Race/Ethnicity Data Request Policy
Based on the 2023 United States Supreme Court decision, race/ethnicity data collected on the undergraduate admissions application will not be loaded into the banner system until the first day of classes and should not be shared/viewed prior to that time without an approved exception. Exceptions can be granted for data related to race/ethnicity to be shared with individuals, preferably outside of the admissions firewall (those who do not participate in [...]
2023 Transfer Accept/Decline Survey
View survey data Each year we send a survey to all admitted transfer students who accept or decline their offer of admission. Our goal is to understand why students choose to come to the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign or choose to go elsewhere, and what matters most when making that decision. We also try to assess how UIUC performs when it comes to counseling, communications, customer service, and more. [...]
Accept/Decline
What Is the Accept/Decline Survey? Each year, we survey all students admitted to the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, including both first-year and transfer students who have accepted or declined their offer of admission. The survey gathers insights on how students discovered the university, their reasons for choosing or not choosing Illinois, and other factors that influenced their decision. How Can My Unit Use the Data Collected? This is [...]
2023 First-Year Accept/Decline Survey
View survey data Each year we send a survey to all admitted undergraduate students who accept or decline their offer of admission. Our goal is to understand why students choose to come to the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign or choose to go elsewhere, and what matters most when making that decision. We also try to assess how UIUC performs when it comes to counseling, communications, customer service, and more. [...]
Unit Presentations
Learn more about the organizational structures, biggest challenges, most successful outcomes, and more of each of our undergraduate academic communities through these presentations, given in summer 2023. College of Agricultural, Consumer, & Environmental Sciences View ACES presentation slides (pptx) College of Applied Health Sciences View AHS presentation slides (pptx) College of Education View EDU presentation slides (pptx) College of Fine & Applied Arts [...]
Email Policy
All emails to OUA audiences are created in Litmus and sent via Slate in coordination with Enrollment Management. This ensures that emails are templated and accessible, student statuses are accurate, and more. Audience Before creating an email, please review our audience policy to ensure you can communicate with your intended audience. Content As you're creating an email, make sure you adhere to the following standards: 1. Stay relevant to your [...]
Audience Policy
Academic units can communicate with students at the inquiry, admitted, and accepted stages: Inquiries - Students who have expressed an interest in Illinois and your college's interest area Admits - Students who have been admitted into your college/major at Illinois but haven't yet accepted their offer to attend Accepts - Students within your college/major who have accepted their offer to attend Illinois Prospects We cannot process any college emails to [...]
Forms Policy
In many cases, forms need to be created in Slate. Below are our general policies as to when and why Slate forms are required. To learn how to create a form in Slate, check out our Slate form training. To view this training, you must log into Google through your illinois.edu email address. Prospective Student Forms If your form is for prospective students, it needs to be in Slate. This [...]
New to R&Y?
Welcome to the R&Y Network! This page is your starting point to learn more and explore training opportunities. Access Join the R&Y Network The R&Y Network is a collaborative community of University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign faculty and staff dedicated to supporting undergraduate recruitment and yield efforts. Through shared resources, training opportunities, and open communication, the network fosters transparency, inclusivity, and teamwork to enhance the university’s enrollment strategies and ensure student [...]
How to Submit a Request
Requests must be submitted by a communications, marketing, or admissions representative within your college. Generally, we do not process requests from individual departments; instead, those should be routed through the college staff members authorized to submit requests. Email Send Requests Before submitting your email send request, review our email policy, audience policy, and blackout dates to ensure we can accommodate your request. Once your email is created and in Slate, [...]
Training Overview
Trainings by Tool Below are the key tools we use to support colleges and units in their recruitment and yield efforts, along with training resources for each. Learn how to request access to these tools and keep in mind that access privileges may vary. Slate Slate is a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tool used across the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign campus. It centralizes student records and allows us to manage [...]
Blackout Dates Policy
During certain key periods of the admissions calendar (particularly when data is changing rapidly), the Office of Enrollment Management are unable to fulfill email, text, or data requests. These dates are as follows: Two days before, on, and three days after early action decision release Two days before, on, and three days after regular action decision release One day before, on, and one day after application open One day before, [...]
