Recent press releases by the LSC make it even more imperative that your website is optimised to meet the
training needs of employers….

You may have read about the recent launch of the Training Quality Standard that celebrates organisations delivering the best training and development solutions to employers.

As you will be aware the Standard was developed and is  accredited by employers thus ensuring that the criteria set for achieving the standard reflects what employers want.

So the key question to ask yourself is…

"Do our employer pages on our website reflect what employers in our area want?"

For example…

• Do you have comprehensive information on all your services?
• Do you have examples of how you have helped employers in various sectors?
• Do you demonstrate your expertise in specialist sectors?
• Does you website reflect the quality of service you offer employers?

If you have already achieved the Standard or you are striving to achieve the Standard then I'd urge you to
address these issues as a matter of urgency.

If you would like an impartial assessment of how your website looks to employers searching for training providers then you may be interested in discovering how FEmarketing are helping other colleges…

Just go to…

http://www.femarketing.co.uk/check.html

If there is one drum we like to bang constantly to Colleges is you must study your website statistics.

Now marketing professionals by our very nature tend to be more creative rather than analytical types but here's the thing….

Your website statistics takes the guessing out of who's visiting your website, how they found you and what they did when they got there.

Yet we are often surprised at how little attention College Marketing Managers are paying to  their  web stats.

Web Analytics is about understanding how your website is being used in order to help you optimise it's performance.

Now here's the really good news - these website analytics packages need not cost your College a single penny and we can show you to easily and effectively interpret your stats so that your SMT will really be impressed!

Click here and we'll show you how for FREE

Here's a question we strive to ask every College as part of our College Website Feedback Sessions…..

"How much time do you spend weekly/ monthy optimising your site for the search engines?"

It's frightening that the responses on average are either 'no time whatsoever' or 'occasionally when we have time'.

We understand the issues - a lack of internal resources may mean you are spending all your time maintaining your website and keeping it up to date and not looking for ways to improve your rankings.

But please be aware that if you neglect fundamental search engine optimisation (SEO) techniques such as link building this could have a detrimental effect on your seach engine rankings.

The problem you may have is that you are top for the phase XXXX College (by the way if you are not that is a real problem!)

But what about the specific key programmes, quals and services you want to rank for  - you may be ranking high now but if you don't closely monitor you rankings and your link building activity you may wake to find your competitors overtaking you in the search engines.

Its the difference between pro-active online marketing and reactive online marketing - if you are not doing the basics and other Colleges and private trainging providers are being proactive in promoting their site and building links then that could spell trouble for your rankings.

FEmarketing would urge you to stay on top of your link building as it is easier to stay at the top of the rankings then it is to play catch up….

Please dont make the mistake of assuming that because you are top today that you will also be top in a few months time without closely monitoring your activity…..

The starting point is identifying where you are now and here's how we can help…..

Is your College Content Management System (CMS) really search engine friendly?

Well virtually every CMS sales pitch we've ever read always states that their CMS is search engine friendly and will help you rank highly in the search engines.

In our recent analysis of College's search engine rankings we were shocked at how poorly some Colleges were ranking locally (town, county, LSC region) for their key programmes and services.

A major contributing factor could be the CMS - in fact if it is poorly designed then this will hurt rather than help your search engine rankings.

'But we were assured our CMS was search engine friendly when we bought' is the regualr cry.

Nowadays a search engine friendly CMS means more than just the ability to be able to  offer custom title tags and meta tags.

Want to know you are ranking in Google - check out our free ranking report before its too late…

You have probably read about John Denham's speech at the AoC Conference last month.

We know that Colleges are under threat of losing funding unless they change to meet the demands of employers. This at the same time as the more funding is diverted to Train to Gain.

There's a blunt message from the Secretary of State…..

He said that providers “who do not listen and do not change with the times” would lose funding to those that do and that further education funding was currently being “reshaped to focus, at every level, on work-related skills”

For some Colleges this will not be an issue as they are already delivering to employers. But some Colleges we have spoken to it will be a challenge.

One  mistake we see Colleges making time and time again is not paying enough attention tohow they promote their services to employers on their website.

You can easily prove your track record with testimonials and case studies and showing that you understand the needs of employers and the challenges they experience in their sector. 

Have a look at how you are currently showcasing your employer engagement successes online and think about what else you could be presenting.

According to the Guardian by 2010 the internet will overtake magazines to become the world's largest advertising medium.

It is estimated that the online advertising  market will be worth £29 billion per annum and will account for 11.5% of total gloabal ad spend. 

