Flipping the Script on Targeted College Marketing

Welcome to From Carpool to College, a show for parents who are trying to get ahead or just keep their sanity while navigating the college planning landscape. Welcome to From Carpool to College. I'm Tracy Amadeo Tara Harritz, and we have a exciting revelation for our parents today. In this episode, we're going to be talking about marketing surprises that colleges employ. But my sweet parents, you are in for a pleasant surprise because we're gonna flip the script. Yes, terror's last. Sure, Yeah, sure, that's it. That's what we're gonna do. Should I tell them to just like lead with my story? Okay, so very often I pretend that I am I pretend that I'm a parent, but I actually I'm a parents So that's kind of stupid to say. But I try to put myself in the shoes of a parent of say a freshman or a sophomore in high school, and I think about parents who didn't go to college in this country. I think about parents who this is their oldest kid. And we know, as we're people of a certain age, that the world is different than when we were growing up, and college, the whole college scene is completely different. The scene is, well, the scene isn't that much different, but the application process is different, and a big question we get, and we addressed it on another episode about curating our list and how do we help how do we help our students, how do we help our clients? And I found this really cool app. I'm not going to say what it is, and it wasn't really an app. It was like a website. So I didn't download the app, but I went on the web and I pretended to be a student. This time my multiple personality disorder clear and every time I do that, like in the past, the other episode we had when I signed my husband up for pretending he was a student a leadership program, a summer leadership program for future medical professionals, and then all of the marketing material came in addressing him by name Doug, we think we like what we see, and inviting him to all of the to this conference, this selective conference. Clearly it wasn't as selective and it was a lot of money, so this is not necessarily an expose. So I found this website and I liked what I saw, so instead of putting my husband's name in and because he was pissed. I was not happy. Why did you do that? Now my name was out there. I didn't even Oh I did use his last name. Oh well, sorry Doug. But this time I'm like, all right, I'm not gonna put a real person. I'll put my junkie email, because you know, we all have a junkie email for like the Coles coupons and you know whatever other you know, we play the game with our fake emails. So I use my junkie email. And I picked the name of two of my dead dogs. All right, I've been through a couple of dogs in my lifetime. So I picked Cleo, my Doberman, and Clyde, who was a rescue greyhound. So Cleo Clyde, Right, it's my name. So I put Cleo Clyde and my my junkie email, and I just put in like then it has like a questionnaire of like what colleges are you looking at? Or what do you want into college? And it got my I put my Oh, so it asked for my home address, and instead of putting my home address, I put my parents address. I know that was a mistake, right, So I don't know what I was thinking, but I needed to put something because I wanted to see I wanted to see where my data would go. Who's going to get my data? Because parents, when we fill out anything online, what are what are the motives? It's it's always it's business. College is it? Colleges have to keep their lights on and they need to be marketing just like every other business. Their product is the service of their education, and it's the brand and it's the experience. So I'm not ripping on colleges here, but I'm hoping that with this episode, our listeners understand that you are a consumer, and we want you to be an educated consumer, and we want you to have choices. And this is just a little bit of behind the curtain and even now and honestly, we're going to tell you. We're going to show you a lot of this, tell you a lot of the stuff that we saw. As you hear the paper in the background, I have I printed out a couple of emails I got, Well, Cleo Clyde got some emails. But you need to understand that your kids just by a Terra so gingerly putting down. I'm watching her right now, she's so gingerly putting it down. Her no it was great. That's so good. Do you want me to put like a paper down so you don't Well. No, it's just that we're so sophisticated that we have this glass tabletop and not anything you do. I know there won't do it makes it absorbing. There we go, I know everything we do. When Chris was here, our producer Chris, when he was here for our first couple episodes to get us started, Tara was like taking notes using her favorite number two pencil and apparently like even that, remember he was saying, Oh, I hear it in my headphones that we're a real high tech down here. In any event, buckle up because we're going to go through all of the emails that Cleo Clyde received from different good colleges too. But parents, we want you to understand every time you or your kid enters information into the Internet or an app, that data is