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From text messages to videos, games, and confetti filled game tubes, America’s colleges and universities are increasingly creative when sending out acceptance letters. This trend of creativity with informing prospective students of their acceptance is apparently coming at the expense of denials.

Is this “creative renaissance” on the part of enrollment leaders, an expression of creative freedom, or the sign of true innovation meeting its ceiling? In order to attract college qualified students in a shrinking demographic and a troubled economy does spending money on flashy ways to inform a prospective student of their acceptance really secure the class the institution desires? Or is it a way that allows institutional leaders to feel like they are innovating enrollment when really they are just adding another expense line to their budget.

Here are some ways for non-profit institutions to improve their acceptance to start ratio without paying for games, prizes, videos and customized merchandise:

1. Focus on your target demographic and employ a communications strategy that speaks directly to them
2. Personalize communications by having professional admissions personnel interact with them throughout the enrollment process
3. Avoid delegating communications to your student volunteer “Admissions Ambassadors”
4. Develop an enrollment process flow and write scripts for your admissions staff on what conversation to have, with whom, and when (in the process)
   1. Telling your staff to just make phone calls without providing a written guideline for what should be covered is asking for inefficiency
5. Establish conversion metrics for each member of your staff and if they cannot make calls in the fall and spring because they are on the college tour circuit… stop participating in the college tour circuit, you will find a tremendous improvement in your conversions by freeing up this valuable time (and it will save you A LOT of money)

For more ideas about how to improve enrollment conversions without adding to your expenses contact: dominick@edtekservices.com .