Pretty incredible really  but obviously a still long way  from competing with  tv (37%) and newspapers (25%)

Online advertising is simply becoming more and more important for some brands and products.

So it will be interesting to evaluate what percentage of ad spend colleges allocate to online marketing.

Clearly a significant number of Colleges are advertising on the social networking sites and Google Adwords  but what's your plan going forward?

Now may be the time to start investigating the online opportunities in more detail…

Another report in today's Guardian highlights that 16-24 year olds are increasingly logging on rather than watching TV.

42% now regularly visit  Bebo and Facebook, instant messaging is on the increase and this has resulted in a this target audience using email.

But here's some really interesting facts which should get your College thinking about how you engage 16-24 year olds…

According to Cisco internet video streaming  and downloading will  grow from 9% of consumer internet traffic in 2006 to 30% in 2011.

The article also mentions in passing the growth in internet usage of women and the 55+ age group….

So now's the time to really start thinking about how your College could be using this technology to engage learners from all age groups….

This article in the Media Guardian this morning amused me….

As you will be aware organisations are rapidly increasing their presence on social networking sites.

The Sunday Times suggests that in 2007 £400 million will be spent advertising on social networking sites such as Facebook and Myspace.

Ironically as this is happening more and more organisations are blocking their employee's access to these sites during the working day (this may not be surprising as according to Media Guardian it costs UK industry £130 million a day in time wasted by their employees on these sites!)

The article  outlines how universities

"want to exploit their students' passion for the new generation of interactive online communication tools - collectively known as web 2.0 - to deliver academic content. Not content with podcasting mini-lectures to students' mobile phones and i-Pods, they are hijacking the internet telephone system, Skype, and invading FaceBook."

Makes sense and sounds innovative but the students are not happy…

"Students really do want to keep their lives separate. They don't want to be always available to their lecturers or bombarded with academic information."

The article outlines why universities cannot  afford to social networking…

"Despite students wanting to keep their online personae separate, the Jisc believes that universities can make sensible and considered use of web 2.0.

It recently commissioned Mori to study the online habits of 16- to 18-year-olds. Now just released on the Jisc website under the banner, Great Expectations of ICT, the Mori survey revealed that 65% of 16- to 18-year-olds regularly used social networking sites like Facebook."

Importantly the research points out that web 2.0 and social networking have the potential to bring distance learning students closer together in what would be a virtual campus.

Have a read of the article and think about how your College could be using this to communicate with your existing students as well as to engage new ones…..

Do you know what the key is to helping you engage more learners and employers via your College website?

Well the title of this article probably gave it away but you do need to encourage visitors and users of your website to request more information via email.

Acquiring those email addresses is the first step toward creating lasting relationships with potential learners and employers.

If your College website does not attempt to capture the visitor's email address, that potential learner or employer may never revisit and the relationship is lost.

Here's some tips on how to effectively capture your visitor's email addresses:

• Have a detailed description of your free email newsletter, and its benefits, should appear in a "can't miss" space on your website (especially on your services to employers page)

• The description might include a sample page of the current issue, with an offer of a download of the full newsletter in exchange for the email address and permission to receive future issues.

• Registration should be easy and simple - don't ask them to fill in too many fields - you'll have opportunities to fill in additional data through further contacts such as email alerts and other relevant messages.

It is amazing how few Colleges do keep in touch with employers via email.

It's cheap, effective and if undertaken properly can deliver you deliver measurable results on your marketing activity.

Have a look at these two videos which outline how to increase and convert more enquiries via your website…

In a previous article, Why Your College MUST Rank Highly On Google, I outlined that 75% of the total online searches in the UK were performed using Google.

Some new articles, on the BBC website outline how Google dominates the search world ahead of its rivals, Yahoo, MSN and Ask.

During the month of August, more than 37 billion searches were performed on Google worldwide - that's more than all of Google's main rivals combined!

So now is the time to really review how your web stats:

- How many searches did you get via Google last month?
- Which search terms / keywords were most used?
- Where are you ranking in Google for that search phrase?
- Which other keywords would your College like to rank for?

It's nor just consumers surfing online, recent data enforces the fact that businesses research suppliers online - including training providers.

Here's the bottom line - when someone in your catchment area goes online to search for training or specific quals do they find your College, your rival Colleges or other private training providers?

If you want to fully assess where you are currently ranking in the search engines and want some tried, tested and proven strategies to improve your search engine rankings they have a watch of these videos..

Read a really interesting article recently online by an FE Marketing Manager that sums up the dilemma a lot of Colleges have:

Who is your website primarily targeted at - your existing learners or prospective learners?

