So, nice work getting everyone’s attention! What made you decide to analyze all your college emails this way? Vice presidents of enrollment and deans of admission are tweeting about it and commenting on it. As I said in a previous message, your post is getting a lot of traction in higher ed enrollment, admissions, and marketing circles. With those caveats in mind, here’s the interview. So, again, we’re dealing with a fairly rare demographic here. can realistically hope to recruit.ģ) Popopopper123 mentioned in the interview that their parents have saved enough money so that no loans/debt will be required to pay for their education. So let me repeat, Popopopper123 is not representative of the types of students most colleges in the U.S. Are you ready for this? 1540 SAT, 36 ACT, 4.2 weighted GPA. In a comment on the thread, they shared their test scores and GPA. But I’d be remiss if I didn’t point out a few things before we begin:ġ) A focus group of one can be very illuminating (as this one is), but it’s also extreme grain-of-salt territory.Ģ) Popopopper123 is not a “typical” college applicant. It was, first and foremost, tons of fun! Popopopper123 was open and honest and reflective and easy to talk to, and I think their insights and opinions provide real food for thought for those of us in this industry. I conducted the interview via Reddit’s message function over the course of yesterday and last night. Second, they did reveal that they applied to and were accepted ED by a very good school (trust me, you’ve heard of it), but they asked me not to name it. First, no identifying/specific real-world information about them. They agreed, but with a couple ground rules in place. It’s about as close to viral as we get in this industry, hungry as we all are to understand the preferences, desires, and whims of the students its our job to recruit.īecause I was so taken with the depth of their analysis and the quality of their writing, I reached out to Popopopper123 to see if they’d be interested in being interviewed about what the whole process of being marketed to by the higher ed industry has been like. Not too long after the post went live, it started zinging around higher ed admissions, enrollment, and marketing social media circles. If you haven’t already, you should give the whole thing, including the comments, a quick read. It was also extremely well written and occasionally hilarious (be sure to catch the bit about naming conventions in Pennsylvania’s state school system). The post immediately stood out in the r/ApplyingToCollege subreddit for its thoroughness and sheer volume of information.
On Monday morning, Reddit user Popopopper123 posted an analysis of the college marketing emails they’ve received over the last couple years, 2,374 of them be exact.