Post-May 1 Communication Policy
Overview May 1 is the national accept deadline. All admitted students must accept their offer of admission by this date, at which point they can claim their NetId and have their illinois.edu email address. May 1 will therefore serve as a transition date for units to start communicating with incoming students using their illinois.edu email address. At this point in the cycle, units will create and send emails to incoming students [...]
2022 Transfer Accept/Decline Survey
Each year we send a survey to all admitted undergraduate students who accept or decline their offer of admission. Our goal is to understand why students choose to come to the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign or choose to go elsewhere, and what matters most when making that decision. We also try to assess how UIUC performs when it comes to counseling, communications, customer service, and more. This report provides [...]
Litmus
Litmus is a tool for designing, building, and testing emails. We require that all non-text-only emails sent to prospective and admitted undergraduate students be created within Litmus; for exceptions, review our Alternative Access Plan. This allows us to utilize shared templates and test for accessibility and other potential delivery issues. Litmus training guide Roles & Access Everyone that logs in to Litmus as either a [...]
2022 First-Year Accept/Decline Survey
View accept survey data View decline survey data Each year we send a survey to all admitted undergraduate students who accept or decline their offer of admission. Our goal is to understand why students choose to come to the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign or choose to go elsewhere, and what matters most when making that decision. We also try to assess how UIUC performs when it comes to counseling, [...]
Content Marketing
What Is Content Marketing? We define content marketing as any material, including videos, blogs, or social media posts, that stimulates interest in a brand's products or services even if the material isn't explicitly advertising the brand itself. For example, a social media post featuring students playing frisbee on the Quad doesn't have to go into detail on all of the benefits of attending UIUC; the picture of students enjoying themselves [...]
Lead Generation
What Is Lead Generation? Lead generation is the process of capturing names and information of people interested in something. For our purposes, lead generation often means someone provides a unit with information (name, email, address, etc.) and in turn expects something from the university. For example, when a student signs up to receive more information or registers to attend an event, they submit information and expect to hear more about [...]
SEO
What Is SEO? SEO, or search engine optimization, is the process of making content streamlined to achieve better results on searched topics. For example, the Office of Undergraduate Admissions should be a topic result on Google for the search term "University of Illinois Admissions." When someone types in that search term, our website should be one of the first results. The largest web traffic source category for the Admissions website [...]
Terminology
Shared terminology ensures we understand each other when we collaborate. This list is designed to cover common admissions, marketing, and communications terms. Admissions Terminology Prospect – A student who has not yet taken a trackable action to demonstrate interest in UIUC. We can have a prospect within our CRM if we've purchased that student's information from an outside source. Inquiry – A student who has taken an action to demonstrate [...]
Goals
"If you aim at nothing, you will hit it every time." –Zig Ziglar Top-Level Goals & the Enrollment Funnel Top-level enrollment goals, defined prior to each admissions cycle, align with the various stages of the enrollment funnel seen below. Ongoing coordination between each academic unit, Enrollment Management, and campus leadership enables real-time assessment of these goals and dictates their fluidity. Enrollment Funnel Stages (from the largest student volume down to [...]
Marketing Plans
What is a marketing plan? A marketing plan is a key component to recruiting and yielding students. It provides an overview of what marketing programs you plan to utilize to achieve your objectives and articulates how success will be measured. Does OUA have a marketing plan? Yes, the Office of Undergraduate Admissions has a marketing plan, and we're happy to share it with the R&Y Network. We're also happy to [...]
Communication Plans
What is a communication plan? A communication plan includes all of the communications you intend to deliver to your target audiences. It should articulate the who, what, and when for all of your strategic communications. Does OUA have a communication plan? Yes, the Office of Undergraduate Admissions has several communication plans, each built around a different audience segment or a campaign theme, such as visiting campus. Do I need a [...]
Research
What Is Market Research? Research is an important part of understanding our audiences. Market research can provide us with key data on audience opinion, viable communications tactics, and more. Students, parents, and other stakeholders in the admissions process have a lot of opinions on what they want. We should listen to them! Listening to our audiences will improve our communications and marketing efforts. If you're planning on your own research [...]
Metrics
Why Do Metrics Matter? Metrics allow us to measure our progress toward goals and ensure our efforts are making an impact. Without metrics, it's impossible to know if our hard work or strategy is paying off. But what measurements of success matter? Of all the information and analytics available, which metrics should we look at the most? Organic Social Media Social media analytics offer many different metrics. Which ones matter [...]
