Social Media Marketing for Higher Ed Students

Social media is a go-to outlet for a lot of Gen Z students, who use a variety of channels to connect with others, find entertainment and belonging, and source information that they trust. Being able to navigate social media marketing for a Gen Z audience is crucial to the success of recruitment and retention for any higher ed institution.

Social Media as a Research Tool

Students use social media as a part of their information-seeking, and will often go to online communities to ask questions and conduct research about their options. Social media is seen as more credible and honest than traditional media, as content written specifically for your higher education institution can have clear bias whereas social media tends to be the opinions of a person or group who has an experienced perspective to share.

Social media can also be used to get answers to questions that students may not know to even ask. Connecting directly with another person or browsing a forum can build a student’s breadth of knowledge so they have a firmer understanding of what they’re looking for or have questions about. For example, a student with ADHD might be asking about what kind of study strategies others use, and may not even realize that they could also be asking for academic accommodations as part of their success strategy.

Another alluring part of social media research is that answers are typically instant. Querying social media often returns answers from other students who have already had the same questions and means that a student doesn’t need to spend valuable time browsing obscure company websites for several minutes.

Creating an Effective Social Media Campaign in 2023

Effective marketing often hinges on making a personal connection, and in higher education that can mean showing students that you understand who they are and what they’re looking for. Traditional marketing like paid ads or email blasts are out of touch with Gen Z students, and 20% of students report that paid ads don’t represent them. Without making students feel connected by seeing people that look like them, doing things that they do, marketing isn’t going to be effective.

Related: Social Media Marketing for Higher Ed in 2023

What is relatable for students are influencers, who are viewed as their peers, and therefore more like them and more trustworthy because they are representative of their lives. Influences come at a cost though, and your higher ed institute already has peers who are living the experience that your prospective students are feeling anxious about. Student ambassadors can make that genuine connection that you’re looking to make while marketing their experience, and can do so in a way that is more natural and unbiased if you give them the chance. Using a platforms like Unibuddy can facilitate these connections easier, so students don’t need to struggle to develop these connections on their own and have a varying success rate when they attempt to do so.

Tools for Scaling Messages

If students are your untapped resource in social media marketing, figuring out how best to access their talents is your next step. However, you may have a lot of prospective students who would benefit from a connection. Student ambassadors can make those connections, and with Unibuddy Chat, they can communicate directly with prospective students looking for questions to be answered and guidance on joining the community. 

Related: Supporting students to overcome their fears with Community

Unibuddy Community is a great option if you have a lot of students and not as many student ambassadors, as it’s able to be scaled with forum-style communities that can be moderated and guided by the ambassadors who are trained to keep an eye on Communities and encourage participation.

Useful Data from Unibuddy

Unlike other social media, you might only have data that shows how many clicks and views you’re getting, and that’s the only way to measure engagement. With Unibuddy, you can track habits and trends, and focus your follow-up campaigns on the major student needs that crop up in Chat and Community. 

Unibuddy helps to navigate privacy laws, and allows transparency as students are given all the information they need before consenting for your institution to use their information. As privacy laws vary in different countries, and you likely have international students looking to connect, gaining consent can be adapted easily so that students are aware of how their information will be used and your institution remains compliant with privacy.

Unibuddy can convert students from other social media, like Reddit or Discord, with it being a safer alternative and able to provide your administration team with insightful statistics about your students. It can run internal campaigns, and is embeddable in your website with just a bit of code.

Student Safety Over Social Media

Other social media channels are accessible to anyone, sometimes even without an account. The people using these channels may be even be outside of your higher ed community. Social media is a less controlled environment, which means misinformation might be interpreted as true, or that safety is compromised.

Related: How Community Forums Drive Student Retention

Student ambassadors as part of Unibuddy can be trained to help ensure safety and cooperation with the terms of use when students sign up for Chat or Community. These ambassadors can also report behaviour that is unsafe and note any worrying trends that are popping up over their channels. With this information, administrators can take prompt action before a situation escalates.

Building Social Media Communities

You know that your higher ed community already exists in person on your campus, and lives between your students as they attend class, participate in clubs and join programs. Unibuddy is meant to be an extension of this already well-developed community. For new students, it can be a way to dip their toes in the water before diving in fully. Unibuddy Community can give them a sense of the “vibes” that they can expect, while Unibuddy Chat can offer a low-stakes way to make initial connections that will support them as they join their campus community.