In this example the Marketing Manager had approached his learning resources department for feedback on the new website design and content.

The department felt that the College website should be tailored towards existing learners - the Marketing Manager in question felt that as 95% of their website visitors were prospective students it makes sense to tailor the contents to motivate them to apply.

When we were recently reviewed over 200 FE College and Sixth Form College websites we did see numerous examples of websites that offered brilliant content for existing students and in some extreme cases frankly poor content for prospective learners.

So what is the right answer? Personally I think that your College website is your most powerful interactive, and measurable marketing tool - therefore it makes sense to use your website to continually sell the benefits of studying at your College or teaming up with your College to undertake training.

Once prospective students become active, enrolled learners then they should have access to your students only intranet.

So the obvious action from this? Make sure that your website is helping you achieve your overall College objectives and above make sure all the copy, images and information are always selling the benefits of studying at your College….

In a previous article we wrote about how 90% of teenagers use social networking websites and that Colleges are now actively targeting prospective learners using social networking sites.

The last twelve months has seen a phenomenal increase in the popularity of social networks - indeed Facebook is now the UK's most popular social website.

Facebook is now so popular in the States that more people visit their site than eBay!

Here's a great quote from an article in The Sunday Times about Facebook:

"Facebook takes off where Google left off. Google is all about finding information; Facebook is about communicating that information and sharing it efficiently"

According to recently released stats from Nielsen the most popular UK social networks are:

- Facebook (6.5m unique visitors)
- MySpace (6.4m unique visitors)
- Bebo (4.4m unique visitors)
- Windows Live Spaces (2.3m unique visitors)
- Friends Reunited (2.1m unique visitors)

Amazingly according to the survey UK web users spend a total of 991 million minutes on Facebook.

As it is without question an area of online marketing that requires more investigation, over the months to come we will be sharing with you how other organisations are using social networks to achieve their marketing objectives…

I was catching up on the latest articles on the Education Guardian website and read a great article from Ruth Sparkes entitled "Marketing is not about papering over the cracks"

Its partly about how somehow it is always marketing's fault if a College fails to recruit enough learners or the right calibre of learner.

"It's that time of year when student numbers are the most
important thing in the world. The summer marketing campaign
is about to end, but now enrolment is nearing completion the
numbers may not be as expected, or promised. In some colleges
there will be a painful, knee-jerk reaction. It's marketing's
fault!

Whispers in the corridor … "Marketing is rubbish. If they
weren't so rubbish, we would have more students, results
would be better, too. I mean, if marketing got a better
calibre of student, it stands to reason that results would
be better …"

The article makes a good point about the function of marketing is to generate enquiries from prospective learners and employers - its the job of other departments to convert them into enrolments or training contracts.

"… many marketing departments are so successful at
generating inquiries that few colleges are able to
handle the volume of calls and visits generated.

All the good work that goes into brochures and PR
stories generating these inquiries can come to nothing
if the phone isn't answered, an application form languishes
on a desk for weeks, an interview is half-hearted or
intimidating or a student is enrolled on the wrong
course."

I think the point that all marketing professionals working in FE will agree on is Ruth's point about College marketing departments can implement creative strategies to engage prospective learners and employers.

However they need support, a decent budget and lets not forget, recognition for the contribution they make towards helping Colleges achieve their objectives….

It is always useful to look beyond the FE and training sector to see organisations in other sectors use online marketing strategies to attract, convert and retain more customers online.

In our opinion it is a mistake to assume that because some strategies work in one sector then they would automatically not work when your College is striving to engage more prospective learners and employers.

Here's a prime example of taking research data from one sector (in this case retail) and seeing if you could learn tactics that could be used in FE:

Silverpop's 2007 Retail Email Marketing Study identified that although UK online retailers are getting better at email marketing there is always room for improvement…

Despite obvious concerns about spam email the research suggests that both email senders and the recipients are more enthusiastic about email than ever.

 Here's some data that may give your College some food for thought….

• 80% of retailers now offer emial sign ups on their home pages (35% of UK retailers hide their opt-in on interior pages thus missing out on registrations)
• Retailers are requiring less personal info to sign up to email newsletters
• Only 45% of UK firms are using links within the emails
• Not enough UK firms offer easy options for customers to opt out of receiving further inforamtion

 It may be worth ten minutes browsing the report as there are some real gems on how organisations motivate potential customers to sign up to the newsletter to receive more information.

This is an area that most Colleges could improve - if you can motivate visitors to your website to request futher information then you WILL increase your chances of converting that prospect into a learner or a client.

 Think about where you offer your newsletter on your website - extensive research suggests that this should be above the fold in most instances.

