By Jeremy Tiers, Vice President of Admissions Services
3 minute read
Next week in Florida I’ll be leading my first of 7 recruiting workshops in a 30 day span on different campuses across of the country.
When it comes to my dinner choice after a long day of speaking, I tend to prefer a nice non-chain restaurant where I can sit down, relax, and experience something new.
To help with my decision I go to Google, Yelp, or I ask a staff member from the school for their thoughts. I’m looking for testimonials from other people who can verify that I’m not going to be disappointed. Sound familiar?
Sharing feedback and testimonials from current students, or even other students who have recently visited campus, applied, or deposited is something most colleges and universities aren’t utilizing enough with prospective students.
Peer reviews have become a trusted source of information for Gen Z who values authenticity and real-time feedback straight from the source.
It’s not that adults (or even recent graduates) can’t share relevant information with a student. It just tends to land differently and can feel more like a sales pitch versus when it comes from someone who is currently going through the actual student experience.
In a nutshell, testimonials can be your secret weapon as this next class considers which campuses they will visit and where they will apply to this summer and fall.
Below are a few ideas and strategies that you can put into play immediately.
And if you’re worried that gathering testimonials will be too time consuming or will be a ‘bother’ to current students, I can confidently say they won’t be.
- In your messaging to drive more campus visits, share feedback from first-year students who visited campus or other rising high school seniors who recently visited. Have them touch on why coming to see things in person was helpful and what surprised (or excited them most) during their visit.
- During campus tours, in addition to speaking with the tour guide/student ambassador, incorporate time for a visitor to informally chat with one or more current first-year students who are majoring in the same program, are also from out of state (if the visiting student is), or are also first-generation (if the visiting student is), etc.
- If you choose to do an ‘information session’ during a visit, instead of having slides that are loaded with the same stats and facts about a topic that are on your website, consider including one or more short videos from current students and having them speak to what they love most about your school’s location or about their classes and the professors.
- Have a current first-year student record a quick video that mentions a specific student by name and says something like “Hi Jeremy, heard that you were considering applying to <College>, that’s awesome! One of the things I love most about being a student here is <Insert fact>. This is similar to what they’d see on social media, but more personalized because they’d be getting that video texted to them.
- To aid in your communication flows, once a year survey all of your current students who have been there at least one year and ask them a specific comment box question about each key topic that you will message about during the recruiting cycle. You can then repurpose those quotes in different emails and text messages, as well as on your website or in other printed materials. Let them back up the points you are making in your message, and see how much of a difference it makes in what they remember about what you’re telling them. If you need help coming up with the questions to ask, drop me an email and I’ll share the questions we use with our college partners.
- Building off that last bullet, at key points during the cycle get current first-year students to share a sentence or two about why they chose to apply to your school or what gave them the confidence to know it was time to submit their deposit. You could also ask a current junior or senior to talk about the internship they’re doing (or about to do) and how that all came about. Incorporate the current student feedback in an email or text campaign, and/or on social media.
- Ask the parents of your current students, especially freshmen, to share a few sentences, or record a video, outlining why they are glad their family chose your school – or what they did to support their child during the college search. You could even have them offer to answer any parent-to-parent questions to the parents of your prospective students. Parents need to hear from fellow parents.
Three additional things to keep in mind. First, make sure the testimonials aren’t outdated – they shouldn’t be more than one year old. This generation of students wants up to date information and experiences.
Next, other than correcting spelling or obvious grammar mistakes, don’t edit the quotes you receive from current students. It’s okay if it sounds wordy or relaxed.
And last but not least, whenever possible, let your newest students do the talking. Why? Because they’re closer in age, and according to our research, they are far more believable and trustworthy in the eyes of a prospective student than older students the majority of the time.
If you’d like to talk more about something I said in this article, let’s do it! Send me a note at jeremy@dantudor.com
And if you found this article helpful, please forward it to someone else on your campus who could also benefit from reading it.