Don’t Fall Behind: Increase Your RTO’s Enrolments Through Digital Marketing

New students are increasingly finding their future Education Provider online. With advertising being more regulated the stakes are high for businesses to ensure that can be found online for their specialty.

Did you know that 75% of consumers admit to making snap judgements about a business based on its website design? That’s the world we live in now. Digital marketing is key to driving sales and increasing credibility, and this is no different for the education industry. Students shopping around for the right training courses to enrol in will trust an RTO that has a well-designed website and an active social media sphere. Credibility lies in polished, optimised online presence.

As more people opt for VET over tertiary courses, your RTO needs to stand out in the sea of other RTOs, especially against the businesses offering similar courses to you. If you’re looking to increase your enrolments, then in today’s world you have to have confidence in your digital strategy.

Here are the questions you need to ask yourself to ensure you’re maximising your enrolment opportunities with the best digital marketing steps possible.

Maximise the online experience for your students and invest in quality web development.

Take the time to think about branding, and how you want to convey your message to the wider world. How many pages will there be? How many clicks to enrol? Is it ASQA-compliant? Is it optimised for mobile access? Can students enrol online with ease? Is it optimised for Search Engines like Google?

That last question is particularly pertinent. Creating a sleek website design with active content, usually in the form of a blog or news page, if done correctly will increase the chances of being found first on Google. This won’t happen overnight, you will need to create a bank of content to eventually be found in the high ranks of a search engine.

The trick is to make life as easy as possible for potential students. Having all the necessary information online, plus creating an easy digital enrolment solution, they are integral to gaining traction in the digital space.

Market your website!

The next question to ask is how you’re going to direct students to your website. Are you using social media to drive traffic? You can create a strategy about what you want to tell the world on a week-to-week basis using Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and any other platforms you believe would help.

Google Adwords and pay-per-click advertising is a game changer in reaching out to audiences online. This is a measurable, cost-effective advertising solution to help increase your brand online, and is proven to be highly effective in converting browsing to sales. Are you a not-for-profit? We may be able to get Google to provide $168,000 per year in free Adwords advertising to your organisation.

Build an email list (but don’t spam!)

Reaching out to your potential students is vital. Talk to your students and community. Do you know your target audience? Gather information on prospective students and send targeted emails using Mailchimp and other CRMs (many of them are free). You can let them know about special deals, upcoming courses and the latest news in your RTO. You can do this for your current students, too! This will also direct people to your website, and will eventually lead to strong conversions in your enrolments.

The key is in visibility. If you want students to take you seriously, provide them with a strong online resource, an attractive website and plenty of interesting social media posts. This is a fool-proof way to maximise online engagement which will inevitably lead to strong results.

Want to know more about how you can increase enrolments for your RTO? Contact Predikkta today.

ABOUT THIS ARTICLE

Students shopping around for the right training courses to enrol in will trust an RTO that has a well-designed website and an active social media sphere. Credibility lies in polished, optimised online presence.

April 2nd, 2017 - Posted by Clayton C

*Predikkta has sourced several external independent global tools to analyze websites.These tools do not reflect on occasion the internal website analytics, but are recognised global tools and provide accurate comparative results for measurement against competitors.

**The views in this article are those of the author