Distance learning alternatives to traditional classroom learning made it possible for people to continue pursuing their educational goals. This model has been around for many years, it was the pandemic era (starting in 2020) that showed the world how essential it really is.
Online learning remains popular as it allows students to keep learning regardless of where they happen to be or why.
That said, it’s clear at this point that online learning options like EdTech are here for the long haul. But the world of online education is also a lot more competitive than it used to be, so a thorough understanding of proper digital marketing strategy for EdTech is a must.
Here are a few insights into what you need to know to help your company get ahead in 2023 and beyond.
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How to Create a Successful EdTech Marketing Strategy
EdTech companies are similar to other businesses in that the same basic principles of good digital marketing still apply. For example, to succeed, you need a solid working knowledge of concepts like SEO, keyword research, and target audiences. And you need reliable ways to engage your audience and get your message through to them.
However, those interested in EdTech marketing should be aware of some of the ways higher education marketing is different. Here’s a closer look at what makes a digital marketing strategy for EdTech, in particular, successful.
Segmentation
EdTech customers often are looking to accomplish very specific objectives. One portion of your target audience could be on a completely different journey than another. Still, all of them need content that delivers the information they need to meet their goals.
Segmentation helps you qualify your leads, organize your existing customers into categories, and handle everyone’s educational needs more efficiently.
Generally speaking, the more personalized a given piece of marketing content, the more effective it’s likely to be. People automatically tune out the minute they realize a particular message doesn’t apply to them, but the opposite occurs when a message resonates or feels extra relevant.
Marketing strategy
Successful EdTech marketing strategies are strategies that accurately identify and target consumers that are right for the product. Yours should:
- Define your brand’s target market in detail
- Target consumers who are the best, most profitable fits for your company
- Play to the unique strengths of your product and brand
- Address ways your product is truly the solution a prospect has been waiting for
Creating detailed customer personas to represent each version of your ideal customer is a solid way to accomplish objectives like these.
Personas should be detailed enough to feel like real people when you consider them, but not so detailed as to be confusing. Think of teachers, students, or universities, for example.
What specific type of person would get the most out of your product?
How old are they, where do they live, and what interests do they have? What are they looking to get out of their ongoing education? What do they dream about achieving in life, and what are their fears?
Marketing plan
Once you know which demographics you’re marketing to and why, you need a plan for successfully reaching and converting those people. First, consider how your target audience goes about researching products like yours.
Be sure to also think about where (and in what formats) they prefer to consume content. Then, focus the bulk of your efforts on the options with the most potential.
For example, video content and infographics are two examples of content formats that lend themselves particularly well to EdTech marketing.
Make sure you’re also fully considering the ways an EdTech customer’s buyer’s journey differs from that of any other consumer. A standard B2B sales funnel makes a fine starting point, but your sales funnel will also need to address key concerns like:
- Budget differences
- Who and what could influence an EdTech buyer’s purchasing decisions
- Location-specific concerns like regulations and social climate
Robust ongoing marketing research can be helpful here.
Monitoring and analysis
Data collection, monitoring, and analysis are crucial to the success of any online learning or EdTech marketing strategy. They’re really the only ways you’ll know for sure which strategies, content formats, and approaches are as profitable as you hoped they would be. Key performance indicators to keep an eye on in EdTech include:
- Web traffic to lead ratio
- Overall web traffic
- Lifetime customer value
- Customer acquisition costs
- Email open/response rates
- Overall sales growth
When fine-tuning your various marketing approaches, consider leveraging techniques like A/B testing to zero in on which approaches truly deliver the best results for your brand and products.
EdTech Marketing Approaches to Increase Conversions
Ready to kick your next EdTech marketing strategy into action? Here’s a look at some marketing strategies that can be especially effective for EdTech companies.
SEO
Although pretty much everyone uses the internet to research purchasing decisions these days, this is even more the case for those in charge of making those decisions on behalf of schools, universities, and other educational institutes.
The information a researching consumer finds online can have a massive impact on which direction they ultimately go. So, you’ll want to ensure your company is the authority that tells them what they need to know and wins their trust.
A next-level SEO strategy is key to achieving top SERP rankings, attracting visitors to your site, and making sure they find the help they need when they get there. The better your SEO efforts, the more you’ll experience benefits like the following:
- Better-quality traffic and more of it
- Competitive advantage over other brands in your niche
- Better credibility, as high-ranking sites are generally always seen as better sources of authority content
- Better overall user experience for your visitors, leads, and customers
Email marketing
Email marketing has been around almost as long as email itself, and it’s still around for one very important reason – it works, plain and simple. It’s also one of the most-effective marketing methods for EdTech companies, as it lends itself very well to segmentation.
