The ABCs of Slaying Digital Marketing Challenges for an Online Educational Hub
Attracting an International Audience, Beating Competition, and Building Trust with Students and Parents - A Performance-Driven Agency's Guide
Unlocking The Power of Fantastic Marketing In The World Of Online Education
Online education has been on the rise for the past decade, with more students opting for the flexibility and convenience it offers. With the onset of the pandemic, the demand for online education skyrocketed, and online educational hubs have been quick to adapt to the changing times. However, with the growth of the online education market, comes new challenges.
From attracting an international audience to building trust with potential students and parents, digital marketing has become an essential tool for online educational hubs to succeed. In this blog post, we will explore briefly the complex world of digital marketing in online education, the challenges faced by online educational hubs, and how a performance-driven marketing agency can help them overcome these challenges and unlock opportunities for growth in the global online education market.
Client Brief: Revolutionizing Online Education with a Hybrid Approach
Our client is a leading online educational hub that offers students all over the world access to IGCSE and IB subjects. With a focus on a hybrid approach of small group and 1:1 classes, the platform is dedicated to helping students achieve personal success and growth. Founded by a team of experienced educators, the platform provides students with high-quality education that is tailored to their individual needs and learning styles.
As a niche online education platform, the client has built a reputation for excellence and innovation in the education sector. The platform’s unique hybrid approach to learning has received accolades from both students and educators, and has set them apart from other online education platforms.
However, with the increasing demand for online education, the client recognized the need to expand their business internationally to reach a wider audience. This posed significant challenges, as the client needed to navigate cultural and linguistic differences in each market, while also addressing the skepticism and competition that exists in the online education space.
Despite these challenges, the client remained committed to their mission of providing students with high-quality education that would help them achieve their full potential. But they faced many issues with their previous digital marketing agency (which they have been working with for a while).Â
They approached Grow Faster Marketing, a performance-driven marketing agency, to help them develop a comprehensive digital marketing strategy that would help them overcome these challenges and expand their business globally.
Challenges - Not One But Many
International Audience - Localising For The Market
Attracting an international audience can be a daunting task for any business, and the online educational hub is no exception. In addition to language barriers, cultural and social differences also play a significant role in shaping the marketing message and content for each market. What works in one market may not necessarily work in another, which means that the client would need to have a deep understanding of the local customs, preferences, and values in each region they are targeting.
The marketing approach would also need to account for differences in time zones and the availability of resources, such as reliable internet connectivity. The marketing message and content would also need to be tailored to each market to resonate with the target audience.
Competition
The challenge of standing out in a highly competitive online education space can be daunting. With numerous online education platforms, such as TutorMe, Skooli, and Varsity Tutors, vying for the attention of potential students, the client must find a way to differentiate themselves from both the larger and smaller players in the market to attract and retain their target audience.
In order to do so, they must identify and communicate their unique selling proposition (USP). This requires a thorough understanding of their target audience and the value that the client’s platform can offer them.
Additionally, the client must establish a well-defined brand identity that effectively communicates their USP and resonates with their target audience. This challenge requires careful planning and execution to effectively establish a strong brand presence and gain a competitive edge in the online education market.
Skepticism
As online education is still a relatively new concept for some, the client may face skepticism from students and parents who are not familiar with the benefits of online learning. Even though COVID-19 made the transition to online learning much easier, the traditional classroom setting has been the norm for centuries, and many people still believe that in-person instruction is the only way to ensure quality education. Therefore, the client would need to address these concerns and persuade potential customers that online learning is a viable alternative to traditional classroom learning.
Building Trust
Establishing trust with potential students and parents is a critical challenge for any online educational platform. Since online education is still a relatively new concept for some, potential students and parents may have doubts and concerns about the quality of the platform’s services.
When entering new markets, establishing trust becomes an even greater challenge for businesses, and this was no different for our online educational hub client. They were expanding into new territories with diverse cultures, languages, and educational systems, making it challenging to build trust with potential students and parents who were not familiar with their brand or their unique approach to education.
