Easy Fixes for Poor Campus Admission Letters
Austin, Texas: My son, who is starting his senior year in high school just tossed out a stack of over 80 campus admission form letters last night– each trying to entice him to consider going to their college. They were all unopened.
I asked his buddies if hey have opened all of their letters from school administrators and admission officers, and most have done the same thing — tossed the unopened letters in the trash.
When I was a high school senior in 1981, I received many campus recruiting letters and actually read many of them.
But why are colleges still recruiting is it were 1981?
I opened a few of the letters form the trash — and most were bar coded, auto sorted form letters — in 11-point font– some over 7 full paragraphs long. You have got to be kidding!
I received two letters by DHL courier from the same school- one addressed to FNAME, LNAME and the other to LNAME, FNAME telling us that we were specially selected – that is why the letter came by DHL. Really? They carefully selected my son, FNAME LNAME!?!? I am so proud of my little FNAME!
The best way to reach high school seniors would be a bold postcard – with the school emblem, a large url code and the words- Learn About Our Campus and Download 5 Free Tunes of Your Choice.
That’s it.
Let them go online, give you some pertinent information like their email address in exchange for a link to download their free tunes – and let them learn about your college at their leisure.
If they LIKE you on Facebook –give them additional song tracks.
It is that simple.
High school students will not sit and read dozens of letters from the Dean of Admissions from unsolicited universities and colleges. They will go to a website in exchange for free music downloads or free pizza or free movie tickets — and explore your campus online.
It is time you move your campus recruiting and college admission drives to the modern era and reach students the way they want to be reached–which is digitally.
A 2011 Nielsen poll showed that the average 17 year old texts over 3700 times per month.
Why are you still trying to reach students with boring form letters?
Isn’t it time you tried something else to avoid the recycle bin?
