As competition for international students continues to increase, many schools are asking the same question: “ How do we stand out when more schools are doing exactly the same things?”
For many years, international recruitment followed a familiar model – Schools invested in websites, prospectuses, education fairs and agent networks. These remain valuable and continue to play an important role in helping families discover schools. The challenge is that schools are often competing for attention within exactly the same channels.
At an education fair, families may speak to dozens of schools in a single day. An education agent is likely to recommend several schools that all fit a family's requirements. Even the best school website is usually visited only after a family already knows the school exists.
The question is whether simply doing more of the same is enough to create meaningful differentiation.
Interestingly, many universities seem to have recognised this shift earlier than many schools. I recently watched a live stream hosted by the Course Leader for a UK Master's programme on Wechat Channel. More than 10,000 people watched it.
One academic. One hour. Thousands of prospective students reached.
No travel. No exhibition stand. No geographical limitations.
More importantly, prospective students weren't simply reading about the programme. They were engaging directly with the academic leading it, asking questions in real time and developing a much richer understanding than any prospectus could provide.
That isn't simply a different marketing channel. It's a different way of engaging prospective students.
As competition continues to increase, I believe schools may need to think beyond how they generate more exposure through traditional recruitment activities.
An equally important question is how they create more opportunities for families to experience the school before they ever visit it—or before the admissions process even begins.
Traditional recruitment channels will continue to play an important role.
But perhaps the schools that thrive over the next few years will be those that gradually build their own channels for engaging prospective families—creating direct relationships rather than relying solely on third-party channels to introduce them.