The Client

Harlow College has undergone a transformation over the past five to six years and recently achieved the prestigious status of No 1 college in England. It is a medium-sized tertiary college located on a single site close to Harlow town centre, North West Essex. The college draws around half of its learners from Harlow and the remainder largely from West Essex and East Hertfordshire. The college’s main work is vocational education and training.

The Principal has been in post approximately 5 years and immediately bought a focus on teaching and learning.Harlow now have excellent A level results, with a 100% pass rate, and are rated No1 in England for overall success on full-time courses.

The Challenge

Although Harlow College have recently been rated as the No 1 college in England, there is a perception issue with students, parents and key stakeholders, mainly due to a historical legacy of poor results, which has manifested itself with many high achieving pupils continuing to opt for other educational choices.

With changing funding agreements Harlow recognised the need to promote and celebrate their No1 status of the college to increase enrolment numbers.

What we did

Mackman created a tactical marketing campaign to raise awareness of Harlow College’s newly achieved status as the No1 college in England.

As Harlow have a range of stakeholders, the campaign needed to reach a broad cross section. The starting point of the campaign was undertaking a perception survey with students and parents. The output from the research enabled us to shape, develop and deliver a fully integrated ten week campaign based around four key themes;

• Grab Awareness – Launch emails, posters, window panels
• Engagement – Tshirt competition/Microsite/PR/Social media
• Reinforcement – Broadsheet
• PR & Advertising – local PR and advertising including posters strategically placed at tube and train stations, bus stops and bus backs as well as press events.

This is the first phase in the college’s strategic marketing plan to help change perception, drive increased student recruitment, partnership working and investment opportunities, which Mackman are delighted to continue to be instrumental in.

What we achieved

• Student enrollment up by 19%
• Campaign returned £21 for every £1 spent
• 16% increase in open day attendance
• 24% increase in website traffic
• Facebook likes up by 387%