University prospectuses: Take off those rose tinted glasses

After reading a recent news article on "Do University prospectuses mislead students" on the Guardian, it got me thinking on how sometimes marketing is treated as the black sheep of everything. The article mentioned how Universities/Institutions promote certain facts and detain from clearly mentioning other necessary information to prospective students. I would hardly think that today's Digital Natives wear rose tinted glasses whilst choosing their Universities, and that prospectuses depicting touristy images mislead students. Facts - I agree should reflect truth as they are taken at face value - especially when most of the audience is young and trust educational institutions to depict an honest picture.
However, are University prospectuses the sole deciding factor to decision making? I think not.
Most of today's prospective students are very "connected" to different channels of information flow. Be it social media for direct and indirect referentials, site visits, alumni referrals/opinions etc - today's prospective students have a large array of sources to get the information needed to make important decisions.
Students need to be smart about accessing the data/information available to them. Getting advice from peers, parents, industry experts seems to be a logical step as well. Of course it also helps having the industry support factual depiction like the KIS - Key Information Set started in the UK - which aims at providing up-to-date information about different factors around University and academic life. Having this information can definitely help students to assimilate, analyse and make the right choice.
All I would say is, there are different tools out there that help prospects make the right decision, and it is a bit unfair to keep blaming marketing or the institution/university for showing blue skies and greener gardens. After all no one wants to see depressing pictures of grey skies!

The Social TV Revolution - how far are we willing to go?

I am sure you've all heard the latest buzz on Social TV and how this is the next big thing! Interesting phenomenon this Social TV thing.

TVTechnology recently published an article on this, and stated that at least 19% Americans within the 15-54 age group come across social media TV mentions at least once a day. Personally, I haven't seen any of my few hundred "friends" on Facebook mention anything about TV shows - movies yes - but not TV shows. Maybe the fact that I live on the other side of the pond, or my friends aren't that into TV (which I doubt) or I don't fall into that marketing demographics to see these references.

I think this is still a very American sensation and is in it's infancy stage as well. But I was surprised to see Twitter buying France's Mesargraph and UK's SecondSync to step up its efforts in Europe. So I think I may be wrong in underestimating the Europeans, as its pretty obvious the undercurrent is there, a bit slow to catch up, but it's there.

What is fascinating how far away from reality we are moving? Or is this current social mediatised, multi-gadget-ed and round-the-clock-aware world the real one? Very surreal, but I guess you're either in or you're out. For me its a paradox, as on one hand we are ready to share our intimate thoughts and personal boundaries are almost blurred and on the other hand we are fiercer about privacy and security!

But then like every hype, is social media TV a bit too far along the adoption curve? According to an article by Seth Fiegerman on Mashable this new aspect has a long way to go. Couldn't agree more! I mean isn't a bit disruptive to watch and tweet at the same time? Even though I am a fan of multi-tasking, I find a bit absurd to relax and provide input (hopefully intelligent one) at the same time. Kind of refutes the point of watching TV, no?

Ethical marketing in Higher Education

Recently I read an article in the Times Higher Education on a creeping "mission drift" in UK Universities. After reading it - I was intrigued to see the stated perception recruiting international students. The article states that Universities are not "profit maximising" operations, however one cannot ignore the fact that UK Unis are having to fend for themselves and the inclination to source a major chunk of the funding from students is apparent. So I wouldn't completely argue that Unis should not look at running operations the way a corporation does.
However I agree that recruiting international students should be done ethically and Unis have responsibility in educating students in what to expect right at the outset. This brings me to thinking about educating your audience. How important is "educating" the customer in the early stages of the purchasing cycle?
And shouldn't customers educate the sellers? Shouldn't expectations be made clear from the buyer? That also raises the question if the buyer knows what exactly he wants.. ! Where should Universities draw the line in pure commercialisation of offered courses/services to students - no matter from where they hail?
A paper on Ethical Marketing of Higher Education: What might be done to encourage its adoption? by Middlesex University and University of Notre Dame and published by the OECD outlines issues surrounding marketing with a moral sense in today's super competitive environment. It is pretty interesting to see the issues outlined and how leaders within institutions have a strong role in adhering to ethical marketing.
I think compared to faceless corporations, institutions are still in the clearer zone when it comes to delivering on promised dreams and my naive heart wants to believe that all of them do deliver on their basic promise of imparting education. Marketing with ethics, strong morals and pure intentions is not always possible and probably not always what the consumer/customer wants to hear either. But I think it is our responsibility to make sure we try to adhere to these guidelines as much as we can.

Revival of the fittest!

Time is of such essence. Time whizzes by and we're in that perpetual motion of moving forward. It's been 6 years since my last personal post - I cannot even find the posts I owned, let alone access that account now!
But as I keep saying - things happen for a reason, and perhaps this proves a reason to start afresh.

Working in the field of higher education for the last 7 years and more so working in companies that require to wear several hats, I've not had the time to devote time for myself - as a marketer. I read, don't get me wrong, but I let that information sink in and move on to the next thing - which is always work and some more work.

A few recent events have made me realise that with the perpetual forward moving whirlwind we call life, I've not devoted myself enough to my passion - of course I claim to have one passion only. That would make me so boring. Marketing and education are such strong passions - and I hope to devote some more time to these from a personal yet professional point of view.

So let's hope I do keep my word of devotion, and use this incredible platform called blogging!