Education Development Center (EDC), in partnership with the National Convergence Technology Center’s Convergence College Network, led this exploration into the feasibility and potential effectiveness of social media as a recruitment tool.  The project paired faculty leaders of technical programs at three colleges-El Centro Community College (TX), Polk State College (FL) and the University of North Texas (UNT)- with social media subject matter experts (SMEs) who helped each college to design a recruitment strategy built upon social media best practices.

Each college then ran their campaigns in advance of the Fall, 2016 semester and the Spring, 2017 semester.  The social media SMEs provided periodic technical assistance to the faculty leaders who were charged with implementing their school’s social media campaign. The faculty leaders were responsible for creating messages, posting messages on selected platforms, monitoring activity in response to messaging, and submitting monthly data reports to the project’s researchers. Based upon social analytic data generated by their campaigns, faculty leaders made adjustments to their messaging and use of platforms. Researchers analyzed the data generated by the social media campaigns, surveyed students and interviewed the faculty leaders. Their analysis of the recruitment campaigns were presented in a report whose major findings included:  

1)    Regarding the key question guiding the research- What impact does the implementation of a best practice social media recruitment strategy have on student enrollment in ATE programs?- the results were inconclusive. Between the three schools, a total of six “runs” of a social media strategy were completed during the project. In four of these six runs, program enrollment decreased, while enrollment increased in the other two instances.

2)    Based upon the social analytic data generated by the schools, there was no consistent correlation between the number of social media posts and the reach of social media messaging. In some cases, less frequent posting, with careful attention paid to the post content and presentation, led to greater post reach. This suggests that messaging (content and presentation) is the driving force behind engagement. At the same time, based upon the experiences of the three college leads, creating engaging content is the most labor-intensive aspect of a social media campaign requiring a highly honed marketing skill set.

3)    After both runs, the overwhelming majority of surveyed students who said they used social media to learn about the schools’ programs indicated that social media influenced their decision to enroll. Nevertheless, most surveyed students indicated that they initially learned about their programs through means beyond social media (e.g. personal recommendations, college websites). This suggests that social media may be a powerful source of information for prospective students IF they can be prompted to connect with school social media platforms.

4)    All three schools tended to utilize platforms that they were most comfortable using, particularly Facebook and Twitter. This matched the platforms used by students who indicated they learned about the schools’ technology programs via social media.

5)    Leading and implementing a social media campaign requires more skills and time than being an active social media user. All three college leads were frequent users of social media platforms, but none of them had ever led a campaign before. In addition, the pressure of existing and added teaching responsibilities limited the time the leads could devote to message development and posting. These and other factors resulted in modest posting frequency at all three schools.

6)    School Public Relations Departments presented an unexpected and sometimes significant obstacle to the implementation of a social media recruitment strategy.  While the college PR departments gave initial verbal support for the projects, in actuality they seemed reluctant to open social media space for individual departments. The approval process for messages and branding were particularly cumbersome.

7)    Schools intending to provoke engagement with students using social media need to track social media trends closely and to have the resources to adapt new platforms that gain popularity. Project surveys revealed that SnapChat and Reddit were emerging as possible viable platforms over the course of the project. Due to factors like those described in items 5 and 6 above, the schools were unable to test the effectiveness of these new platforms. 

The full research report, the Guide for Planning a Best Practice Social Media Campaign and other project related documents can be accessed at https://sites.google.com/site/edcsteppublic/resources/research-report-docs.

Last Modified: 12/12/2018
Modified by: Joseph Ippolito