It’s a challenging time for student recruitment and marketing. The international recruitment market is tough, as are the domestic demographics. With the finances of our institutions in varying degrees of health, the importance of external relations professionals and the work they do has probably never been in sharper focus.
The lifeboat isn’t likely to appear in the form of added investment, so for most it’s about being creative to maximise impact. Delivering really great recruitment campaigns, brand building, a quality applicant experience and innovative partnerships: all driven by articulated, ambitious and inspiring strategy.
At SUMS, we take the time to understand the problem you want to solve before applying the knowledge and expertise we’ve gained right across the higher education sector. It’s about realising benefits: delivering marketing and recruitment solutions that build your brand, maximise your recruitment and get the best from your resources.
Mapping your existing portfolio against market demand, and making recommendations for new programme development in support of your market strategy.
Whether for TNE or direct recruitment, we’ll use data analysis and qualitative interviews to assess the business case for new opportunities. So you can make confident, data-led decisions.
We’ll work with you to develop the right student recruitment and marketing strategies for you.
End to end process mapping to identify where applicants are being lost from your funnel. We’ll recommend quick wins and longer term actions that will increase conversion from application – offer – accept – enrol.
SUMS will partner with you to optimise your marketing, communications, recruitment and admissions functions, bringing good practice and innovation from across and beyond the sector.
We can also support you to work with other experts in this area if that’s what you need. For example, we supported a small specialist institution to begin working with student recruitment agents for the first time. We engaged with stakeholders to understand their context and aims, before creating a scalable strategy and supporting action plan.
Working with LSHTM academic and external relations colleagues, SUMS carried out bespoke market research on proposed new online short courses. LSHTM was able to make informed go/ no-go decisions based on market demand.
SUMS conducted a thorough review of UEL’s partnership with their private provider of international pathway programmes. Through engagement with students, academics and professional services colleagues, UEL have an action plan to develop the relationship for even greater benefit.
Through workshops with marketing and admissions staff, SUMS mapped out the existing pre-enrolment student journey from first touchpoint to arriving in Liverpool. We helped LSTM to articulate a desired future state, for better applicant experience and increased conversion.
Taking a mixed methods approach of quantitative data review and qualitative interviews, SUMS produced tailored benchmarking reports for a large group of UK universities. These gave directors an objective view of their resource size and shape relative to the sector.
Whether you need an in-depth analysis and recommendations for significant transformation, or a more high-level review from a critical friend, we have the expertise to support you at every stage. In designing our support, we bring together higher education-specific insight from our comparative research and benchmarking, and world-leading effective practice from other sectors and internationally.
page
page
page
page
