Category: Recruitment

  • How to Recruit Undergraduate Students Who Persist

    How to Recruit Undergraduate Students Who Persist

    Key Takeaways:

    • Today’s undergraduate enrollment and recruitment strategies should be data informed and personalized, prioritizing quality over quantity.
    • “Flipping the funnel” shifts the focus from mass marketing to building meaningful, tailored connections with students, ensuring better matches and higher retention rates.
    • Student personas and data analytics enable institutions to craft targeted messaging that resonates with individual student goals.
    • Liaison’s tools empower colleges to use predictive analytics, real-time engagement, and tailored outreach to attract and retain students who are well-suited to their programs.

    For today’s higher education institutions, attracting the right students is more important than reaching a high volume of applicants. Traditional enrollment models that rely on casting a wide net and filtering through broad pools of applicants are no longer enough. Colleges and universities must instead adopt data-informed, personalized strategies that focus on quality over quantity.

    Liaison’s suite of advanced tools makes this possible, offering data-focused insights, real-time engagement capabilities, and tailored outreach options. This approach not only streamlines recruitment but also ensures a stronger match between students and their chosen programs, leading to higher yield and retention rates and ultimately providing a more fulfilling educational journey.

    Flipping the Funnel: Moving From Volume to Value

    Historically, institutions have used a “funnel” approach to undergraduate admissions and recruitment, beginning with a large pool of prospective students and narrowing the field. But with today’s intensified competition, this model is proving less effective. Rather than expanding the top of the funnel by acquiring more student names, “flipping the funnel” is a strategic approach that begins with the end goal in mind: enrolling and retaining the students who will thrive at your institution.

    Flipping the funnel shifts the focus from raw numbers to meaningful connections. Instead of mass marketing, this approach encourages institutions to recruit based on the distinct needs, goals, and interests of each student cohort. Just as each program or field has unique strengths, each student brings unique aspirations and potential. This customized outreach means that a prospective engineering student, for instance, might receive information about hands-on lab opportunities, while a fine arts student sees highlights of campus studios and faculty profiles. Liaison’s Enrollment Marketing and CRM solutions facilitate this tailored approach, allowing schools to reach specific audiences on digital platforms with messages that resonate with individual student interests.

    Building Student Personas to Enhance Targeting

    Understanding how to recruit undergraduate studentswho are likely to succeed and remain engaged throughout their academic journey requires a clear understanding of those students. Creating detailed student personas—representations of ideal applicants based on real data—lets institutions tailor their outreach with pinpoint accuracy. For example, Liaison’s CRM solutions facilitate this process by analyzing key data points such as academic background, geographic location, and behavioral insights, helping teams identify the students most likely to flourish and stay enrolled.

    With clear student personas in mind, institutions can deliver customized messaging that aligns with students’ priorities. For example, a prospective first-generation student may be most interested in affordability and support services, while a STEM-oriented applicant might respond better to information about research facilities and career pathways. Crafting communications based on these personas enhances engagement and strengthens student bonds from the beginning. By sending recruitment messages that truly speak to students’ goals, institutions foster a sense of belonging, which in turn improves retention and satisfaction rates.

    Utilizing Data Analytics for Personalized Interactions

    Data analytics has become an essential tool for individualizing outreach to connect with the right students with the right message at the right time. Real-time data enables institutions to track student responses, identify prospective students’ preferences, and adapt strategies based on what works best. Liaison’s AI solutions are designed for this agile approach, allowing institutions to monitor interactions and adjust their recruitment efforts dynamically throughout the enrollment cycle.

    With predictive and prescriptive analytics, schools can employ advanced tactics like retargeting, which reconnects with students who may have previously shown interest but haven’t yet committed. By capturing students’ attention during “micro-moments” as they browse social media or search online, institutions can stay relevant and timely in their communications. This data-informed approach—using Liaison’s Enrollment Marketing and digital services—increases enrollment numbers and forms trust with students by providing content that aligns with their journeys. The result? Stronger engagement and a greater likelihood of success.

    Transforming Enrollment With Data-Informed Precision

    In higher education, student recruitment requires a thoughtful, data-centered approach that emphasizes quality over quantity and personalization over generalization. By leveraging tools like Liaison’s Enrollment Marketing, TargetX, Outcomes, Search, and Othot, institutions can move beyond traditional methods and create recruitment strategies that attract students who are well-suited to their programs. By creating tailored recruitment strategies aligned to student cohort needs, you inspire students with a stronger sense of belonging and deeper engagement throughout the enrollment cycle. That, in turn, drives long-term success on your campus.

    To discover how Liaison’s technology solutions can transform your recruitment practices, reach out to us today. Our team is ready to help you implement data-backed, individualized outreach strategies that benefit your institution and future students alike. Contact us for a demo or a consultation to see how Liaison’s tools can elevate your enrollment efforts!

