Jan
29
2009 Lead flow for online schools
- January 29th, 2009
How’s it looking to you? I have heard thru the grapevine that January as expected was another great month. With volume increasing year over year by any where from 8-15%! What have you seen or heard?
yes, we are up in volume thus far. Another good January, I think it will be a good year
Yes, January is strong as usual. But why? Is it because schools have a fresh budget to play with? Is it because they have aggressive start goals to meet in Q1? Is the extra volume due to an increase in supply or actual demand (interested students)? And if it is the demand (which is a better indicator than supply in this instance), is it truly plausible that every single year, the target market increases by 10%, or are more drawn to inquire on lead source sites by 10%? These are all important questions we’re trying to answer internally. There will be
Also, will 2009 be that great a year for lead sources as “lead scoring” with intent to right price becomes more prevalent? I will include my thoughts on a follow up post regarding lead providers and hope to answer some of the questions above. As far as the methodology behind any kind of “true demand” vs. volume forecasts, I’ll be looking at mostly organic traffic for individual schools to take away the evil factors of lead caps and lead fraud, or multi-school inquiries from the equation.
Lead flow may be up, but the real question is, how are conversions? There are more schools dipping into the internet lead gen space, including the traditionals and for-profits. Schools are resorting to outsourced call centers to pre-qualify because such a high percentage of the leads are “junk”. Two groups I’m working with are trying new lead generation strategies to try to combat the crowding in internet lead gen. Their success will offer hope for colleges and universities for new ways to attract student prospects.