Tips for Creative Permission Marketing for Hong Kong Business Schools
Hong Kong’s education marketers embrace new technologies and use novel marketing approaches to good effect. Most schools use social media sites and marketing videos and show signs of success with these channels. Of course, anything that’s good can always become great.
Permission marketing for education means helping students with their concerns and fears about studying, whilst understanding their dreams and ambitions. Blogs and social media channels then become ways of imparting advice and engaging prospects.
These approaches can make Hong Kong business schools more approachable and engaging.
Blogging
Blogs are not about the hard sell, but for helping students. Student-led blogs make advice personal, reliable, and the long-form means there is the opportunity to give really detailed help.
HKudos is a student-led blog from the University of Hong Kong (HKU) and features advice on accommodation, sports, and exams. The site is useful for both current and prospective students and a recent Twitter campaign and blog series about Sri Lankan student life is particularly creative.
This could work even better if more posts were catered specifically to those still deciding on their MBA. Advice about how to juggle family and school life or tips for the GMAT might work.
Social Media
Many schools use Facebook, but the tone is often quite official. While photos from conferences and business lunches are likely to generate some interest — especially from current students — there is less to break down the barriers around the institution for people to feel welcome to start conversations about enrollment.
The University of Science and Technology (HKUST) has a separate Facebook page for their top-ranking MBA programme, which is great for publicising their events and achievements. They also share other’s content, for example graduate employment projections, to help engage and connect students.
Many other schools also use Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and even Instagram, but posts often cater to current students or seem to come “from above”, whereas the advantage of social media is that you can engage people informally.
Conversations on social media get started when people feel they can be playful. Case studies of current students or alumni, for example, can be opened up to questions or left open to be memes (a question or phrase on a whiteboard always attracts attention).
Videos
The university promotional video is a staple of education marketing globally, but they are often quite formulaic and not particularly inspiring. This is a shame because videos have the potential to engage people emotionally and influence their decisions for the better.
Some schools are using video sharing platforms more creatively. The filmed lecture by Nicholas Tse at HKU generated a lot of traffic and interest in the school, while the Chinese University’s (CUHK) CUTV made a great series of videos for their 50th anniversary. Talks with alumni about their professional and creative lives were not sales-driven at all; rather, prospective students could get a feel for what might be possible in their working lives, whilst seeing how the university helps people to realise their dreams.
There are also some unofficial videos by students about Hong Kong schools on YouTube and education marketers might try this “honest appraisal” style to engage people emotionally.
Permission marketing shows respect for prospective students and also for their time as individuals to allow them to choose when to look at the marketing material, whether a tweet, an e-mail, or a YouTube video. Hong Kong business school marketers are starting to grow a strong following, but now it’s time to try some of these new ideas to inspire and engage that following. Ultimately, this will help attract the most suitable students to their courses.
Happy posting!
