Key results
- +120% new student enrolments from targeted recruitment region (Latin America)
- Communications strategy for acquisition and retention across all campuses
- Automation of integrated acquisition campaigns with partner Agents
The Education space is evolving and transforming to suit the needs of students around the globe. This year has seen a need for universities to focus energy and resources on honing their digital presence in a socially distanced world. This gave life to our partnership with Educo Global, with a network of 16 universities in the USA, Australia, Canada and Ireland. Our work focused on their Canadian and Australian campuses.
Also read: The Global Demand for Education is growing, and we’re there to meet it
“We engaged with The Conscience Organisation when it became apparent that as a company we needed an upgrade to our digital marketing approach and how we were engaging with our customers. TCO was able to quickly understand our brand, key value messaging and who our target audiences are. With this in mind, the team refined our approach by developing not only a digital plan to better access customers but one that presented fresh messaging that truly highlighted our brand.”
Julia Tracewski (SVP of Marketing and Conversion, Educo Global)
Problem
Educo Global had a traditional “pen and paper” approach to education marketing and student acquisition. Although engaging digitally and physically with agents and students all over the world, their approach was skewed towards physical touch points with minimal digital follow up.
“They weren’t fishing where the fish were in a digitally-led world – the focus needed to shift.”
Clive Burcham (CEO/Founder, The Conscience Organisation)
Approach
Translate the elements that drove success for Educo’s schools and their students – the personal touches, the tailored approaches – into a digital experience that helped existing students feel included, and let potential students understand the Educo difference.
“Be a name, not a number.”
Deep research of the student journey – both at home and abroad – helped uncover how digital experiences could compliment traditional physical approaches. We spoke with students and Agents remotely and in-person all over the world, allowing us to get to the heart of how and why students choose to study abroad. Clive: “People’s digital intentions and behaviours are often a metaphor for their physical behaviours.”
We transformed their Always On digital marketing strategy, which aided student retention – essential to the success and survival of private and public universities.
Solution
Content was king! A diverse range of video and still content brought to life the inclusive and personal nature of the on-campus student experience.
We engaged with students and agents from key acquisition regions – such as Asia and Latin America – to ensure a culturally diverse approach that resonated with a global audience.
From application to enrolment to graduation and beyond, we captured and told the stories of students, staff, teachers and alumni, highlighting people’s unique paths to success, and the role Educo and their school played in each of them.
To our solution, Julia says, “It’s impressive when a company can do this for one product in such a short time, but TCO was able to address our concerns, develop a digital solution and produce valuable marketing assets across 3 of our internal brands at the same time.”
Educo’s Canadian and Australian campuses were the frontrunner for supportive and structured learning during the COVID-19 lockdown periods and we saw higher completion rates of courses and above average pass rates.
We created hundreds of stories and “worked closely with each brand to design a customised digital communication strategy and build entrepreneurship B2B relationships” says Julia.
“Most notably, their support triggered a company-wide shift where staff is more willing to engage in and promote digital relationships, communication and marketing. This change has directly led to the upskilling of staff, an increase in brand reputation and the development of new relationships with partners, ultimately leading to an increase in student enrolment.”
Julia Tracewski (SVP of Marketing and Conversion, Educo Global)
We focused on upskilling staff, developing Educo’s digital and social assets and worked with them to develop personalised automations across their digital marketing. Additionally, we introduced clear roles and strategies for direct messaging, letting students engage with the school when and how they liked. We wanted to ensure a strong overall digital presence and ensured we were implementing programs that matched student touchpoints and made digital communication easier.
Results
The results were continually outstanding with boosted segments of new students and constantly increasing overall intake numbers.
In collaboration with many other on campus university activities we helped to increase engagement and retention rates as well as well as dramatically increasing the number of enquiries to the university through student and immigration agents.
We helped develop stronger relationships between the university campuses and students and the faculty staff and student agents. We facilitated and supported entrepreneurial relationships with agents, sending them student leads from digital communications.
We saw an increase of students in seats at the Vancouver campus and a significant increase – 120% YOY – of Latin American students. These figures have continued into the following intakes.
“We achieved the goals we set out to and continue to back them up semester after semester.”
Clive Burcham (CEO/Founder, The Conscience Organisation)
Key Achievements
- +120% increase YOY in Latin American students
- Increased retention, even during Covid-19 pandemic
- Translated all key government updates into relevant student updates, weekly
- Over 120 unique ads, seen over 13 million times with 3 million engagements
My belief is that you learn a lot about an organisation by looking from the outside-in. People’s digital and social media presence will provide insight to what is happening with process or communication. When we partner with a brand or business we might be running their social media, but we’re also transforming their customer experience, digitally and physically – for example, how their staff interact with customers from a holistic view.
Clive Burcham (CEO/Founder, The Conscience Organisation)
Maybe most importantly, we helped an international organisation modernise their approach to finding and serving their customers, all over the world – helping educate and mobilise a new generation of culturally diverse leaders!