Suggest_How_the_Tools_of_Marketing_Could_Be_Used_to_Promote_an_Institution_of_Higher_Education

Suggest how the tools of marketing could be used to promote an institution of higher education Nowadays, marketing plays an important role in many aspects of life. It can be defined as a management process in which goods and services can be provided very well to reach customer needs and satisfaction. How to attract people’s attention, arouse their interest, activate their desire and motivate them to take action also included in marketing. Therefore, one strategy that can be very useful to satisfy customer needs more easily and lead to the company’s success is marketing tools. There are many tools of marketing such as marketing communication and marketing strategies, provided nowadays by means of advertising, press release (PR), social networking , event marketing , printed materials, Branding, and so on. Also, there are many benefits of using marketing tools such as promoting the new product of the company, maintaining the customer’s satisfaction and keeping brand’s loyalty of customer as long as possible. It is not only useful in the business part but it is also useful for the education part as well especially for promoting higher education institutes. As a result of using marketing tools to promote institution of higher education, it can bring a good image, make more number of students’ admission and also improve the education system of any schools, colleges or universities. The marketing strategies that can be seen to be useful for promoting the institution of higher education are advertising that using printed materials such as posters and brochures to inform students. Then, the public relation such as education fairs and conferences is the part of event marketing that can be very helpful to promote large amount of students. Moreover, social networking that uses technology as a tool like internet to make the world smaller such as Facebook, Blogs and websites. So this essay will suggest how the tools of marketing can be used to promote an institution of higher education. First of all, when marketing is being considered, there are many points that have to be focused on. For example, market analysis has to be done to make sure that who will exactly be the target audiences as it refers to students in this case. Then, the market research is needed to meet the demand because after getting the target audiences, their lifestyles and needs have to be considered such as their personality, what they are like and dislike and where do they normally go. The next process is analyzing the competitors that have the same level as an institution in the same area or provide the same course and criticize their strengths and weaknesses to know how to beat them. So the way that the higher education institutes itself can differentiate from others is to position the institution to make it unique and different from the competitors and also more interesting in the higher education industry. In addition, a goal needs to be set for the institution to make the process being in the same direction such as to build a stronger brand and making it more relevant in a borderless higher education market. When the goal is already set, the process that can help you easier to meet the goal is by the use of marketing tools. One of the marketing tools that can be effective to promote the institution of higher education is advertising. Advertising can be on many media such as television, radio and any printed materials. These media have both advantages and disadvantages. For television, it provides clear picture, movement and sound but the cost is very high, and it cannot cover all of the information you want to tell the customer. Moreover, advertisement through radio can be another choice to communicate with customer, the good things is it can provide more information and more save than TV but the weak part is that the voice just only been heard so it have to be very clear. On the other hand, printed material can be the best way to communicate with the customer especially students in higher education institutes because it can provide all of the information that can be suggested to the customer and also can reach the target people. The communication can be provided throughout many methods of printed material, including catalogues, brochures, annual reports, leaflets and posters. If in the case of an institution the information provided in these materials should be about the positioning of the institution, the course you are provided, some relevant pictures and contact details. The positioning, can be defined as how customer receive the product’s values, is the way the product is defined by consumers on important attributes, the place the product occupies in consumers’ minds relative to competing products. (Armstrong, Kotler and da Silva: Marketing: An introduction an Asian Perspective chapter 6), should be short, clear, straight to the point and easy to understand. Also, the design is important too because it is the first thing people see and then make a decision to read or not so it have to be very interesting by the color, the picture, and the letters. Moreover, the most important point is contact details because it will be the one way that the feedback will be received and can be realized that it is effective or not. Contact details must provide as much as possible such as name, telephone number, address, opening hours, email and also the websites. Therefore, if one person is interested, he will know how to make contact and gain more details. It will be the opportunity to contact more easily to the customer. In addition, where to give these printed material are also important and generally, education exhibition and career fairs can be considered as the best because it have large amount number of students there and they are looking for the place to study as well as the institution looking for the students to come. However, this is only one way to promote higher education and it cannot be enough for covering through all the customers. So the other ways is social networking. Social networking is another method for promoting higher education. Social networking may be called as online marketing or internet marketing; it is the one way to communicate throughout the popular methods nowadays which is the internet. Internet can make the world smaller; people can communicate more easily to each other even though they are in different part of the world. This method is very suitable for institution that looking forward to have international students to study abroad. Internet marketing can be blogs, websites and any social networking websites such as facebook, MySpace and twitter. These social networking websites are very popular nowadays and they can promote and communicate by themselves because many people will see it easy and it is like a word to word marketing that if one person tells something and they continue say to other then it will become bigger words of mouth. It is the fastest way to let many people know in one time. For example, “TechCrunch reported that Twitter is receiving 8 million unique visitors per month and about 3 million messages are posted daily. It can be used as a marketing tool; you can use Twitter to post news or updates about your company or products. Twitter is a fantastic tool in giving your brand a voice and a personality. Being successful in Twittering, you will have to put forth your personality and a unique style. That's what makes the difference and can increase your Twitter following and make it a successful marketing tool for you.” This was written by Laura Lake, Author of Consumer Behavior for Dummies, Marketing Columnist at About.com and independent marketing consultant. So you will see many benefits of using twitter as a marketing tool to promote the education. Moreover, another example is a comment from HTMLcenter.com about the topic ‘facebook offers new tools to higher education written by Curtiss L., the comment said “In accordance with Facebook, above 500 million active users regard the website home. It averages about 250,000 new registrations each day, and in every 6 months the active users get doubled in number. More than 12,000 applications are already built on the Facebook Platform. And he also suggested that Facebook possesses the potential to be one of the finest marketing tools for any higher education institution. Due to its simple and widget design, one need not be a graphic designer to build an impressive presence on Facebook as it does not really permit much wiggle room in this respect. The greatest warning is not to spend much time endeavoring to overdo it.” Therefore, social marketing especially on Twitter and Facebook are very popular nowadays and it can be very effective using to promote the higher education. In conclusion, there are many tools of marketing that can used to promote an institution of higher education such as advertisements, using printed material as a tool, the event marketing of the education fair and possibly way nowadays is the social networking websites. These tools can become effective if the institution set the clear picture of institute positioning, goal and target students. Also, the appropriate way has to be chosen carefully because different targets can be used different tools so make sure that it suits different of style. The ideas that can be concluded about the marketing tools is from marketingsurvivalkit.com by Joel Sussman, president Optimal Marketing Communications have suggested that “Penetrate awareness of your target audience by using an integrated marketing strategy, stated simply: the more ways the public hears about you, the better your chances are for achieving brand recognition, name recognition, credibility, trust, and greater market share. Although Facebook marketing and Twitter marketing can be effective tools for attracting customers, building brand recognition, and staying in touch with clients.” (Word count: 1635) References Armstrong, G., Kotler, P. and Da Silva, G. (2006) Marketing: an introduction: an Asian perspective. Singapore: Pearson Ed Asia Curtiss, J. (2009) ‘Facebook Offers New Tools to Higher Education’. Available from [Accessed 31 August 2010] Lake, L. (2010) ‘Twitter: A Valuable Marketing Tool'’. Available from [Accessed 31 August 2010] Sussman, J. (2000) ‘Sales and Marketing Strategies that Help Generate Leads, Inquiries, and Referrals’. Available from [Accessed 30 August 2010]