The Pulse of Higher Ed

Shifting Student and Employer Priorities Create Opportunities for Higher Education

Interest and innovation in workforce-related programming and credentials continue to surge, emerging as one of the fastest growing markets in higher education. Two-thirds of colleges and universities are making significant investments in this area, with more than one-third also embedding professional certifications into their online degree and nondegree programming Emerging research by the Rutgers Education and Employment Research Center (EERC) is demonstrating that learners eager to grow their career favor targeted workforce programs. Nearly three out of four adults without degrees say that industry certifications are “very” or “extremely” valuable.

A 2023 study by UPCEA and Collegis Education found that employers have a strong interest in engaging with higher education institutions to develop and deliver non-degree credentials, citing the quality of the content from institutions.

With strong interest from students and employers, what is keeping institutions from capitalizing on this opportunity? First and foremost, higher education institutions are not known for their agility or prowess in cultivating university to business relationships. Often institutions get in their own way with a lack of strategic vision and purpose around engaging employers holistically.  In addition, the space of workforce training and non-degree credentials requires institutions to adopt a demand-driven approach to program identification and development versus the more common supply-driven model of faculty driving program suggestions. To achieve success, institutions must take a strategic approach, considering both student and employer perspectives over a much broader timeline, recognizing that learners will need upskilling and reskilling throughout their career.

Maximizing Audience Lifetime Value

Institutions have historically focused on more traditional learners but with the shifting demographics of today’s learner, this focus must expand to consider learners across a continuum. In fact, the lines between traditional and non-traditional students have blurred over the past several years to the point where age is no longer a predictor of preferred learning pathway. According to a 2025 study of the Modern Learner conducted by EducationDynamics, nearly half (47%) of students enrolled in classroom programs considered fully online program options and an astounding 59% of online undergraduate students would consider classroom programs. These students are motivated by multiple factors, led by cost and the return on their investment. 

Institutions must view students not as one-time enrollees but as lifelong learners and advocates. This is a new concept in higher education but is commonplace in business. Institutions must define “audience lifetime value” and consider learner needs at various phases of their educational journey.  Learners are seeking opportunities to build their skills throughout their career.  Even the traditional undergraduate student is seeking opportunities to demonstrate skills and knowledge that will allow them to stand apart in the job market upon graduation. As their career progresses, students will be seeking opportunities to upskill and reskill to help with upward mobility. This is particularly true when talking about students enrolled in credential programs; 82% of whom intend to re-enroll in future programs and apply their current studies to future credentials. 

Institutions have an opportunity to strategically engage learners beyond a single credential, by deliberately designing programs to help students to “learn and earn” throughout their lifetime. This includes offering credentialing opportunities to existing students while developing continuing education programs to attract new learners and to bring students back as they progress in their career. Providing upskilling and stackable credential pathways focused on building necessary skills will provide on and off-ramps as needed.  Engaging employers and alumni in the design of these programs will ensure relevance, reinforce the institutional brand, and signal quality. Offering alumni discounts and/or other exclusive offers will provide value and help to ensure they continue to return.

Leverage Institutional Reputation 

Leveraging institutional reputation may sound simple when in reality, it requires a disciplined approach to market evaluation, recognition of the institution’s unique strengths, and a commitment to serving the nearby community.

It is critically important to align credential offerings with institutional mission and areas of expertise.  What is your institution known for?  What draws students to your programs?  What do your alumni do upon graduation?  Answering these questions is critical to maximizing the value of your brand. All too often institutions consider developing programs in “hot” areas when they do not align to their strengths. 

Institutions must use labor market data and employer feedback to shape programs.  Labor market data is available through free sources such as the Bureau of Labor Statistics and paid sources such as Lightcast. A combination of tools will provide foundational data on skills gaps in the workplace and emerging careers.  

Geography plays a key role as well.  Local schools own their local markets – most students enroll at schools within 50 miles of campus. This is even more relevant for credential students and those that may be returning for repeat engagement. As you conduct market analysis, it is important to consider the regions currently being served and those you wish to serve in the future. Brand awareness will be greatest in your region and learners are drawn to institutions that are close by, even if they never attend classes on campus.

Leveraging Alumni Networks in Credential Design

We work with numerous member institutions and consistently find that alumni are not being engaged in program planning.  There are many reasons for this, primarily that Alumni and Engagement offices play a key role in outreach and want to ensure that alumni are not inundated with outreach. However, by playing that gatekeeping role, those offices often exclude the offices of online and professional continuing education from connecting with alumni and offering an opportunity for alumni to help shape program offerings.

Alumni are your institution’s greatest brand ambassadors.  Alumnae are proud of their alma mater, and want to give back in ways beyond donating.  There are several key ways to engage your alumni to ensure credential success.

