This blog is the second part of our POV on what makes the dominant online brands successful.
It seems like all we hear is doom and gloom. Rising student expectations, increased competition, the demographic cliff, reduced ROI on ad spending, digital ad fatigue, etc. But, what makes dominant online universities like SNHU, Liberty, WGU, and GCU so successful?
Why are so many universities struggling to grow their programs, and yet these schools are growing and thriving?
They execute best practices – they capture interest and convert the interest into leads.
Have you ever wondered why 98 percent of your web traffic leaves your site without submitting the slightest bit of information— no form fill, no chat, no inbound call, nothing?
Well, we did.
In fact, recently we researched 100+ non-profit universities offering and advertising an online program or graduate program. And we formulated an evaluation plan:
- Identify opportunities for increased organic leads
- Measure inquiry response time and persistence with live humans
- Measure nurturing channels and frequency
Regarding growing opportunities for increasing organic leads, our goal was simple: survey their ability to capture organic traffic and overall, on-page conversion, which would then allow us to arrive at an “Inbound Quality Score.”
This Inbound Quality Score would help us measure the opportunities and ability to capture current organic traffic. More than that, we have identified several opportunities for these schools to immediately grow organic inquiries and total enrollment for online and graduate programs.
Key Finding – 84% of schools had a Weak Inbound Quality Score (Missing 20% of Organic Lead Volume)
Unfortunately, schools are spending money on paid media, expensive SEO, and technology without seeing results. They but have not optimized with simple tools such as inbound live answering and live chat. The primary reason is they fail with Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO). Conversion Rate Optimization is the process of increasing the percentage of users or website visitors to take a desired action, also known as lead generation.
Based on the opportunities we identified, we believe the following results are possible:
- An increase of 25% in unpaid, high-intent organic inquiries monthly for graduate and online programs
- Increased web traffic and expanded reach for ALL audience types
- Higher return on Marketing Investment
Consider this: if you increased by 25% your highest intent, highest probability leads what would be the increase in enrollment? We believe you can increase enrollment by 5% or even 10%. Why are these results possible? We’ve helped several universities produce similar results. Can we help you? Isn’t it time to turn your web traffic into higher enrollment for your university?
If we can help you generate and convert more leads, call us at 877-434-1828 or email Greg at gswinhart@educationconnex.com. We’re here to help your university succeed!
