Local or International | How to Market Your School to Different Demographics
We know that figuring out how to reach potential families and stand out is a challenge, especially with limited marketing staff and budget. In this article, we’ll discuss how to create a marketing strategy to attract prospective parents and students from different demographics in the best way possible.
To start with basics, demographics include information like age, generation, gender, geographic location, income, profession, and family structure and they will help shape how you market to your audience. Nowadays, many schools prefer to market to both local and international demographics to get the best results in admissions. That’s why we’ll touch on both local and international marketing strategies that will help you drive your admissions.
Marketing to Local Demographics
When it comes to marketing to local prospective parents and students, one of the most important points is to be active in your community and local media. Get your school involved in non-profit activities, local sports teams, community school events, and expositions and make locals feel like you are one of them.
Another important point is to localise your social media and paid advertising. Including terms like your city or neighbourhood to your listings and incorporating location data when possible will help you reach prospective families in your local community easily.
Become a local sponsor. If you get your school’s name in front of potential local families through sponsorships, collaborations and events, people will get familiar with your name and they will be more likely to choose you among other options.
Last but not least, localise your web content wherever relevant, and keep this language consistent between your website and ads.
Marketing to International Demographics
Keep in mind that personalisation goes hand-in-hand with a content marketing strategy; you should prepare personalised ads and email templates to reach your target audience such as long-term expats.
Understanding international families is the key to opening up opportunities. Find what your target international families and students need the most and use those key points in your marketing strategy. For example, you might highlight the international environment where students can make friends from different nationalities and cultures, English language proficiency as well as having world class boarding facilities etc.
When targeting an international audience, it is also important to remember that there might be some language barriers. Make sure that your marketing content has language options for your chosen target demographics so that prospective parents can easily learn more about your school and offerings.
Measure and track where new visitors come from. For international schools, it might be hard to narrow down your target audience. The best way to focus on countries that are most interested in your school is to measure and track where new visitors are coming from. This way, you can easily make more personalised content for them.
NEED HELP WITH MARKETING TO DIFFERENT AUDIENCES?
If you don’t know where to start optimising your customer/admissions journey, our marketing experts with over 13+ years of experience are ready to help you. We can help you create a customer journey map and optimise every step of your marketing strategy. Our school marketing experts are always available, so you can contact us anytime using our website contact form, or calling us on +44 20 34 55 22 41.