sold to colleges, not to admissions. Right, so when you receive information, it is not from even though it may say from the admissions office, your kid is not necessarily being watched, and that they're lighting candles and saying prayers that your kid is going to attend. They're lighting candles and saying prayers that your kid will apply. Right, they want to get their school on your radar screen. That makes sense, Yeah, it does. So I'm not going to give colleges the bum rap because they need to keep their lights on, they need to keep a robust selection of students, they need to keep their applications up. Now, why do you think schools want to have a lot of applications? Terror And you know, I'm gonna you know, we were just talking about this earlier. This is your quick question. Oh boy, Well when we were talking about it, I did want to also, I don't know if we mentioned this, but each application ranges between like fifty and one hundred, and I don't know what that amounts to a by the end of the application cycle, right, but I'm sure. Yeah. So let's say I have my my little, my handy handheld computer here, otherwise known as my iPhone, And so let's say I'm a big state school and I got one hundred and forty thousand applications last year. Let's just down let's just downplay that. Let's just say it was one hundred thousand, so make it simple. And let's say the application is seventy five dollars each, So that's seven point five million dollars of revenue alone. That's not profit though, because there's a lot of expenses. There's a lot of expenses. But I will say we have mentioned in previous episodes about waivers and things like that, they are out there, they're not easy to come by. You have to work for them, sometimes really hard. And she's smiling. Have you hustled for some free at. Yeah, if we did. But I think when it came down to it, we were able to get one and it required some work like watching videos, answering questionnaires. Oh yes, which is great. I get that. That's smart to me. But before the application started, before that part of it, we I had in my head that we were going to have more than that. And maybe it was that we didn't look as hard as we could have because there was a lot of other moving pieces. But there are waivers out there, you. Do you know, oh, parents, Absolutely, we do have the power to your parents look for those waivers. Everything everything adds up. It does add up, it does, and it does. But that's part of it, right, So that's part of it. That's why they want you to apply. The other is that the admissions. People need to fill the seats, right. You need what they need to have, right, they need they have their quotas, just like any other sales job. They have their quotas. And most importantly, not most importantly, but the big like little the big little jumbo shrimp, the elephant in the living room, we will is rankings because the more applications generated, the admissions rates can go down, right, because their seats are limited. So there's a lot of I don't want to say games, but it's a it's a very complicated. World strategy and strategy it is, it is. So what we want in this episode is we want you to understand that correspondence prior to filling out the application is marketing. M hm. It's very seductive though. It comes in the mail, in booklets and cutouts, in these very colorful everybody's having fun in their classes, smiling walking across the campus. It's always autumn, yeah right, they're like the leaves are changing if it's like the northeast. Yep, exactly. There are emails that come through, there are I believe there are even text messages that have been that have come through this cycle as well, so you know they come in all different forms. Obviously, if your child is on social media, which most likely they are, they are targeted in that way too. So what I did was I just opened up my choch Key email account, my junkie one for all my coupons, my Sephora, you know, all those another possible sponsor. Yeah, there you go, Tara and I are trying. Listen, we put this out here for parents because we verily believe that as educators, and we know so much about the college admissions process, we we want parents to make informed decisions about the whole process. So we're putting it out there. But we do realize in the podcast world, oh my goodness, there's like commercials in podcasts and their sponsorships. So we were joking around in another episode about n Espresso because we're addicted to in espressos, and so we're looking at that now Sephora. Okay, we go, So let's go. Let's go, Sephora, let's kick it out. It all right saying that, So I've opened up my junkie email and I just typed in Clio and in the last oh goodness, gracious, in the last week, I have sixty one emails from different schools, and I got to tell you, these schools are great. I have heard of every single one, and that one I haven't heard of. I wonder where they are. All Right, I'm going to click on the one and open it. That is from a college I've never heard of, And it says, dear Cleo. As you begin your college search, let us show you why our college may be a great fit for you. We know your ambitionous and open minded