Social Media for Educational Institutes – Why and How

The Facebook social network is hugely popular in India among the young generation. More than 80 percent of Indian Facebook users belong to 17-34 age bracket. Moreover, India has the highest number of Facebook users in the world.

There are three things you could do to target students for your coaching institute on Facebook, that are:

1. Facebook Page: the business page on Facebook allows you to engage your target audience using your branding. But make sure, when you create the business page either you could create with your institute name (do that if you’re popular in your region) or could create one using the target keyword (if you have recently started). The keyword targeted will allow you to easily come into the top searches for the target keyword on Facebook for example – CAT Coaching India, UPSC Coaching India etc. Also, regularly share an update on your page related to your courses, news, and educational content.
2. Facebook Groups: Facebook groups can be the most important tool in your arson. However, it has to be used intelligently, as spamming will lead to less organic reach and high chances of profile block by Facebook. Suppose, you want to target CAT aspirants, then, in that case, you could group post or directly post promotional content in college and universities’ groups, and also Management Entrance Exam groups. Or you could create your own group as well with the name of CAT Prep Delhi, Common Entrance Test Group etc.
3. Facebook Ads: I believe, it is quite a long topic to discuss here, but I recommend that you will need to engage a professional to manage your Facebook Ads to actually get the results. You could use Facebook Ads to target your audience on an event basis such as CAT registration or preferences such as Management Topics and College. There are many more ways you could target students online with the help of Facebook Ads. All you need is creative ideas and ways to target them.

4. Google my Business

   For any coaching institute, the majority of your target audience is based in and around your location. Therefore, it becomes important to target your local audience online. That’s because you know that they will easily convert into your paying students.

   Google My Business is a business location verification service that’s free and any business can use it. You could also use it to verify your location on Google Maps and promote coaching institute.

5. Google My Business service will allow you to target the local audience more effectively. I have elaborated the process on how to verify your location on Google My Business in my last blog. If you any questions regarding it then do use the comment box below.

   Now, to get your listing on to the top searches for the target keyword on Google Maps, do the following:

   • Add Keyword Optimized Content on GMB
   • Add Actual Photos of your Business and Locality
   • Get Some Positive Reviews

Google Adwords

However, the most common thing about all these Google AdWords promotions is that they all are not able to effectively target audience; leave alone the engagement and lead management.

Above all, poor follow-ups and customer relationship management lead to an extremely low conversion rate.

With proper planning, working on your keyword researching and targeting, and developing quality content you could improve your returns from Google AdWords’ promotions.

For the keyword targeting and researching part, you should extensively use keyword planner.

Apart from above, focus on Landing Page and Content, just remember the following key pointers:

1. The landing page should be easy to navigate, opens fasts, attractive, engaging and lead the traffic to conversion points.
2. On the content part, make sure that you convey the offer/proposition accurately and clearly. Moreover, focus on the engagement, persuasion and convincing part by adding content such as results and successful students’ list, awards, teacher’s profile, infrastructure photos, and features etc.
3. Do not use spammy words, and make sure that your content is grammatically correct.
4. The headline of your Ad Copy is highly important that’s because when your target audience finds it interesting only then they will click on the Ad Copy.
5. Lastly, give your traffic multiple touch points to contact your coaching institute such as online chat, phone number, visit request, online application, email and contact box, open forum discussion, and request a call back etc.

The Google AdWords system is quite tricky and complex, therefore, you will always need an experienced and/or certified professional to handle it. And make sure you follow up with your ROI to make each penny count.