I started college just three years ago and during my college search prior to that, I was much more drawn to the institutions that were personal and could relate to me. I was looking for an institution that was large, offered a multitude of ways to get involved, but at the end of the day still genuinely cared about the success of its students.

So far in my short time as the Digital Marketing Intern at Converge Consulting, I have already learned how important inbound marketing is in the world of higher education. Inbound marketing allows institutions to make that personal connection with their prospective students before they even get them to step foot on campus. With inbound marketing, you can use your website as a “virtual campus visit” to give prospective students a sneak peak of what your institution is all about and what you have to offer. If prospective students can find the information they are looking for, they are more likely to schedule a visit to campus to learn more.

1. Google Analytics – As I continue to learn about inbound marketing and its four pillars, my favorite inbound marketing pillar is the “measure” pillar. Measuring your marketing efforts is extremely important. This is done easily by using Google Analytics. With Google Analytics, you are able to see what content is drawing the most students to your site and base your content marketing goals off of that. It is important to look at the analytics report from your site at least weekly, if not daily. If you don’t know what is drawing prospective students to your site, how are you going to know to promote it? It’s all about getting the content on your website that draws the most prospective students to your site which brings me to my next favorite pillar, content strategy.

2. Content Strategy – As I mentioned above, it is important to be able to relate to your prospective students, as this was something that was important to me during my college search. Having relevant content on your site allows prospective students to do a Google search for the things that are important to them. Using the content on your site to show students the many great things that your institution offers is one of the best ways to get students to actually travel to campus for a visit. Even if an institution had everything that I was looking for, if I couldn’t find that out by visiting their website, there was no way I was going to make a visit to campus.Once you have the relevant content on your site, it is important to make sure that prospective students can actually find the great information that they are looking for. This can be done through the next pillar, Search Engine Optimization (SEO).

3. Search Engine Optimization – SEO is extremely important to actually being found by prospective students. If you have a lot of great and relevant content on your site, but no one can find it, then what’s the point of even having it? One way that students can find your content is through social media, the fourth and final pillar of inbound marketing.

4. Social Media – Social Media is one of the best ways to get your relevant content found by prospective students. Post to social media often about particular things that set your institution apart from other similar ones. The infographic that Vera Reed references in her guest blog on social media states that over 50 percent of prospective students use Facebook specifically as a way to research their future college. Why not use that to your advantage? Not only does it allow you to interact with a prospective student, but it also allows you to start creating a personal connection with them as well.

The first thing that drew me in to Iowa State’s website was at the top where I could read more about all of the different “adventures” that current students were pursuing at Iowa State. Since I was able to see right away all of the different ways that students were getting involved, this made me want to read more into what the institution had to offer. This ultimately led me to choosing my “adventure” at Iowa State as well.