Reports
Reporting allows us to evaluate our success in communication and marketing efforts as well as do research for future projects. Enrollment Management offers a variety of reporting that's helpful to units across campus. If you're a unit that sends communications via Enrollment Management/OUA processes, you can request small-scale custom reporting as well. Reporting Resources Accept/Decline Surveys. Our accept/decline surveys allow units to look at a variety of questions asked to [...]
Surveys
What Makes a Good Survey? Sampling Sample, sample, sample. The goal of any good survey is to find out what people think to inform a decision or many future decisions. For that reason, you should plan to talk to a lot of people and a diverse range of people. A healthy sample size is critical to getting usable information. If you do not get many opinions, one person (or a [...]
Calling & Texting
Top Priorities for Calling & Texting Encourage action. Calling and texting should be restricted to campaigns. In other words, you should have a specific reason for calling or texting, encouraging action. Avoid marketing messages. Any calls or texts should be helpful, timely, and relevant. These are not appropriate channels for general marketing messages. Again, focus on a call to action. Target specific populations. If you have an audience segment that [...]
Top Priorities for Email Focus on your email strategy. Email is one of the most direct methods of communicating with our audience, and in-house surveys show it's the number one way students wish to be contacted by us—so you'll want to make your emails count. Know who you can communicate with. Review our audience policy for more information. Follow our email best practices. Review our email policy for more information. Encourage [...]
Annual Marketing Report
The Annual Marketing Report provides a summary of marketing activity related to undergraduate recruitment and yield through the Office of Undergraduate Admissions. 2021 Marketing Report Slide deck Recorded presentation We recommend watching the recording to get the most information. Topics include: The enrollment funnel Marketing efforts and goals by channel OUA's advertising efforts & strategy Web content performance Social media performance Email outcomes & more
Event Planning & Training
Planning All visits, both in-person and virtual, are coordinated with the Office of Undergraduate Admissions (OUA) and centralized through our CRM, Slate. Visit planning occurs three times throughout the admissions cycle. To view our planning spreadsheets, you must log into Google through your illinois.edu email address. Fall Visits For prospective undergraduate students OUA reaches out to units to finalize plans in June/July Units are required to share all visit plans [...]
Virtual Events
Planning & Training All prospective student events are coordinated with the Office of Undergraduate Admissions (OUA) and centralized through our CRM, Slate. Review our event planning and training to know what steps you need to take to properly coordinate your events and enter them into Slate. Planning Considerations Virtual visits are valuable. Time and again, OUA surveys show that students want to hear directly about academics within their intended college. [...]
Off-Campus Events
Planning Process If you're interested in holding or attending an off-campus event, make sure to contact us so we're aware of your plans and can assist if necessary. Individual colleges and units should not plan high school visits without first reaching out to the Office of Undergraduate Admissions (OUA). OUA's Strategy In addition to on-campus efforts, the Office of Undergraduate Admissions conducts a wide range of outreach, recruitment, and yield [...]
On-Campus Events
Planning & Training All prospective student events are coordinated with the Office of Undergraduate Admissions (OUA) and centralized through our CRM, Slate. Review our event planning and training to know what steps you need to take to properly coordinate your events and enter them into Slate. OUA's Strategy Visiting campus can be one of the most important factors when making a college choice. It gives students and parents the opportunity [...]
How-Tos
CommunicationsHow to Create a Communications PlanHow to Define Your AudienceDataHow to Add a Mailing, Data or Report Request in BasecampEmailHow to Add an Email Request to BasecampHow to Add an Email to SlateEventsHow to Coordinate Your EventHow to Create a Slate EventHow to Create a Special Slate EventMajorsHow To Edit Major Information on the Admissions WebsiteTextingHow to Add a Text Message Request to BasecampHow to Send Text Messages from Slate [...]
Policies
Undergraduate recruitment and yield policies are created to ensure consistency and reduce risk. Audience Policy Blackout Dates Policy Data Request Policy Email Policy Forms Policy Marketing & Communication Plan Policy Post-May 1 Communication Policy Program Explorer Policy Race/Ethnicity Data Request Policy Texting Policy
Evaluation
How to Evaluate Communications & Marketing Success There are many ways to evaluate success, and you should always keep your campaign goals in mind. Preferably, you and your team should make a plan to evaluate success prior to the launch of a campaign in order to then tailor the campaign to succeed on your key metrics. Remember, some evaluation is certainly better than none. If you have limited time to [...]
