Facebook won’t help you reach your parent engagement goals

We know that parent involvement in college is at an all-time high. Communication expectations are high, too – when we surveyed 20,000+ college parents, 70% of parents responded that they expect communication at least weekly.

It’s no surprise that parents flock to Facebook for information if they don’t feel those communication expectations are being met. But whether your institution uses Facebook as an official channel or not, it’s probably not serving you well. 

4 reasons Facebook should not be family engagement channel

Facebook doesn’t care about your goals. They care about theirs. And their #1 goal is to increase user engagement in order to sell ads. They want more user comments, more user logins, and more user impressions … in order to sell more ads to more users.

Each post you make on Facebook is competing for your parents’ attention with Facebook ads. Instead, colleges and universities should focus their parent involvement on student success and outcomes that actually matter. Drexel University and University of Mississippi are two of our many partners that are doing this (more on that later!)

Aside from Facebook failing to focus parent involvement on better ways to help students succeed, there are 3 key reasons why it shouldn’t be the center of your parent engagement strategy.

1) Facebook is the Wild West of parent engagement

Facebook is free, so it’s an attractive option for engaging college parents. However, it’s the Wild West of parent engagement. There’s very little control over the content and comments your parents see, unless you want to be the sheriff. And we all know what happens to the sheriff in a Western.

But there are ways to maintain the tone and tenor without the tumult.

2) It’s potentially dangerous when false info is shared

Facebook can be hard to manage … and potentially dangerous. It wasn’t originally designed for the specific purpose of engaging families of college students. As a result, it can become difficult for schools to monitor Facebook and stay updated about what parents are saying on the site. 

Are comments from parents helpful to student success? Sometimes. But we all know that those comments can get out of hand quickly and even the most well-meaning parents can accidentally spread false information. And getting people to forget fake news and take in the facts is like trying to put toothpaste back in the tube (read: close to impossible).

3) Facebook’s lack of data leaves you in the dark

Facebook has very little data or analytics, which means that you don’t have any insight into who your users are or how many true families you’re actually engaging with. Also, not being able to see what gets views or traction leaves you guessing on your content strategy and hoping for the best.

4) Very few parents prefer institutions to communicate with them through Facebook

When we surveyed over 12,000 families, only 5% of respondents indicated that they prefer social media as a communication channel (down from 10% the previous year!) – and those families are mostly White and have high family incomes. Black, Hispanic, first-generation, and low-income families prefer other channels such as email and text message.

45% of families don’t engage with their student’s institution on Facebook at all — meaning if you’re relying on it as a way to share information, you’re missing more than half your audience. That’s even higher when you look at non-White families (61% for Asian families, 55% for Black families, and 48% for Hispanic families).

If you’re trying to reach those family populations, Facebook is not the way to go.

Drexel gains better control of their narrative with switch to CampusESP

Drexel University had a Facebook page for families led through the Drexel Family Association, but they quickly found it difficult to control the narrative and prevent inaccurate content from being shared. 

“With Facebook, stories can escalate with incorrect information getting shared. Facebook isn’t a good front door for an institution,” said Subir Sahu, Senior Vice President for Student Success at Drexel. “What information is on there, how it looks, how it’s presented, and how quickly you respond make up the pieces to tell a story. We wanted a better front door, which leads to why we partnered with CampusESP.”

Within a year of launching The Drexel University Family Portal and after seeing great engagement from their families, Drexel decided to sunset their Facebook page and go all in on CampusESP. The results? 100% worth it!

“CampusESP allows us to coordinate delivery of information and messaging in a real way, both with internal pieces along with content that CampusESP provides,” Sahu added. “The feel of the platform is much more polished and professional than Facebook, and we get good data back on what information is being utilized and when. It’s been a win all around for us.” 

Ole Miss warns parents of the hazards of Facebook and the fake information that comes with it

University of Mississippi has also struggled with incorrect information being shared, many times from unofficial Facebook pages that weren’t affiliated with the university. Merrill Magruder, Special Assistant to the Chancellor – Family Engagement, emphasizes the importance of letting parents know about legitimate social media pages and communication channels early on. If parents notice something outside of the verified list provided by Ole Miss, she explains that there’s a chance that the content is coming from someone who bought their information. 

“I think it’s important to create the narrative early. By having parents sign up for CampusESP, I’m able to create our narrative as an institution. From the start, we let parents know how and when we’ll reach out to them, and when we don’t reach out to them, which helps them recognize when something is fake.” 

Magruder also makes use of Parent Orientation sessions to set expectations with families on where they should go to find accurate information and ask questions.

“At Orientation I pull up the CampusESP platform and tell them it’s the best place to go for information,” said Magruder. 

Research shows that most parents are expecting weekly communication from their student’s institution. And underrepresented groups prefer channels like email and text message rather than social media. It’s time for parents to stop navigating the Wild Wild West. Ensuring the information families receive accurately represents your institution is imperative, within a platform that you can monitor, maintain, and scale from.

Want to learn more about how we can help you grow your parent engagement strategy?