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Digital ad campaign to promote Sussex to prospective students

A new University advertising campaign to raise the profile of Sussex among prospective undergraduate and taught postgraduate students will go live in the next few weeks.

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The campaign, “See the bigger picture with us”, will be visible on south-eastern railway routes and stations and in the press, but the focus is really going to be online.

Katy Hiles, Head of Marketing, explains: “The reason for the digital focus is that it’s possible to target advertising closely to the core audiences, and also to measure effectiveness, and tweak activity to ensure it delivers the desired outcomes.”

Ads will run across a wide range of digital channels, targeted by age and interest.

The campaign will drive awareness of Sussex ahead of A level results day and will be in place before UCAS Clearing (the process for universities to fill any remaining places on their courses).

It will also reach applicants to taught postgraduate courses for autumn 2014 entry.

Some of the ads will promote specific subject areas, and Student Recruitment Services intend to cover the full range of subjects on offer.

The University first ran an institution-level advertising campaign in 2013.

“We were very pleased with the look and feel of last year’s campaign, which delivered a really strong and distinctive visual impact,” says Katy.

“It's not easy to stand out from the crowd in the higher education sector. Over 90,000 students visited a micro-site designed to accompany last year’s ad campaign and 35,000 students clicked through to our home and to the prospectus pages of the courses they were interested in.

“2013 saw an increase of 10% in undergraduates studying at Sussex and an increase in the number of high-quality students who applied via the Clearing process.”

Marcus Williams, Director of Student Recruitment says: “The competition among research-intensive universities to recruit the most able students is increasingly intense.

“A highly visible online campaign will complement the hard work put in by our colleagues in the schools to continue to attract the best applicants to study at Sussex.

“We are ensuring that the high quality of our campaign reflects the high quality of our academic offer to students.”

From late summer Student Recruitment Services will shift to publicising the University’s autumn open days (5 September and 4 October) and to driving applications for 2015. From autumn and through the winter, marketing activity will focus on applicants to taught postgraduate courses.