    About the Author

    Craig Cornell is the Vice President for Enrollment Strategy at Liaison. In that capacity, he oversees a team of enrollment strategists and brings best practices, consultation, and data trends to campuses across the country in all things enrollment management. Craig also serves as the dedicated resource to NASH (National Association of Higher Education Systems) and works closely with the higher education system that Liaison supports. Before joining Liaison in 2023, Craig served for over 30 years in multiple higher education executive enrollment management positions. During his tenure, the campuses he served often received national recognition for enrollment growth, effective financial aid leveraging, marketing enhancements, and innovative enrollment strategies.

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  • College of Western Idaho Boosts Enrollment and Retention with Data-Driven Solutions

    College of Western Idaho Boosts Enrollment and Retention with Data-Driven Solutions

    In late 2021, the College of Western Idaho (CWI) needed to address a consistent enrollment decline and improve student retention. With an ambitious vision to improve and optimize its technological infrastructure and student outreach, CWI sought to build a best-in-class system to enhance student engagement and elevate enrollment strategies. To ensure that data and technology were aligned with CWI’s growth objectives, the college partnered with Collegis Education to analyze their combined impact. Were its data and tech aligned for impact, or were gaps hindering progress and creating unnecessary burdens across the team?

    Key Takeaways

    • Six consecutive terms of YoY enrollment growth
    • Experienced the highest YoY increase in persistence in history of the college from Fall 2022 to Fall 2023
    • Consistent improvement in term-over-term retention

    CHALLENGES:

    • Declining enrollment
    • No established retention strategy
    • Lack of CRM
    • Underutilized LMS
    • Siloed technology and data systems

    SOLUTIONS:

    • Connected Core®
    • Advanced analytics + business intelligence
    • LMS support
    • Website optimization
    • Data-driven outreach and support for students identified as at-risk

    Strategy

    Collegis Education and CWI began collaborating on building a best-in-class student journey from the point of initial inquiry through graduation.

    A comprehensive evaluation of existing CWI systems allowed Collegis to assess the college’s digital readiness, technology infrastructure, and enrollment ecosystem to understand how they aligned with its growth objectives. The partnership quickly proceeded from consultation to implementation.

    Collegis prescribed a set of solutions to enhance student engagement from first contact and elevate the school’s enrollment strategies:

    • Connected Core® to unite siloed systems, data sets, and other enrollment technologies, providing more accurate, actionable, unified institutional intelligence with clear visualizations to support data-enabled decision-making at all levels.
    • Website optimization to improve conversion and deliver a student-centric digital experience that supports the objectives, goals, and mission.
    • Prospective student nurturing campaigns with a messaging protocol designed to drive conversion and prospective student engagement with CWI.

    Collaborating closely with CWI, Collegis developed a well-defined student retention strategy that established meaningful student-advisor relationships early on, ensuring students felt supported from their first interaction onward.

    • Enrollment conversation training gave student-facing staff the tools to drive positive experiences for CWI learners while embracing a liaison approach to student engagement.
    • Collegis student success coaches conducted proactive outreach to engage students while leveraging an at-risk alert system to drive intervention. This early alert system flags students needing support based on learning management system (LMS) data on attendance, current grades, and assignment completion.

    Results: Average YoY growth each semester since our partnership began has averaged 5%

    By working with Collegis, CWI could focus on its student journey and how it could better use data and technology to deliver superior student engagements and reach its growth targets. This has helped not only stop, but reverse historical enrollment declines. In 2024, CWI projected year-over-year growth for the sixth consecutive academic term. The school has achieved an average year-over-year term growth of 5%, with a trendline for fall 2024 of over 9% growth.

    “Our partnership with Collegis has provided expertise, speed, and flexibility in areas where we, as an institution of higher education, have been unable to improve so nimbly.  Where most consultants provide an analysis and leave, Collegis follows through with ‘and this is how we’ll make that happen for you’.  Trusting their recommendations is easy because I know they are signing themselves up to do the work with me.”

    Tyler Brown, Associate Vice President Enrollment & Student Services, College of Western Idaho

    Value-based conversations with prospective students have resulted in increased applications. Further, pre-start engagement from the advising and student success coaching teams has increased registrations from admitted students.

    By fostering a culture of meaningful interaction and support for students, CWI paved the way for improved student retention. The LMS-based at-risk model has driven 19,000+ proactive student engagements and interventions in one academic year.

    Within just one year of implementing these targeted strategies, CWI witnessed a remarkable in retention rates, all while alleviating the workload on faculty and staff.  Similar retention strategies deployed by other Collegis partner institutions have yielded term-over-term retention rates exceeding 90%, underscoring the effectiveness of our approach.

    “Whenever we want to try something new or have a challenge we need help with, my first thought now is let’s call Collegis and see if this is something they can help us with.”

    Denise L. Aberle-Cannata, Provost, College of Western Idaho

    With a proven retention strategy and access to a proactive model, CWI can now build out its internal retention capabilities and plans to take over the student success coaching function.

