FE Marketing – Audiences
Marketing is an essential tool for many businesses. This allows them to create a brand that drives consumers to the company. They create something that aligns with their business goals, which in turn, attracts their specific target audience.
With further education marketing, this is slightly different.
In education, you are not selling a handful of products, you are selling hundreds – Colleges can have upwards for 400 courses. You are also targeting two different audiences: the parents and the students.
So how do you ensure you are attracting both audiences without undermining one or the other?
Answer: You understand what each of them wants to see or hear to help them make their decision.
Parents as a target audience
Parents/Guardians ultimately want the child to be happy. But they can also be persuasive! What they are looking for on your website and at open events, is how the child will be taught, times, progression routes, and support. Some of the most popular questions at open events are:
What can they do with this course?
Can they still attend university with a BTEC?
Where have other students progressed to?
Can you talk me through the course?
What are your facilities like? Of course, this one should be covered during an event, because the facilities should be open and viewable.
If you can cover the basic questions in your prospectuses, website and open days, you will quell worries before they come to the surface.
Students as a target audience
The student is slightly different. Yes, they are interested in what courses are on offer, but they also want to know about everything outside the classroom, what other students are like and if they feel comfortable in your environment. Questions from students are slightly different:
What food is in the canteen?
What clubs are there?
Can I wear what I want?
Can I leave in between classes?
How much money can I earn doing this course?
As you can see, their queries differ – we are not saying they don’t ask about the courses, because they do, but in a more general approach around how many days and hours.
Advertising to both at the same time can also be a tricky one. Do not try to push the same messaging because their motives are different. Understand your platforms and learn where your audiences sit. It could be you use Facebook to target the parents and Instagram for students. Outdoor advertising can be more general and used to push a generic message and brand awareness but the digital platforms are where you will be able to see the metrics, which in turn, will make the next campaign stronger.
Something else to bear in mind – each year the audiences do differ slightly. Always use the autumn term, where you are running the bulk of the open events, to A/B test adverts in the first few weeks. This will give you the insights to streamline the advertising for the rest of the year.
If you are ready to increase enrolments, contact Micca Marketing today. We have actual in-house educational experience, which means we understand your lifecycle, processes, and more.