• Ask alumni for their input.  Alumni are not only loyal to the institution, they are working professionals with needs for continuous learning for career mobility.  Additionally, they are often in leadership positions, managing teams of people that also need professional development and skill building.  Alumni are uniquely positioned to provide valuable insights to help shape program offerings.
• Leverage alumni to promote credential programs and attract learners.  Ask them for testimonials and to tell their personal stories, highlighting how the institution has helped them along their educational journey.  Establish alumni referral programs and/or discounts for alumni to encourage participation in credential programs.
• Consider co-branded initiatives with alumni as employer partners. Alumni have a tremendous amount of credibility because they speak from their personal experience.  That can help to reinforce the quality of your credential offerings and build trust in your programs.

The Impact of Corporate Partnerships on Revenue and Reputation

Institutional partnerships with employers can drive enrollment and build credibility.  As noted, employers want to be included in the design of credential programs. They have first-hand insight into the skills needed by their workforce and involving them in designing courses and programs will ensure that their needs will be met by the program. 

For the institution, partnerships such as these help us to grow our learner audience while we also strengthen the relationship with the employer partner. This also helps to ensure that there is demand from learners for the program. Employers that are actively engaged are committed to having their employees complete the program. This helps to ensure revenue to off-set development costs and allows the institution to gain valuable insights into ways to attract other learners.

Employers benefit from programming that is aligned to their unique needs. They have confidence that their employees will gain the necessary skills and this helps to ensure they receive a return on the investment in training.

Another positive impact of these partnerships is that they push institutions to be more agile and responsive.  Employers provide the budget that institutions often need to move more quickly to respond to the rapidly changing needs of the workforce. Employers simply cannot wait for institutions to follow traditional program development timelines of months to years. They need upskilling and reskilling to be just-in-time.

Lastly, prominently featuring employer partnerships builds institutional reputation. These partnerships highlight the innovation and focus for the institution, while demonstrating the employer’s commitment to development of their workforce. The partnerships help to attract other employers who may be seeking targeted skill development for their employees as well.  It is truly a win-win for both.

The University of South Florida shared an interesting case study about their successful turnaround of their continuing education unit into a revenue generating part of the institution.  A key part of their strategy was focusing on the workforce needs in their region and partnering with key employers to develop targeted, skills-based training.

Marketing Strategy/Recommendations

While recruiting career focused students can leverage many of the same strategies and tactics regardless of the type of credential, there are some special considerations for marketing to students considering credential programs. Perhaps the most important consideration is where to invest to maximize your return on investment. With a lower average lifetime value cost per enrollment, credential programs can’t afford to waste limited advertising dollars on ineffective and inefficient marketing strategies. 

Invest in brand awareness

Students pursuing enrollment in credential programs emphasize the same factors that appeal to all Modern Learners: cost, career outcomes and convenience. Students today turn to the brands they trust more than ever, and a majority (58%) begin their search at the institutional level, even before they search for programs. This makes brand awareness not only an efficient use of your limited advertising budget, but also a critical channel to your success.

Discoverability is Key and your website remains the hub of your brand

49% begin their search on Google or a similar search engine, while another 27% turn directly to your website. In an era of rapidly shifting online behavior, this means your website and web presence is more critical than ever. Your website is your most critical marketing asset and the hub of your brand. 

The Search Engine Results Page (SERP) experience has dramatically changed in 2025, and will continue to evolve as AI-generated responses become more prevalent. While total traffic has declined for most websites, a website that simply exists as an online brochure is a missed marketing opportunity. Traditional SEO, while foundational, falls short of delivering in an online ecosystem where the rules are being rewritten almost constantly. Offering multiple engagement and communication channels through your website, including live chat, AI-powered chatbots, forms and video, provides your visitors options and opportunities to engage on their terms. Credential students are often also working professionals, meaning they are searching for and researching programs outside of your (and their) normal working hours. Your website and related resources are powerful tools that work while you aren’t. 

There is another key new audience that you must now address: the AI agents that are delivering results and information that users would previously search over multiple websites. These agents are delivering information on your brand and program in platform – be that in the SERP experience via AI Mode or Search Generative Experience, or within the chatbots themselves. Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) is a critical strategic imperative that you cannot afford to ignore. Your website serves as a critical source of information for answer engines like Chat-GPT, Google Gemini and Perplexity and your strategy should include serving this new important audience. When a future student turns to Chat-GPT to learn more about career-advancing education, you want to be a source of information driving the answer results. Go ahead and turn to your AI agent of choice and ask it about advancing a career related to your credential program of choice and you’ll see the power of GEO. 