Think about how much information you are asking your visitors to fill in as part of their enquiry - we have seen some College opt-in forms that look more like application forms rather than requests for more information about a programme, course or service.

In future emails we will share some more strategies to effectively attract, convert and retain more learners and employers via email marketing…. 

Could your College be running the risk of losing potential employers and learners by not responding to their online requests for more information?

According to research by eGain, one third of UK organisations ignore customer emails. These include information requests generated via web forms and email addresses found on company websites.

Sounds astonishing doesnt it? Maybe not as we all have our own nightmare stories about poor customer service from certain leading organisations.

Here's some of the findings….

• Only 36% responded to customer emails within 24 hours and only 16% within one hour
• Only 18% sent an automatic acknowledgement in response to a customer's email.
• Just 19% of organisations provided an accurate response to their customer's queries

So how many learners could your College be losing to your competitors by not measuring your response rates?

Here's some tips to help you ensure that emails do not slip through the net…

1. Do an audit of all the email addresses and web forms listed on your College's website
2. Test every email address and web form to make sure that all addresses are accurate and up to date
3. Pilot an online Mystery Shopper campaign to measure how quickly you receive a response and how accurate the response was
4. Measure how many email requests and web forms are received every month - this will help you identify how your website visitors are communicating with your College
5. Set up automatic acknowledgements so that the enquires receives an instant email  acknowledging receipt of their information.

Need more help? Then please don't hesitate to contact us so we can help point you in the right direction…

Here's a question to ask yourself about your College website:

"Is there a reason for the user to return frequently to our College website?"

As we all know the Internet is a 24/7 medium, and visitor attention and enthusiasm can be very, very short-lived.

According to some recent research websites with a high update frequency generate more repeat visits per month per unique user.

This is why we always maintain that your College website is always a work in progress that is constantly updated— if only to avoid boring repeat visitors (especially employers).

Here's some things to consider:

• Users expect fresh content on a website.
• Credibility plummets if your homepage promotes an event that occurred two months ago.
• Weekly updates are the absolute bare minimum and daily are even better
• With no apparent changes from visit to visit, there's no reason for a user to feel compelled to return or take any action with any urgency.

Here's the bottom line: you need to be committed to updating your website frequently and make it clear and apparent to your potential learners and employers that you do.

Here's a very short article but the core message is really important…

In our experience of reviewing FE College websites we have found several website designers who are more interested in the "look" of a site than its functionality.

As a result they often make two huge mistakes:

1. They turn off or hide the underlining of hypertext links, removing the visual cue to the user that the links even exist;  
2. They create images for section headings that look like buttons but, in fact, don't execute an action.

If you want your site visitors to click on a link or to take an action then use a button with a clear, unambiguous label, placed in a logical location for your desired outcome.

Text links should be underlined and ideally change in appearance once the user has visited that page.

Have a look at your site and make sure that all your links are underlined and that you dont have unneccessary image links that are confusing to the user…

If you want an objective appraisal of your website and tips on how to improve your online enquiries then have a look at these videos…

Now that the GCSE results are published Colleges will obviously be focusing on enrolment days for your full time learners.

If so then you may want to read this article below that we originally published in June 2007 to help Colleges prepare their website for August and September…
 

As the current academic year is drawing to a close, a couple of Colleges have contacted us wanting advice on what to focus on over the Summer period.

One College in particular was asking what changes they should make to their site in preparation for engaging any new 16+ learners during August and early September.

Here's some things you may want to consider that are simple to implement:

1. Adapting Your Homepage

For any potential new learners your home page will be where the majority of visitors to the site will land first.

So you may want to have new creatives designed so that in that immediate recruiting/enrolling period that there is a very heavy bias towards 16+ learners on the home page.

Of course there is always a balance to make sure you are not putting off potential employers or 19+ learners but as a number of Colleges keep saying 16+ learners are the bread and butter.

Once this period is over you can go back to how the home page looked before but for now make sure that all that you focus on making navigation easy for your visitors.

Don't just rely on people clicking on the vertical and horizontal navigation bars - use your copy on your home page to guide them in the right direction.

Make sure any out of date information is removed - this sounds so obvious but you will be amazed at how old some website copy is.

2.  Get testimonials from existing students for each main subject area.

It's surprising on some College websites how few testimonials there are from existing students - now is the time to approach students from each main subject area for their feedback on the College:

• Why they chose your College,
• What they like the most about the College
• What they like about their chosen course
• The enrichment activities
• Social opportunities

Going forward this time next year I would expect even more Colleges to be using video and audio testimonials but if it's too late to do that then at least have a photograph alongside each testimonial.

