Most of my customers find my company through our website. We have a form which they can complete if they are interested in our program. Often - the prospective student does not want to provide a telephone number - so email is my only option. What I have taken from this lesson is to avoid the typical emotion icons which are frequently used in casual conversation. My own experience has taught me to keep information brief and organized. Long email messages seem to lose the interest of the reader - and potentially lose the opportunity to earn the business.

What specific criteria do you use to evaluate a potential advertising partner? What qualities and competencies would you look for in an advertising agency?

WHAT DO YOU DO?

One body language stance that surprised me recently was one of "space". My students would put at least one chair, sometimes two, between them and the next student. While this was not unusual to see in one-off situations, it was happening overall in the student body. None of them were approachable and none of them wanted to interact with me, or each other. Now, you ask, what did I do? Well, I started by meeting individually with each student; then I incorporated team building exercises into my lectures; and split the students into groups to work on in-class assignments. Outside of classes, I asked them to reach out to me when ever needed. Slowly the students started moving toward each other. Now, they all sit side by side in the classroom. This, to me, is a bold body language that told me these students were influenced by their environment to stand "alone", trust no one, depend on no one.

Always start and end the conversation (call) with a smile

I work at a tech school so we teach one career class only. We are responsible for placing students in their first job, as we get audited on this. Sometimes potential students come in and I can see right off that they will not fit what the hiring offices are looking for. Sometimes I can tell by our phone calls that the caller has no idea what this career entails.

I am not the marketing person but was asked to take this course because it was though it could help us in marketing our school. The marketing media person is with our parent organization. I am having trouble with all the information presented as I can't relate to it. We are a new very small school--we only take 6 students a year. Our curriculum is very specialized. However we would like to increase the number of prospective students who apply. We are in our second year and for the first year we had only 9 prospective students who applied and for next year so far we have only 10 prospective students who applied. However we have had no problem selecting 6 qualified students from the pool. Any suggestions?

We have our own marketing/media manager. She is responsible for all marketing and media for our parent company and the new school we have started. Are any other schools using this approach as opposed to hiring an outside agency?

I am currently the Admission Coordinator for our college. However I work off-site. My involvement with prospective students is only to answer their inquiries about the college and provide them with links where they can download an application from our website. As such I do need to have knowledge about all aspects of the college. I am not involved in the interview or selection process. Has anyone had a similar situation?

What would be the approximate right amount of time that an admissions' rep should dedicate to a prospective student?

The most interesting part of module 4 was learning about reframing content and context. Learning how to re-invent the meaning of a situation will become very valuable in the future. I will be able to turn bad situations into good ones with my students. I will be able to give students positives out of the negatives. These are very important things to remember in communication!

I have had an issue in the last couple of months with several students that feel as if they are superior to other students and believe that they deserve special treatment. These students are students that are receiving financial aid to attend our school, yet show no gratitude to the fact that they are coming to our school at no cost to them. These students have caused so much turmoil within our school. What would be some affective ways to communicate with these students to get the point across to them that they have the same standards to uphold as any other student and that they should not be given special treatment? Any suggestions would be great! I am hoping that this communication course will help me learn some techniques to use in the future with problems like this!

It seems that having a set goal of students a rep is responsible for enrolling on a weekly or monthly basis may sometimes conflict with using an ethical process. For example, what if we can clearly see that the best choice for a student is not to attend our school/program, but we are under pressure to meet an enrollment goal that we might not get to without this student, and higher-ups don't support turning students away? The rep can't change corporate policy or culture alone, so what do we do then?

When making a connection with a student you have to be sure that your attitude and the way you say your words aren't off putting. So, I always tend to engage with the student in an inviting and helpful tone.

Ultimately, listening is an essential part of the admissions field and you always have to be closely listening to the student so you can guide them and help them with anything they may need.

When working with students, I always tend to seek some common ground. That way it is easier to interact with them and to resolve any of their issues.

You could improve your communication skills by sending out a positive attitude through your body language and responses.

As less people read newspapers, we should include more social media and search engine ads in our media mix. Like twitter, google, face book. What do you think. I think a successful media plan should include the above mentioned.

Asking questions is the key to discovering hidden obstacles. If a student seems reluctant to set an appointment, find an appropriate way to explore what's holding them back. What way do you make contact in this situation?

Why it's not important to start with grants and schoolarships in the process to recruit students?