Search Engine Visibility
The client’s website was built several years ago and had not been updated since then. As a result, the website was not optimized for search engines, which meant it was difficult for potential customers to find the website when searching for relevant keywords. This was a major challenge for the client as they needed to reach a wider audience to grow their business.
As part of our comprehensive digital audit, Grow Faster Marketing conducted a thorough SEO audit of the client’s website to identify areas that needed improvement. We discovered that the website was missing meta descriptions, title tags, and other key on-page optimization elements that were critical for search engine visibility. We also found that the website had a high bounce rate due to slow loading times, poor mobile responsiveness, and broken links.
Technical Challenges
Technical challenges can be a significant hurdle for online educational platforms. In this case, the client’s platform needed to be user-friendly and easy to navigate to ensure a positive user experience for students and parents. This required ongoing technical maintenance and updates to keep the platform up to date with the latest technology and trends. The platform’s interface needed to be intuitive, and all features and functions should be easily accessible for users.
Moreover, the platform needed to be optimized for different devices, including desktops, laptops, tablets, and mobile phones. The content should also be optimized for different screen sizes and resolutions. This is especially important because students may access the platform from different devices, and a subpar experience on one device may discourage them from using the platform.
The platform also needed to have robust security measures in place to protect sensitive student and parent data. This included measures such as data encryption, secure logins, and secure payment processing. These measures would help build trust with the platform’s users and ensure the platform’s compliance with data protection laws.
Drop In Traffic
Given the above, the inevitable decline in website traffic, social media marketing, and email campaign performance became a major challenge for the online educational hub. According to the data provided to our agency, the website traffic had dropped by 20% over the past year, resulting in a significant loss in potential leads and revenue. Similarly, the social media campaigns were experiencing lower engagement rates and impressions, with a decrease of 15% in overall reach compared to the previous year. The email campaigns were also facing challenges, with open rates dropping by 10% and click-through rates decreasing by 5%.
These statistics indicated that the current marketing strategies were no longer effective in engaging the target audience, and a new approach was needed to revitalize and expand the online educational hub’s digital presence. In other words, the client needed urgent work to grow faster by marketing.
Dealing With The Challenges To Drive More Revenue & Clients
Together with the client, we started with a deep dive into its business alongside a digital marketing audit to review every facet of the client’s online presence to uncover problems, challenges and opportunities for improvement.
We then implemented the following solutions.
Internationalising its online presence
Together with the client, we conducted extensive market research to gain a thorough understanding of the cultural and social differences in each proposed market, as well as the language barriers that may exist.
Furthermore, the client would need to develop localized content that speaks to the unique needs and challenges of each market. This could include producing video content in the local language, using local examples and case studies, and showcasing success stories from students in each region. By doing so, the client can build credibility and establish trust with the target audience, ultimately leading to increased enrollment and revenue growth.
We then tailored the marketing message and content to each market to resonate with the target audience. For example, for the target market in parts of Asia, we highlighted the benefits of online education in the context of the highly competitive education environment, while for the broader European market, we emphasized the flexibility and convenience of online learning.
By analyzing the various reports across the different marketing platforms, we also discovered that TikTok was not giving them the return on investment required and therefore shut it down temporarily. We focused precious marketing spend on Google PPC and Facebook Ads as we saw the greatest engagement there. However, we discovered that while impressions were high, conversions were low and that was mainly due to the ads were too generic. We understand the client wanted to go international, but that did not mean all the ads could be the same. We discussed with the clients the various customer personas they were targeting and subsequently designed ads that were tailored to each specific country so that we could better address their pain points. This resulted in a 315% increase in click through rates and also brought cost of acquisition down by 75%.
Taking the competition on
Brand Identity
To further differentiate the client from other online education platforms, we also focused on creating a strong brand identity that resonates with the target audience. This involved developing a clear and consistent visual language, as well as a tone of voice that speaks to the client’s unique value proposition. We also helped the client develop a brand messaging framework that articulates the key benefits of their platform in a way that is compelling and resonates with potential students and parents.
