Higher Education Texting Platform for Colleges and Universities
Today's students expect to hear from their institutions the same way they hear from everyone else — by text. Textedly helps colleges and universities reach students, alumni, and parents with campus alerts, enrollment reminders, and event announcements that actually get read.
Texting for Higher Education
The process of texting college students is simple and easy using Textedly. Our features allow you to automate, segment, and review analytics so every text can be crafted to your SMS campus messaging.
College SMS messaging is a powerful marketing tool for delivering customized information to particular populations, such as parents, prospective students, alumni, and donors. Higher education SMS messages can also serve as an effective call to action for a range of purposes, such as surveying recipients, soliciting donations, and driving traffic to online materials.
Why Texting College Students Works
Reach students easily and instantly with mass texting for educators.
- 33% of undergrads own a smartphone.
- 5 hours are dedicated each day by students on their phone
- 28 times every day a student will pick up their phone up and check notifications or messages.
- 91% of college students prefer text messages over voicemails.
According to the ECAR Study of Undergraduate Students and Information Technology, 95% of undergraduates own a smartphone. An analysis by communication scholars in 2019 found that most students are on their phones five hours per day and check messages 28 times per day. So messaging clearly provides an immediate and inclusive means for connecting with members of the campus community.
More than three-quarters of all college students want to receive information from their institution by text message and 91% prefer it over voicemail. Sending texts is a far more effective means of communicating than sending emails. Less than one-quarter of emails are opened but 98% of text messages are opened. Emails receive less than a 5% click-through rate (CTR) and those typically occur an hour and a half after the email is sent, but texts have a nearly 50% CTR and are acted on in under two minutes.
18 Sample SMS Messages for Colleges
College SMS marketing is a vital part of the higher education system. It allows colleges and universities to reach their own communities and build direct relationships with constituents in and beyond the campus instantaneously. Education staff can prioritize school SMS efforts and save time when applying college texting to these use cases among others:
- Fundraising campaigns
- Marketing sports, arts, and other events
- Outreach to alumni
- Schools texting parents
- Connecting prospective students to admissions officers
- Reminders about upcoming deadlines
- Sharing news and studies
- Sending alerts about emergencies
- Linking to websites or online content
- Publicizing contests and other forms of engagement
Universities and education institutions are actively using texting to increase enrollment, reach their students, minimize drop-outs, track campaign success, and develop supportive communication channels that benefit students. The benefit of college texting is that people on staff do not have to over allocate efforts on less effective outreach and instead, can quickly create impact at scale.
Try any of the university text templates below for your SMS campus campaign.
18 Sample SMS Messages for Colleges
Templates for Texting Alumni
Templates for Texting Parents
Sample SMS for College Admissions
How to Start Sending College & University Text Messages
Ready to take advantage of education marketing campaigns and all that mass texting has to offer? Here’s how to start sending college and university text messages:
Sign Up For a Text Marketing Platform
Research the platforms that are available and find the one that is best for your institution. Not every platform is designed to serve the particular needs and populations of higher education institutions. Choosing the right platform will save time and money later.
Upload Current List of Contacts
Using the platform’s tools, upload your organization’s list of contacts in one of the file formats available. As your contact list grows over time, be sure to remember to update the platform.
Compile Text Templates
Different audiences call for different kinds of messages. Crafting thoughtful templates for the different outreach needs your organization will have can improve the efficiency of your campaigns. Save those templates so you can easily find them when needed.
Set Up a Campaign Keyword
When it comes to mass texting for education, it all starts with a keyword. Carefully select a keyword that is relevant to your audience and campaign. Then, set it up in your text marketing platform. When potential or current students text in this keyword to your number, they will automatically be opted-in to your college SMS messages.
Promote Your Keyword
Once you have your campaign keyword set up in your text marketing platform, you’ll have to spread the word to encourage users to opt-in.
Send College & University Texts
When you’re using an SMS platform, actually sending the message is easy. You can send it immediately, schedule it to be delivered at a particular time, or have it be triggered by a specific action, such as clicking on a link or replying to a message.
Additional SMS Features for Universities
Scheduled Text Messages
Secure SMS Payments. Request and collect secure payments by text messaging. Create payment requests that send as text messages to customers asking them to pay. Track requests and revenue all in one place and watch as your revenue grows as payments come into your bank account.
Text Surveys
Textedly’s higher education texting platform makes it easy to create and send SMS surveys to students, parents, and faculty. You can use surveys to request feedback after orientation day or to ask students about preferred events.
Auto Reply Texts
These are automated replies triggered by specific keywords or actions from the recipient. For example, a student might text a specific code to get information on library hours or to confirm their attendance.
Group Texting
Our texting platform lets you segment your contacts into groups who you can text simultaneously. You can have different groups for new students, parents, staff, and interested prospects.
Personalized Messages
Personalized texting offers better engagement for your university. Refer to your students by their first names or reference their majors.
Why Users Love Textedly
Best for Marketing & Review Management
Textedly allows you to really customize the campaigns you’re sending, who you’re sending them to, when they go out, and much more. We have retained many customers and generated revenue from Textedly.
Simple, Smart, & Personal
I needed a simple way to stay connected with my clients about things like appointments, birthdays, payment reminders, and holiday greetings, and this platform made that possible without overwhelming me
Textedly Has Made my Business More Money
It’s quick, simple, and has saved me so much time. My clients love it because they never miss an announcement, and I love it because it’s helped me grow engagement and sales.
Sending College SMS Messages With Textedly
Textedly is a leading provider of SMS messaging services. Whether you need a college texting service to send ten messages to a targeted group or a bulk message to 100,000 people, Textedly has the tools and expertise to make it happen.
And Textedly’s flexible, state-of-the-art platform makes it easy to monitor your campaign’s performance. Sign up for a 14-day free trial today.
