Dive Brief:
- Colleges that recruit teenageers often think they know what the prospective students want but a new report from Chegg Enrollment Services and mStoner, “Mythbusting Admissions,” offers proof they’re often wrong.
- According to the report, 71% of admissions officers believe their conversations are important in a student’s decision about whether to apply, but only 37% of teens agree, finding other information sources to be more important.
- Only 4% of teen respondents said social media is a good strategy for the first point of contact from colleges, but two-thirds ranked Facebook as the most valuable social media channel in their search — even though one-third of admissions officers believe teens are no longer interested in Facebook and have moved on to other platforms.
Dive Insight:
The survey data started out with responses from teenagers and then researchers developed a parallel survey for admissions officers to see how their responses about what teens do and prefer compared to what the prospective students said of their own preferences and behavior. When it comes to printed brochures and pamphlets, teens say that’s the best way to reach them if the school is unknown, but more than half of respondents said they threw away a good portion of unsolicited mail without ever reading it.
Admissions officers are right that students are visiting their websites on their cell phones, but they far overstate the other actions students take on phones, assuming that more of them schedule campus visits, ask questions on social media of college reps, download an app from a college, chat live with a college rep, and take a virtual tour than really do.