Colleges Compete

We've been getting a lot more mail in the mailbox lately. The colleges are coming.

It's important to understand that many, maybe most, colleges are businesses.

Some run their business better than others. Private colleges must do a good job here. Small private colleges really really need to run a tight ship. State and public colleges are usually under less pressure because they are getting public money.

And schools are feeling the pinch for customers more than ever. Colleges are now competing for students like never before. When I was a high school senior, I wasn't flooded with marketing materials from colleges.

Now? Wow. Starting in her junior year, we got 5-10 pieces of printed marketing material from a wide variety of colleges from all over the country, delivered to our home. And we have never heard of many of these colleges.

I thought realtor spam was bad. But, at least with these schools, we ARE actively looking at colleges. So I don't really mind the spam. Plus, it's interesting to see the variety of messaging that is coming our way. Here are some examples of what we have seen so far:

University of Chicago - Discover the UChicago Experience

USC - You're Invited To Discover USC In A City Near You

Colby College - Design Your Future

Gonzaga - At Gonzaga You Can

Scripps College - It's Your Time

Suffolk University - That Feeling When You Make An Investment That Pays Off

I especially like that last one from Suffolk, because that's exactly what we want - the investment to pay off. Right? And being in sales myself, I know that selling the feeling is the whole point because that's what the customer really wants. Well done there.

Some of these marketing materials are simple postcards, while others are beautifully printed brochures on thick matte stock. These were not cheap to produce.

And it's no surprise that we have received hardly any marketing messages from public schools. Around here the UC's (University of California system) and the CSU's (California State University system) get high volumes of applications, which makes sense. There is a big high school population here in Los Angeles, and I'm sure the lower tuition of a state/public school is the other big appeal. Well, it's probably the main reason.

My brother works as a college administrator and has worked at different colleges. He started working in admin in the '90s. He can confirm that the marketing departments have definitely scaled up over the past 20 years. These colleges are really competing for students. Some, of course, don't need to compete. We don't get any marketing materials from the UCLA, Stanford, Yale, etc. Those schools will always be in high demand and will always have WAY more applicants than they know what to do with.

I have not received much marketing from junior colleges.

And I have not gotten into the email and social media advertising that we are now seeing regularly. I could write another few paragraphs on just that. I'll just add that these ads are very targeted, and mostly consistent with the printed pieces.

We are deep in the spin cycle. It's my first ride and I'm mostly enjoying it.

Please leave your comments and thoughts.