Home Marketing Reach More Prospects – and Get Better Inquiries – From Your Paid Search Strategy
Reach More Prospects – and Get Better Inquiries – From Your Paid Search Strategy

Reach More Prospects – and Get Better Inquiries – From Your Paid Search Strategy

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By Brian Walker, Executive Vice President, Statwax

Google claims that 78 percent of conversions on education websites are influenced by paid search (Think with Google). And studies show that nearly 60 percent of new enrollees relied on search engines when learning about colleges (Fishman 2015). But the way your prospects are searching is changing dramatically. Without adapting to the evolving student journey you may start to find that this once-reliable marketing channel no longer seems to get the inquiry volume needed to justify the cost.

Any paid search account left unattended and un-optimized will have a finite reach and diminishing returns, and this is especially true in higher education.

A campaign that efficiently produced inquiries converting to starts at a good rate two years ago may now be doubling its costs and generating fewer enrollments and starts. The world of paid search changes too quickly for the strategy to run unchecked for even short durations of time. New features and tactics require agile adjustments. For example, Google recently rolled out new expanded text ad versions that provided a third headline and double the ad copy. Failure to implement that feature account-wide as quickly as possible could have resulted in competitors dominating search space ahead of you.

Turning around a stagnant paid search channel and hitting your start goals once more is possible. It starts with taking advantage of new optimization opportunities that can help you avoid wasted ad spend and prevent losing prospects to competing schools. So instead of scrapping your digital strategy in search of more inquiries, let’s look at how search – and how your prospects use it – is changing higher education.

Hone in on competitor brand terms

Using your competitors’ brand names as targeted search keywords is an oft-debated tactic. It’s not against the rules of Google or Bing, as long as the trademarked name isn’t mentioned in ad copy. But the practice often comes with business ethics arguments, not to mention questions about actual cost efficiency.

In higher education, there is a definite benefit to keeping your brand visible as prospective students search for other schools. Whether your school is the first one a person searches for or not, there is a good bet it’s not the only school. In fact, more than one-third of students are now applying to seven schools before making a decision, and better than 80 percent apply to at least three (NACAC).

Your prospects are looking at your competitors during their selection process, whether you want them to or not. Putting your school name and messaging in the search results every time they do will allow you to more closely control a prospective student’s research journey. Use each impression as an opportunity to promote value-adds, like updated labs or no waitlists for a particular program. Differentiators that help your institution stand out against other schools in the market will resonate with a prospective student as they continue their research and note the pros and cons. You may be surprised to find how effective this strategy can be at delivering inquiries much faster than if you had waited on prospects to search for your school on their own.

Mobile dominates – don’t get left behind

It’s no secret that mobile has been on a rapid rise in the search space. Mobile now accounts for nearly 60 percent of all searches, an exponential growth from just a few years ago (Hitwise). Search behavior in the education space is no different. Google claims that education queries have grown 6 percent on mobile year-over-year yet declined 5 percent on desktop over the same time frame (Google 2018).

Looking specifically at paid search strategies in higher education makes it even clearer how important it is to perfect your mobile strategy.

Ad spend on paid search was up 7 percent this last quarter, with mobile ads making up 60 percent of all ad clicks on all platforms – an all-time high (Merkle 2018).

At the same time, the number of ads appearing for the average education query on mobile is on the rise at double the rate of desktop (Google 2018). This all means that the click totals are steadily increasing – so there are more prospects to be gained. There are also more ads fighting for visibility in the same small amount of screen space. If you take ownership of the lead position on mobile, you can reap all the benefits of the astronomic rise in search volume. If you’re still struggling to make an impact on mobile and languishing at the bottom of search results, your account is going to keep spinning its wheels. It will end up spending more just to keep up with competition, without showing any lift in click volume or quality – a combination that is bound to increase cost-per-inquiry.

Combating these growing costs and positioning your school high amongst the ever-increasing mobile volume is a big step toward expanding the reach of paid search efforts. Being first on desktop isn’t always the most efficient placement, but that changes a bit on mobile thanks to smaller screens. With longer ad copy and more ad extensions, sometimes position one is the only position that a mobile user sees above the fold. Experiment with mobile bid adjustments and Google Ads’ “bid for top position” automated strategy to see how click and inquiry volume are impacted.

Also be sure to test for the most eye-catching, engaging ad messaging to ensure maximum click-through-rates from the most relevant audience. This is a great time to make use of campaign segmentation by device type on popular ad platforms. Google, Bing, and Gemini all allow bidding devices down to -100 percent at the campaign level, ensuring that you can create mobile-only campaigns and focus ad messaging for this smaller screen. You can keep the copy shorter and punchier to account for smaller screen space and can call out value propositions specific to an on-the-go mobile user (like text-to-chat admissions reps or a quick RFI process).

Go for the degree

Expanding keywords into more exact, long-tail variations is a surefire way to gain efficiency and performance from any paid search strategy. When it comes to implementing this tactic to reach prospective students, one of the best places to start expanding is in the degree type.

Plenty of prospective students already have an idea of what they want to go to school to study. Keywords involving your school’s programs – like “nursing program” or “business administration classes” – are no doubt a large piece of your paid search account. But if you aren’t also targeting searches for the types of degrees your programs offer, you could be missing out.