One challenge the client faced was the need to improve their online platform’s user-friendliness. To address this challenge, our agency worked with the client to revamp their platform’s design, making it more intuitive, distinctive and visually appealing. We also helped them implement new features such as an interactive dashboard that allows students and parents to easily track their progress and communicate with teachers.
Unique strengths
As part of our competitor analysis, we identified a number of key gaps in the market that the client could capitalize on. For example, we found that many other online education platforms focused primarily on academic performance, but did not offer the kind of personalized support that the client did. By emphasizing the client’s personalized approach to learning, we were able to position them as a unique and valuable option for students who were looking for more individualized support.
Another key way that we differentiated the client from other online education platforms was by focusing on their expertise in IGCSE and IB subjects. By positioning the client as a specialist in these areas, we were able to target a specific niche market and position the client as a go-to resource for students who were looking for support in these subjects. This helped to set the client apart from other online education platforms that offered a more general curriculum.
Seeing is believing - addressing the natural skepticism
To address skepticism from potential students and parents, our agency crafted a marketing message that highlighted the benefits of online learning and the client’s hybrid approach. We also showcased customer testimonials and social proof to build credibility and establish trust with potential students and parents.
For example, we highlighted the success stories of students who had improved their grades and achieved academic success through the client’s online classes. We created targeted social media ads that focused on the client’s USP and targeted specific demographics and regions where the client had identified a high demand for their services. This approach led to a 182% increase in website traffic and a 45% lift in conversions.
Building more trust with the target audience
Our agency helped the client establish trust with potential students and parents by providing transparent communication, sharing customer testimonials, and building a strong social media presence.
One of the key elements of this strategy was to ensure that the client’s website and social media presence conveyed a strong sense of professionalism and expertise. This involved creating engaging content, leveraging customer testimonials, and showcasing the platform’s unique selling points to potential students and parents.
Our agency also implemented a targeted social media campaign that emphasized the benefits of the client’s hybrid approach of small group and 1:1 classes. By showcasing the success stories of past students and highlighting the qualifications of the platform’s instructors, we were able to build trust with potential customers and establish the client as a leader in the online education space.
Additionally, we provided the client with a customer support plan that emphasized transparency and responsiveness. This included ensuring that all customer queries were promptly addressed and providing customers with detailed information on the client’s services and policies.
Based on these key building blocks, we then implemented a targeted social media strategy that focused on building engagement and creating a sense of community among the target audience. For example, we ran a social media campaign that encouraged current students to share their learning experiences and successes on social media using a unique hashtag. This helped build credibility and establish the client as a reputable online education provider.
Turbocharging search visibility
To streamline the client’s website, our agency conducted a thorough audit of their existing site and identified areas for improvement. On top of localising the website as mentioned above, we also redesigned their homepage to highlight their unique selling proposition and to make their services easily accessible to potential customers. This included restructuring the navigation menu, simplifying the page layout, and adding clear calls to action.
Critical keyword researchÂ
To improve the client’s search engine visibility, we conducted extensive keyword research to identify relevant search terms that their target audience is using. We then optimized their website’s on-page content to include these keywords in strategic locations, such as in headers, meta tags, and within the body of the text.
Backlinking strategies deployed to increase traffic
Backlinking is an important part of off-page SEO that involves getting other high-quality websites to link back to your client’s website. This helps to establish credibility and authority with search engines, as well as increase referral traffic to the client’s website.Â
Our agency implemented a variety of white-hat, high quality backlinking strategies for the client, including:
Guest blogging: We identified high-authority websites in the education niche and reached out to them with article ideas that would be valuable to their readers. We then wrote articles for them and included a backlink to the client’s website in the author bio or within the content.
Broken link building: We identified high-authority websites that had broken links, and reached out to them to offer a replacement link to the client’s website. This provided value to the website owner by helping them fix their broken link, while also giving the client a high-quality backlink.
