Talking Tactics

This episode is about this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9Ph0-mO9Bc . Go watch it! A new program has launched — how do we make people aware of it? We make a video, of course! But, not all videos are created equal. In this episode, Emanuel Díaz from IE University will share how a team at the university (shoutout to Sofía, Lucia, and Elena) created a video to boost enrollment in a marketin...

Picture a world where the standard social media engagement rates for educational institutions are 3.26% on Instagram, 1.36% on Facebook, and 0.51% on TikTok, as outlined in Hubspot’s December 2023 report. Now, imagine Duquesne University smashing these benchmarks with a remarkable 11% engagement rate, far surpassing what's typical for its size. This exceptional performance is thanks to Ian Hurley,...

Imagine requesting information for a master’s program and being asked about your favorite movie… that’s what Lydia Fine did at the University of Iowa Tippie School of Business! As the Senior Marketing Technology Specialist, Lydia faced a challenge: form submissions were okay on desktop but not quite up to par on mobile. Taking matters into her own hands during the transition to Drupal 9, she took...

This special cross-over episode features clips from Confessions of a Higher Ed CMO, Talking Tactics, and The Application with Allison Turcio. These discussions highlight the significance of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in higher education marketing. Through these carefully selected clips from several podcasts within The Enrollify Network, this episode illuminates the multifaceted approac...

Getting a mention on social media is only half the win. Real engagement happens when we respond. This was Sabreen’s philosophy going into this shift in mentality for Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science. As the sole social media manager for the university, she decided to devote at least as much time to social listening (and responding, and reposting) as content creation. The result...

Email is a sea of sameness. Just ask any sophomore or junior in high school you know: they are getting bombarded with thousands of emails and they all sound the same. Katie Mills-Erickson wanted to break through the noise to share the University of Iowa story. But how? In email, it starts with the subject line. Her tactic was to change the tone so they would sound and feel more quirky, more human,...

When yield is the focus, personalization is key. But, just how personalized could an event be? John and his team at Waukesha County Technical College had an idea to create an event where — no matter where you were in the post-app funnel — you would leave the event as an enrolled student. Yes, that included transferring credit, accepting, advising, scheduling courses, and committing — all as part o...

If the atomic unit of content is usually a story, what happens when we redefine it to be a snippet or a single quote? That’s what Mackenzie pondered, then implemented at UW-Eau Claire in preparation to launch their new website. In the process, she realized she had ready access to a treasure trove of content she could use to make quick videos, quotes, or add to emails. The results? Her team can pro...

The podcast Profcast at the University of Antwerp isn’t just thinking outside the box, it’s checking multiple boxes. Each episode features one professor, focusing on their research but also on the person behind the research. Building academic reputation? Check. Establishing good partnerships between academics and marketing in house? Check. Helping current students know their professors? Check. Rea...

The task was monumental: Write career content for 70 different programs. In late 2022, before AI was top-of-mind for any of us, Patrick was thinking... How can I do this with AI? With the help of his student employees, Jasper.ai, a spreadsheet, and the =CONCATENATE() function, they created powerful, search engine optimized content that resulted in these incredible results: 217% increase in clicks...

What does diversity, equity, and inclusion in content creation look like? To Mikki Collins, it was this: real, unfiltered stories told by more than one student in a format that could both go deep and was built to last. So, she built a podcast for the University of Chichester centered around authenticity and honesty. In the third series of the podcast, she wanted to feature true stories from her ca...

How can we build audiences in our secondary social channels in a meaningful way? That’s what Andrew Cassel, Senior Social Strategist at Middlebury College sought out to answer. He engaged his community in submitting prompts which he then used to generate beautiful AI images. He posted the images on Pinterest, LinkedIn, and other secondary platforms. His results? On the form, 53 prompts were submit...

As a campus tour guide back in 2005, Mallory Willsea noticed students would ask very different questions when they were alone vs. when they were with their parents or in a group. When she graduated, Mallory started working in the admissions office just when digital was starting to happen.  She remembered how differently students would behave when alone, so she came up with a tactic to let them ask...

