School is a highly competitive business. There are more schools than ever competing to have more students. It takes more than just building a school to attract students, it takes standing out from the crowd. There are 1.56 billion people on Facebook, that is more than the entire population of Africa, to gain dominance you have to have several channels of making your school known to prospective parents, and one of such vital channels is social media. Quickly i will show you reasons why you need it in your school.


1. It’s free

OK, maybe that isn’t directly true... you need to pay for your broadband connection after all, but in essence it’s free to use many of these social mediums (some charge). It also takes time to engage in and this is where many businesses falter... social media marketing is a medium to long term strategy on the whole and you need to be committed to it. Twitter for instance is entirely free and possibly the fastest way to build a list of prospects, but it doesn’t stop there – you need to keep them entertained and informed and that takes valuable time. The platforms are ready to use... so what you waiting for – start with twitter.


2. It's where your peers are

There are so many deals waiting to be done out there. Whether it’s aligning your brand with another, a JV or perhaps even finding someone to bounce an idea off – social media lends itself perfectly to connecting you with other people just as passionate about a particular industry. Start by looking on twitter and sending a direct message to someone of interest, retweeting their messages or even go to the lengths of making positive comments about articles they may write on their blogs. Anyone who’s anyone is joining the social media revolution so don’t get left behind.


3. It's the best way to get publicity

From experience I have found that most journalists are using social media to communicate and listen to buzz. Twitter, especially, is a great way to communicate directly with journalists and pitch exclusives and breaking news. Prominent blogs are also a fantastic new resource worth sharing your news with.

4. It helps you to attract more students

Whenever you are communicating through a social medium you are helping to build a little more awareness about yourself, especially if you have something truly interesting or exclusive to report. Coming back to my ‘medium – long term strategy’, the more online publicity you get, inbound links you attract, journalists/bloggers you bond with etc... the more web traffic you get and therefore more likely to attract more students.


5. It’s the future

No business wants to get left behind right? Every single day that passes the more your competition promote across social media. This wave of social media marketing is here to stay... and if you don’t jump on board now you are severely hampering your chances of longevity online – which is where more business is going.

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