Infographic outreach: We created high-quality infographics that were relevant to the client’s niche, and reached out to websites in the education industry to offer the infographic for their use. The infographic included a backlink to the client’s website.
By implementing these backlinking strategies, we were able to improve the client’s domain authority and search engine rankings, leading to increased organic traffic and improved visibility in search engine results pages.
Less is more (at times)
To further improve their search engine ranking, we conducted a few rounds of content pruning of their existing blog posts. We analyzed each blog post to determine their performance in terms of organic traffic and engagement. We reviewed various metrics such as pageviews, bounce rates, time on page, and click-through rates to assess the effectiveness of each post. Using this data, we identified the low-performing content and decided to remove it from the website.
Next, we focused on optimizing the high-performing content for selected keywords. We used keyword research tools to identify relevant keywords and topics that the target audience was searching for. We then strategically placed these keywords in the blog posts while ensuring that the content remained engaging, informative, and valuable to the reader.
In addition to optimizing the content, we also worked on improving the structure and formatting of the blog posts. We added subheadings, bullet points, and images to break up the content and make it more visually appealing. This helped to increase the readability and user experience of the blog posts, which in turn led to higher engagement and longer time spent on the website.
As a result of our efforts, we were able to increase the organic website traffic by 248%. This was a significant improvement that helped the client to reach a wider audience and improve their online visibility.
Conclusion
After implementing the website optimizations and SEO strategies, the client’s website saw an increase in traffic by 182% and a decrease in bounce rate by 50%. These improvements were tracked and measured using Google Analytics.
Additionally, the client experienced a higher conversion rate, with a 65% increase in form submissions and a 40% increase in phone calls. This led to an increase in revenue of approximately 25% for the client.
These metrics were regularly monitored and analyzed by our agency, allowing us to make data-driven decisions and continuously optimize the client’s online presence for maximum impact.
Tackling the technicals head on
To address the technical challenges faced by the client, Grow Faster Marketing implemented a number of ongoing maintenance and update procedures to ensure that the platform was always up to date with the latest technology and trends. This included regular software updates, security patches, and bug fixes, as well as ensuring that the website was optimized for mobile devices and had a responsive design.
In addition to ongoing maintenance and updates, we also conducted user testing and feedback surveys to identify areas for improvement and gather insights into the user experience. Based on this feedback, we implemented a number of changes to improve the user experience, such as optimizing the website’s load speed, implementing a more user-friendly interface, and streamlining the online booking process.
For example, we conducted user testing on the online booking process and identified that some users were experiencing difficulty in completing the booking process due to confusing terminology and unclear instructions. To address this, we simplified the language used (or had accurate translations) and provided clearer instructions throughout the process, resulting in a significant increase in the number of successful bookings.
Overall, by addressing the technical challenges and improving the user experience, our agency was able to help the client achieve their business goals, resulting in increased revenue and customer satisfaction.
A successful conclusion
Congratulations, you’ve made it to the end of our success story! You’ve seen how our partnership with the client led to explosive growth in traffic, engagement, and revenue. Our agency’s efforts led to a 182% increase in organic website traffic, a 50% decrease in bounce rate, and a 30% increase in conversion rate. Additionally, the client’s revenue increased by 25% as a direct result of our partnership.
We took on the challenge of differentiating the client from their competitors, and we did it with flying colors. With our targeted marketing campaigns, website optimizations, and technical expertise, we helped the client rise to the top of their industry.
But this is just the beginning. Are you ready to take your business to the next level? We’re not just another marketing agency – we’re a team of growth experts with a track record of delivering real results. Whether you need to increase your online visibility, drive more leads and sales, or optimize your website for maximum conversion, we’ve got you covered.
So what are you waiting for? Let’s take your business to new heights together. Contact us today to learn more about how we can help you grow faster than you ever thought possible.
Table of Contents
hear from the client directly