Finally make sure the testimonials are displayed in their specific subject area.

3. Create Short URLs for your phone enquiries and offline literature

We asked one College what happens when someone rings Student Services about accessing information online about the courses on offer.

Their response was that Student Services often directed them directly to the College home page. This may be the right action to take IF it is very clear to the visitor where they need to click to access the information they are looking for.

If someone is specifically looking for info on sports courses then Student Services could email them a link directly to that page (anything you can do to make it easier for visitors will be appreciated - trust me)

In my opinion, unless the home page is excellent, I would want to make it easy on the visitor by verbally telling them where to go

eg www.college.ac.uk/sports

Unfortunately for a number of Colleges if you were to direct them to the sports courses pages the URL would look something like this…

www.college.ac.uk/?eee54496939/sport

Its not pretty and you certainly cannot give that to somebody over the phone.

So you may want to speak to your webmaster about creating short URL redirects that can be given easily over the phone or in your offline marketing literature.

4. Does the information online match what's in your prospectus?

We've noticed that sometimes Colleges do not the depth of information online that they have in their offline prospectus.

Now we know that by and large most people skim read on websites but you should cater for people who want more information.

When we compare the quality of offline information compared to what's on their website some Colleges are not doing themselves justice online.

So these four areas are some very simple starting points - if you would like some pointers on your website then don't hesitate to contact us

The day of the A Level results is upon us and predictably there are yet more calls for a review of the standards.

So let's not dwell on the usual arguments about whether the examinations are getting easier.

Let's focus instead on how to effectively promote your College's successes online…

Obviously today of all days is a great opportunity for all Colleges to highlight positive success stories and you will probably all be hard at work getting your press releases out ASAP and arranging media coverage.

But don't overlook how you could be using this to drive even more traffic to your College website and increase your course enquiries online…

Think about what your call to action will be in your press release - are you going to encourage readers to go to your website for more success stories?

If so then do make sure that your home page is promoting your great news and that the links are working.

Here's what you may also want to be thinking about…

This is a great opportunity not only to drive more traffic to your website but more importantly  to drive traffic to the specific qualifications that have heralded the greatest successes.

So make sure that the press releases you publish on your website have links to the specific qualifications page (not just the generic full list of all the provision you offer).

This will help you measure how many people are actually reading your online press release and clicking for further information.

Think about creating multiple online press releases tailored to the programme areas you want to really promote - this will help your Google ranking as well. Make sure that the name of the qual is in the press release title.

Next key point is don't miss the obvious opportunities of using today to get some excellent testimonials with photographs from successful students about your College and that particular courses they studied.

As we keep on saying Colleges are really missing out by not having online testimonials from as many programme areas as possible…

Having audio or video testimonials with static images of participating students will have an incredibly powerful impact online.

Think about the opportunities for people to request more information about your programmes - have you got clear calls to action on every page promoting your programmes?

Have  you  offered multiple  communication  methods to request more info via email, mail and telephone?

Have you got your opt-in mechanism set up to build your email list of potential full time learners?

Today is just such a good opportunity to publicise your College's successes - so don't miss out on the online opportunities and ensure that your website is completely ready to promote your good news effectively for you…

Remember how many potential learners and their parents will visit your website as part of their decision making process…

Discover how other Colleges are looking to dramatically improve their website's ability to generate even more enquiries from potential learners in 2007/8 and beyond…

As you will be aware publishing content on your website is different from publishing your College prospectus or  services to business brochure.

Your website is a unique medium that unlike a printed page, puts no constraint on content length in order for it to be cost-effective.

To a certain extent your College website has infinite space available for your users to access additional information or to drill down to receive more detailed information.

But here's two questions you should be asking yourself:

• How easy is it find information on your website?

• What are you doing to further engage that user once they have found the information they are looking for?

This is why your website's navigation and the promotion of your services is so important online.

Here's some areas to consider….

• Are you taking advantage of multimedia technology such as video and audio?

• Are you grabbing their attention with innovative video and audio such as client testimonials, video demonstrations, or snippets from live presentations or training seminars?  

• What other tools could you offer that would engage your users and make your website more interactive?

Depending on your target audience you could have interactive calculators, checklists, search tools and  surveys. 

You can imagine how effective it would be if you had a calculator an employer could use on your site which allows them to estimate how much poor literacy and numeracy skills could be costing their organisation every year….

So have a look at the quality of content on your site  and think about how you could make it more engaging for
your users…

Here's an example of  how we use video to outline the benefits of our services to organisations in our target market…