In the same study, they gave another group of participants this non-jargon-filled sentence to read: “This system works because of programming that makes the robot’s movements more precise and less shaky.” Despite the fact that those who read the jargon-filled sentence were given the definitions to the terms, they felt disengaged by the end of the passage. The jargon-free group felt engaged and empowered, wanting to learn more.
Prospective students likely don’t share the same knowledge about your program’s subject matter that you do. Specialized words and jargon may be unhelpful, especially at the beginning of the prospective student’s college search journey. Writing about complex programs/subject matter isn’t easy, but enrollment marketers who write clear and understandable descriptions about their programs and processes will see better results than those who rely on jargon.
Zach: Speaking of words, I loved the Search Engine Journal article you shared in this week’s edition about missing out on conversions due to a boring contact us page. It wasn’t news-y per se, but a helpful reminder nevertheless.
Matt: One of the questions we like to ask our clients at the outset of a new relationship is “Are you guilty of slapping a Slate or TargetX form on a landing page to collect inquiries and calling it a day?” Most of the time they are!
Chances are you might be as well — and your inquiry form asks too many questions and lacks sufficient branding, leaving prospective students with an uneasy feeling that their request won’t be answered in a timely, beneficial way. It might be time to revisit your inquiry page to enhance your branding, reevaluate the questions your form is asking, and ensure there’s a clear value proposition that explains what prospective students will receive in exchange for their information.
Search Engine Journal reminds us to not be afraid to make your page fun with beautiful photos, interactive elements, and quirky copywriting that show off your brand’s personality.” They shared 39 examples of unique contact us pages (we can share this link in the show notes) that can help you find the right balance between making it as easy as possible for a prospective student to reach your school and collecting information that enables you to provide truly helpful content and answers to those prospects.
Zach: A recent poll by RNL of 180 graduate programs across the country uncovered that 23% of leads generated by graduate enrollment teams are from digital advertising efforts and 24% are from search engine optimization (SEO) efforts. This is amazing! What stood out to you here in particular, Matt?
Matt: If you’ve worked in the industry for a long time, you’ll notice this is huge growth for these marketing channels, marked by trends in higher education that began years prior to COVID-19. About 74% of respondents in RNLs polls are “very confident” or “somewhat confident” in the data they use to track lead generation. Improved marketing attribution, lead tracking, and data collection have enabled enrollment marketers and recruitment professionals to be increasingly confident in proving the ROI of digital advertising and content marketing strategies.
Many are also realizing the ROI of these channels is higher than traditional practices like TV ads, print ads, list-buying, and corporate sponsorships.
Zach: Finally, let’s end where we began...talking about meta...descriptions. Give our listeners a refresher on what meta descriptions are and remind us why they still matter, Matt?
Matt: Meta descriptions are HTML attributes that concisely describe what a page is about in roughly 160 characters. Adding keywords in meta descriptions isn’t a significant SEO ranking factor, but Google still shows meta descriptions in search results about 37% of the time, according to ahrefs.
Writing meta descriptions to match a user’s search intent could increase your page’s click-through-rate and thus significantly raise your number of page visits per month.
If your recruitment strategy relies heavily on content marketing and organic traffic growth, optimize meta descriptions by writing them with prospective students’ search intent in mind. When performing a search, meta descriptions that directly answer the posed question or query may have a better chance of being clicked on.
It’s also worth noting that social media platforms rely on meta descriptions to auto-generate post text and descriptions. If you’re sharing a registration page for a virtual event on your social channels, for instance, make sure to write a strong meta description. This will guarantee that the right messaging is used when the post is further shared by alumni, faculty, or prospective students.
Zach: So much gold here, Matt! Okay, sir...thank you for your time today!
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SecondLook is a monthly segment on The Enrollify Podcast where Zach Busekrus and Matthew Fall, Managing Editor of The Minute, discuss the top trends in higher education marketing that are worth paying attention to.
On this month's edition, we discuss podcast search engine optimization strategies, Facebook limiting the number of ads a page can run at any given time, a merging of audience types within Google Ads, and a recent poll by RNL of 180 graduate programs across the country which uncovered that 47% of leads generated by graduate enrollment teams are from digital advertising and search engine optimization (SEO) efforts.
Tune in for an exciting, enlightening, and tactical conversation!
Transcript of 8 Higher Ed Marketing Trends Worth Paying Attention to This Fall
Zach: Hello friends! It’s Zach and Matt here from Enrollify. Welcome to SecondLook — your monthly briefing on the latest higher ed marketing trends worth keeping tabs on.
SecondLook is the podcast segment where we aggregate and highlight the top trends featured each week in Enrollify’s weekly newsletter, The Minute. Matt is the Managing Editor of The Minute and spends time each week scouring the internet for the trends that are most crucial for enrollment marketers to be paying attention to. Matt, you ready to dive in?
