Outside-the-Box Marketing

One discussion at a recent conference call meeting of the Convergence College Network (CCN) involved creative marketing strategies.  Every IT program needs to attract students and keep them enrolled, but there’s not always a surplus of budget money or marketing personnel available to help with those efforts.  In hearing some of the clever ways our CCN member schools market their programs, the old adage “necessity is the mother of invention” came to mind.  It was a great refresher in the need for all of us to think outside of the box when developing ways to appeal to prospective students and engage current students.

Here are a few highlights:

• Four-year universities use cyber competitions to attract hundreds of students to their campuses for a weekend event.  Community colleges can get involved and use that venue to promote programs and certificates.
• A “one-stop shopping” recruitment event made sure multiple departments (instructors, counselors, financial aid) were in attendance to answer any and all student questions.  Laptops were also set up to allow for on-the-spot registration.
• One school in Alabama arranged for summer camp flyers to be distributed at visitor’s centers across the state.  That helped attract out-of-state interest.
• Getting faculty active on Facebook and Twitter – posting interesting content and news – can energize your program and keep students (and business partners) engaged.  Some view Facebook as a platform for students and Twitter more of a professional tool.
• A school in Texas parked a modified tractor-trailer at local high school football games.  The trailer not only provided a memorable marketing/promotional hook, but also housed a small computer lab to expose students to hands-on IT curriculum.

Documentations and more examples can be found at: http://nationalctc.mobilectc.wikispaces.net/Recruitment+Retention+and+Marketing

This sort of resource sharing and best practices discussion is a hallmark of the CCN, a unique community of practice that connects IT educators from across the country.  Who knows what topic the group will discuss at the next meeting?

Your school can be a part of this conversation.  Membership is free.

To learn more, visit: https://www.connectedtech.org/educators/convergence_college_network.html.