1. 6 Ways to Get Better Conversion Results from
your Higher Ed Website
Slide 1
6 Ways to Get Better
Conversion Results
from your Higher Ed Website

2. 6 Ways to Get Better Conversion Results from
your Higher Ed Website
Slide 2
1) Know what you want your site to do
2) Get feedback on the site you have
3) Know when and what to ask to get what you want
4) Track it
5) Test it
6) Say thanks
Overview
Source: Higher Education Marketing – 6 Ways to Get Better Conversion Results from your Higher Ed Website

3. 6 Ways to Get Better Conversion Results from
your Higher Ed Website
Slide 3
 Do you know what your website’s goals are?
 This seems like a pretty obvious question but many institutions have
not done the hard work to carefully define their site’s objectives.
 Many institutions too easily slip into the old-school thinking that the
website is simply a brochure for their college, and don’t carefully
work out their marketing objectives.
 The reality is that your website is your most critical public facing
communications tool that must serve multiple roles and deliver
multiple outcomes from multiple types of visitors.
 Your website forms the foundation of your relationship with all of
those visitors, be they prospective students, alumni or staff.
 So if you have not carefully defined your goals, take some time
upfront before you launch into trying to improve page or conversion
performance. It will save you tons of time and give you a much more
valuable end result.
1. Know what you want your site to do
Source: Higher Education Marketing – 6 Ways to Get Better Conversion Results from your Higher Ed Website

4. 6 Ways to Get Better Conversion Results from
your Higher Ed Website
Slide 4
 It’s surprising how little time webmasters and web marketers
spend gathering feedback on their own websites.
 There are really great resources sitting in offices all around you on
campus who can provide really helpful insight into the effectiveness
of your website.
 Talk to marketing staff, admissions counsellors, departmental chairs,
international recruiters. Step into your students' shoes and ask them
what problems they run into to get what they want.
 Spend some quality time talking with your users and you will learn a
lot.
 Particularly focus on your visitor acquisition channels to boost the
performance of your high traffic an high value conversion events.
 Google analytics is your friend so be sure to take advantage of
funnel flow and visitor page maps.
2. Get feedback on the site you have
Source: Higher Education Marketing – 6 Ways to Get Better Conversion Results from your Higher Ed Website

5. 6 Ways to Get Better Conversion Results from
your Higher Ed Website
Slide 5
 Every page on your site should have an objective, but keep
it simple and focus on your best value proposition, page by
page.
 Conversion events like request info forms, downloads, videos, call to
action buttons need to be driven by your related content.
 For example don’t ask for too much information; that’s a classic
conversion killer. If the conversion event is an info package, ask for a
name and email address. If you ask for a phone number and home
address you may have gone too far and significantly reduced your
conversion rate.
 Keep the relative value of the conversion equal to the info required
to get it.
 Think about every page, as a landing page, getting your links, calls
to action and forms correct and limiting visitor leakage by minimizing
the number of possible exit links a visitor is exposed to.
3. Know when and what to ask to get what you
want
Source: Higher Education Marketing – 6 Ways to Get Better Conversion Results from your Higher Ed Website

6. 6 Ways to Get Better Conversion Results from
your Higher Ed Website
Slide 6
 As they say if you can’t measure it you can’t manage it.
 If “it” is a conversion, of course you need to set it up in Google
analytics as a goal, with a goal value, and possibly with a goal
funnel.
 Be sure to always add goal dollar value.
 Total conversions numbers, % increases etc are all very nice but
what you want here is to see real impact on your business and
dollars are the best way to do that.
 If you are new to Google Analytics then you should also
learn about how to tag other kinds of events with the Google
URL builder so that you can track events outside of your
normal page flow and bring their results into sight within
Google Analytics.
4. Track it
Source: Higher Education Marketing – 6 Ways to Get Better Conversion Results from your Higher Ed Website

7. 6 Ways to Get Better Conversion Results from
your Higher Ed Website
Slide 7
 The statistics are very clear that if you adopt a testing
mentality and conduct testing on your pages that your
results will improve.
 Conversion improvements will come in two forms.
 Firstly, you will get a lift in conversions on a page that you
have improved, having applied some logical testing
hypothesis to it.
 A/B and Multivariate testing will teach you things about how to better
connect to your audience that you can get in no other way.
 Testing will knock you down a few pegs and then build you
up again with new insight and skills that you can get no other
way.
5. Test it
Source: Higher Education Marketing – 6 Ways to Get Better Conversion Results from your Higher Ed Website

8. 6 Ways to Get Better Conversion Results from
your Higher Ed Website
Slide 8
 It seems a bit redundant to point out to say thanks but so
many websites do this badly or not at all.
 A thank you page is a really critical piece for your analytics, as this
page view is what is tracked to indicate a conversion.
 But equally or more important is to take the opportunity to further the
relationship that you have begun to build with this visitor with a
simple thank you.
 They also buffer the visitor against “buyer’s remorse” about revealing
their interest in your programs to your admissions department.
 Thank you pages are also excellent opportunities to give the
visitor more value i.e. another link or download a pdf, that
takes them further down the path towards registration.
6. Say thanks
Source: Higher Education Marketing – 6 Ways to Get Better Conversion Results from your Higher Ed Website

9. 6 Ways to Get Better Conversion Results from
your Higher Ed Website
Slide 9
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