    The Future

    CWI’s commitment to embracing change and being agile is demonstrated by the school’s evolving partnership with Collegis to exceed industry best practices and realize sustained growth. Ongoing services and incremental work are targeting LMS initiatives to stabilize, standardize, optimize, and transform CWI’s instance of Blackboard Learn and redesign its new student orientation, among other things.

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  • Higher Education Marketing Job Titles and Salaries

    Higher Education Marketing Job Titles and Salaries

    Elevate your marketing team with strategic expertise

    Does your higher education marketing team have what it takes to capture the attention of right-fit students in a competitive landscape? Marketing budgets can be tight, but without the right mix of talent, increasing your ability to reach and convert key audiences, clearly connect upstream efforts to enrollment outcomes, and producing actionable marketing intelligence will be a constant challenge.

    Dive into our latest infographic to uncover the key roles essential for enhancing the student journey and driving a robust return on investment.

    If you hired them all, you could spend $1M+ in annual salaries alone. But you don’t need all the roles all the time. Hire the ones you do and outsource the part-time or specialized roles where you can.

    Partner with Collegis to expand your marketing approach

    Ready to assemble a marketing super team that engages students with personalized, AI-driven experiences at scale? Join forces with Collegis Education to access tailored marketing services that maximize the data, tech, and talent you already have.

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  • 10 Reasons to Go Digital with Your Course Materials – Eric Stoller

    10 Reasons to Go Digital with Your Course Materials – Eric Stoller






    When I was a college student, there were times when I skipped out on buying a required textbook for a course. Finances were always tight, so I tried to balance my checkbook with buying actual books. Even then, textbooks weren’t cheap. Today, students are paying more and more for their higher education experience. If a university can find ways to make attending college more affordable, accessible, and “high-tech/high-touch”, well, it’s not really an option, it’s a necessity.

    Today’s technology makes it easy to distill course materials into digital formats and enhances them as a result.  Colleges and universities are quickly shifting from books to bytes to improve the student experience and boost course outcomes.

    Here are 10 reasons why your university should go digital with its course materials:

    1. Affordability: This may seem like an obvious reason to move to digital delivery of course materials. Students will end up paying less for digital course materials. From production to shipping, textbooks require a lot of costly infrastructure. Digital materials eliminate these costs and pass the savings on to students.
    2. A better experience for students with disabilities. Unlike print books, modern eTextbooks can be accessible “out of the box.”  When eTextbooks include features such alternative text descriptions of visuals and content that can be used with assistive technology, students can start reading right away, without waiting for a disability services department to create a file.
    3. Learning Analytics and Digital Integration: Can you remember when a physical book connected to a digital learning system? It’s just not possible. However, with digital course materials, integration with the campus LMS/VLE is possible. Plus, with learning analytics built in, digital materials can help support at-risk learners who may need additional assistance.
    4. Recruitment: Digital course materials might not seem like they give universities a recruitment edge, but in an increasingly competitive enrollment landscape, everything helps. Students seek modern solutions for their educational experience. For bring-your-own-device (BYOD) campuses and institutions that provide technology platforms for students, digital course materials hit the sweet spot. They create more affordances for student success and showcase a university experience that is effectively using the latest technologies.
    5. Multi-Platform Capability: The ability to view course materials on a variety of devices represents a huge advantage for digital course materials. If a student needs to read a chapter while on the go, odds are, they will be able to access it on whichever device they have with them. Also, it’s a good bet that no one misses having a backpack filled with textbooks.
    6. Seamless Group Work: University campuses are filled with versatile seating and project workspaces. You can’t project a textbook onto a large screen, but you can with digital course content. It’s simply a matter of either plugging in or wirelessly beaming content to a screen. It makes group work and collaboration a much easier task. 
    7. Always Current: Have you ever tried to update a textbook? Editions come and go, each one costing more than the last. With digital course materials, content is as up to date as possible and it doesn’t cost students more for this “always current” content. Who wants a used book when you can have a new digital version? 
    8. Instant Access: No longer do students have to search for the lowest price option or wait until after term starts. Instant access to digital materials, through programs such as Pearson Inclusive Access and others, ensures all students are ready to learn on the first day of class, not the third week. It’s as easy as logging into the university system, selecting the appropriate course, and downloading the material to a compatible device.
    9. Interactivity: Textbooks have been surpassed in form, function, and capability. Digital course materials allow authors the opportunity to embed audio and video into their work. This makes for a much more interactive and “real” experience for students. 
    10. Retention: Anything that a college or university can do to assist students with their academic success is a good thing. Digital course materials aid and enhance an institution’s ability to improve their overall retention rates and bolster student success with all of the supportive elements in this list. 

    What would you add to this list?

    Digital course materials are not the future for higher education; they’re the present. It’s only a matter of time before your institution goes digital for student success.

     

    This post was sponsored by Pearson as part of a higher education influencers collaboration.





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