Email marketing initiatives are also easy to automate, cost-effective, and strong when it comes to your potential ROI. The benefits of making email a primary marketing channel when you’re in EdTech include:
- Cost-effectiveness: You don’t need a massive marketing budget to put together a stellar email campaign – just creativity, research, and a solid understanding of your audience.
- Measurability: Tracking, organizing, and analyzing data related to your campaigns are extremely easy and intuitive with email.
- Hyper–targeted: Sending highly personalized messages to separate recipient segments is easy to plan and execute with email.
- High convertibility: When executed properly, an email marketing campaign can yield incredible numbers and effectively guide many types of customers through a sales funnel.
Video marketing
Video content is red hot these days, accounting for an astonishing 69 percent of today’s global web traffic. And it’s not hard to see why, either.
Video is engaging, easy to consume, easy to share, and incredibly versatile. It’s also an accessible way to capture a consumer’s attention and encourage them to stop scrolling long enough to check out what you have to say.
However, you’ll want to give some careful thought to the pros and cons of using a public hosting platform like YouTube versus a private alternative.
- Using YouTube means resigning yourself to the fact that ads will occasionally interrupt your content and break a viewer’s attention. However, you’ll also have access to over 2 billion active users.
- Private platforms cost more but offer greater control over how you present your content. They also make it easier to track your results, control data, etc.
- Private platforms also make options like lead-generation gates possible.
Social media
Social media is more than just an avenue for people to keep in touch with friends or see what’s happening in the news. It’s also an important way that today’s consumers use to look for services and products and evaluate their options, including EdTech products.
Don’t limit yourself to posting only to your company’s main page and calling it a day, though. Take advantage of options like hashtags and in-network social media groups to raise your chances of reaching the right people. (Just be careful not to overdo it in groups.)
It’s also important to have a posting strategy and to understand how that strategy ought to differ from platform to platform. What really gets people’s attention on Twitter or TikTok isn’t going to be right for Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. Again, market research is a must.
Pay-per-click marketing
Although PPC advertising should never be considered a substitute for proper long-haul strategies like SEO and social media marketing, it can make a terrific supplement to your larger approach.
PPC options like Google Adsense make it easy to create highly targeted advertisements with a fairly high return on your investment. And it’s easy to tailor your spending to your marketing budget, too.
PPC works best as a tool to drive traffic from specific target demographics over a relatively short period of time. Factors to pay attention to include:
- Which specific segments you’re looking to reach
- Timing each ad to deliver the highest possible return on your investment
- Comprehensive keyword research
- Word choices that keep ads short but effective
Buyer journey analysis
Remember, the average buyer journey attached to education software and other EdTech products is more complex than it would be for any other product type. For example, more people will likely be involved in the decision-making process.
Understanding how to properly nurture sales prospects through your marketing funnel is essential. Here’s a brief rundown of the basics involved at each stage:
- Top of the funnel (TOFU): Make your leads and sales prospects aware of their problem (if they aren’t already). Present your product as the ideal solution via blogs, social media posts, infographics, and other widely accessible content types.
- Middle of the funnel (MOFU): This is the point at which you begin the process of converting mere prospects into qualified leads. Quizzes, educational resources, special offers, and more can be helpful here.
- Bottom of the funnel (BOFU): Leads who make it this far are ready to be nudged toward an educated purchase decision. Leverage tools like demos, customer testimonials, spec sheets, etc.
Getting your customer buyer journey correct takes time, as well as a lot of trial and error, but it’s a must-do. And when it’s properly accomplished, it makes all the difference to the health of your bottom line.
Content marketing
Consumers in the market for EdTech products generally have a lot of questions and are looking for solid information sources. That said, a great content marketing campaign that includes plenty of fully optimized original content can position your company as a major authority in the field.
It can also deliver the type of user experience that catapults you ahead of the competition and keeps you there. A premium all-in-one content marketing solution like Content Cloud can really help you meet your goals here.
Ensure you’re giving your content marketing strategy the attention it deserves by researching keywords, brainstorming content ideas, and testing options for prospects at every stage of your sales funnel. Outsource some of the work to qualified freelancers with EdTech experience to scale content production while maintaining quality.
Attract and Convert Customers With High-Value Content
Content marketing should really be considered the mainstay of any thorough EdTech marketing strategy, with good reason. Ultimately, it will be your content that grabs your customer’s attention, drives traffic to your website, and eventually convinces them to trust your product with their ongoing education.
A comprehensive, user-friendly content management option like Content Cloud includes everything you need to ensure your EdTech marketing efforts are successful. Examples include premium products and services like Stage (hosting made simple), Writer Access (experienced content creators at your fingertips), and Ion (interactive content that converts).
Conclusion
At the end of the day, both meeting your EdTech marketing goals and reaching exactly the right customers for your products don’t have to be rocket science.
Streamline, scale, and implement your content production with ease when you try Content Cloud today!
