Yes, this is a movie title from a 1990’s formulaic romantic comedy starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan. However, it also describes the current status of mailboxes and email inboxes of hundreds of thousands of high school juniors and signifies the commencement of the college search process. Parents and students that I work with seem frustrated by these marketing tactics. Colleges are not trying to exasperate you; they just want to broadcast their offering to families across the country.
Today, students see mail as an oddity like the rotary telephone, record albums, and Blockbuster movie rentals. I would guess most teenagers rarely opened a letter before this deluge of marketing material from colleges. At present, students’ correspondence takes the form of texts messages with parents, streaks on Snapchat with friends, direct messaging to classmates on Instagram, and posting birthday wishes to family members on Facebook. So why this flood of communication from colleges all over the country, many you never heard of or will not contemplate attending? Simple, the recruitment funnel. Let me explain.
PSAT: Remember that test you took last fall, that 3 hours of pure bliss? Well right before the exam started, you completed some biographical details including whether or not you would like to receive information from colleges. You probably checked yes, not realizing that every university in the country would have access to your data. Well, they do. When the PSAT test scores are compiled and calculated in the fall, colleges can go online at the College Board and purchase your data.
YOU: What information can they access? Universities can retrieve your name, address, and email. They cannot view your PSAT score but can filter by the range it falls in, for example, top 10 percent of all test takers. Colleges will purchase your name from the College Board and send you letters, brochures, postcards, and emails.
WHY: Admissions offices recruit students from geographic and demographic pools and have calculated that by sending out tens of thousands (or in some cases hundreds of thousands) communiques that some percentage of students will reply. To put it bluntly, it’s a numbers game. They need many students to request additional information. Out of those who inquire, they expect some percentage to apply. A subset of applicants will be accepted. Finally, out of those admitted, a group will enroll. The enrollment manager calls this process the funnel. I created a visual below.
This method is used by virtually every college in the country from Harvard to Rutgers to your local community college.
What does it mean? The college recruitment process is a long and complicated journey with many stages and processes. Marketing, advertising, and communication are all part of what colleges do to capture your attention and persuade you to consider applying. The steps an admissions office takes is no different than companies looking to increase market share by advertising on television, or youtubers promoting themselves on social media, or the many emails you receive about music downloads available on iTunes. Some tactics work, and some do not, but the method is the same. Frequent communication will generate interest among end users.
What can you do?
- Read the emails and letters if the college is on your preliminary list. If you are still interested, go to their website and fill out additional information. As I have mentioned before, demonstrated interest never hurts an applicant.
- Glance through others; you never know what colleges may have to offer. As your Independent College Advisor, I will encourage you to consider universities you never contemplated or pondered previously. It’s a big world out there, go and explore.
- If the emails feel like span, just opt out. One-click at the bottom of the email will put an end to it.
Finally, one parent recently asked me, “When will this end?” I told them it would end in the print form shortly, but emails will continue. Printing and mailing cost money, so colleges will put a limit on how much they will send out via snail mail. By mid-March, it should stop altogether. The flood of correspondence is part of a ritual, tradition that dates back at least 40 years. I remember my older sisters getting mail from various colleges when they were in high school, and I indeed received my share when it was my turn. In the end, its just information used to inform, educate, and sway. It’s all good.
yourcollegeselection.com 