Power your institution’s marketing with alumni data

For this article, we use the example of a graduate Economics program while demonstrating how to use alumni data for marketing. Note—with access to Alumni Pathways, this same information is available for any of your institution's programs.

Powering your marketing efforts with alumni outcomes data can be a game changing advantage for higher ed marketing and enrollment teams. Unlike anecdotal evidence, alumni data gives prospective students and families concrete proof that your institution’s programs provide a competitive edge in preparing for and finding career success. It’s a powerful tool for clarifying and communicating your stories, discovering new demographics to market to, and highlighting the unique strengths of specific programs in your marketing campaigns. But knowing that alumni data is valuable for marketing is one thing; knowing how to go about using it is another. 

So in this article, let’s get practical. Let’s say you’re on a mission to boost enrollment in your institution’s graduate Economics program, using the Alumni Pathways platform. Where should you begin? And what should you look for? Using this example program, we’ll walk you through how to: 

1. Highlight areas where your alumni outshine your competitors

No matter what kind of offerings you provide, it's important to know what competitive advantages your program can give students compared to others of its kind. So let’s begin by comparing your graduate Economics program to the ones your competitors offer, keeping our eyes out for areas where your grads outperform their peers. 

The Comparison Report in Alumni Pathways makes it easy to see how your alumni compare to those from other institutions across key areas:

• Companies

• Occupations

• Job titles

• Skills and certifications

As we explore the Comparison Report for your Economics program, a few stand-out data points begin to emerge. 

Under the “job titles” portion of the report, we can see that more of your Economics grads go on to be presidents, owners, and directors than your competitors’ alumni do. In the “companies” section, we can find some notable companies that your alumni are more likely to work for: 

• Amazon

• Boeing

• JPMorgan Chase

• Microsoft

• American Express

This is valuable information for prospective students wondering which institution's economics program will give them the best leg up in a competitive job market. 

Of course, it would be nice to get more specific about how your grads progress into these roles, and—as many students will be eager to find out—how well they’re compensated for them. So next, let’s take a look at the data on your alumni’s career journeys & salary. 

2. Demonstrate the ROI of your degree

In Alumni Pathways, we’ll open the Career & Education Pathways report for a closer look at the career journeys your Economics grads take. Here, the Outcomes Over Time chart makes it easy to trace what roles your alumni fill 1 to 15+ years after graduation, as well as their projected salary based on their occupation, region, and time in the workforce.

For instance, we can see that 1 year after graduation, the majority of these grads work in Business & Financial Operations with an estimated salary of $63k. We can also see that of your alumni who graduated 15+ years ago, over half are projected to earn $155k a year.

For prospective students curious about where this degree can take them, this chart offers an evidence-based roadmap. And in a time when many Americans are questioning the worth of a college degree, the value of that long-term career vision shouldn’t be underestimated. Realistic salary estimates, based on reliable occupation, location, and time-in-workforce data, is one of the best ways to show students and their families the ROI of the education you offer, so don’t be afraid to get concrete!

3. Discover demographics to market to

Next, let’s see if we can find any data that will help you discover new demographics to engage and reach out to when promoting the graduate Econ program.

Within the Career & Education Pathways Report, we’ll use the tool entitled “How do my Alumni Reach Their Outcomes?” to discover the feeder role that students had before entering their Economics program.

As is to be expected, many students were in other academic programs before enrolling in an Econ program—specifically, business administration and finance programs. This helps confirm that your program could be of interest not only to Econ undergrads, but also to graduates from adjacent business concentrations. But we also see that a number of individuals worked as operations managers and even administrative assistants, indicating that there may be an opportunity to recruit mid-career professionals, or those looking to advance their career. It may be worth connecting with those alums to learn more about their journey and consider how this might inform your outreach and ad targeting.

Finally, we’ll return to comparison data, this time using the Demographics Table in Alumni Pathways. Here, you can analyze the gender & racial diversity of the alumni from this program, to better understand your institution’s impact on the diversity of the workforce—and hopefully, use this information to recruit more diverse learners. For instance, you might notice that your Economics program produces more female graduates than your competitors’ do. This would be a great datapoint to emphasize to female students preparing to enter a male-dominated field.

Putting it all together

Now that we’ve taken a quick journey through your alumni data, let’s summarize a few of the golden nuggets we found along the way. We discovered that: 

• Alumni from this program are more likely to be presidents, owners, and directors than alumni from competing universities

• Alumni from this program are more likely to work at Amazon, Boeing, JPMorgan Chase, Microsoft, and American Express than alumni from competing universities

• This program has produced more female graduates than the equivalent program at competing universities 

• Based on their occupation, location, and time in workforce, the majority of alumni from this program are estimated to be earning $63k one year after graduation

• Over half of your alumni who graduated 15+ years ago are now projected to make over $155k a year

• Of your alumni, many studied economics, business administration, or finance before enrolling in an economics program—but some also came from the workforce in management or administrative assistant roles 

Now, you can use these insights to enhance your marketing campaign, perhaps using GoRecruit to quickly generate summary graphics of your alumni data.

Now that you’ve seen the magic of alumni data, you know how to use it to highlight areas where your alumni outshine your competitors, demonstrate the ROI of the education you offer, and discover new demographics to market your programs to. Reach out for more guidance on how you can leverage Alumni Pathways to take your institution’s marketing to the next level. 

💡 Want to learn more about Alumni Pathways’ capabilities? Explore these short (<2 minute) tutorials: 

• Using the Alumni Trends Report for Enrollment Marketing

• Using the Comparison Tool for Enrollment Marketing

• Using the Outcomes Roll-Up Report for Enrollment Marketing

• Using the Demographic Table to Inform Strategic Initiatives

• Using the Career and Education Pathways Report for Program Review