Texting in Higher Ed | Do applicants want to receive texts?
Virtually every single adult aged 18-29 in the United States owns a cell phone.
As a college, that’s your core demographic, and you know the importance of meeting students where they are. So it’s no wonder that more and more colleges are texting their students.
At Unibuddy, we’ve dedicated a lot of time to researching how your applicants and prospective students want to be communicated with, and we’ve learned a lot from our over 300 worldwide partners.
The ability to send texts to your future students is a useful tool! You can text your future students to:
- Send appointment reminders
- Communicate important deadlines
- Share links with important information
- Send deposit reminders
- Announce tests and exams dates
- Outline housing requirements and rules
- Provide helpful tips
- Send a celebratory message and an orientation reminder.
What do those things have in common? They’re easy to send to a large number of prospective students, even if you customize them a little bit by state or region of their area code. And sometimes, you don’t need to personalize the messaging – texting students is perfect.
No substitute for personal connections
But texting students isn’t a substitute for personal connections. Just because it’s traditionally a 1-1 channel, your students know those texts aren’t being sent directly to them.
They are very much aware of the technological capabilities that admissions offices have access to and they are probably receiving similar texts from all the admissions offices where they have submitted inquiries or applications.
I’m not suggesting that you stop texting prospective students, but that your team should work to supplement these texts with more personalized and authentic content.
For example – have you got a system in place for prospects to build relationships with members of the admissions team and your current students?
At the end of the day, it is the personal connections that drive enrollment throughout Higher Education.
Here at Unibuddy we empower the prospective students to chat directly with your current students, staff, and even alumni. And we know it has an impact.
Feeling worthwhile and validated
When Fairleigh Dickinson implemented Unibuddy to connect their current students with future students, one prospective student said to an ambassador, “It’s made my decision feel worthwhile and validated. I don’t know how many times I was anxious or cried over the process to transfer here but you helped me through it all with patience. I am eternally grateful for all you have done to assist me and provide me with your words of wisdom, and can’t wait to meet you on campus next year.”
This is what Unibuddy is all about. Easing the concerns, fears and worries of prospective students by allowing their peers to ensure them of their college choice.
Your students want to hear from you! And in this time, you can’t overcommunicate. Whether it’s via text, email or social media. But whichever channels you are speaking to them, you can’t neglect the personal and 1-1 connections that will have the biggest impact on their decision-making.
