Raul Ranne Head of International Education Marketing Archimedes Foundation, Study in Estonia raul.ranne@archimedes.ee
Study in Estonia: centralized cooperative marketing effort. Main goal: increasing visibility of our HEIs and raising the interest of international students to study and work in Estoniain cooperation with Study in Estonia and all institutions of higher education offering international degree programmes. Activities in internationalmarkets: participation in fairs, infosessions, FAM tours, working with agents, online marketing. Domestic activities: coordinating marketing activities of our partner HEIs and supporting them, working with alumni, cooperation with employers, organizing trainings. Development activities: research and surveys, national frameworks, joint activities.
Why did we start evaluating our marketing activities? Increase in application numbers, increasing workload on admission personnel but do we get the students from our target segments? Resources big part of budget dedicated to fairs, but how to improve our marketing mix? Entering new markets, but how to determine if we are doing the right thing? Ministry of Education and Research asked us if international students come to Estonia becauseor despite of our activities and we couldn t answer. They politely recommended that it d best for everyone if we find it out fast.
So, how do we evaluate our activities?
International Student Barometer 2014 Helped to choose elements Global ISB Estonia Difference The institution website 37% 48% 11% Friends 32% 32% 0% Education Agent 31% 10% -21% Family 26% 21% -5% League tables or rankings 22% 8% -14% Alumni of this institution 17% 21% 4% Current students at this institution 16% 22% 6% Staff of this institution 13% 11% -2% Teacher/tutor where you studied previously 13% 12% -1% Prospectus from this institution 12% 11% -1% A visit to the institution 11% 11% 0% Social networking site 11% 18% 7% Other 9% 7% -2% Careers advisor where you studied previously 8% 2% -6% Independent website 7% 15% 8% Other media or press 4% 6% 2% Your employer 4% 3% -1% Education exhibition/fair 4% 3% -1% Home government advisory service 4% 3% -1% Host country government advisory service (e.g. British Council, Education UK) 3% 6% 3% An advert for this institution (TV, radio, poster) 2% 4% 2%
Using CRM to measure marketing activities Alluniversities in Estonia are using DreamApply CRM (http://dreamapply.com/) to manage admissions and, increasingly, marketing: Country-wide data on student information sources, citizenship, city, previous level of education etc. Possibility to analyze lead generation and conversion which channels offer best conversion rate. Possibility to create further developments in cooperation with universities that benefit both university and national agency. Connection between admissions and marketing on university level.
International students admissions funnel in Estonia 2013-2014
Information channels for students acceptedto Estonian universities 2014/2015 Internet 13% 8% 3% 3% 38% Personal recommendation Other Education agent Education fair 35% School visits
Information sources of applied and accepted students 2014/15 (%) 60 50 40 30 Applicants Admittances 20 10 0 Education agent Education fair Internet Other Personal recommendation School visits
60 Changes in information sources of accepted students 2012-2014 (%) 50 40 30 20 2012/13 2013/14 2014/15 10 0 Education agent Internet Fair Personal recommendation School visit Other
Changes in information sources based on study levels (accepted students 2014/15, %) 50 45 40 35 30 25 20 BA MA PhD 15 10 5 0 Education agent Education fair Internet Other Personal recommendation School visits
Changes in information sources of accepted MA students 2012-2014 50 45 40 35 30 25 20 2012 MA sources, % 2013 MA sources, % 2014 MA sources, % 15 10 5 0 Education agent Internet Education fair Personal recommendation School visit Other
Information sources and target countries (applications 2014/15, %) 70 60 50 40 30 20 Education agent Education fair Internet Other Personal recommendation School visits 10 0 China Finland Georgia India Russia Turkey Ukraine
Going down to local level... In 2012 Estonia participated in fairs in China (Beijing and Shanghai) and organized additional marketing events. Universities received 40 applications next year. Good job! Or was it? Top cities from where Estonia received Chinese students applications in 2013/14 were the following: 1) Tallinn 2) Varkaus 3) Beijing
Interesting snippets... Internet search is 99.5% Google. Few people use Yandex. Exactly 1 person every year uses Bing. Unbelievable variety of Other sources articles, rankings, heavenly visions, dreams. Before looking at data we had no idea that there are THAT many study portals around. Good marketers are often mentioned by their name invest in people.
Tracking students: entry points
Tracking students: lead conversion
Tracking students: lead details
Tracking students: upload lead files
So what changed? Change driven by availability of data, gut feelings replaced by numbers. Using data to push forward domestic internationalization developments. Slooooooooooooow shift in mentality from we cannot (and don t need to) evaluate it to hey, this stuff is interesting. Understanding link between marketing and admissions. Choosing more efficient marketing mix, going deeper, not wider.
Thank you! raul.ranne@archimedes.ee