The time has come again to wrap up another great summer and kick off a new school year. With fall starts upon us and students eager to get back to campus life, it is a great time to do a final check-in to start the new year off on the right foot. We recently held a Benchmarks Mid-Year Review Webinar and wanted to share some highlights below.

Really think about your messaging

With unemployment rates remaining low and opportunity in the job market remaining high, prospective students don’t understand the value of going back to school right now. It is important to review your messaging to make sure you are not only telling students where to go back to school but why. Having strong messaging that clearly communicates the value of a degree and what your school offers is critical.

Review your program portfolio

We touched on this in last month’s Future Focus but as you are getting ready for fall starts, checking in on your program offerings is important. Are you positioned for growth? Are you continuing to evolve your offerings to fit with the current marketplace? Do you have a strong program portfolio that equips students with the necessary information and tools to be set up for success?

Think mobile first

We have been saying this for years, but we cannot stress the importance of a mobile focus enough. This is the first year that mobile device usage is expected to exceed television watching and we expect to see continued growth. Make sure your campaigns and .edu sites are mobile optimized and pay attention to site speed. Not only are attention spans continuing to decrease, site speed is becoming more and more important when it comes to rankings.

Finish the year strong

It is all too easy to get focused on the day to day and not take a step back and look at the big picture. Do a quick review of your overall marketing plan. Are you spending enough on social? Are there programs that are outperforming others that you can be pushing? What tests are you currently running to challenge the status quo? Have you incorporated SMS in your nurturing program? All of these things can set you up for a great 2020, which is just around the corner!