The discussion during the forum also highlighted that while discounting may offer a short-term boost when opening new markets or coping with seasonal downturns, the long-term risks are severe. “Clients expect a lot more for a lot less,” said one participant. “The long-term risk is that it’s a very slippery slope to go down and once you’re at the bottom, it’s hard to climb back up.”

In fact, it is that prospect of a “race to the bottom” that really focused discussion at the forum, in that reduced margins threaten the sector’s sustainability and reputation over the long term, not to mention what they mean to the quality of the student experience across the sector.

Claudio Cesarano is the CEO of , a Zurich-based agency. He feels that there is “a bit of a mix” of factors behind the widespread discounting in the industry today. “At the end we’re selling a product like any other industry and we’ve all missed out a bit on giving it enough value. If there is enough value then there is no discounting.” He puts the practice down to a number of factors, including larger chains that are effectively buying market share through discounting, and, in the process, putting pressure on small operators to adapt. He also sees discounting in some hyper-competitive markets where agencies are compete with each other for a booking.

The practice is so widespread that when it comes to discounts, “I get it without asking. The genie is out of the bottle.”

Participants at the ALTO forum advanced a number of strategies for responding to that persistent pressure on pricing for language courses, including:

• Investing in staff training
• Developing innovative programmes for specific market niches
• Enhancing communications throughout the student journey and/or investing in student support services

Beyond that, the discussion stressed the importance of a more strategic and limited use of discounts – with specific time limits in place – and never as the default pricing option.

One school’s response

Leanne Linacre, the director of in Liverpool, has seen that pricing pressure firsthand. “The pressure to discount has definitely increased over the last few years,” she says. But she finds that it can also be driven by the customer in some markets, especially in cases where there is a culture of bargaining or expecting discounts or where the student’s home currency is more volatile. “Currency fluctuations have a huge impact,” she adds.

So too does the broader shift toward the junior market in many language learning destinations. “Juniors are coming for less time,” says Ms Linacre, “and so families are looking for a lower price; sometimes even scaling back on excursions or taking things out of a package to get the price down.”

For its part, LILA is responding by building additional value into its programmes, and by being strategic in targeting specific high-value niches. For example, LILA has introduced A level courses and university foundation programmes in order to better build its enrolment outside of the peak summer season and to boost the average stay per student. “It was a lot of hard work and a lot of time to get it off the ground,” Linacre says. “But that gave us time to build out our agent networks and to begin to build the enrolment base.”

In addition to that careful segmentation, LILA has also invested in expanding student supports. The school has introduced the Progression Platform, for example, as an in-person eight-module course for all levels of language learner. Students are offered Progression classes outside of their timetabled classes. This enriched programme is free of charge and focuses on skills – such as team building or communications – that students need to be successful outside of the language classroom, whether at university, at work, or in life.

“The students love it,” says Ms Linacre. “The challenge is letting the agents know about it in a way that they can understand and use to support sales but when they see what we’re the sort of school that goes the extra mile, it gives them the confidence to recommend us.”

The Liverpool language school has also invested in a new student lounge space – The Park – which features docking stations and other supports for digital nomads. The school is leveraging that space in a new Digital Nomad Package, which is specifically designed for students who want to improve their English skills while working remotely and networking internationally.

Segmentation, niche programmes, new services, and better student supports. In the view of the delegates at the ALTO forum, these are all effective strategies for countering downward pressure on prices. The forum also called for better collaboration between schools and agents, and for peak bodies in the sector to play a more active role in bring forward guidelines and advancing best practices to better stabilise pricing in the sector.

For additional background, please see:

• “Irish ELT sector sounds note of ‘cautious stability’ for 2024“
• “US ELT numbers moving toward pre-pandemic norms“
• “Economic impact of UK ELT estimated at nearly £2 billion“

The post Language travel sector leaders call for a focus on value amid persistent discount pressure appeared first on ���Ϲ��� Monitor - Market intelligence for international student recruitment.

DEMAND AND REVENUE OPTIMISATION

“Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don’t know which half,” observed businessman and political figure John Wanamaker (1838–1922). This famous truism is relevant to the international education sector, where many institutions still do a lot of guessing about what is going right or wrong with regards to recruitment, marketing, on-campus student services, and admissions management.

