PS&L Blog

Hermann Ebbinghaus is a scary guy.  Well, scary in the sense that he was the first person to describe the “forgetting curve.”  The forgetting curve is what all of us in higher education marketing should fear. It’s what we’re up against when we try to influence prospects,

Forty percent of what is learned in a presentation is forgotten within the first half hour. After a day,  your prospects have forgotten 60% of your presentation, and by the end of the week your thoughts are barely a blip in their brain -10% remembered. Ouch.

As a college recruiter, whether your presentation is a chat with your boss over some little but important point or a presentation to win the hearts and minds of a dozen people on a campus tour (which could be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars to your school) the forgetting curve is your enemy.

Strategically, your university’s integrated marketing approach can be affected by the forgetting curve too. The higher education sales cycle is a multi-year presentation. How do you keep a sophomore in high school engaged with your brand message when the final decision won’t be made for two more years, especially when you take into consideration the forgetting curve.

Luckily there are ways to combat the forgetting curve.

Here are some things Herr Ebbinghaus learned to help us get people to remember our message.

•  People remember first things and last things better.

•  People remember things better if they relate to other things they already know.

•  People remember a focused message much better.

Accordingly, we need to do several things to be successful in getting people to remember our request for action.  When you talk with someone, be focused.  Make one or two points.  Mention them early in your presentation.  Make them as vivid as possible.  If you can tell stories to help people relate current knowledge to your points, all the better.  Don’t be afraid to repeat yourself, in fact it is important to repeat yourself, especially at the end of the presentation.  If your message is your brand, all of the above applies too, when you are talking on your web site, your admissions publications and your advertising stay focused, vivid and repetitive.

Almost everyone knows the military saying, “Tell them what you are going to tell them, tell them, and then tell them you told them.”   Now that you know the enemy – the forgetting curve -  go get ‘um higher education marketing soldier.