Advertising
Top Priorities for Advertising Build and strengthen brand awareness. As with any advertising, building and/or strengthening brand awareness is a top goal. That's why it's important to brand your ads appropriately and target the right audiences. Generate new leads. Ads are a great way to reach prospects. Planting a seed is great, but if you can also provide an easy conversion method such as an email form for more information, [...]
Websites
Top Priorities for Your Website Make your inquiry form easy to find. Ultimately, you want to convert your prospective student traffic into inquiries. This means your inquiry form should be front and center on all pages. The best way to do this is to incorporate it into your navigation. Focus on relevant, engaging content. What do prospective students want to know? What will get them interested in your programs? Videos, [...]
Applicant Communication Policy
An applicant is defined as a student that has submitted an application but has not yet received a decision. Therefore an applicant audience includes students that will unfortunately be denied. Due to the sensitive nature of applicant communications, colleges and units are not allowed to communicate with applicants. The Office of Undergraduate Admissions manages an applicant communications plan to ensure students continue to receive touch points from Illinois while awaiting [...]
Contact
For general inquiries or specific questions about the R&Y Network, admissions policies, processes, and more, please complete our request form.
Cycle Overview
Stages of a Cycle Here are the key points throughout a cycle for first-year applicants: Application opens Early action admission deadline Regular admission deadline (application closes) Early action admission notification (decisions are released) Regular admission notification (decisions are released) Accept deadline New student registration Students begin classes Tenth day of classes (official enrollment numbers are released) Key Dates & Deadlines The undergraduate application cycle starts when the application for admission [...]
Handouts
Top Priorities With Handouts Focus on your content. With content pieces, make sure the focus is on your unit/services. Avoid including admissions content or anything that runs the risk of changing. Share stories and make the material as engaging and worthwhile as you can. Consider the quality. Cheap handouts will be ignored and find their way to the trash quickly. Invest in high-quality pieces, such as booklets, die-cuts, or keepsake [...]
Presentations
Top Priorities With Presentations Brand appropriately. Make sure your presentations have the appropriate branding in place, including logos, colors, messaging, etc. It's critical that all of our materials fit together, both through appearance and content. Be engaging. Audiences come to a conclusion on what level of engagement is necessary within the first 90 seconds of your presentation, so it's important to be engaging. Keep things concise and understand your audience. [...]
Social Media
Top Priorities for Social Media Engage prospective students. Make sure you post content that is appealing for teenagers and addresses their interests and needs. It's also important to consider what platforms are most relevant for high school students. If posts elicit comments, try to interact with your audience. Generate leads. Direct social content to landing pages where students can easily sign up for more information. Share information. This may seem [...]
Video
Top Priorities With Video Entertain and inform. Students are watching how-to videos and being entertained on YouTube. To meet them where they are, we must create entertaining ways for students to digest information they may need. Encourage YouTube subscriptions. It's good practice (and quite common) to build a prompt into the end of your videos encouraging subscriptions to your channel. Don't fret about production quality. High school students are accustomed [...]
Direct Mail
Top Priorities for Direct Mail Be strategic with populations. In order to reduce both physical and financial waste, you should be as strategic as possible with the populations you choose to engage through direct mail. This could mean sending to admits only, or sending to top-tier inquiries (those that have signed up for more information directly through our inquiry forms). Focus on yield. When a student is admitted, we have [...]
Joining
The R&Y Network is hosted on Microsoft Teams and is open to University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign faculty and staff involved in recruiting and yielding undergraduate students. Designed to foster transparency and collaboration, the network aims to be broad and inclusive, bringing together diverse perspectives to enhance our shared efforts.
2021 Enrollment Management Summit
Download presentation decks
How to Present a Unified Brand to Prospective Students
Branding may seem like business reserved for marketing and communications staff, but each individual touchpoint matters. Even if you aren’t a designer it’s important to ask yourself, “What role do I play in the Illinois brand?” Or more importantly, “How can I contribute to the goal of presenting a unified brand to prospective students?” Why It Matters If we think about some of the strongest brands, there are a few [...]