The time for guessing is over. Demand for study abroad is volatile and fast-changing; students are considering an ever-wider range of destinations and institutions. Committing to data-backed strategies is the only way to remain competitive and to maximise return-on-investment (ROI).

It’s tempting to believe that intuition – perhaps based on years of experience and success – is enough, especially when margins are tight and data collection and analysis seems like a big investment. But consider this scenario:

Your institution ran a campaign or scholarship initiative that yielded some good results in a key market. But, could those initiatives have performed even better? Did the scholarship need to be that large or would demand have remained strong if it had been smaller or more targeted? Or vice versa: would a bigger scholarship have filled the seats you couldn’t fill in an undersold programme?

There is no way of knowing without data, because there are no comparison points or analytics. And so, the answers to whether your ROI was as strong as it could have been will always be at least slightly vague.

For many institutions faced with a less certain marketplace, answers to questions like these would be extremely important to know:

• How do we increase demand/revenue for certain programmes? For example, in Canada, business courses are no longer linked to the Post-Graduation Work Program (PGWP). Study fields that are linked are agriculture and agri-food, healthcare, STEM, skilled trades, and transportation. Educators are trying to find out how to price programmes in those fields given that they are now the only ones tied to the PGWP. Would demand fall if the price went up? Which programme features could be emphasised to keep demand high (e.g., internships, on-campus housing, the ability to study at home for the first two years, etc.)?

• If demand appears to be low, could it increase if we decreased tuition fees? How much of a price cut would make a difference?

• Which programme/campus features are game-changers for prospective students? The answer would help inform marketing messaging and future investments in different services.

• And for all these questions: how do the answers differ by international student market and segment?

At the , attendees learned more about the benefits of optimising price, features, demand, and revenue in target markets.

Oliver Fortescue, a partner in the education consultancy firm , presented about the firm’s capability to determine the relationship between demand and pricing, and between demand and programme features, in key overseas markets. The model allows institutions to see how students’ “willingness to pay” changes according to different scenarios.

Mr Fortescue used a travel industry example to illustrate that most people will trade off certain features of a journey to arrive at a fare they are comfortable with – e.g., departure and arrival times, number of connections, allowed baggage, or carrier. If a traveller must arrive at their destination as quickly as possible, they might be willing to pay more. If they have more flexibility, they might be more likely to choose a less optimal departure time for a lower fare.

Prospective international students also make trade-offs when deciding where to study. They consider such variables as campus location, cost of living, ease of transportation, length of course, graduate outcomes, rankings, and scholarships.

The Edified team works with institutions to determine their top goals (usually regarding revenue, demand, yield, or all three) and then designs a project accordingly. A partner company secures a custom survey sample of ideal students/parents in key markets (at least 1,000 per market, often more). A choice modelling framework determines how students would respond to different scenarios (e.g., this tuition fee with this course length, this tuition fee with this course length plus a scholarship, this tuition fee/course length/scholarship plus on-campus housing).

Among other results, the model can show the exact points at which demand begins to increase or decrease depending on the scenario. The following slide shows that demand for arts programmes is the most sensitive to a tuition fee increase or decrease of all the programmes in this illustrative choice set.

Institutions can also discover how willing students would be to pay for different features. For example, in the slide below, you can see that a 12-week internship is the most valuable of the possible durations, and that Southeast Asian postgraduate students would be willing to pay significantly more if they were able to study in Melbourne.

This kind of research is not inexpensive, but it adds much greater certainty to recruitment decisions, eliminating the likelihood of costly mistakes such as offering:

• A large scholarship where a smaller, more targeted one would have been just as effective;
• A campaign aimed at a city where there is no intrinsic demand;
• A programme priced so high that it is impossible to sell;
• Additional campus services or a facility expansion that students don’t care about.

