Global Universities Use Digital Tools to Recruit International Students

Goggles, virtual reality, 3-D animation -- these are some of the digital tools global universities are using to recruit increasingly tech-savvy prospective international students.

"Though I hadn't come to Savannah before classes started, I felt like I knew the campus even more so after exploring it in virtual reality," says Colombian national Nicolas Barrera Castaneda, an architecture major at Savannah College of Art and Design in Georgia. He received virtual reality goggles to explore the campus and says he got a good sense of what the university had to offer because of the technology.

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To date, the school has distributed more than 25,000 sets of goggles worldwide to prospective and accepted students, says Laura Kennedy, associate vice president for admission at SCAD. Used with a smartphone, the goggles provide a 360-degree, real-life experience of the campus.

Channels for digital marketing "are being used increasingly to have very targeted efforts" among students in particular countries and fields, says Megan Brenn-White, managing director of The Brenn-White Group, a higher education consultancy firm. She says these methods are used "to spread word-of-mouth and to help convert prospects to applicants" and eventually to enrolled students.

A 2015 study by Uversity.com -- a company that provided universities with a student-engagement platform and has since been acquired by TargetX -- found that of the 800 newly enrolled international students from 88 countries who were surveyed, 95 percent owned a mobile smartphone. The study showed that these students used their mobile devices to view university websites, download school apps, access university social media, take virtual campus tours and submit their college applications.

These stats have not been lost on SCAD -- President and Founder Paula Wallace says Snapchatting, FaceTiming and texting are "the new normal for rising generations." She says augmented reality and virtual reality digital tools "are about meeting students where they are."

This fall, the school welcomed "a larger than ever before" student body, Wallace says, which included students from 115 countries. Kennedy attributes the growth to a combination of these initiatives and other marketing and recruitment efforts.

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Researching U.K. and Canadian schools from Palestine, Marwa Afaneh relied heavily on global universities' digital tools, particularly those that the University of British Columbia in Canada offered. She attended several of UBC's live chats and virtual events to ask more in-depth questions about scholarships, financial aid, study permits that allow international students to stay in Canada, transfer credits and the basis on which the university revokes its offer.

Afaneh, who is now a media studies major, says the live responses she received from UBC were "one of the decision-makers to my university choice." She says they made her feel that the university was not only strong academically, "but they also care about their students."

Graeme Menzies, UBC director of recruitment marketing and prospective student engagement, says the school's digital recruitment strategy also includes social media outreach, such as Twitter chats and Snapchat geofilters, which are location-based digital stickers on videos and photos. He says that in the previous recruitment cycle the university held 176 digital events, averaging two to three events per week and collectively engaging nearly 10,000 prospective students.

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Aston University in the U.K. similarly uses a variety of digital tools for both recruitment and conversion efforts. Yuliya Whittem, senior international officer at Aston, says these include live chats, webinars, Skype calls to and from students as well as virtual recruitment exhibitions organized by external providers and virtual open days.

She says some live chats are for students from a particular region, while others are focused on a specific degree program. They also tailor topics ranging from immigration advice to living and studying in the U.K. She says current students often participate in the chats, "which gives a more genuine student perception to the applicants or enquirers as the students can communicate with them in their own language."

She says professors from the various schools of study typically use webinars, followed by question-and-answer sessions. During the webinars and live chats, Whittem says "students receive the answers almost instantly; they also make friends; they engage with academics and university staff even before they come to study here."

Catherine Riggins, associate vice president of marketing and alumni relations at Royal Roads University in Canada, says the school is currently exploring the option of offering a virtual open house experience through Facebook Live for prospective students who can't physically be on campus. Facebook Live could be used "for interviews with our alumni, current students, faculty, enrolment advisors or just film a lecture specific to what a prospective student might be interested in," Riggins said via email.

At the National University of Singapore, R. Rajaram, director of the admissions office, says the school's "comprehensive digital and social media strategy" includes daily live chats that are run each semester by student ambassadors who share information about NUS student life.

UBC also uses student ambassadors to help engage prospective students. As a senior UBC student ambassador, American student Mina Willett has given campus tours and participated in live chats and online recruitment sessions. She most recently did an Instagram takeover, where the university allowed her to host its prospective undergraduate Instagram account to help relay a student perspective to potential applicants.

She says the variety of digital tools used lets prospective students tailor how they want to learn about and engage with the university. "Looking into university is a big step," says Willett. "I really appreciate the opportunity that these new digital tools allow us in providing new forums to connect."

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Anayat Durrani is a Los Angeles-based freelance education reporter for U.S. News, covering global universities, including those in the Arab region.