August… Quite the weather events these past weeks. Hoping that everyone is doing well despite the heat and floods and more we are experiencing. Notable Marketing Quote: “The ballpark minimum amount you should invest to support a new program is $150,000 per year.” Details from Seth Odell, CEO at Kanahoma. HE Connect Liverpool 2023: Janus Boye’s first higher education conference last year in the U.K was a success. See 11 top people participating in the September 26-27 program “tailored for digital leaders in higher education” at the conference website. Join 912 higher ed ..read more

July… Quite the weather events these past days. Hoping that everyone is doing well despite the heat and floods and more we are experiencing. Notable Marketing Quote: “Just launched the sign up for my free newsletter, which will be a curated list of articles, podcase episodes, and other content most helpful to higher ed marketers!” Allison Turcio, AVP for enrollment marketing at Siena College. Subscribe here. HE Connect Liverpool 2023: Janus Boye’s first higher education conference last year in the U.K was a success. See 11 top people participating in the September 26-27 pro ..read more

Easy-to-Use “Accordion” Program Finder at Roger Williams University Potential students rank learning about programs offered as the first or second Top Task they want to complete at a website. (For some, “cost” is first.) Roger Williams University makes this task easier to complete on its academic programs page by using an “accordion” style page design. Visitors get basic information about a program without having to leave the page. Just click on the program name to get an initial review. Interested in comparing the basics for more than one program? Biology, for instance, and Biotechnology. You ..read more

Yes, You Can: A Fast & Creative Higher Education Home Page at Middlebury College We’ve preached the “need for speed” for years. And years. Making a positive impression on potential students visiting for the first time starts with a fast website. Can’t be too fast. When landing pages take more than 5 seconds to download, visitors are lost. And yet very few higher education websites (and the agencies that often create them) pay serious attention to making the sites work fast. Especially if “fast” is seen an an impediment to “creativity.” Today’s Link of the Week selection shows that you can ..read more

Unicorn found: UC San Diego makes freshman & transfer admit rates easy to find If potential students google about they can find college and university admit rates. But they will rarely find them on the actual “admissions” pages at college and university sites. My Link of the Week search this week (“relax most college applicants are accepted”) took me to about 35 public and private sector sites before I quit looking. I found a listing of each individual University of California site and visited each… and there at UC San Diego was the unicorn. Also deserving credit is the University of Calif ..read more

Is college worth the cost? Easy to learn salaries by major at American University Public opinion polls for some time now have been telling us that people increasingly doubt the value of a college education, particularly when salaries after graduation are compared to employment opportunities that don’t require a college degree. Countering that sentiment requires, among other things, easy access to earnings information presented according to the various academic majors that a school offers. That’s much better data than “average” salaries overall or even “average” salaries with academic areas. Am ..read more

Case Western Reserve Links Alumni Stories to Academic Program Stories Nearly all alumni websites include stories from and/or about alumni. Some mention a person’s academic major. Not many link from an individual story to details about that person’s academic major. That’s a marketing mistake, particularly for alumni stories located in the admissions area and intended to boost student recruitment. Case Western Reserve takes marketing advantage from potential students who like a story from an alumnus in an area that interests them and might want from that point to learn more about that program. A ..read more

Sticker Price & Affordability Get Real at Weber State University It isn’t unusual to find admissions and financial aid professionals who complain that potential students don’t understand that few people actually pay the “sticker price” they find in a “costs” section of a website. Why don’t they understand? Too many colleges and universities fail to clearly tell people that the “sticker price” is meaningless for almost everyone attending the school. Weber State University sets an example with easy-to-understand “sticker price” and “affordability” content that addresses debt fears right from ..read more

University of Georgia Highlights Top 3 Admissions Myths for Easy Scanning Many colleges and universities have web pages explaining and/or debunking what are described as common myths about college admissions. (Alas, I’ve never seen one that says admissions isn’t difficult at a particular school, no matter the actual admissions rate.) Nearly all the “admissions myths” pages I’ve visited are general in nature. Few put a special focus on “myths” common to the individual place creating the page. University of Georgia (UGA) is different. The UGA “Admissions Tips, Hints & Myths” page has 12 poin ..read more

May… The May 1 counting day for traditional students is past… and for most schools, yield season continues from now until well into the summer. May everyone who perseveres profit from your efforts. Notable Marketing Quote: “Just because you want to grow, doesn’t mean you need more leads.” Seth Odell, Founder & CEO, Kanahoma. Gerry McGovern & Top Tasks: Mark your calendar now for Gerry’s next “Top Tasks overview” on May 10. Here’s what’s covered: How to identify what matters most–the Top Tasks How to measure the performance of the Top Tasks How to create a classification / na ..read more