How to Keep Your College From Going the Way of the Brick and Mortar Mall

Gen Z was too young to experience the height of the mall craze—Gen Alpha wasn’t even born. Instead, these populations came of age in an e-commerce economy.?

Relatively speaking, your traditional brick-and-mortar malls are a thing of the past (sorry Millennials and Gen Xers). It’s not uncommon to see far fewer storefronts inside today’s malls as retailers like Amazon take over the shopping industry.?

Back then, if you needed something, you’d go to the mall and potentially wind up perusing more stores than you planned. The centralized location was a huge marketing perk. But to be successful nowadays, stores inside these malls have had to retrofit their messaging and promise to earn customers.?

Similarly, smaller colleges can’t rely on old techniques to reach students—there needs to be a new way of packaging your college’s promise to prospects. Small colleges are fighting against a lot of variables: a crisis of faith in higher ed, less college-aged students, low brand awareness in an increasingly competitive market—just to name a few.?

Enrollment at smaller colleges doesn’t have to go the way of the brick-and-mortar mall, but we can take approaches from way-back-when to turn the tides on declining enrollment.?

Earlier Brand Awareness

Remember going to college fairs? Whether on your own volition or your parents’, you awkwardly walked around a sea of booths with eager-eyed admissions counselors ready to chat.?

Most likely, you only stopped at the booths of colleges you were familiar with. And maybe—just maybe—you talked to one or two colleges you weren’t originally familiar with.?

Setting up camp at college fairs is no cheap expenditure. Travel, printed hand-outs, personnel, and giveaway trinkets can add up quickly. Especially for smaller colleges, repping at a college fair without proper brand awareness may not move the needle as far as you’d like.?

Raise your hand if you remember circling all the items you wanted for Christmas or your birthday in a magazine or catalog back in the day.?

Those mailing efforts made it all the more likely that you (or your parent) physically showed up to a store to purchase an item. Without that mailer, you may have never known that item existed.?

See what we’re getting at here??

Colleges that struggle with brand awareness need to invest in the development of leads. And that nurturing takes time. That’s why inquiry generation is so crucial, and the name lists of recipients have gotten younger and younger.?

Invest in engaging with juniors, sophomores, and heck—even freshmen! That way they’ll be familiar enough with you to walk up to your college fair booth and have a fruitful conversation.?

Heightened Customer Service

Stellar customer service seems like a long-forgotten memory. Now, we’re bombarded with chatbots, computer-automated phone responses, and AI.

Sure, this technology can take mundane tasks off admissions counselors’ hands. But as a customer, isn't it more helpful when you’re talking to another person and not a bot?

While some may appreciate not being stalked by a salesperson around a store, the days of store reps helping you find exactly what you need with a smile on their face are long gone.?

Now more than ever, we need to provide students excellent customer service. People may not remember exactly what you say, but they remember how you made them feel.?

Whether it be answering questions specific to your college or just about the college application process in general, being that helping hand could make a world of difference and might keep you on a prospect’s radar for longer.?

In the copious amount of conversations we’ve had with students this year, almost all point to a friendly campus tour guide or a helpful admissions counselor as one of the last deciding factors in selecting their current school. And these students? They’re currently enrolled at smaller colleges they weren’t originally as familiar with.?

That’s the leg-up you have over large institutions. Oftentimes, you can provide a level of customer service that these massive state institutions simply cannot due to sheer volume. Use that to your advantage!

Try-Before-You-Buy

Certain purchases are difficult to make without trying the item first. Clothing, furniture, make-up. Let’s go ahead and add education to the list.?

How can we expect students to make a decision that will impact the next four years of their lives without ever having known of your college or stepped foot on campus? (A great reason why you should never begin an engagement with an “Apply Now!” CTA).?

At that age, selecting a college may be the first large, impactful decision a teenager has made up to that point. Yes, they need as much information as possible, but you must also help them get a taste for what the next four years will be like at your school.?

A great way to do this is to invite them to visit campus and let students sit in on classes of interest. They can get a feel for the teaching styles of their potential future professors while also getting the chance to see if they’d even enjoy their intended major at the college level—again, another way not only to promote your college but also help them in their overall college search process.?

Additionally, offering overnight stays at dorms, meals in the cafeteria, or introductions to club and organization leaders helps these kids get a feel for the school outside of academics.

Keep in mind not every student will have the schedule or availability to do this—especially out-of-state students and those with part-time jobs or caretaking obligations.?

For the academic portion, consider offering your college’s online courses for these populations to sit in on. To get a feel for campus, send them a link to a virtual tour.

It won’t be the same experience as the traditional, in-person “try on”, but showing that you see these populations and their constraints showcases empathy and that lovely customer-service experience mentioned earlier.?

Retrofit Your Strategy with The Parish Group

Will the brick-and-mortar mall ever make a comeback? Who knows. But your school definitely can.?

Change is never easy and the above suggestions require dedication, time, and funding. But investing in your own institution will help avoid the shuttering of windows as so many small colleges with 100+ years of history close their doors for good.

Don’t know where to start or need help getting there? The Parish Group is at your service.?

We offer the most comprehensive enrollment management and higher ed marketing solutions from student search, social media strategy, web design and SEO, publications, photography, branding, CRM optimization, and more.?

Reach out at [email protected] or call our office at 828-505-3000.

Together we do BIG things.