Cleo was not by the way, unless you had cheese. Yeah, you have what it takes to succeed in business and build a career of meeting and purpose. You seek a small campus filled with classmates, teammates and friends who will push you to be your best and support you for who you are. We are such and such credited for business. I guess I put. I want to be a business major and embrace and that's important, by the way, parents, that you want to always look at your creditation. Always look at accreditation, because you will see in headlines that some schools are risky, you know, at risk for losing accreditation. So again we're telling you this because there are nuggets these these marketing emails may sound like propaganda, and we've busted their chops in the past, but these specific ones from schools. There's a lot of resources here, right, So now this little school that I've never heard of, and I'm a school coun I mean, I'm a school counselor, shame on me for not hearing of it. But maybe that's why they're spending the extra money to buy data to get on the grid a little bit, because there are some wonderful schools that you've never heard of. So shame on me, shame get the shame bell. We're credited and embrace hands on experiential learning. Think internships, professional certifications, consulting projects, and study abroad. Here professors will know your name and care about your future. We offer majors and it's a hot link, so now I can click on the majors and see what this college has to offer, from corporate finance and investments to sports management to criminal psychology. What very criminal psychology? How about the apples? Oh my goodness, right, parents, did you have criminal psychology as a major in your undergrad twenty five years ago, twenty years ago, thirty years ago? Probably not? Thank you, Netflix, ncis right. Want to spend a semester building your own business. We offer that too, like yeah, like entrepreneurship. That wasn't a major when we were back in the old days, so now we have some more. The last concluding two sentences say you can connect with us on social good right, visit campus right, separate link, or reach out to us directly. We look forward to meeting you soon. Can I ask you how did they ask? How did they say you can reach out directly? How through email? Or what? What did it do? It says you can so social, So I'm going to click on social and it's bringing me to insta. Because it's interesting. The level of interaction you have with a school opens up more and more forms of communication, and it gets to a point where they will offer you their I'm sure it's it's obviously a business cell phone, but we'll offer you their mobile number so that you can text them, because do you do you think many of our students are doing email if they don't have to know they're texting right and they're speaking their language. Yes, yeah, so you just want so you're not at that stage yet. You have to interact a little and once you do, you'll get any I'm going to interact with them, though, you'll get a phone number, but I will. So when I clicked on social it for me to their insta visit campus, I'm going to click on right now, and it's pricking me. To oh cool. Check out the dates for these events in the calendar below and sign up and it's open houses next sentence. Students who apply for fall twenty six and visit campus by December fifteenth, twenty five are eligible for a renewable thirty three thousand, seven hundred and fifty dollars visit grant a fifteen thousand dollars grant over four years. Score like my kid got that when he went to Bond Adventure. It was just like a visit grant. It was like, I think it was two thousand. I want to say, I can't rememberf it was two thousand a year for four years or two thousand split up over four years. But but look at. These nuggets enticing. It's awesome and it's really user friendly. This is really cool. So that is one of the emails I got. And that was from where who is it from? What does it say? I'm not going to no, no, no. It's not specifically the school, but I want to know of it. Says the executive director of enrollment, who was actually an alumnus. And because they have their their graduating here. Oh, and he's young. Because you sometimes get alumni, you sometimes get current students, current students, and they'll say, reach out with any questions, so I can tell you more about my experience. Yes, so true, so true. So there's all different angles. Recently it was did you hear about our athletic program? We have one of the best baseball teams in the country. Because we've tried all the other ways to reach you, now we're going to go in. Yeah, through the athletic way. And it's marketing and it's not so smart, but you have to know what you're looking at and what you're dealing with, know your role. Yeah, and flip the script so you are being baited, but look at these nuggets. And then at the bottom it has like a graphic that has the name of the college, and then it has follow us on social media Facebook, Insta, LinkedIn x which is the old Twitter, right, and then YouTube so it has one, two through five icons that I can click on. Oh are they live? Oh I can Oh. I gotta turn