Matt: Let’s do it!
Zach: We’re about to get super meta and talk about podcasting on a podcast…Matt, as someone who records 3-4 podcasts a week, let me be super candid on how scrappy my process is: record an episode, send it to Dan at DD Studio, have him edit it, upload it to simple cast and share it on social media...I don’t spend nearly enough time thinking about podcasting’s effect on Enrollify’s SEO game. You covered podcasting a few weeks ago...can you please school me on how to ensure the Enrollify Podcast ranks #1 for “best podcast ever?!”
Matt: Just like any other form of content, getting your school’s podcast to rank on Google is key. Start by forming podcasts around a keyword (we suggest long-tail keywords to start), and mention your keyword a few times in the podcast itself (search engines can actually listen to your podcast).
Your podcast title and description should always include that keyword or phrase. Lastly, publish a transcript of your episode that’s optimized for SEO with headers and links. You could even consider repurposing the transcript as a blog post on your site!
Higher education is adopting podcasts as a recruitment tactic while also growing thought leadership. But sharing your podcast on social media likely isn’t enough. You want listenership to grow organically, which is why you should start optimizing your podcast for search engines. This can improve the chance that prospective students searching for information related to a topic associated with your program can find your podcast, just like they would your eBook or guide!
Zach: I’m taking all sorts of notes, Matt. “best podcast ever” has an MSV of 1,000 and a KD of 84…but we’re gonna try to win a top 3 position, okay, Matt?! Time to start keyword stuffing my transcripts ;). Alright, speaking of social media, Facebook announced that come February 2021, it will limit the number of ads your page can run at once. Can you unpack this for us, Matt? What is Facebook’s logic here?
Matt: First and foremost, the limit will depend on how much you spend on Facebook advertising in any given month. For example, if you’re a company spending less than $100k per month on Facebook, you’ll be limited to deploying no more than 250 ads at once.
So, Facebook claims that running too many ads at once can negatively affect the “learning phase” where Facebook’s algorithm attempts to collect information about your ad and determine how to optimize it. While not many enrollment marketers will have to worry about these ad limits (250 ads is a lot!), there is a potential positive: fewer ads mean less competition to reach prospective students on Facebook. Plus, Facebook claims your ads will improve as a result of a more optimized learning phase.
Zach: Hey, in a time when media budgets are being slashed left and right, I’ll take any reduction in competition I can get! I think this will be a net positive for the education space...since most institutions aren’t running 250+ ads at the same time.
Speaking of media buys and digital advertising, Google made a fairly notable change to its audience types. Enlighten us, Matt, on these changes and why they matter…
Matt: Google merged its custom affinity and custom intent audiences into “custom audiences.” Marketers can now use custom audiences to reach people with certain interests or purchase intentions and people who searched for certain terms on Google properties. Any preexisting custom affinity or custom intent audiences can be automatically converted to custom audiences as well.
Enrollment marketers can use Google’s custom audiences to target people who have searched for specific terms. Adding search terms like “top MBA programs” to your custom audience will allow you to match your ads with users who have searched these terms on Google or YouTube. Relevancy and personalization in advertising are key, so the ability to deploy an ad for your MBA program to someone who just searched for relevant terms on Google is a huge opportunity.
Zach: Annnnnnd speaking of Google, there was another significant update it made to its reporting tool which concerns the inability to see queries that triggered Google ads if there’s not enough “significant” data on the actual query. Matt, what does this mean and why is change important for enrollment marketers to be aware of?
Matt: Google advertisers will no longer be able to see search queries that triggered their ads when there is not enough “significant” data on the query. Why? To prevent advertisers from using minimal query data to identify users or to have access to personally identifiable information (PII) used in search queries.
Currently, advertisers have insights into search terms with only one impression or click. This allows them to deploy a negative keyword management strategy, where they can prevent wasteful ad spend by excluding irrelevant queries with minuscule impressions or clicks.
If your MBA program is running a Google Ad and the ad shows for the query “undergraduate business school rankings,” you may want to exclude that query moving forward. With Google’s new announcement about limiting query visibility, you won’t know that your ad ran for that query unless it has enough “significant” data.
If Google’s main intention is to reel back a few select sensitive queries, that’s one thing. On the other hand, there are thousands of low-volume queries with zero privacy risk out there that serve real value for advertisers. It would be a huge loss if that insight vanished.
Zach: Seriously! Especially for schools with smaller budgets and niche programs...the MSV might be small comparatively, but for a school with a PHD program looking to garner a handful of students from a paid campaign, this could be catastrophic. I’ll be very interested to see if Google repeals this change or not in the months ahead.
