2005:14 R

Marketing and brand creation - higher education institutions in competition

During the period of just over ten years in which the higher education institutions have been marketing more extensively, greater professionalism has developed. Their budgets for information and marketing are not particularly large, but awareness and the ability to set priorities has increased in pace with the growing competition for students.

The small and medium-sized institutions have felt the greatest need to present themselves and during the 1990´s many of them turned to advertising agencies who devised campaigns and brochures. Some also resorted to special offers such as season passes to ski lifts and free bikes and presented a glossy image of student life. Today marketing is more restrained on the whole and more serious, and the strategies are chosen with greater thought and awareness.

The most important way of reaching students is through personal meetings and prospectuses. For this reason virtually all of the higher education institutions devote a great deal of time and energy to visiting upper-secondary schools, arranging open houses and training student ambassadors. Most of the institutions also send their prospectuses to all those leaving the upper-secondary schools.

The internet and the institutions´ own web-sites are expected to provide the most important sources of information in the future - but today only a few place their entire trust in their own home-page. The local authorities have become more involved in trying to attract students to the local higher education institution. They often offer guaranteed accommodation, support for the student union and help in finding vacation jobs.

Competition between the higher education institutions obliges them to present a clear image of what they have to offer - a brand. Many institutions are now pooling their efforts to devise an information strategy that includes the overall image they want to convey.