CCS Recruitment Open House Case Study

Drawing Bigger
Open House Attendances

Detroit’s College for Creative Studies (CCS) wanted to increase applications from prospective students, so one of PUSH 22’s first tasks upon being named CCS’ digital media agency of record was to raise awareness and increase attendance for their February open house—a critical event on their recruiting calendar. By rethinking their digital media strategy, we helped to more than double year-over-year attendance numbers.

” I just wanted to share some good news. We had a record-breaking open house turnout for February compared to the same open house last year. The difference is huge! Thanks for all your work on this! ”

– Megan Mesack, Associate Director of Marketing, CCS

Creating the Perfect Persona

We worked closely with CCS to understand the criteria for a high-potential, high-quality applicant—then crafted a broad-based digital strategy to connect with them. We identified the specific online entertainment and social media channels where CCS could reach its ideal candidates, and crafted channel-specific media designed to connect with top prospects.

Aligning the CCS Media Strategy

Geotargeted internet radio and high visibility social media posts brought CCS to the attention of its highest-value prospects at the places and times when they would be most receptive to the CCS message—and most likely to develop an interest in CCS as their school of choice.

Precision retargeted ads spoke to those who’d visited the CCS site but hadn’t yet submitted an application.

Custom Intent targeting enabled us to reach additional prospects whose online behavior indicated that they were actively researching undergraduate schools, but who had never visited a CCS site.

Doubling Open House Attendance

While working to optimize the reach and impact of a very limited budget, PUSH 22 succeeded in gaining both the attention and the interest of the precise population of high-value prospective students CCS sought to attract. We were able to more than double their year-over-year RSVP numbers, boosting student and total guest RSVPs by 124%. Actual student attendance was up by 77% and overall guest attendance by 137%—far exceeding their expectations.