Mark Pettitt, founder and CEO of Edified, observes that a more challenging recruiting context can also be viewed as an opportunity:

“I’ve been in this industry for a long time, and the policy environment we are seeing now in some destinations is just another example of a crisis–recovery pattern that has played out for years and that will continue to play out. There will always be changes in government policies, global viruses, geo-political tensions, currencies bottoming out, etc. – followed by a new normal once the crisis has passed. A devotion to students’ well-being and career outcomes; personalised, timely communications with prospective students; strong leadership with a long-term perspective; and an investment in data-informed decision-making will allow some institutions to survive – and even thrive – where others cannot.”

Mr Pettitt adds that data can help to maintain a diversification effort even when visa refusal rates are going up:

“An example of short-term thinking is, ‘I need to cut back in the risky markets because there’s less chance of students being approved … and everyone else is doing that as well.’ What a shame if you have been developing those markets for years – and what a shame for the bright students in those countries who would be perfect for your institution.

What you could do instead is use targeted scholarships to top students from highly reputable schools in the markets everyone else seems to be leaving. Over time, your mix of students can shift dramatically — to high-quality, low-risk students from a range of target countries. Well-considered scholarship programmes can align with diversity goals and boost your competitive position in some of the most promising markets for years to come. Especially during periods when competitors are dropping out of these markets.”

TREND #2

PERSONALISING COMMUNICATIONS

As with understanding demand, precision is key when it comes to communicating with prospective international students. Generic emails are just not going to cut it anymore – students are used to personalisation in their shopping, and they expect it from the schools and universities they are checking out.

A well-configured customer relationship management system (CRM) offers a foundation for the ability to personalise. On the CRM, you can enter information on leads, segment them, and track every contact and result. The information in your CRM enables the creation of custom emails based on individual students’ programme preferences and that skip past general content.

Website data analytics allow you to personalise further. As per :

“Create landing pages tailored to different segments of your audience. These pages should highlight the most relevant information to the visitor, increasing the likelihood of engagement and conversion. For instance, a landing page for international students could feature visa information, housing options, and success stories from other international students.

Implement dynamic content on your website that changes based on the visitor’s profile. A prospective student from a particular region might see testimonials from alumni in their area, while another visitor might see information on scholarships they’re eligible for.”

The Amazon.com main storefront offers a masterclass in personalising content. For example, data-informed recommendations such as “Based on your browsing history,” “Other items you might like,” “Inspired by your shopping trends …”. Amazon is explicit in personalising content – but effective personalisation can simply consist of creating and sending custom content to each of your leads

TREND #3

ON-THE-GROUND REPRESENTATION

Data can show you that in a certain week (or even day), students in target markets:

• Lost interest in one destination and began to consider another;
• Warmed up to a programme they hadn’t considered before;
• Finally accepted an offer of admission because a scholarship was offered;
• Spent a great deal of time on the accommodation section of your website;
• And all sort of other essential insights.

However, data insights do not replace human insights. A student’s ultimate decision about where to study may be decided by such things as:

• An agent who sits down face-to-face with parents and dispels the myth that no one is being approved for visas;
• A returning student who sets up a successful start-up company, signalling to the local market that their study at a particular institution paid off;
• An alumnus who speaks with local school leaders about pathway programme options that will guarantee admission to an institution with high admission standards;
• An in-country representative who sets up a fancy event with great food and successful alumni speakers, and shares video testimonials of happy current students.

Partnering with trusted agents and in-country reps is even more essential when travel budgets are tight and when an institution is trying to keep diversifying despite cost-cutting measures.

Prediction: More sophisticated recruitment strategies in 2025

In times like these, institutions will either lean into or back away from investments in international student recruiting. If the former, the obvious approach is to become more surgical in recruiting, in order to zone in on ideal students who have a good chance of being approved for a visa. Enrolling best-fit students begins a chain reaction of greater student satisfaction, better graduate outcomes, and positive word-of-mouth about your institution.

For additional background, please see:

• “International education has a data problem. It’s time to do something about it“
• “The way forward: Shifting to more strategic and student-centred recruitment“

The post Three international education trends for 2025: Revenue optimisation, marketing personalisation, and on-the-ground local intelligence appeared first on ���Ϲ��� Monitor - Market intelligence for international student recruitment.

A 6 June does just that, and it makes it plain that the company is anticipating lower revenues and job reductions this year, and a smaller international student market for at least the next year, as a result of new policy settings in Australia, Canada, and the United Kingdom.