off the volume and make sure it doesn't start playing. Okay, So these are great bits of information. And guess what that college now knows that Cleo Clyde has explored the links because the I don't want to say digital stalking because it sounds pretty scary, but the automated interest tracking on digital platforms, the bots are are keeping track, right, The bots are keeping track for what marketing strategies work. If Cleo Clyde is ever going to apply, right, so what is the what is the success rate of their if their whole goal is to get me to apply? Because this is not through admissions, right, but then this will lead me to admissions, and then where will the final problem? Where will I? Where will Cleo Clyde land? Right? So it's pretty So that's just one example of one of the sixty one emails I got in a week. Your kids once they the first time they sign up for the PSA T yep, the college board is going to harvest that data and I'm telling you your kid is going to get spammed. However, there's a lot of great resources in those emails. The problem is the problem is there's so much that it all becomes spam to a kid and they can't handle it. Have you looked at your kid's chromebook to see the number of unread messages? Have you ever done that? I've seen it on my Yes, some of my students accounts that. Some of my students during my day job, they they get to me and they don't they don't know how to send an email or read their email. So we have to start, oh with that, And it's like three thousand unread or one thousand, five hundred I've had. I have students, I have high school seniors who have five digit unread messages in their Google chromebooks. It makes my skin crawl. Oh I know, if I'm in like the double digits, I'm like, yeah, I get I can't well, especially for work, Oh my gosh, for work, like if I'm over twenty, Oh my gosh, I get nervous. And we all have our compulsions and rituals when it comes to our inboxes. But parents, you know you might want to parents, do a Cleo Clyde situation just to help you understand do your own kind of recognaissance right and and check things out because this is its valuable stuff. So here's another one, and it starts out with so it's from a person's name. I don't know the school. I haven't I haven't opened it up yet. And it says in bold it's nice to meet you, Cleo. Okay, oh, I love the school. I'm not saying what it is. Okay, So it's from a great school. There's a beautiful picture in the autumn. It's a school in the water in New England. Love the school, Cleo. I'm excited that you're taking the next step and learning more about I hope you'll visit us in person and or virtually as a current college student. That's what you're talking about. As a current college student. I know what it's like to be busy with classes and activities. Fitting in, visiting colleges and attending search sessions can be challenging. But let me share why it's such an important thing to do soon. No brochure can do justice of what culture, people, and beauty of our campus. You have to see and hear it yourself. Our various visit options that's the hot link will allow you to do. So. You'll get to interact with your admissions counselor. That's great, right because parents, we know we taught you this already. If this is your first time listening to us, go back and look into our other episodes, because you need to understand that there is an admissions counselor part of this process, part of this marketing process that is like a sales rep for the university, for the college who has it assigned territory, a very specific job, and your kid is part of that territory. So it's very important that you know who your admissions counselor is. And this college does a great job of saying just that. You know, you'll get to inter with your admissions counselor your financial aid counselor another one. Faculty students and the majors you're interested in, and staff that will be mentors for you on campus. So they're really much talking about relationship. It goes on to say blah blah blah blah. Okay, so here's another hot link. You will get important tips and advice before you submit your application. And submit your application is a hot link. I'm going to click on it right now because some colleges will have a tutorial for their application linked in their website. Super super helpful. Because also we give another episode about this, but the college interview. Some colleges like to extend and interview opportunity, and that will be hidden in the kind of like tips about how to submit their application. Right, So I just clicked the link on tips about application and it brought me to the common app and it's showing me a map before the school's located. Oh, a beautiful virtual campus financial aid wep, just more links. It's not really giving me the inside scoop, like some schools do. Lots of really cool pictures tuition visit us. Okay, so nothing. I thought maybe it was more of an easter egg, but it's just not. That's okay, Yeah, some of them can be. I do have a question for you regarding if you could go back to your inbox, the junkie and box and just look to see the timing of those those emails that are coming through. So we know, in