2022 Admissions Cycle Marketing Plan
Chris Axtman-Barker, Marketing Coordinator within the Office of Communications for Enrollment Management, presents the 2022 Admissions Cycle Marketing Plan, providing information on overall strategy and ways to collaborate. If you work in a college or campus unit here at UIUC and create a marketing plan for prospective students, this is resource designed primarily to inform you of our efforts within Undergraduate Admissions. The slide deck for this presentation is also [...]
Tips for Creating & Sending Emails
Email is the most important communication channel we currently have, so it’s critical that we make our emails as effective as possible. Here are a couple tips to ensure we do just that. Keep It Simple Many of our emails go beyond text only and utilize HTML to create more visually appealing designs. This can often cause us to overcomplicate things. In fact, sometimes text-only emails are the most effective, [...]
Notice of Admission (2021)
Decisions are coming in February and that means admitted students will be receiving some great news. We’ve included many of the communications below so you can see what students receive online, in their inbox, and in their mailbox. myIllini Splash Page The first place students discover they’ve been admitted is within myIllini. When decisions become available, admitted students click on their application and discover a splash [...]
Best ROI Yield Activities (From Chief EM Officers)
Back in November a VP of Enrollment sent out a question on the AAU Chief Enrollment Management Officers listserv asking, "What do you consider to be the top 3-5 yield activities that bring the best return on investment (ROI)?" Here is a condensed list of answers that were shared in response to this question. Hopefully you can find some inspiration for your own yield activities this cycle. One-on-one meetings with students [...]
Marketing Planning: 1 of 2
In case you missed the webinar, here is the recording.
Marketing Planning: Part 2 of 2
In case you missed the webinar, here is the recording.
2019 Accept/Decline Survey Overview
In case you missed the webinar, here is a link to the slides and a video of the presentation.
How to Create a Communications Plan
It is important to make a communication plan. Having all of your messages in one place, with brief descriptions, timelines, and send dates will make planning for the rest of the cycle much easier. These plans will also help you evaluate your message holistically, focus your messaging, and target the right audiences. Think about your audience. What are their needs? What do you need to tell them in order for [...]
Data Request Policy
Colleges and units may submit a data request to obtain information regarding audiences or general student trends. Data Request Restrictions Requested data should be about the college or academic unit's audience, or general student trends. Data requests should present efficient solutions to straightforward problems or questions. They should not be used to create specialized workarounds to solve niche problems. Requested data and reports will be presented in Tableau or in [...]
College/Unit Marketing & Communication Plan Policy
Marketing Plan Requirements Before each admissions cycle, colleges and other strategic partners are required to submit a comprehensive marketing plan to the Office of Communications for Enrollment Management by August 1. Marketing plans are shared with the R&Y Network and reviewed by Enrollment Management. Not only does this allow for transparency, but it also optimizes coordination of activity. Learn more about marketing plans, including the Office of Undergraduate Admissions marketing [...]
Program Explorer Edit Policy
What is the Program Explorer? The Program Explorer is an interface on the Admissions website that allows users to explore undergraduate majors. What information is editable within the Program Explorer? College staff may request an edit to the following information: Description—Descriptions are carefully crafted to be informative and understandable for those who do not yet have a high school degree. Please consider these factors when submitting an edit suggestion. Career [...]
Texting Policy
Requirements All text messages should be sent via Slate in cooperation with the Office of Enrollment Management. This ensures that student statuses are up to date, reduces the risk of texts being filtered as spam, and enables centralized metrics and functional tracking. The college/unit sending the text message must have staff online for at least two hours after sending a text message to handle responses, since communication expectations with text [...]
How to Request Edits to the Program Explorer
We present our programs of study through an interface called the Program Explorer. This tool allows students to see what we offer and learn more about each program of interest. Some program explorer information comes directly from data sources; however, some information is provided by the college. You can read more about what information colleges can edit within the Program Explorer on our policy page. If you have program [...]
10 Tips for Creating Effective Emails
1. Define your purpose. You should always have a clearly defined purpose for your emails so that you can keep your content focused on that purpose. If you don’t have a clearly defined purpose, you should probably revisit whether the email is necessary. 2. Know your audience. For starters, Gen Zers (categorized as 19 years of age and under) know how to educate themselves and find information. They’re driven [...]