Universities are investing heavily in attracting the adult learner, and justifiably so. The demand for undergraduate degrees is shrinking and the demographic cliff is upon us.
Even without these factors, the total addressable market for adult learners—students aged 25 and over—is exponentially greater than that of undergraduate students. This creates a seemingly limitless opportunity for universities to increase revenue while navigating a changing educational landscape.
Marketing to the adult learner is significantly different from marketing to the traditional undergraduate. Adult learners prioritize professional outcomes over college experience, look for flexibility and care more about the program’s reputation than the college’s brand.
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They are not beholden to the traditional education pathway of choosing which college; they get to choose if and when they go back to school. This combination of factors makes online and professional education schools a popular choice for adult learners.
Universities must adapt how they market to and guide prospective students through the enrollment funnel to capture this important market.
Defining a strategy to reach and engage the adult learner means optimizing your most effective marketing channels. Visibility into the right metrics will tell you where to spend more or less of your resources to meet enrollment goals.
‘True north’ metrics
Cost per inquiry (CPI) and cost per enrolled student are the two “true north” metrics to gauge the effectiveness and efficiency of marketing investments. Marketers often focus on campaign-level metrics like cost per click, click-through rate and conversion rate—but at the end of the day, are those clicks leading to results? How many marketing dollars does it cost to get a prospective student to make an inquiry? How much did it cost to enroll a student?
If you can’t answer these questions, you risk basing decisions on advertising activity instead of your true priority: enrollment activity. When you focus on enrollment costs, you can impact enrollment costs. You can advocate for the right budget to meet your goals. You can know what to expect from your investments.
Search Influence and UPCEA recently surveyed marketers at universities to understand the impact of tracking these cost metrics. The data linked tracking with satisfaction: 92% of those who are satisfied with their ability to track costs also report satisfaction with the performance of their marketing campaigns.
Tracking cost per inquiry and cost per enrolled student allows you to evaluate your costs against industry benchmarks. From there, you can make more informed strategic adjustments, which will improve campaign performance, drive enrollment and boost return on investment—making you a happier, more satisfied marketer.
For example, the survey revealed that the average cost per inquiry across program types and size of university was $140, and $2,849 for cost per enrolled student. Institutions can use these benchmarks to gauge the effectiveness of their own marketing efforts. The full report breaks down each benchmark by program type and size of the university.
Poised to pivot
The same study found that less than half of online and professional education marketers track cost per inquiry (46%) and cost per enrolled student (43%). Additionally, less than half are satisfied with campaign performance, exposing a critical opportunity for institutions to improve their marketing performance and boost enrollment.
Online and professional education schools spend an average of $800,970 on digital media annually. With this much money at play, marketers must track cost per inquiry and cost per enrolled student to spend responsibly. Ensuring you are looking at not just metrics—but the right metrics—will inform the decisions and optimizations that make the biggest impact on your ROI.
At high levels of investment, cost per inquiry is valuable when measured at almost any interval—daily, weekly, monthly—while cost per enrolled student may be most relevant by semester or cohort start. Monitoring cost per enrolled student is one way to understand the quality of leads over a longer period (in addition to monitoring lead quality all along the way).
Establishing a metrics-driven approach ensures accountability, informs strategic decisions and can even shape your course offerings by showing what is resonating with your audience and what isn’t. In the long term, as demographics and technologies continue to shift, you will be set up for success and poised to pivot your enrollment strategy as needed to ensure that your institution remains profitable, competitive and relevant.