the world of college applications, we have certain deadlines, right, some of those emails are tied to emotional moments, right, and wait times of the year that Okay, students are submitting their applications, like week before they are due, they get an email right that might say, oh, so they're tied in with those moments, right for sure? Like I have another fake this junkie email, not that Sephora's junkie, but this email that's kind of like my slushy email. I have a fake Common App account as well, and I have colleges on my Common App. I didn't obviously I'm not applying to college, right, So because I had those colleges on my Common App as if my fake student identity was going to apply, I got messages saying, you know your e early action applications do in one week? What are your questions? Yeah, you know, to your point. Then also that I missed the deadlines because I didn't submit anything. I haven't submitted anything in fifteen years, by the way, right right, I did, though just recently the common app started in new feature marketing. By the way, they start a new feature where if your self reported GPA is a certain threshold. There are some schools who if you are like an absolute safety like the poster girl for that for them, they will send you an instant decision link. Yeah, yep, so my fake identity like that's actually a person yeah on the common App that exists has gotten her first acceptances. Wow, without even hitting send down my application. It's a guaranteed acceptance. All I have to do is apply. So that's called an instant decision right. Just add water like incident meal, right, just add application. You're pre screened. It is a great marketing tool your I had a client this year, good kid, and he had a great safety school that is down South and I don't want to say what it is, but it's like a real solid, solid institution. And after he applied, he was invited down because he hadn't visited campus yet, right, So, so that school knew that this was a safety school, but they really wanted to showcase what they have. And it's again, awesome school, a lot of resources, so they invited him to an instant decision day. Right Now, this is a North Jersey kid going down and somewhere in the South. I'm not saying where it is, but it's in the South, and you're getting on a plane and you're going to be on that plane for at least at least two hours. Oh God, I. Hope I'm not giving it away. No, I'm not giving it away. No, absolutely not. So so I called the school and said, hey, now this was a private client. But again, what I do during the day as a school counselor I have relationships with all of these admissions departments. And I called and it's like, hey, how's it going. Listen, I got a kid who applied and this was his GPA and he got an invitation to an instant decision day, and and I need to know is it in his best interest to come down with his mom or dad? Because they were like, you know, they said, if if this is worth our while, we'll we'll cough up the money and do it. And she said, well, yeah, we would love to have It would definitely be worth his while. And I said, listen, I'm a school counselor. So when I host instant decision days at my school, for example, I have a regional like I will like a local college that is twenty minutes away from my high school and it's a great option for my kids who might want to commute. So I know that I can pull my students transcripts and do a search and say, generate a list of students who have over a three point two GPA who have not applied, you know, doesn't who have less than six schools on whatever whatever my criteria are. And I want to make sure my kids are taken care of. I want to make sure they're all of my seniors have an option if that's what they're if that's where they may want to go, or you know, if they want to go to a four year school. So I'll be in touch with the school and say hey, let's students and decision day. What are your criteria? Get the criteria, invite my students and say hey, listen, you qualify for an instant decision based on your GPA. I just needed to fill out this application. They fill out the application. I get the applications and transcripts to the admissions counselor at the school. They pre read everything and because they're already screened, it's almost like a credit check. Yeah. Right, So they get accepted and then the admissions counselor shows up at the school, hangs out in the library with you a box of munchkins and some balloons and some swag for the kids. I set up the kids to come for the appointment every fifteen minutes, and that admissions counselor saying, hey, congratulations, you've been accepted to our college. What And it's like what And the kids are all excited. They even have financially packages like Merit based scholarships. It's awesome. It's a great thing. So this particular client, he had to hop on a plane with his dad and they gave him a tour, they invited him for this decision, and they did this big, beautiful, like grandiose mass acceptance of all of the attendees because they were pre screened. So saying all of that, what a great marketing tool. The instant decision Now it has nothing. Now Cleo, Cleo's going to be