“If everything’s the priority, nothing is.” We’ve all heard it, and it’s smart advice. But we work in higher ed – so these days everything is, in fact, the priority.
Good news, though! There are ways to whittle down your task list and protect yourself from campus politics. We’ve tried a lot of them over the years, and today you can steal the product of our blood, sweat, and tears: our prioritization guide. We designed this to give you a defensible framework for decision-making in under five minutes.
Ready to get started?
What type of prioritization are you doing?
Proactive
Step 1: Review your institution and/or program’s goals.
Assess if any have already been identified as higher priority. If none have been, assess what you personally believe would be most impactful to your institution’s enrollment.
Step 2: List tactics to help you achieve each goal.
Include tactics you are already doing, tactics you know others are doing, and tactics you think others might be doing.
Here, by tactics, we mean the specific, concrete actions you take to achieve a goal. For example, if your goal is to increase out-of-state enrollment in a key metro, your tactics might include geofenced display ads, a paid search campaign, and/or a targeted email journey.
Step 3: Sort tactics into an impact vs. effort framework.
Weigh tactics that benefit high-priority goals and/or make a difference in achieving challenging goals as “high impact.” Tactics that you’re already doing and can maintain usually belong in “easy wins.”
Step 4: Taking into account resources, identify must-do and wishlist tactics.
Make sure to always be working on multiple easy wins and at least one big project. In the case of the tie, prioritize tactics that yield measurable results. If needed, feel free to leverage a decision matrix to choose between a few promising high-impact, high-effort tactics. Here’s an example:
| Criterion (Weight) | Geofencing | Paid Search Expansion | Email Journey |
|---|---|---|---|
| Estimated Enrollment Impact (x5) | 4 → 20 | 5 → 25 | 3 → 15 |
| Measurability (x4) | 3 → 12 | 5 → 20 | 4 → 16 |
| Speed to launch (x3) | 3 → 9 | 4 → 12 | 5 → 15 |
| Cost efficiency (x3) | 2 → 6 | 3 → 9 | 5 → 15 |
| Total | 47 | 66 | 61 |
How it works: Each tactic gets a raw score (here, 1–5) on every criterion. You multiply that score by the criterion’s weight, then total each column. In this case, paid search expansion wins at 66 – it scores well on the two things weighted most heavily (impact and measurability), even though email is cheaper and faster.
Reactive
Step 1: Review current tactics that may achieve the new objective.
Step 2: Assess if the proposed new audience or tactic will do a better job at achieving your overarching goals than tactics already in market. Ask these questions in order:
- Does it directly help us achieve our goals?
- Do we have the funds on hand? If not, is this a more efficient use of our energy than existing efforts and worth reallocating?
- Can we target the audience accurately? How confident are we in the targeting method?
- Is the message unique and not already covered in existing campaigns? OR Does this get our existing message to a new audience?
- Do we have the assets needed? How will they be created if they don’t already exist?
- Can we realistically launch in time?
- Can we measure the impact?
Conclusion
Congratulations! You should have a well-documented thought process that you can use to not only organize your tactics but also bring others along in your thinking. We’re cheering you on as you plan!
And if you need some help along the way, whether that’s a complimentary audit or more robust strategic analysis, you know where to find us.
