Don't Overlook the Classics

It's an unfortunate, yet undeniable, fact that college tuition costs have been steadily increasing. Especially in today's economic landscape, colleges and universities, much like other businesses, are going to face even more obstacles with recruiting and retaining interest in their offerings due to those rising costs and the tightening of wallets.

What's the best way for universities to attract students when marketing departments and those they're marketing to are facing severe budget cuts? It's probably going to require a little strategy tweaking and leveraging some online tools and features to maintain that wide outreach on a short budget.

Take Digett client Arizona State University (ASU), for example. They've dedicated a focus on creating ASU loyalists even before the potential recruits have left middle school. Their new Digett-built Club ASU web site, in particular, takes aim at attracting an 11-18 year old audience.

As an organization, Club ASU has a few main marketing goals:

• Recruitment of youth into the Club ASU program
• Creation of ASU loyalists/Translation of Club ASU membership into university recruitment
• Education and promotion of offerings geared towards youth from the greater university community

They're accomplishing all three of those main goals with their site through a couple of simple features.

Cool Sites and Activities Listings

The majority of the Club ASU web site is dedicated to providing a one-stop-shop for all youth-aimed web content that is otherwise scattered throughout dozens of sites within the ASU network.

The portal listing of cool sites and activities helps kids connect to the ASU programs of most interest to them. Hopefully, the kids that get involved with ASU offerings early on will be predisposed to become full-fledged Sun Devils when the time for college selection rolls around.

Secondly, showcasing the wide-array of departments with youth programs gives kids a glimpse at the more than 250 potential undergraduate degree programs they could enroll in. It's a simple, yet effective and unobtrusive, method of relaying the breadth of ASU education.

Sign Up Form

That's right, a plain 'ol webform. If your goal is recruitment for your organization, make it as simple as possible to sign up. We've made it really easy for kids to pass on their information and areas of interest to Club ASU. In turn, by gathering email addresses, Club ASU has an easy way to send out info blasts to their members.

Don't Overlook the Classics

Club ASU facilitates kids and ASU connecting in a way that's useful to all parties and is fairly low maintenance for Club ASU leaders. We think it successfully achieves Club ASU's marketing goals, too.

If you've seen your budget tightened, don't forget that simple features like listings and forms, though not neccessarily exciting or revolutionary, can still provide you with some decent bang for your buck.