Texas Tech University Grows Enrollment 9% Using Prescriptive Analytics to Support Growth and Goals

Texas Tech University (TTU) is a comprehensive public research institution located in West Texas. It is the largest public university in the region with 78 percent of students coming from more than 300 miles away. TTU has thirteen colleges and schools, offering programs and majors in business, agriculture, cotton, fine arts, energy, architecture, and engineering. The University had been using a static third-party analytics solution and was finding that its capabilities were limited. With aggressive growth goals for enrollment, TTU needed a solution that would evolve/grow with their needs.

Shift from Static Modeling to Dynamic Analytics Improves Understanding of Students

When Texas Tech announced the goal to grow enrollment to 40,000 students by 2020, the Enrollment Management team put together a comprehensive plan to achieve the goal.

The team knew that in order to grow enrollment they would need a deep understanding of student behavior and how students responded to recruiting and marketing efforts.

The University was using a predictive analytics solution that provided likelihood to enroll scores for students, but only twice a year.

That kind of static modeling represented distinct moments in time.

It didn’t take into account how students responded to different marketing and recruitment campaigns throughout the entire enrollment cycle or provide prescriptions to change behaviors.

TTU needed a more dynamic and actionable analytics solution, and that led them to Othot in 2017.

Othot’s advanced analytics solution has both predictive and prescriptive analytics. Where predictive analytics shows what will happen in the future, prescriptive analytics recommends actions to take to improve outcomes.

The prescriptive analytics, Othot’s What-if capability, is the reason why TTU decided to partner with Othot.

Two-Phase Rollout Empowers Staff and Shapes Recruitment Strategy

Supported by Othot’s Partner Success Team, TTU implemented the solution in two phases. During the initial rollout, Othot and TTU worked together to identify, collect, and organize data for customer modeling.

The second phase of the rollout was to the team, including 30 admissions counselors, who would be using the Platform on a day-to-day basis. Rex Oliver, Associate Director of Recruitment and the champion of the Othot Platform at TTU, trains users and empowers them to use the Platform’s insights.

“With a funnel that starts with more than 300,000 students and with only 30 admissions counselors, we all have a role in meeting our enrollment goals. The Othot Platform has been extremely helpful to our entire team, including identifying what students to recruit and what it takes to recruit them,” says Oliver.

Jason Hale, Executive Director of Undergraduate Admissions, uses the Othot Platform to gain a high-level view of enrollment predictions and the forces driving them to meet their goals. With those insights, Hale can evaluate marketing and recruitment strategies and determine what actions to take next.

“We are more strategic with our time and resources because we can focus on actions with impact,” says Hale.

Targeted Outreach Increases Efficiency and Event Attendance with Limited Resources

In 2020, the marketing budget at TTU remained flat and there were more prospective students in the funnel.

With those budget constraints, Julian Olivas, Director of Marketing and Communications, worked with his Othot Strategic Partnership Manager to determine which students in a pool of 300,000 should receive a mailer.

They used decile scores in the Othot Platform to create a mailing list that included students who were most likely to enroll. The deciles provide a more targeted and efficient outreach strategy, and Olivas was able to stay on budget. “Because of the deciles provided by the Platform, I’m confident that when I mail a marketing piece, especially at scale, that piece will positively impact a student’s likelihood to enroll,” says Olivas.

TTU hosts ‘Raider Roadshows’ throughout Texas and it’s one of their premier recruitment events. It’s also an event that has been especially successful in yielding students. Oliver wanted to expand the event, but with limited budget and resources, he needed to be strategic in the approach.

In the Othot platform, he identified a group of students who, if they attended a Raider Roadshow, would be more likely to enroll at TTU.

He gave the admissions counselors the list of students so they could focus their outreach efforts on those individual students.

The results: TTU saw a 31 percent increase in attendance.

Enrollment Goal Exceeded, Notable Improvement in Student Success Achieved

TTU reached its enrollment goal in 2020. In fact, the University exceeded the goal by 322 students.

Not only that, TTU saw its retention rate grow 2.6 percent over three years. “The residual impact of using the Othot Platform is that our retention rates went up. That’s confirmation that we’re recruiting students that will be successful at Texas Tech,” says Hale.

The University is quick to point out that Othot’s Partner Success Team has been instrumental in the implementation and adoption of the Platform.

The teams meet bimonthly to talk about different strategies. “Partner Success is what sets Othot apart from other vendors. They are directly invested in our success,” says Oliver.

Success on Main Campus Drives Future Planning

Leadership at TTU has taken notice of what’s happening in the Enrollment Management office.

Moving forward, the team will be working with university administration to craft the University’s five-year plan for growth.

And, as Hale, Oliver, and Olivas look to the future, they would like to increase enrollment at regional campuses, increase access to opportunity for under-represented and Pell-eligible students and maintain the academic reputation they’ve built.

“We have great momentum and will continue to pursue our goals with Othot as a key member of our team,” says Hale.

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