Those include:

• New student visa settings in Australia, and a newly announced cap on international enrolments that will come into effect in January 2025

• An enrolment cap in Canada for 2024 and 2025

• A new policy preventing students from bringing accompanying dependants during their term of study in the UK

As a result of those policies, and assuming no further changes in key immigration settings, “IDP expects that the size of the international education market will contract over the next 12 months due to the supply side constraints. If current trends continue, international student volumes, as measured by the total number of new international students commencing study in IDP’s six key destination markets, are expected to decline by 20-25% in [fiscal year 2025] relative to the volumes expected to be reported for FY2024.”

Taking that forecast into account, IDP further projects a 15-20% decrease in its student placement volumes for fiscal year 2024. The 6 June guidance indicates that the company will now undertake a cost cutting programme that is “designed to align expenses to the near-term revenue outlook.” In a subsequent investor briefing, a company spokesperson indicated that this would include a 6% reduction in IDP’s global staff complement, which currently sits at more than 6,800 people in over 30 countries.

The news comes as the company’s share price has already been under pressure, with .

However, the company’s statement indicates as well that it expects to weather these short-term challenges, and that IDP remains confident, both in the “long-term structural growth drivers for the international education market” and of its leading market position and roadmap for further product development and innovation.

Expanding on the guidance during a 6 June briefing call, Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director Tennealle O’Shannessy said that she expected the company would not feel the full impact of the recent policy changes because it was “over indexed to high quality universities.”

“The purpose and the intent of the policy changes that you’re seeing across all these nations is to really bring an increasing focus on quality and sustainable growth into the industry,” she added.

“We have seen governments explicitly call out a focus on less scrupulous players, and players that are operating in the lower quality segments. We think that it creates a stronger industry structure and gives opportunity for quality players like IDP to really be operating in a structure that is more consolidated and more sustainable.”

Ms O’Shannessy noted as well, however, the extraordinary scale of significant changes in multiple destinations all at once: ““What is unique in the current environment, however, is the synchronisation of these cycles, with policy settings timing across the IDPs key destinations for Australia and the UK and Canada at the same time.”

Because those new policy directions were “linked to election cycles,” she added, their effects were likely to be short-term.

For additional background, please see:

• “Prospect survey points to key factors in study abroad planning for 2024“
• “The other side of a “V-shaped” recovery: 2024 and the transition to steadier growth in international enrolment“
• “US gains greater share of international student interest amid policy changes in competitor destinations“
• “The impact of immigration settings, affordability, and job opportunities on international students’ study abroad decisions“

The post IDP investor guidance warns of market downturn through 2025 appeared first on ���Ϲ��� Monitor - Market intelligence for international student recruitment.

In total, 1240 agents from over 65 countries responded to the survey, which was distributed in March 2024. Chinese and Indian respondents made up roughly half of the sample.

Affordability matters

As INTO notes:

“Policy discussions that simply assume ranking or prestige of a university is the best indicator of quality of incoming international students significantly overlook the fact that affordability is a major barrier for students. Over 80% of our agents agreed that study abroad discussions are becoming increasingly focused on cost.”

Price-sensitivity was highest in Africa (96%) and lowest in the Middle East (75%).

Alternative destinations on the rise

Three of the “Big Four” destinations (Australia, Canada, and the UK) have tightened their immigration settings and have become even more expensive to study and live in. Not coincidentally, agents indicate a growing trend of students applying to alternative destinations – especially in Europe and Asia.

Agents from South Asia and Middle East & Africa regions cited Europe the most (especially Germany and Ireland), while Chinese agents noted increased interest in intra-regional options, especially in Southeast Asia. Chinese agents also highlighted “rising interest in international schooling options, more localized pathway provision and a heightened sense of priority given to geographic and cultural proximity.” INTO suggests this means “there are significant opportunities for future growth in transnational educational arrangements.”

International students “hedging their bets”

Students are applying to an increasing number of institutions and destinations, and many are working with multiple agents, hedging their bets. The noise created in the marketplace as a result is well illustrated in the finding that 21% of agents submitted applications to more than 60 universities in 2023, and 11% sent them to more than 100 institutions. As INTO notes:

“There are some strong incentives for students to [submit so many applications] at present. In some countries limited availability of visa appointments, or large delays to visa decisions, coupled with lack of clarity about evolving landscape, increase the reasons for needing a good back-up plan should their preferred destination become less desirable, or accessible.”

INTO points out the administrative burden placed on institutions with so many applications whirring around and sometimes little indication of which ones are from truly serious leads, calling it “pressure on universities to effectively resource admissions” that will “ultimately result in lower rates of conversion and enrolment.”

INTO makes a prediction for 2024 based on all the frenzied application-sending from anxious students:

“We believe that in 2024 this will likely impact on the timing of when students commit to study abroad decisions, both in terms of confirming places (and completing a financial deposit), or if primary choice remains uncertain, potentially opting to defer enrolment until greater clarity is available.”

Destination specialists are the exception, not the norm

Less than a quarter of agents said they specialised in sending students to only one destination in the past year. More than three-quarters (78%) said they’d recruited students to more than one destination; 44% had sent students outside of the Big Four (Australia, Canada, UK, US); and about a third (34%) had sent students to institutions across the “Big Four.” From this, INTO concludes:

“In this global, highly competitive and increasingly crowded landscape, it is essential that universities and colleges can find ways to clearly communicate their proposition in order to stand out and be positioned effectively relative to a global range of options.”

Time is of the essence

While institutions may not be able to control policies, they do have a lot more control over how well and how quickly they get back to student enquiries – and the chart below shows how important this is to agents.

INTO elaborates:

“Service response times stand out from the crowd in terms of importance to agents. It seems reasonable to conclude that delivering on these will enable institutions to stand out also. That does not mean that outcomes, student experience, employability don’t count. They do. But, if there is one area to focus limited resource, service standards feel like a great place to start.”

Growing participation in training and accreditation programmes

The past few years have seen an increasing number of professional qualification programmes available to agents, and the INTO survey shows that some of these are now industry standards. For example, “one in four respondents indicated they had participated in ���Ϲ���’s agent certification programme” and “of those sending to the UK, 79% of respondents indicated they had received some form of training from the British Council,” whereas, “By contrast, only 17% of those sending to the United States indicated they have received training or certification.”

For additional background, please see:

• “The rise of alternative destinations: Thailand, Poland, and the Philippines”
• “Southeast Asian students increasingly considering “studying abroad” closer to home”
• “The impact of immigration settings, affordability, and job opportunities on international students’ study abroad decisions”

The post Agent survey finds growing interest in alternative destinations; many students “hedging” plans with multiple applications appeared first on ���Ϲ��� Monitor - Market intelligence for international student recruitment.

Education agents were overwhelmingly ranked as the top source of information by parents with 86.5% saying that they relied most on agents (up from 74% at the time of the last survey cycle in 2021). This compares to the 52.5% who said they turned to school websites, recommendations from friends and family (46.9%), and school visits (27%).

Similarly, nearly all respondent-parents (86.3%) of prospective students said that they intended to apply through an education agent (up from 71% in 2021). Among respondents of currently enrolled students, 88.49% said they had applied through an agency, another notable increase from the 78% who said they did so in the 2021 survey.

“It is increasingly clear from our surveys, that agents have been playing a more and more important role in the admission process. UK schools need to be aware of this trend and work more closely with agents,” said the survey report.

For parents of prospective students, local accreditation was a top factor in choosing an agent (96% rated this as “important” or “very important”), alongside provision of guardianship services (97%), recommendations from friends and family (77%), and fees (67%).

Other notable changes from the 2021 survey include:

• Reasons for study abroad. Most respondents (73%) cited “pressure from the current Chinese education system” as the main reason for exploring study abroad (up from 41% in 2021). This was followed by an interest in “a more well-rounded education” (70%), and getting on a pathway to enter a top-ranked university (50%; up from 33% in 2021).

• Destination choice. Along with the UK, parents were most likely to consider the US, Canada, Hong Kong, Singapore, and Australia when planning for K-12 studies abroad. “Security and safety and educational quality were rated as the top two factors in choice of destination,” adds BSA. “But employment prospects/immigration possibility was more prominent this year at 28%, compared with only 12% in 2021.”

For additional background, please see:

• “What is behind the dramatic expansion of the international schools sector?“
• “Japan and Europe increasingly important sending markets for Canada’s K-12 schools“
• “British independent K-12 schools expanding overseas campuses“

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The episode features a special discussion on the role of sub-agents and aggregators with special guests Gautham Kolluri, the founder and managing director of CIP Study Abroad and Chris Price, senior vice-president partnerships (UK & Europe) with .

We conclude with a closer look at Ecuador and some of the distinct characteristics of this emerging Latin market.

You can listen right now in the player below, and we encourage you to subscribe via your favourite podcast app in order to receive future episodes automatically.

For additional background, please see:

• “���Ϲ��� Podcast: Quality assurance in student recruitment from India“

The post ���Ϲ��� Podcast: Tackling the sub-agent dilemma and the pros and cons of aggregated recruitment appeared first on ���Ϲ��� Monitor - Market intelligence for international student recruitment.

“This is a sector-wide shift,” says BONARD’s Chief Intelligence Officer, Patrik Pavlacic. “And it will be interesting to monitor the situation in the immediate future, as the sector moves on from the pandemic crisis and study destinations globally compete aggressively for student recruitment.”

That latest study, , was released today by The American International Recruitment Council (AIRC) and industry research specialists BONARD, with the support of the National Association for College Admission Counseling (NACAC) and the Association of International Education Administrators (AIEA).

The study gathered responses from roughly 200 US colleges and 100 education agencies in order to provide a multi-perspective view of the state of international student recruitment in the US.

Educator-respondents reported weighing a number of factors when vetting a new education agent, including the market where the potential partner is based, quality of students referred, and external certifications or reference checks.

Most indicated a preference for agent compensation based on a fixed post-enrolment per capita fee (63%), as opposed to a commission based on a percentage of either gross (17%) or net (17%) tuition.

How institutions are approaching recruitment

Just over half of responding colleges (54%) say that international recruitment at their institutions is organised and carried out within their admissions office. As we see in the table below, others rely on recruitment staff within their international offices, or as carried out by multiple operating units across the institutions.

The survey also finds that US colleges are recruiting across a wide range of channels, with virtual events still the most prominent (93%), followed narrowly by in-person events for nine in ten respondents.

The agent’s perspective

Agent-respondents to this year’s survey say that market demand/student preference (54%), along with US career opportunities (18%), and “increasing the number and variety of institutions we serve” (18%) are their main reasons for recruiting for US institutions.

Responding agents also reported a number of challenges in recruiting to the US, including costs (65%) and visa issues (53%). An accompanying statement from AIRC/BONARD adds that, “Crucially, almost a third of educational agencies (29%) report not having enough partners in the US, which indicates there is scope for further partnership-building opportunities.”

To that point of building new agent-educator relationships, the survey report adds that agents prioritise the programmes offered by a potential institutional partner, followed by considerations of cost, ranking, student life, and career supports/graduate outcomes. “Overall, the survey reveals that educational agencies place the highest importance on how their partner institutions benefit their student clients,” adds the report.

For additional background, please see:

• “New forecast warns that US is falling behind in the global race for talent“
• “AIRC releases best practices guidance for US institutions“
• “What role can agents play in diversifying foreign enrolment across a wider range of fields of study?“

The post Nearly two-thirds of US colleges now working with agents appeared first on ���Ϲ��� Monitor - Market intelligence for international student recruitment.

The episode features a special discussion on the role that agents play in destination marketing. It was recorded live at the recent ���Ϲ��� ANZA event in Perth, Australia, where Martijn was joined on stage by Fionna Brazier, destination marketing manager with StudyPerth; Larnie Batten, the director of StudyNT; and Janine Huxford, manager, global events and agents for Education New Zealand.

We conclude with a closer look at New Zealand and its distinct approach to controlled growth in international education.

You can listen right now in the player below, and we encourage you to subscribe via your favourite podcast app in order to receive future episodes automatically.

For additional background, please see:

“���Ϲ��� Podcast: How student accommodation crises are affecting international education“

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