College Enrollment and Digital Maturity: A Quantitative Study of Small New England Colleges

Smaller colleges and universities feel an increasing urgency to respond to an enrollment cliff, a decline in student matriculation created by demographic changes and the convenience and efficacy of online teaching modalities. This research study investigated the impact of digital maturity on enrollment in small colleges with registration of less than 5,000 in the New England region of the United States. The study focused on understanding the impact of digital maturity through a comprehensive analysis of 77 college websites. It used a Poisson regression model to analyze domain rating, URL rating, backlinks, keywords, traffic, paid marketing, and a proprietary ranking (Ahrefs1) to understand the impact of these components of digital maturity on enrollment. Ahrefs was chosen as it is a respected search engine optimization (SEO) online toolset used by marketers from world-leading companies to analyze and improve their websites.

The findings suggest a positive impact of digital maturity on college enrollment. Moreover, the study highlighted that digital maturity is an integral part of the stature and reputation of a college. The research proposes that digital maturity was one of the key pillars of attracting students to new colleges, inseparable from other factors like athletics, housing, campus beauty, community feel, and reputation of faculty. This research is significant for college administrators who aim to improve their enrollment rates, particularly considering the constrained demographics and continued changes in education delivery. This research also proposes a framework of digital maturity assessment that college administrators can use to assess and create their enrollment strategy.

The findings suggest a positive impact of digital maturity on college enrollment. Moreover, the study highlighted that digital maturity is an integral part of the stature and reputation of a college. The research proposes that digital maturity was one of the key pillars of attracting students to new colleges, inseparable from other factors like athletics, housing, campus beauty, community feel, and reputation of faculty. This research is significant for college administrators who aim to improve their enrollment rates, particularly considering the constrained demographics and continued changes in education delivery. This research also proposes a framework of digital maturity assessment that college administrators can use to assess and create their enrollment strategy.