Digital Advertising has Evolved

The world of paid search advertising has been transformed by AI user experiences and AI-powered advertising tools that are being built into advertising platforms. In this new reality, search is no longer only a tool to generate leads, it is a reputation and visibility builder as well. The lines between paid and organic search are blurred and the two cannot operate in silos. Legacy paid search strategies hyper-focused on narrow and isolated keywords are outdated and fail to capitalize on the nuanced triggers uncovered by the latest AI-driven campaigns. Evolving your campaign strategy from a list of keywords and narrow ad placements elevates this critical channel to one that both influences and capitalizes on brand visibility while also driving enrollments. 

Continue to Nurture and Engage Your Audience

We tend to think of a CRM as a piece of software that we purchase and use to store student data, but to effectively market credential programs, you need the right strategy, processes and staff to leverage your data and engage prospective students. If you have earned your way into a prospective student’s consideration set (or better yet, have a prior relationship with a returning student) you have already done the hard part. Email remains the gold standard for communication, along with telephone and text messaging. Effective CRM database marketing requires personalized messaging that delivers the right message at the right time. Prospective credential students are likely to care deeply about career outcomes and return on investment, but they also want to know that you know them. Segmentation strategies that leverage demographic data like alumni status, career role and employer build trust, while delivering deeper information based on behaviors help inform and overcome objections before they are raised. 

Measuring the Metrics that Matter

For all the promise of credential programs, there are no guarantees of success. Continuously monitoring, managing and optimizing based on metrics that matter will give you, and your students, the best chance at success. We recommend focusing on a few key performance indicators and avoiding the vanity metrics that show a lot of activity, but do little to deliver insights that improve outcomes. These metrics should be compared regularly against both historic data within programs and against other similar credential programs rather than against legacy academic programs. 

• Student Metrics – Evaluate your program first on student-driven metrics like completion rate, enrollment rates and lead-to-enrollment rates. If you have a low or flagging program completion rate in relatively short credential programs, it is likely that the students are losing belief that the program is delivering the learning outcomes required for their desired career outcomes. Meanwhile, a low lead or inquiry-to-enrollment ratio suggests that you have a leaky enrollment funnel. There is a disconnect between your initial marketing promise and the follow up messaging. This could be because you are bringing poorly matched prospects into the funnel or you are not communicating the program value to highly qualified candidates. 

• Constituent Metrics – Particularly for credential programs, your audience extends well beyond the students enrolled in your program. It is critical that you pay attention to and respond to metrics around employer satisfaction and endorsement rates and alumni engagement rates. While there may be many reasons employers pull enrollments, slowing enrollment from an employer (or employer pool) may be an early sign that they may not value. Similarly, alumni engagement is an excellent indicator of social proof and the strength of a program’s reputation. 
• Financial Metrics – Credential programs operate on tight margins that require optimal resource allocation. Primary among those resources are financial and human capital. Closely monitor your return on investment at the marketing and program level. However, guard against the temptation to measure marketing ROI at a channel level and instead consider your entire marketing mix from brand awareness to inquiry generation and enrollment. Placing too much emphasis in inquiry and enrollment attribution at the channel level risks undervaluing critical brand and reputation-building activities and channels. 

Your KPIs related to human capital in the form of program managers and instructors are among your most critical. These costs may be fixed in the short term, and those allocated differently in a program break-even analysis. However, the indirect and hidden opportunity costs of managing and teaching under-utilized programs weigh down performance of your entire program portfolio. The nature of credential programs allow for rapid reallocation of resources to higher performing programs that are delivering outcomes the market demands. 

Conclusion

In an era where credentials are increasingly abundant, standing out requires more than just delivering quality education, it demands thoughtful marketing and powerful partnerships. By aligning your credential offerings with clear market needs, communicating their value proposition effectively, and aligning with your institution’s brand, you don’t just raise awareness, you multiply impact.

• Invest in data and storytelling to show how your credentials pay off—for learners, for employers, and for your institution.
• Don’t go it alone: partnerships with industry, community organizations, and employers can extend your reach, enhance credibility, and unlock new pathways for learners.
• Be intentional about consistency: branding, messaging, and delivery should reinforce each other, building trust over time.
• Finally, measure what matters. Track outcomes—not just enrollments but employability, skills attainment, and long-term value—and let those metrics guide future strategy.

In short, maximizing credential value is a journey, not a checkbox. With the right strategy, you can ensure your credentials don’t just exist—they lead, influence, and endure. 

Eric McGee is the Senior Director of Marketing & Corporate Communication for EducationDynamics. Prior to joining EducationDynamics, he spent 12 years in various positions in higher education, including positions in higher education consulting, edtech organizations, and as the Director of Continuing & Professional Education at University of South Carolina.  To learn more about EducationDynamics, contact [email protected].

Stacy Chiaramonte is the Senior Vice President of Operations and Strategy for UPCEA’s Research & Consulting division. Prior to joining UPCEA, she spent 13 years at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, most recently as the Associate Vice President of Graduate and Professional Studies. To learn more about UPCEA, contact [email protected].