Matt, totally changing gears here, I’d love for you to share about the recent survey conducted by Ohio State on “jargon”...
Matt: A study from Ohio State gave one group of participants this jargon-filled sentence to read: “This system works because of AI integration through motion scale and tremor reduction.” In the same study, they gave another group of participants this non-jargon-filled sentence to read: “This system works because of programming that makes the robot’s movements more precise and less shaky.” Despite the fact that those who read the jargon-filled sentence were given the definitions to the terms, they felt disengaged by the end of the passage. The jargon-free group felt engaged and empowered, wanting to learn more.
Prospective students likely don’t share the same knowledge about your program’s subject matter that you do. Specialized words and jargon may be unhelpful, especially at the beginning of the prospective student’s college search journey. Writing about complex programs/subject matter isn’t easy, but enrollment marketers who write clear and understandable descriptions about their programs and processes will see better results than those who rely on jargon.
Zach: Speaking of words, I loved the Search Engine Journal article you shared in this week’s edition about missing out on conversions due to a boring contact us page. It wasn’t news-y per se, but a helpful reminder nevertheless.
Matt: One of the questions we like to ask our clients at the outset of a new relationship is “Are you guilty of slapping a Slate or TargetX form on a landing page to collect inquiries and calling it a day?” Most of the time they are!
Chances are you might be as well — and your inquiry form asks too many questions and lacks sufficient branding, leaving prospective students with an uneasy feeling that their request won’t be answered in a timely, beneficial way. It might be time to revisit your inquiry page to enhance your branding, reevaluate the questions your form is asking, and ensure there’s a clear value proposition that explains what prospective students will receive in exchange for their information.
Search Engine Journal reminds us to not be afraid to make your page fun with beautiful photos, interactive elements, and quirky copywriting that show off your brand’s personality.” They shared 39 examples of unique contact us pages (we can share this link in the show notes) that can help you find the right balance between making it as easy as possible for a prospective student to reach your school and collecting information that enables you to provide truly helpful content and answers to those prospects.
Zach: A recent poll by RNL of 180 graduate programs across the country uncovered that 23% of leads generated by graduate enrollment teams are from digital advertising efforts and 24% are from search engine optimization (SEO) efforts. This is amazing! What stood out to you here in particular, Matt?
Matt: If you’ve worked in the industry for a long time, you’ll notice this is huge growth for these marketing channels, marked by trends in higher education that began years prior to COVID-19. About 74% of respondents in RNLs polls are “very confident” or “somewhat confident” in the data they use to track lead generation. Improved marketing attribution, lead tracking, and data collection have enabled enrollment marketers and recruitment professionals to be increasingly confident in proving the ROI of digital advertising and content marketing strategies.
Many are also realizing the ROI of these channels is higher than traditional practices like TV ads, print ads, list-buying, and corporate sponsorships.
Zach: Finally, let’s end where we began...talking about meta...descriptions. Give our listeners a refresher on what meta descriptions are and remind us why they still matter, Matt?
Matt: Meta descriptions are HTML attributes that concisely describe what a page is about in roughly 160 characters. Adding keywords in meta descriptions isn’t a significant SEO ranking factor, but Google still shows meta descriptions in search results about 37% of the time, according to ahrefs.
Writing meta descriptions to match a user’s search intent could increase your page’s click-through-rate and thus significantly raise your number of page visits per month.
If your recruitment strategy relies heavily on content marketing and organic traffic growth, optimize meta descriptions by writing them with prospective students’ search intent in mind. When performing a search, meta descriptions that directly answer the posed question or query may have a better chance of being clicked on.
It’s also worth noting that social media platforms rely on meta descriptions to auto-generate post text and descriptions. If you’re sharing a registration page for a virtual event on your social channels, for instance, make sure to write a strong meta description. This will guarantee that the right messaging is used when the post is further shared by alumni, faculty, or prospective students.
Zach: So much gold here, Matt! Okay, sir...thank you for your time today!
Matthew is the Director of Marketing Technology at Direct Development — an enrollment marketing technology agency that helps undergraduate and graduate institutions recruit students. He enjoys being a problem solver for clients, using his deep understanding of marketing automation technologies to help higher education institutions achieve greater efficiencies and success. In his spare time, he enjoys playing basketball, hiking, skiing, and learning web development.
Zach is one of the founders of Enrollify. He is also the Director of Marketing Strategy at DD Agency — an enrollment marketing technology agency that helps undergraduate and graduate institutions recruit students. He thoroughly enjoys building new brands, developing and executing content marketing strategies, and helping clients rank better on SEO. When he's not in the office, he enjoys discussing life's quandaries over coffee (or a good bourbon) with friends, trying out new virtual HIIT workouts, and adventuring across the globe with his wife!
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