Education searches involving a degree type have historically shown quarterly gains (Lee 2013).

Queries like “business administration certificate” or “bachelors in accounting” are rapidly increasing in volume, as prospects become more in tune with where they can go in life with each type of degree or certificate offering.

And while it’s true that a broader keyword such as “business administration” could still trigger an ad when someone searches “business administration certificate,” that doesn’t mean it’s the most efficient way to reach prospective students. Remember, competition is increasing and screen real estate is at a premium. If your paid search strategy is stuck on shorter, broader terms while your potential students are seeking out more specific results, it’s only a matter of time before those keywords become cost-prohibitive. Building out keywords to focus on precise long-tail variations being searched by prospects is a great way to mitigate this and stand out from the competition.

Furthermore, targeting queries based on degree type helps you place more relevant, engaging information in front of a potential student. If your school offers multiple degree options for a program, this keyword strategy ensures that your ad is talking about the single program and degree type that interests the prospective student. It means more engagement right off the bat, and a better chance of turning a prospect into an enrollment for that program.

Don’t forget the job-seekers

All of these strategies will help you to better reach and engage those who are looking for education and specific school programs. Beyond that, there is untapped potential among those who aren’t necessarily immediately interested in education. Job seeking searches are also on the rise, and with them comes the possibility of steering another segment of prospective students toward your school and its career training options.

Unemployment is low right now in 2018, but that doesn’t mean that everyone currently working is happy in their position. Recent surveys suggest that as many as 22-million Americans feel they are underemployed (PayScale 2018). The underemployed segment is one potential audience to market career training opportunities to, with the idea that a better career may be within close reach. The problem with this strategy, when it comes to paid search, is that the underemployed market isn’t always specifically seeking out education. But data suggests they are seeking out new career opportunities in other ways. These users often turn to “job and opportunity” type searches. This means queries for job openings in specific fields as well as what salary a certain job type would provide. These search increases are a consumer demand indicator, showing that users are interested in “leveling up” their career but not yet at the point of knowing how or where to do so. For example, a search for “registered nurse salary” may not seem like the ideal prospect to target with a school’s search ad. But current job markets and search behaviors say that this user would be a prime target for ads pushing a school’s online nursing program.

If your paid search account isn’t also using job and salary-based searches that are relevant to the programs your school offers, it is a missed opportunity that is growing in volume each passing quarter. While search is a bottom-of-funnel tactic, consider adding these types of keywords as a higher-funnel prospecting play. Use them to identify and first engage users who indicate a potential desire to get training in a new career path. Utilize ad messaging that speaks to schedule flexibility, online offerings, accelerated programs, and more.

These users may not realize that a career training school is for them, but their searching indicates that is a decision they could be easily nudged into with the right messaging from your school.

The work on a successful paid search strategy for student acquisition is ongoing and always evolving with new platforms, strategies, and ways to best engage the user. There are countless ways to adjust bids, build out keywords, implement audiences, and a/b test inquiry-driving landing pages. But if you’re finding that inquiry volume is slipping, or becoming inefficient within your digital budget, turning to these forward-thinking tactics first can help turn results around and have you hitting start goals for less spend than ever before.

References

“Education Trends Through the Eyes of Your Customer.” Think with Google, Google, April 2012, https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/consumer-insights/education-trends-through-the-eyes-of-your-customer/

“Searching for the Right College.” Rachel Fishman, New America, 17 Sept. 2015, https://www.newamerica.org/education-policy/policy-papers/searching-for-the-right-college/

“2017 State of College Admission.” NACAC. 2017, https://www.nacacnet.org/globalassets/documents/publications/research/soca17final.pdf

“Mobile Search: Topics & Themes.” John Fetto, Hitwise, Aug 2016, https://hitwise.connexity.com/070116_MobileSearchReport_CD_US.html

Google Education Insights Quarterly, Q1 2018

“Digital Marketing Report: Q2 2018.” Merkle, Merkle, 2018, https://www.merkleinc.com/thought-leadership/digital-marketing-report

“Higher Education Searches Rise on Google, Reveal Marketing Opportunity.” Jessica Lee, SearchEngineWatch, 1 Aug. 2013, https://searchenginewatch.com/sew/study/2286142/higher-education-searches-rise-on-google-reveal-marketing-opportunity-study

“The Underemployment Big Picture.” PayScale, PayScale, 2018, https://www.payscale.com/data-packages/underemployment/


Brian Walker

BRIAN WALKER is the Executive Vice President for Statwax. For more than seven years he has worked in digital advertising, starting as an account executive performing ads work and optimizations. As Executive VP, Brian oversees the strategy and operations of an education-only digital agency, ensuring that his teams are making use of the most relevant and up-to-date platforms and tactics. A graduate of the University of South Carolina, he now calls Indianapolis, Indiana home.



Contact Information: Brian Walker // Executive Vice President // Statwax // 404-219-6729 // Brian@statwax.com // https://www.statwax.com/ // https://facebook.com/Statwax/, https://twitter.com/Statwax, https://www.linkedin.com/company/statwax

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