4 Offbeat Strategies To Drive Student Enrollment In Colleges

4 Offbeat Strategies To Drive Student Enrollment In Colleges
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Summary: This article talks about some strategies that institutions could deploy to drive student enrollment in colleges.

How To Boost Student Enrollment In Colleges

Higher education enrollment across the United States is on a dip since 2012. There are multiple factors contributing to this decline. Although America has one of the best higher education systems in the world, it is also one of the most expensive. Government funding has been dropping, immigration laws keep changing, students keep applying to too many colleges resulting in unpredictable yields, and online education continues to explode. The future could be bright for those colleges willing to offer competitive pricing, but for those not strategizing a price dip, what can drive better enrollment? Apart from increasing their geographical footprint or opting for an integrated marketing approach encompassing multiple channels, here are 4 strategies that could turn things around for the best and drive student enrollment in colleges.

1. Go Online

If you can’t beat the trend, join it. Well, this certainly holds right for the online learning bandwagon. Online learning is here to stay, and you need to adapt it sooner than later. Building a good online education system has multi-fold benefits; it could significantly shoot up new enrollments and improve the performance of existing ones. Build impressive online curricula and showcase its effectiveness to your potential students. It could also help you offset drop-outs. Nothing speaks better about your brand than your students’ performance. Deploy an effective Learning Management System (LMS) that suits your institution’s needs. Here is an article comparing some of the most popular LMSs across higher education.

2. Harness The Power Of Interactive Learning

If you already make use of digital media in your classrooms or curricula, then you probably know that students no longer prefer traditional, text-heavy, static learning presentations. Interactivity is the key to engaging the new age learners. Bring variety in your courses through interactive quizzes, videos, games, and simulations. This will ensure that your students learn quicker and retain knowledge better. You could use these modules to improve existing students’ performance for your distance or executive education programs, as well. Consider using a tool like Raptivity, which offers over 190 interactive learning templates to build your online learning lessons rapidly and in an inexpensive way. These templates range across categories like games, quizzes, simulations, presentations, and more. Customize them with your content, publish, and you are ready to go.

3. Creative Marketing Through Storytelling

Storytelling is one of the most powerful mediums to communicate. And if you are wondering what makes stories so effective, here is what works in their favor:

  • Stories are inspiring. Influencing a viewer’s attitude is possible only when the person is motivated and emotionally engaged. Storytelling is the best way to tie emotions with the message and set that ‘emotional connect’ with the viewer.
  • Stories are attention grabbing and make information easier to remember. No matter how busy people are, they pause to listen to a story or tell one of their own. Stories have dramatic arcs that can retain viewers’ attention long enough. This can work better than making learners read or listen to any information. Discover more about the power of storytelling in this blog post.

You could, of course, use stories in your curriculum but, interestingly, they could be a great marketing tool as well. They could communicate your institution’s value proposition and unique differentiators to prospects. Through your stories, engross applicants and show them how they will fit into your institution. Use these stories across all your marketing channels, especially social.

To build effective and engaging stories, use characters that your learners could relate to. Build immersive learning experiences or simulations or take help of interactive videos and digital eBooks. Raptivity provides many interesting templates for building interactive storytelling nuggets.

4. Launch Executive Education

If you have not already, consider launching executive education programs. Working professionals, as well as their employing organizations, are eager to avail good-quality educational opportunities. You could run weekend batches for these executives and even provide them with the option to take online courses. This could bring you good-quality additional enrollment without the need to build any more infrastructure.

Whether your college manages to secure higher enrollment statistics or not depends on the strategies you employ to make your educational offerings appealing to as many prospective students as possible. Essentially, it is your brand that will speak for you. Build it up wisely, and sustain it cautiously.

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Raptivity® is a new-age tool to design enthralling learning experiences. It lets you create visually stimulating eLearning content without any programming.