SEO services for the education sector: a vital need
Submitted by techmagnate on May 27, 2009 - 14:45
The education sector today across the world is booming with potential. Not only are institutions focused on providing quality education, but are now concentrating on becoming commercially viable as well. Millions of dollars are pumped into marketing and branding exercises to make sure they stay one step ahead of competition. Whether it is college brochures or participating in education fairs across the world, schools and colleges are going all the way to woo students.
However, the Internet today is the single-most important place where students search for colleges. When evaluating their options, it is not uncommon to find them searching for keywords like ‘top B-schools’, ‘top engineering colleges’ etc. Therefore it is imperative for educational institutions to include SEO (search engine optimization) as a strategic marketing tool. (In India alone there are 900,000 searches for ‘top engineering colleges’!)
It is not surprising, therefore, that when it comes to SEO services; India has seen a huge increase in colleges and schools seeking out SEO services to market themselves.
Good SEO begins with a good website. The website design needs to be contemporary and lively to makes you look like a top-ranking university. Your language and content needs to be professional, impeccable and relevant to parents, current students, prospective students and alumni. Most importantly, your website needs to be search-engine friendly, making it easy for search engines (Google, Yahoo, MSN etc.) to crawl through your website. This gives you higher rankings on search engines.
The next step is to have your website optimized so that when students search for the ‘best B-schools in UK’, you, as a UK school are sure to show up, and at least have a chance of being considered (this is where a good website counts – once the prospect is directed to your website, your website should be able to convert it into a lead). Leading SEO companies like Techmagnate even offer affordable multilingual SEO services for Education sector as well as other sectors. Therefore if it is international students that you want to attract, they can now find you in their language.
There are other ways to enhance visibility too. Pay-per-click campaigns on search engines are an effective way to be seen on search pages. For instance, if someone searches for ‘B-schools in Boston’, you could show up on the top right corner of the search result pages. While your link is displayed for free, you pay everytime someone clicks on your link. This is a great short-term fix for instant visibility, but over the long term, this needs to be supported by SEO for organic rankings on search engines.
Social Media Optimization is the best form of advertising for any school because it consists of third-party recommendations. This gives far more credibility than all other forms of advertising. SMO depends upon user generated content to create a buzz about your school. It requires a dedicated resource to regularly post content on blogs, social communities, online video & picture sharing websites and other networks where your target audience is active. For example, Facebook would probably have a large segment of potential students in the age group 17-23. If you can get a conversation going about your school or college here, the word would spread on its own.
Emails / Newsletters campaigns are vital too. A good time to start is possibly before the junior and senior year final exams (school and college), when students are beginning to form opinions on where they want to go. Select databases can be bought and prospects can be wooed via emails. This includes the parents too, who are key influencers in the decision-making process.
Before embarking on a SEO programme, make sure you choose the right SEO Services Company. A good SEO company must have a proven track record, and be able to offer complete services including website design, SEO, PPC campaign management, content-writing, brand-building capabilities among others.
If you do all of these, chances are that you would rank higher on college searches. You will be perceived more bigger and better than competition – just the way you want it to be.
For more information on SEO services for the education sector please visit www.techmagnate.com
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