The Social Side of College Admissions

As summer comes to a close, we figured it was about time to release another installment of our most engaging Facebook Pages.

As before, we have grouped the pages in our directory into 4 categories for our analysis:

1. Very Large: More than 25,000 fans / likes
2. Large: 7,501-25,000 fans / likes
3. Medium: 2,501-7,500 fans / likes
4. Small: 2,500 or fewer fans / likes

Because of the growth of some of the largest Facebook Pages, we may have to shift these cut-offs the next time we run this analysis.

We continue to use the following formula to measure the engagement of these posts:

Please Note: We required a minimum of 15 posts over this 3-month period to be included in our rankings.

Quantity Doesn't Translate Into Engagement

There were 45 schools in our database that posted 150 or more times to their Facebook Page over this 3-month period. Only 2 (Graceland University and the University of Phoenix) made any of our Top 10 lists. The average engagement score for these 45 schools was 1.42. Nearly half (22) had an engagement score for this 3-month period under 1.00.

Very Large (25,000+ Facebook fans)

Rank	School		Engagement Score
1		Texas A&M University (College Station, TX)	4.201 45 posts
2		Liberty University (Lynchburg, VA)	3.979 99 posts
3		California State University, Northridge (Northridge, CA)	3.967 52 posts
4		Southern Illinois University Carbondale (Carbondale, IL)	3.813 77 posts
5		Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Cambridge, MA)	3.024 75 posts
6		Yale University (New Haven, CT)	2.929 54 posts
7		University of Phoenix (Phoenix, AZ)	2.866 180 posts
8		Western Michigan University (Kalamazoo, MI)	2.766 25 posts
9		North Carolina State University (Raleigh, NC)	2.605 33 posts
10		Colorado State University (Fort Collins, CO)	2.542 132 posts

Large (7,501-25,000 Facebook fans)

Rank	School		Engagement Score
1		Wellesley College (Wellesley, MA)	8.237 52 posts
2		Brigham Young University - Alumni (Provo, UT)	5.490 73 posts
3		University of Portland (Portland, OR)	5.057 94 posts
4		UT Arlington (Arlington, TX)	4.965 27 posts
5		Smith College (Northampton, MA)	4.755 115 posts
6		St. Olaf College (Northfield, MN)	4.268 28 posts
7		La Trobe University (Melbourne, )	4.187 40 posts
8		Oklahoma Christian University (Edmond, OK)	3.948 30 posts
9		Cleveland State University (Cleveland, OH)	3.937 37 posts
10		California Institute of Technology (Pasadena, CA)	3.809 94 posts

Medium (2,501-7,500 Facebook fans)

Rank	School		Engagement Score
1		Buena Vista University (Storm Lake, IA)	10.089 29 posts
2		Drexel University (Philadelphia, PA)	8.952 68 posts
3		Morehouse College (Atlanta, GA)	7.505 41 posts
4		Sweet Briar College (Sweet Briar, VA)	6.830 21 posts
5		Southwestern University (Georgetown, TX)	6.598 34 posts
6		Susquehanna University (Selinsgrove, PA)	6.565 48 posts
7		Stephens College (Columbia, MO)	5.988 27 posts
8		Graceland University (Lamoni, IA)	5.912 181 posts
9		Ross University (Dominica, West Indies)	5.861 19 posts
10		Point Loma Nazarene University (San Diego, CA)	5.809 55 posts

Small (2,500 or fewer Facebook fans)

Rank	School		Engagement Score
1		VCU School of Business (Richmond, VA)	17.842 27 posts
2		Dallas County Community College District (Dallas, TX)	15.885 44 posts
3		Scripps College (Claremont, CA)	10.380 20 posts
4		Holyoke Community College (Holyoke, MA)	9.958 100 posts
5		University of Minnesota Rochester (Rochester, MN)	9.548 47 posts
6		Haskayne School of Business (Calgary, AB)	7.005 32 posts
7		California State University, Chico (Chico, CA)	7.005 60 posts
8		Neumont University (South Jordan, UT)	6.418 48 posts
9		Capitol College (Laurel, MD)	6.351 15 posts
10		Central Methodist University (Fayette, MO)	5.918 72 posts

Posts and Engagement by Media Type

No surprise here... photos continue to be the most engaging type of post for college Facebook pages. We believe it's because they stand out in a user's News Feed and are easy form of content to consume (it doesn't require a click like a link or video). It also looks like colleges and universities are getting better at engaging their audience through traditional status posts. The engagement for this media type has gone up since our last analysis. When we took a closer look at some of the most engaging posts, we noticed the top 20 dominated by contests. The prizes tended to be fairly modest (a sweatshirt, a t-shirt, or a mug), for the most part. A few schools tapped into college students love of video games and technology, giving away an iPad2, PS3/XBox, or a video game. Beyond contests, posts with questions (essentially asking your users to comment) also popped up again and again throughout the Top 200 most-engaging posts.

Posts and Engagement by Day of the Week

It's still the case that posts on the weekend (Saturdays and Sundays) have the highest level of engagement. Although this figure is down since our last analysis, we expect it to rise again as we head into college football and basketball seasons.

Labels: data, Facebook, Metrics, Pages