Boosting Conversions for a

Online University

Case Study

Background

An established online university within a state school system aimed to enhance their online presence and conversion rates to meet the evolving needs of a growing student base. They faced the challenges of high cost per conversion in an extremely competitive market and maintaining consistent, informative, and engaging content while addressing specific pain points for diverse demographics, such as nontraditional students, veterans, parents, transfer students, and non-degree seekers.

Objectives

  • Understand Target Market: Develop personas to gain a comprehensive understanding of the various audiences.

  • Inbound Marketing Principals: Transition from siloed, reactive marketing to a strategic, inbound approach connecting and engaging with segmented audiences with the right messages on the right platforms at the right time.

  • Increase Nontraditional Student Engagement: Significant boost in nontraditional student engagement within a 90-day period.

Strategy & Execution

1.  Integrated Marketing Strategy:

To start, we took a holistic look at what our client wanted to achieve and the status of their marketing efforts. We created a comprehensive strategy for the university to address all their audiences, grow their digital footprint, and increase conversions. As part of our integrated marketing strategy, we included updating the university’s blogging, new radio ads and banner ads, and updating messaging about featured programs.

2.  Audience Segmentation Utilizing Buyer Personas:

We then moved on to our content strategy and focused on segmenting our client’s audiences and fully developing their buyer personas. After fleshing out their buyer personas, we used them as a guide to create monthly social media calendars with content optimized across various platforms. Studies have shown that most U.S. adults engage with three social media platforms. We prioritized Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, expanding to Instagram to maximize overall traffic and build their follower base on Instagram.

3.  Driving Engagement with Tailored Content:

We tailored content for each stage of the buyer’s journey, ensuring relevance and meaning. With a unified voice, we employed an agile content strategy across platforms to drive engagement.

Results

Using principals from inbound marketing, we helped our university client connect with nontraditional students through integrated digital marketing:

  • Increased social media followers by 286%, impressions by 119%, and engagement by 278%

  • Increased new visitors to the website by 200%

  • Increased overall website sessions from social by 540%

  • Application submissions on the website topped 4,800.

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