Transcript
Rustam Irani: Affiliate sites are just fraud traffic. Why would we even be on affiliate sites? I've heard that. more times than I can count over the past 20 years.
Rustam Irani: And look, I get it. There's definitely some sites and actors out there. over the years. that I've known of. that. don't do things the right way that play a gray hat. or maybe even block that kind of strategy at times. I've been in many conversations around that.
Rustam Irani: but at the end The end of the day. you know I believe that there are some opportunities there that a lot of us might be missing.
Rustam Irani: at a school I was at. we found an interesting take when we had looked at the traffic that was coming to our website and even traffic that was coming through Google.
Rustam Irani: There's about 20 % of those inquiries that were coming in and those leads that were coming into our school. that were coming from directory sites and affiliate traffic.
Rustam Irani: And. These weren't just junk clicks. These are actual. Inquiries, applications. and students. And.
Rustam Irani: That opened my eye. to realizing that. There's a lot more. than meets the eye. Welcome back to ROI University podcast for higher ed marketers and leaders who want to change. the game. and themselves.
Rustam Irani: I'm Rister Birani, your host. former higher ed CMO and now on the agency side working with lots of schools and universities and tackling uh Amazing, fun, and challenging marketing problems.
Rustam Irani: As I mentioned, I've been... doing this for over 20 years back in 2008 -2009. I was working for a marketing company.
Rustam Irani: And... We were doing a ton. of... marketing and lead generation or inquiry generation for universities and colleges and schools. cross nation.
Rustam Irani: And one of the interesting things there was. it was being done through a lot of directory listings and directory sites. So these are sites like college degrees dot com gradprograms .com. There's so many different variations of these sites.
Rustam Irani: Now, back in 2008, 2009, it was a different time. And over the years, I've seen many different variations of... you know these sites and At the end of the day, the important thing here is what is the traffic that is actually coming to the site? Where is it coming from? How are these prospective students finding this site, getting to the site.
Rustam Irani: engaging with this site and then when they do engage with the site what happens afterwards. And so when you start to kind of understand that and you have a good.
Rustam Irani: understanding of where some of these sites have come from how they were built how long they've been around That really starts to open up. your understanding more of the value.
Rustam Irani: of a lot of these sites again, at a school that I was at. we built out a model and we had a tool that we're using that would Look at.
Rustam Irani: and create. an id a student id or not a student id but an id like a gclid and like a google click id that would track you know basically a pixel that would track a student and see or sorry a lehede and see where they would go across sites.
Rustam Irani: And what we realized was when we were tracking it back to the sources of where some of these people that were coming in to our site.
Rustam Irani: or into our funnel we're coming from. we found that 20 % almost 20 % and at times even a little bit more and I was actually just speaking To somebody else about this this week that in there platform and what they're seeing.
Rustam Irani: is almost 24 plus percent. of their inquiries that are coming in. Head. at one point in their student journey. seen them on one of these directory listing or affiliate sites.
Rustam Irani: which is... pretty impactful when you think about it one in five one in four of your perspective students. have done some research and seen you on one of these sites.
Rustam Irani: Right. now The question I always get is, you know, well, there's some like. These affiliate sites, we don't want to be involved. There's fraud. There's there's a lot of you know garbage out there and so on. and Honestly.
Rustam Irani: i can't disagree because i've seen some of this over the years but if you know what you're doing you know who you're working with you know how long they've been around how their sites work.
Rustam Irani: uh and so on there are some really really good sites that are out there. And these sites do absolutely play a role in a student's decision.
Rustam Irani: and you know are impactful. in what they're kind of deciding to do you know. i think like Thank you. Most you know marketing enrollment leaders are looking at, you know hey,
Rustam Irani: What are the external factors out there? Obviously, there's cost per lead pressures, there's cost per... application enrollment pressures there's limited budgets there's all these things to consider so you're trying to think about you know, my marketing investment, how can I get it in front of our ideal student?
Rustam Irani: most effectively and most efficiently. What channels do I need to be looking at? Where are those touch points? Where are students looking for us? and i think a big area that a lot of people miss in this side because of the stigma because of their maybe previous experience because of what they've just heard is these affiliate or directory listing sites.
Rustam Irani: We've seen over the years were You can absolutely. uh uh success and finding students ideal students on these sites now there's a number of things to kind of consider here and i'll talk about that in a little bit but you know It's interesting when you think about you know the history of how some of these sites kind of came to be
Rustam Irani: you know Back in 2008, again, this is when I got my first exposure. There were a lot of sites that were being... uh pumped out the actually affiliate ecosystem just in general across multiple different industries and verticals was really taking off.
Rustam Irani: And so. basically what Google was seeing was looking for relevant content, relevant information that people were looking for and our students were looking for. right so if we had a domain called psychology degrees calm and it had very relevant information on all of the different psychology degrees that are out there.
Rustam Irani: you know different schools information. public information, iPads information, all of these different sources that can be kind of combined. These were very valuable sites that Google said, Hey,
Rustam Irani: They have a lot of great information. Students can get there. They can have unbiased data and information. And, you know, they were giving these sites a lot of. credibility.
Rustam Irani: and a lot of credit and you would see that because the traffic to these sites continued to increase. and continue to become you know powerful.
Rustam Irani: and what these folks who are building these sites obviously On their end, they said, hey. Well, we've got these prospective students coming to these sites.
