4 Top Strategies for Enrollment Growth [+How Mongoose Can Make a Difference]

Some good news: undergraduate enrollment grew by 2.5 percent in the spring of 2024. For many college campuses, this is welcomed news, especially after the post-pandemic drop in enrollment.. However, just because numbers are on the rise again doesn’t mean this is the time to slack off on your strategies for enrollment growth.

Consider continuing to implement effective enrollment growth strategies to ensure you are reaching and recruiting potential students.

In this post, we’ll discuss the most effective strategies for enrollment growth, plus give you tips on how to effectively use a student engagement platform to reach your campus’s enrollment goals.

How Can You Increase Enrollment?

It’s not enough to open your admission applications and wait for students to show interest in your institution. Sure, there will be some who do, like potential students who have heard family and friends sing its praises. But, if the “open admissions and wait” method is your only enrollment strategy, you’re setting up your campus for failure.

So, what can you do to ensure you’re reaching potential students? First, take some time to understand why students might be interested in attending your institution. Does your campus:

• Offer specialized degree programs? 
• Offer great scholarship opportunities?
• Have a reputation for being the “best of the best”?

The answers to these questions can determine why students want to attend your institution. Once you understand your students’ motivations, you can nail down effective strategies for enrollment growth.

Four Tried-and-True Strategies for Enrollment Growth

You don’t need to reinvent the wheel to implement effective enrollment growth strategies. There’s a good chance your campus already has a plan for increasing enrollment in place— it just might need a few tweaks. 

To ensure it has the best chance of recovering from the recent enrollment decline, check out these four tried-and-true strategies for enrollment growth.

1. Personalized Communication

63% of marketers saw an increase in conversions due to adding personalization in their marketing campaigns. Consider how personalizing your communication efforts with prospective students can transform your enrollment numbers. 

When it boils down to it, students, much like consumers, only want to receive messages that pertain to their interests. That means that to connect with prospective students, you need to customize your messaging in the enrollment funnel.

An engagement platform with AI technology can help you and your team quickly uncover student interests and sentiments based on their interactions with your campus. Using this information, you can tailor your messaging for better-targeted campaigns.

2. Streamlined Application Process

Although it may sound silly, your application process, especially if it’s daunting, can be a potential turn-off for prospective students. Aside from paring down your application to cut out unnecessary fluff, adding a chatbot to your admissions web pages can be an effective strategy for enrollment growth.

Chatbots, whether live chat or AI chatbots, alleviate some of the frustration prospective students run into when applying for admission. If they have an immediate question, a team member or an AI assistant can quickly and easily answer and guide them through the application process. Plus, when students receive a prompt response, they’re less likely to get distracted and leave their application incomplete.

3. Engaging Prospective Students Early

It’s never too early to begin reaching out to prospective students. 

Make it a priority to engage with your prospects early and often. With Mongoose, you can reap the benefits of personalized communications at scale on the channels your students are most engaged with – text and chat. 

Consider texting reminders about upcoming events, like application deadlines or open houses. These gentle reminders can prompt students to take action and generate interest in your campus. 

Need some inspiration to craft text messages that resonate with students? Check out our admissions texting templates.

4. Focus on Student Retention

While it might seem as if focusing on student retention should be a separate strategy, it plays a big part in your enrollment growth, too.

Recruiting new students is a long game. However, ensuring your current students are also well-adjusted and thriving speaks volumes to prospective students considering enrolling on your campus. That’s why you need to make every effort to ensure students are engaged with their studies and active on campus.

You can send text nudges to current students about their assignments, upcoming events, or deadlines. Doing so can keep students engaged, increase retention, and create a positive campus experience your students will share with others.

Mongoose: The Secret Weapon for Your Strategies for Enrollment Growth

It’s likely you already have some of these strategies for enrollment growth in place. However, adding an engagement platform, like Mongoose, to the mix can increase the overall effectiveness of your outreach efforts. Mongoose’s AI can help you better understand your prospective students and better understand their sentiments and why they interact in the ways they do.

Plus, using Mongoose, you and your team (and your AI assistant!) can be conveniently available to answer student questions during the enrollment process and launch effective messaging campaigns to generate student interest. If you’re ready to learn more about how Mongoose can boost your enrollment growth, book a demo today.

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