invited to instant decisions based on her transcripts. But again, just because the data analytics and the bots have filtered, it doesn't mean it doesn't have merit. Yeah, that's what That's kind of what we're trying to hammer away at, right exactly. And I think that I just want to say importance in terms of like being aware of how some of the marketing tools are used and you know, just understanding when they're being said. And it's just good to also keep in your mind some of the language that is used in those emails. Right, so when they get a little you know, don't give up on your dreams or time is running out, you know, for a kid, you know, your children the best, But if they are maybe a little insecure about their getting accepted to certain places and whatnot. Maybe it's a good idea to just have that conversation in terms of like you're going to be getting a lot of materials coming at you, and you know, don't get nervous when you hear certain things that are happening in those emails and thinking to add to their you know, we don't want to add to that stress of senior year. It is, it's well and also it's it's sophomore year. Yeah, that's what it's going to start. And parents just know you're to Terris's point, it's a lot of incoming. Our kids are dealing with so much incoming. Now. We have all of this potassing. So we know as adults with a lot of experience being sold something, but this is a very it's an area of vulnerability for us because we want as parents, we want to do right by our kid. We also not every parent as a college planner, and we have our insecurity. So here we are embarking on this gigantic milestone with limited information, and our kid is being flanked on one side with all this information, and then they're being the social pressures from their kids, our expectations as parents. So just you know, just take a step back and understand you don't always every conversation with your kid doesn't have to always be questions about school, questions about that you don't. You can just sit in silence for a little bit, know that their inbox is filled with these things you asked them, Hey, can I go through your junk emails? Can you forward me a couple of things? Or if you want, you could pull a Cleo Clyde, pull a Cleo Clyde, Yeah, and pretend and use your own kids metrics and see what you get and then just kind of do your parallel research. It's a great resource parents, It really is. Right, But you like to your point about the balance of it, right, every conversation doesn't have to be I really it's hard when you are a independent counselor really hard because you're always talking about it always, and so you have to kind of like reel it back a little bit. Just last night, I had a memory of working with a student about so my daughter wanted to go to Taco Bell. And I had a memory of working with a student about an essay where she had mentioned Taco Bell, and I wanted to bring it up, and I said, don't do it. Don't do it, don't do it. We had enough college talk for one day or one week or whatever. So there is that balance. I think it's important to, you know, fill them in, keep the dialogue going, but also let them be Yeah, let them be a kid. Yeah. Not every conversation parents needs to be about college. Ye, because they are getting it in so different ways. It's so much, it's so much. But our conversations are all about college and all about crup planning because you chose this, parents, you chose to listen to us, and thank you for that. Yeah, we're so grateful that you join us in our podcast, from Carpool to College because we really believe we're educators and we want you to make the most informed decisions and do right by your kids. So thanks for joining us today. As we talked about those marketing surprises, flip that script and know that there are a lot of beautiful little easter eggs in that what you think might be propaganda, just exploit it. It's a great resource. So thanks for joining us. I'm Tracy Amadeo, Tara Harritz, and we'll get you next time. Thank you. Thank you so much for tuning into today's episode. If you enjoyed what you heard, we'd love for you to be a part of our growing community. Please share and follow our show. For those who want to support us further, join our Patreon site here. Support helps us create high quality content and great episodes. Plus, our Patreon members get exclusive perks like bonus episodes, early access, and behind the scenes content that we think you're just going to love. And now for some legal stuff. The content of this podcast is for informational and educational entertainment purposes only and is provided as is, with no guarantee of accuracy, completeness, timeliness, or outcomes. I could keep going, but I will spare you, and I will post this entire legal disclaimer on our website www. Dot Academic MENTORINGLLC dot com under podcast. Tara and I are so glad you joined us today on from Carpool to College. See you next time. Something like that. Yeah, gun's good. Okay, Chris, make that pretty please? Pretty please? Make it pretty please? All right, Chris, we're on a roll. This is for Chris's b roll. I'm sorry to clearing my throat, but it's actually a podcast, So