Rustam Irani: How can we give them some options and get them to the schools? to talk to them. right and give them some options for school so there was a couple you know that that was kind of like how all of this was was built out. Now there's a ton of different ways that things are work now where you can do a you know host and post which basically You go to one of these sites You host, you know, they host a forum.
Rustam Irani: four -year school, the student prospective student fills out the form. puts in their information and it goes directly to your CRM. goes directly to you. There's also link outs where they'll put a banner for your school or they'll put a link a cta for your school highlight your school. Maybe it's relevant content. Maybe you have an incredible master's degree that you want to promote within a relevant article.
Rustam Irani: or on a type of site. where they can click. and get directly to one of your landing pages where they would have a branded experience and then come through that way.
Rustam Irani: There's a lot of different kind of opportunities there. There's sponsored listings on some sites. There's some review sites like Niche and others that are out there.
Rustam Irani: but
Rustam Irani: there are absolutely a number of people that come to these sites. That are doing research that are looking for information.
Rustam Irani: that may not come directly to you initially. and this is all a part of their research. similar to what we have conversations with some of our clients on.
Rustam Irani: whether it's connected TV or it's meta campaigns. you know the funnel is longer These are all touch points. These are all... awareness campaigns to get people. to see who you are.
Rustam Irani: Are you relevant for them? Is it a good fit for them? you know And if it is, then they'll take that next step and they'll come through and they're more educated.
Rustam Irani: They have a higher intent. and they have more insight. into what some other options are. So they've already done some of that research. And. Really?
Rustam Irani: We're seeing a lot of this kind of happening right now where a lot of that information is coming through in the LLMs, right? A lot of people are getting some information.
Rustam Irani: uh beforehand they're getting a good rundown of information and then they're more educated when they do come to the site so we are seeing and i think i've talked about this increases and some of the down final conversion rates for organic traffic.
Rustam Irani: But again. Did they see you somewhere else before? Were you in their mind before? Did they research you before? And so that's really important to kind of keep in mind.
Rustam Irani: and And I think, you know. There are a lot of other considerations that students go through. that are important. right and A lot of times you're researching.
Rustam Irani: other. options, other opportunities and these sites do do a good job of giving a rundown on other options. on strengths, weaknesses. A lot of times they showcase you know there's rankings that tied to many different factors. there's articles on online programs that are great for working mothers. there's there's
Rustam Irani: online programs that are great for people who have full -time jobs. There's all these other factors there that a lot of times This information is out there.
Rustam Irani: For. people to make better decisions. right and i think we tend to forget that that a lot of the core of what these sites came out why these sites came out, why these affiliate sites and these directory listings were built.
Rustam Irani: was for giving prospective students more information. better information. and resources so they can make a more informed decision.
Rustam Irani: Right. And. I believe that. They've done that. I believe that. we've seen how there are you know I would say there's at least half a dozen to a dozen.
Rustam Irani: very solid partners out there that are continuing to build resource resources. Content.
Rustam Irani: sites directory listings. that are very, very useful and helpful for prospective students. understand. what's happening.
Rustam Irani: in in the market? What are some options? You know, and not only that, but like. what are some other Down funnel. you know things that they should consider career outcomes.
Rustam Irani: There's some great, great content on career outcomes. across many different you know schools and where the top interns land from some of these schools. Like that's very relevant information, right? For somebody who's looking at going back to get their masters. My daughter's actually looking at that. And these are the types of sites that she's looking at to see.
Rustam Irani: How are, you know, where do University of Texas students get their jobs and internships and where do other master's programs, you know, rank as far as like.
Rustam Irani: placement in states because she'd like to stay in the southeast. there's just so many different things to kind of consider there.
Rustam Irani: I... have seen it over the years many many years that There is a place across, you know, and it's really an omni -channel world, right? where Again, and maybe you've heard that HubSpot talking about this loop versus kind of the direct funnel of how people come. in but they're constantly researching, they're constantly getting information and so on. and Is your brand in front of them?
Rustam Irani: Creating this awareness. uh which a lot of these sites help you do and then b Are you out there? where you should be when these conversations are happening and those are definitely things to kind of keep in mind and and consider and I'm a big believer that you know for the right sites, for the right content, there is an opportunity.
Rustam Irani: to Fine. Very high intent prospective students across some of these. affiliate sites and directory listings. And I think. you know i Personally, it was Pretty surprised what I saw. that 20 percent of the traffic that we were getting to our site at some point in time. saw our brand on one of these sites.
Rustam Irani: to me. That was huge. And that was when I realized the value. of this and Again, in my recent conversation.
Rustam Irani: even just this week. it sounds like maybe it might even be more now So... you know i think you need to kind of just keep open -minded as far as like when channels start to evolve tick tock is another one i've had conversations with some presidents who've said Nope. We're not doing TikTok.
Rustam Irani: and Now they're open to it and this was a year and a half two years ago when we had that conversation and i think over time. Just understanding. the different
Rustam Irani: ways our students are getting information. where they're finding out about us. It may not be just the areas that we think. and also I think it's okay to... you know sometimes Give.
Rustam Irani: chance to something where you might have a bias. and that's just because you're not aware of a lot of what's good out there. And I do believe there are some great sites that are out there.
Rustam Irani: So. If you haven't tried it I would definitely. recommend, uh, there's probably a few great partners out there.
Rustam Irani: uh to consider and seeing if you could get your brand listed in the right places at the right time. So your students can find you. That's all for this episode of ROI University.
Rustam Irani: We're the biggest ROI. is personal.
