Sunday Posts

Of all the strategies a company could conceive to win hearts and minds on social media, nothing is perhaps better than what its employees can do, if they engage socially.  Usually, the Social Media strategies that companies come up with are not very different from the traditional PR. It is top-down, canned good news stories, written by professionals. It has a very predictable, managed feel. Managed by professionals who have transitioned from traditional to social media - what an inconvenience - it can not but be that way.  But, social media is different because of the need for authenticity. Broadcast media has the reputation for editorial control (even if grossly overestimated) and this gives automatic credibility to something seen on TV. Social media has no such thing: Anything can be on Facebook, or Twitter. What such stories lack in credibility, can only be made up by authenticity. And, while one can, and indeed try to, be authentic, it is a hard thing to fake by ...

Indian Education is a fascinating opportunity. It has scale and an extensive ecosystem of demand. It is badly regulated, but as such things mean in India, which helps the people who are already in and keep others out of it. As the Indian consumers get richer and demand more education, the opportunity in India gets more attractive. This is one of those multi-billion dollar market opportunities, which seem to lay untapped. And, as it is happening in other industries, one could reasonably expect a world-beating company being made by this market. Following the classic model of business growth, it should be possible for a visionary company to take advantage of this relatively protected domestic market and emerge as a player in the global stage. So far, it has failed to happen. There are some Indian organisations came close, NIIT and Aptech, the two computer training companies, among them. But in a fascinating saga worthy of strategy case studies, they both lost steam just when it seem...

In private sector higher education, pricing is often the most interesting area to explore. More often than not, institutions tend to take one of the two positions on pricing: Either they want to be top of the range, creating exclusivity with the pricing itself, or, for those who are less sure of themselves, undercutting others and creating 'affordable' options become the name of the game. Both options, in my view, have inherent limitations, and one needs smart strategies for pricing to be successful. Those who price their offerings at top of the range enjoy the advantage of high margins, which allow them to afford better infrastructure and people, at least theoretically. In fact, this is, in many ways than not, a more sustainable strategy than trying to undercut the market and getting into a 'low-price trap' (more on this later). But, top of the range pricing also has inherent disadvantages. By pricing top of the range, the institution may miss out meritorious stud...

I wrote about ' How To Build A Higher Education Brand ' yesterday: One email respondent came back saying if there is any practical advice I could give to someone setting up a private university in India. I am therefore attempting an imaginary exercise here, as if you are trying to set up a private university in India. Whether I shall try to do it myself now is a different question, though. I believe this is 'the best of the times and the worst of the times' to set up a private university in India, depending on the context, exact geographic location etc. It is the best of the time because it has now been proved that private universities offer no easy money, so the black money that corrupted the field is somewhat in retreat: It is the worst of the time because such consolidation will invariably shake the students' confidence further. Moreover, context is important: The Indian student demand is at an inflection point, and an university that anticipates and satisfies t...

Being in the middle of a Higher Ed revolution, this is one question I face all too often: How does one build a new Higher Education brand? The obvious answers, research, league table standing, often do not work for those who are asking the question. The big budget, state sponsored Higher Education still around, but this is not where the action is. It is more on the fringes of Higher Education, driven by those 'Edupunks and Edupreneurs', as Anya Kamenetz calls them. Higher Education, as we know it, has become costly, inaccessible and a bastion of social privilege, rather than an engine of social mobility. And, therefore, in this day of middle class revolts, falling job rates and twilight of the age of conformity, a new Higher Education is happening at the fringes: It is here that the brand creation question gets asked most often. And, this is therefore an important question to answer. Because there is so little these new Higher Education institutions can learn from the esta...

Education Marketing is less about education and more about marketing. It stands almost external to the process of education, a discipline that seeks to import 'best practices' from famed marketers such as P&G, the guerrilla tricks of the trade, the manufactured love of relationship marketing, from consumer goods to education. The underlying belief is that educators don't market well and they need to take lessons from the more 'sophisticated' product and service companies, which have been marketing for scores of years. On the educators' side, some people are revolted by the practise of marketing. Particularly the people who studied or worked at the top institutions, which sit with centuries of well-earned reputation, can't really see the point: For them, education marketing is something for gate-crashers, the For-Profit pretenders. It is indeed true that For-Profits spend an unusual amount of money on sales and marketing: However, this is not just becaus...

In the last 18 months, the structure of the British For-Profit Higher Education has changed completely, and there is more to come. First, the Government went about culling the British For-Profit Higher Education sector with a set of sweeping changes affecting their overseas student market; these changes have been largely successful in closing down most of these colleges, and only those which had very deep overseas connections, most commonly with the owner's country of origin, or well-cultivated relationships with their university partners, have survived. Next, the Government changed the funding regime for all British universities, making the funding follow the students rather than grants to the institutions, and this has opened up an opportunity of public funding for private For-Profit institutions, the same kinds which saw their overseas market disappear in 2011. And, finally, a set of new legislation allow even relatively small colleges, with only about 1000 students on roll, to...

Traditionally, UK universities and colleges, alongside their counterparts from Australia and elsewhere, depended on agents, or education advisers, to recruit students in the international markets. This model works beautifully: The agent brings the local knowledge and personal touch students need while making the big, transformational decision in their lives. It also works well commercially: The institutions pay a commission, usually 10% to 20% of the first payment the student makes, to the agent, a good sum of money in many countries, and being paid after the registration is secured, is good in cash flow terms too. However, while the benefits are obvious, the problems of this model are increasingly becoming apparent. Over-dependence on the agents usually results in the institution becoming distant, not closer, from their target markets. The agents often work for a number of institutions, and auction off applicants to the highest bidder, which may not be the most appropriate instit...

Dr Rahul Choudaha writes about the franchising trends of the British, Australian and American Higher Education on his blog . This presents two interesting pieces of statistics: First, the British HE classroom is far more global than the American (15% international students in the system compared to USA's 3%,), and the second, a fact which is becoming apparent now, that more international students study for a British Higher Education degree outside Britain than inside it. In fact, this is a recent trend: In 2010, for the first time, the number of offshore students exceeded the number of students studying for British Higher Education degrees in Britain. However, the number is large: Out of a total 814, 495 international students studying for a British qualification, 408,685 was offshore, which is about half the number (slightly higher). Australia, despite a higher proportion of international students in country (21% as opposed to Britain's 15% mentioned earlier), has less studen...

These are exciting times in the international student recruitment market. This is a time for new winners and losers, new markets emerging and dominant ones stagnating, and new rules are being written. After explosive growth for a decade, Australia let its dominating position slip in 2008. Also, Britain, which became a very attractive destination in the new millennium, enjoying 64% growth in annual student numbers in the years leading up to 2010, is all set to lose the markets because of the muddled and unwelcoming approach of the current government, which seems to regard all International students coming from outside the EU as potential illegal immigrants. Further, the coalition government's on-the-fly policy-making has decidedly hurt Britain's position as a provider of High Quality Higher Education internationally: The absurd categorisation of Higher Education, Further Education and Private Education colleges (a system not readily understood elsewhere in the World) for visa pu...