THE IMPORTANCE OF RETARGETING IN HIGHER ED: Retargeting refers to the marketing of your school or program to a prospective student who previously visited your website but did not convert, inquire, or apply. Retargeting is a form of reminder advertising, which we’ve all likely experienced. You look at a pair of shoes online but don’t check out and buy them. Minutes later, you see an ad on Facebook for the shoes you just looked at.
Why you should care: Survey respondents noted that affordability, flexible work/life/school balance, and high-quality online learning were the most important factors in their decision. The adult-learner audience is moving through the prospective student funnel quickly and looking to make a decision in the near future. Enrollment marketers that can adapt value propositions and differentiators in the context of COVID-19 to appeal to this wave of adult learners will be primed for success.
RETHINK YOUR WEBSITE’S REAL ESTATE: Average click-through rates for banner ads are around 0.2% and according to Contently, a majority of those clicks are accidental. But banner ads and other ads on prime website real estate still do serve a purpose – especially if you use them to plug your own content and offers. In fact, Contently increased webinar registration by 45% by using their own website’s prime advertising real estate to promote their upcoming webinar, including a banner ad at the top of their pages and a vertical banner in the right margin of their blog pages.
Why you should care: Enrollment marketers may be able to increase the number of website conversions by rethinking all of the available space on their school’s website. Prospective students are likely accustomed to seeing ads in “typical” ad placement areas (banners, tops and sides of pages). By plugging in your own branded eBook, guide, or upcoming event into those spots, enrollment marketers may be able to increase conversions on relevant offers.
AD FREQUENCY’S MAGICAL NUMBER: Ad frequency – the number of times an individual sees your ad during a campaign – can have a significant impact on your ad performance. But just how much exposure is ideal, and how much can lead to ad fatigue? Facebook conducted an analysis of 2,439 ad campaigns on its platform to determine the ideal frequency of ad impressions in order to generate the highest ad engagement. It concluded that after 5 or 6 impressions, engagement actually starts to taper off with each additional ad exposure (see their results in this chart).
Why you should care: The more a prospective student is exposed to your Facebook ad, the better – to a certain extent. After 5-6 impressions, however, results like link clicks, landing page views, and lead ad form submissions actually decline. So, don’t necessarily stop an ad campaign for poor initial performance; realize that it may take 5-6 ad impressions per prospective student before desired actions are taken. To track average impressions per person, check out the frequency column of your ad campaigns in Facebook.
Short on time to build a foolproof content foundation? That's what we're here for. Introducing DD Agency's cohort, "Content Strategy for Graduate Enrollment Marketing."
In today's content-saturated world and competitive graduate school landscape, a valuable and informative website just isn't enough. You need creative and compelling content — and lots of it — to attract prospects and engage them throughout their journey to enrollment. We'll teach you how to craft a custom content strategy that works. Here's what you'll come away with if you join us: