Fanshawe College Case Study

INTRODUCTION

Fanshawe College, London, Ontario.

International students represent approximately 25% of their 22,000 full-time students.

CHALLENGE

With 65 percent of international students coming from India in 2017, Fanshawe College was looking to diversify their international population.

“We understand that India will remain a major international market, but with physical presence established in India for the last 9 years, the focus has shifted to attracting students from under-represented markets.” - Saurabh Malhotra, Manager - International Recruitment and Market Development

SOLUTION

Within the past couple of years Fanshawe College has adopted the core belief of gaining efficiency through digital tools.

“Everyone is being asked to produce more, while spending less. If you’re able to do this without using digital tools, that’s a miracle. With this in mind, efficiency, diversity and impact were our key goals in leveraging digital tools.” - Saurabh Malhotra, Manager - International Recruitment and Market Development

To help develop their digital eff ort, Fanshawe partnered with IDP Connect in June of 2017 to promote their institution and academic programs on Hotcourses international sites, with the end goal of diversifying their international student population and increasing the number of students from underrepresented countries. They did this through creating Global Content Hubs, excluding India, on Hotcourses international sites and re-engaging prospective students throughout via retargeting digital advertising campaigns.

To determine the impact of their IDP Connect partnership through enrollments, Fanshawe was able to run the IDP Connect Enrollment Matcher Tool (EMT), which matches the institution’s list of enrolled international students with IDP Connect’s registered users on Hotcourses international sites. Fanshawe uploaded their list of enrolled international students (for winter 2018, spring 2018 and fall 2018 intake period), excluding Indian students, to determine the percentage of their enrolled international students that can be attributed to IDP Connect.

RESULTS

The IDP Connect EMT allows partner institutions to match enrolled, admitted and/or applied students with students who have registered on Hotcourses international sites. Fanshawe’s Content Hub profile on Hotcourses’ international sites generated the following from September 1, 2017 to August 31, 2018.

ATTRIBUTION

The EMT results found that 35 of Fanshawe’s inquiries generated from Hotcourses international sites went on to enroll. An additional 75 nonIndian international student enrolled at Fanshawe College matched as registered users on Hotcourses international sites. These 75 matches, for instance, could have researched Fanshawe College on Hotcourses international sites and went on to apply without directly inquiring through a Hotcourses site. Since Fanshawe has only partnered with IDP Connect for one year, they took a conservative assessment and attributed 5 percent of non-inquiry matches to IDP Connect, equating to an additional 4 students enrolling as a result of their partnership. Fanshawe plans to increase this 5 percent attribution for IDP Connect non-inquiry enrollments as time goes on and the partnership matures.

Overall, Fanshawe College attributed 39 enrollments to IDP Connect, from the source markets they were targeting, or 4.37 percent of total non-Indian international student enrollments for the winter 2018, spring 2018 and fall 2018 enrollment periods.

Fanshawe calculated a return of $15.77 for every dollar spent with IDP Connect.

“That is something I appreciate about IDP Connect’s digital tools as well, that I am able to pinpoint and assign a dollar figure for everything.” - Saurabh Malhotra, Manager - International Recruitment and Market Development

In just over one year, the IDP Connect partnership has delivered on all three key goals for Fanshawe’s core digital belief: efficiency, diversity and impact.

“In 2018, even though our overall international student enrollment numbers have grown, Indian students now represent 58 percent of our international student population. This is due to diversification efforts and adding new international source markets through such tools as Hotcourses.” - Saurabh Malhotra, Manager - International Recruitment and Market Development

It’s important to note that IDP Connect does not force registration on the 47 million international students visiting Hotcourses sites each year, so not all users who research Fanshawe are able to be included in the EMT matches. The matches generated from the EMT is the minimum return that can be attributed to Fanshawe’s partnership with IDP Connect.