About the Enrollify Podcast Network:  Talking Tactics is a part of the Enrollify Podcast Network.  If you like this podcast, chances are you’ll like other Enrollify shows too!   Our podcast network is growing by the month and we’ve got a plethora of marketing, admissions, and higher ed technology shows that are jam-packed with stories, ideas, and frameworks all designed to empower you to be a bett...

Allison’s start in higher ed was as a writer at her college. In her role, she quickly realized the communications were not student-centered enough, and sought to become an expert on her audience to deliver hyper-personalized opportunities for engagement via the new CRM. The most immediate result? The students who had a one-on-one engagement with admissions were 2.4 more likely to enroll. The long-...

In 2008, Jon-Stephen Stansel was teaching English and noticed his students would pay more attention to their phones than the lecture. He wanted to reach them where they were, so he started trying to find ways to make their phones and social media a productive part of their classes. The rest is history. Today we know Jon-Stephen as THE social media authority in higher education, and it all started...

Dive into a captivating chat with Carrie Phillips, the Chief Communications and Marketing Officer at UA Little Rock. Back in 2008, starting as the Assistant Director of New Media at Arkansas Tech University, Carrie faced a media coverage challenge. When TV stations wouldn't visit their remote campus, she ingeniously produced and scripted her own footage, sending it directly to them. The result? Wi...

For the show’s season finale, several higher ed pros share their yet-to-be-tried or yet-to-be-popular tactic ideas for YOU to try! From a different way to train campus tour guides to how to use your alumni as walking billboards, get inspired by these simple ideas with potentially big results.   This episode features these smart and resourceful folks from all over, with a combined 75 years of highe...

Many research institutions have this same challenge: They want to be known for their research strengths but struggle to do this in a way that engages their non-academic audiences. Lucy Guest at the University of Warwick brings us a highly-effective, super low-resource tactic: share your academic research articles on Reddit. First, find the right community; second, post a recent, peer-reviewed arti...

Less is more. A whole lot more. The University of Nottingham launched the world’s first micro-prospectus (aka mini-viewbook) last year. It may be tiny, but it is making a huge impact. It has allowed the university to reduce the time and complexities to produce this piece, create print pieces that better serve internal audiences and partners, deliver on the sustainability ambitions of their univers...

Ali Abel, senior manager of marketing and communications at the University of Calgary’s Faculty of Law, saw a critical gap that needed to be filled: the online forum prospective law students had been using was moving to Reddit. She created an account for the law school and started answering questions and (softly) promoting events. With ramping up activity to 15 posts and 69 comments, 15% of the la...

Carrie Chambers, Director of Digital Strategy & Student Engagement at Butler University, shows us how to turn up engagement and conversions in online webinars using prize draws. Inspired by the popularity of Pearl Parties in the early pandemic days, she came up with an idea to host short info sessions, no slides, with prize draws every 4-5 minutes. The results are incredible: much more qualified l...

Gustavo Segui combined two foundational principles: 1) What systems are already in place that we could leverage? and 2) How do we make students the protagonists of their own stories? Find out how he accomplished both and as a result, tripled the International School of Curitiba’s followers and reach on Instagram simply by featuring students in their proudest moments. This podcast is brought to you...

Darcy Porter, Associate Director of Communications and Content Strategy at SUNY Brockport, shares how she worked together with the enrollment team to re-imagine the post-deposit email communication sequence. They took the emails from long and overwhelming to engaging and specific — and are seeing the results: increased open rates, increased clicks, and more than 6x first-year registrations year-ov...

Shane Baglini, Senior Director of Marketing and Recruitment for the Division of Graduate and Continuing Education at Muhlenberg College joins the show to share how a simple paid keyword change saved a master’s degree from almost being discontinued. He and his team boosted lead-to-inquiry conversions by 241% and took the program from zero enrolled students to blowing almost 50% past their break-eve...