Colleges have more ways than ever to identify and reach prospective students. The challenge is knowing which audience strategies add value and which simply add cost.
That is especially important when considering purchased lists or third-party audience data.
Intent Matters More Than a List
Before adding another $10,000, $15,000, or $20,000 data expense to your media plan, it is worth taking a closer look at the targeting intelligence already available through the platforms you use every day.
Today’s digital platforms contain an enormous amount of audience intelligence. Google, YouTube, Meta, Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat, Display/OTT Streaming, and LinkedIn use behavioral, contextual, demographic, and intent signals to help advertisers identify and reach relevant audiences.
Think about the digital footprint of a prospective student. Someone considering college might search for “LVN to RN programs near me,” watch a YouTube video about financial aid, research careers with strong earning potential, visit several college websites, or interact with social content about short-term certificates. Each action creates a signal.
Those signals can also look different depending on the audience you’re trying to reach. For example, our research into older community college students found distinct differences in the platforms and media they use.
Search, social, streaming, and professional platforms can use signals such as search behavior, interests, website activity, demographics, job characteristics, CRM data, and location to help colleges reach prospective students. The exact options vary by platform, but the larger point is the same: you may already have access to sophisticated audience targeting without purchasing another list.
GradComm CEO Cheryl Broom explored this topic in more detail in her client question of the month: Do You Really Need to Buy a List of Prospective Students? Watch now.
Before buying an outside list, look at the intent signals and audience-building tools already available within your media platforms. Start by asking which behaviors are most likely to suggest that someone is considering your college, a specific program, or a career change. Understanding your students’ media habits can also help you identify where those audiences are most likely to spend their time.
First-Party Data Should Be Part of the Strategy
Colleges already have valuable data they can use.
Your inquiry lists, applicants, event registrants, website visitors, and CRM audiences can also strengthen targeting through retargeting, suppression, modeling, and campaign analysis. As you activate first-party data, privacy and responsible data use should remain part of the strategy.” Because students rarely enroll after seeing a single ad, this first-party data can be especially valuable for keeping your college in front of people who have already shown interest.
Start with the first-party audiences you already have. Ask your media buyer how they use this data to strengthen targeting and inform future campaigns.
When Does Third-Party Data Make Sense?
Third-party data should earn its place in your media plan. Before investing in an outside audience source, we recommend asking:
- Does this data help us reach people we can’t effectively reach another way?
- How was it collected, how recent is it, and what match rate should we expect?
- Can we prove that it improves meaningful outcomes such as leads, applications, registrations, or enrollment?
A list may generate clicks. It may even generate leads. But colleges should evaluate whether those users ultimately move farther through the enrollment journey.
Your Media Buyer Should Be Testing This
This is also where a strong digital media buyer becomes critical.
A strong media buyer should test these assumptions continuously—comparing conversion rates, cost per meaningful action, assisted conversions, and downstream enrollment behavior—then shifting budget toward the audiences and channels producing the strongest results. Effective audience strategy is an ongoing process of testing, learning, and adjusting as results come in.
Sometimes, third-party data may absolutely be part of that mix. The key is knowing whether it’s improving performance.
Before purchasing more data, make sure you understand the data you already have. The more clearly you understand your audience signals, the more intentionally you can build a media strategy around them.
