Students today rely almost entirely on the Internet to search for schools, submit applications, and communicate with prospective professors and student peers. And with the economic slowdown resulting in budget reductions for many institutions, more cost-effective avenues to recruit students must be considered. In addition, it can help students relate to your school better when you show up right where they go to find information.

Improve organic search engine rankings through Search Engine Optimization

Incorporating search engine optimization (SEO) into admissions and recruiting websites provides an edge when potential candidates are beginning to examine their options. To take advantage of the benefits of SEO, important keywords should be identified that are incorporated into the text along with consistent updating of content, which can be helped by using blogs, press releases, and/or newsletters.

Pursue in-bound linking relationships in an organic manner, to demonstrate to the search engines that your site is considered an authority. In addition, you will need to ensure the architecture of your web site is optimized, or all that wonderful content you are adding will not even be indexed.

Depending on your site, you may begin seeing higher search engine rankings for your relevant keywords within a couple weeks - or it could take 6 months or longer.

For faster visibility, pay-per-click (PPC) ads listed through Google or Overture can be a good tool during peak recruiting times.

Network where today's tech savvy youth hangout, on social networking sites

Another method for schools to increase their Web presence is through the ever-growing social networking medium. A profile for a particular program or institution as a whole can be created on MySpace or Facebook for no cost, giving you the ability to reach thousands of high school and undergraduate students.

One particular social networking site, Zinch, is specifically made for students and admissions counselors to interact slightly more in-depth than traditional name, GPA, and test score environments. Recruiters can better narrow their searches rather than sending thousands of e-mails, resulting in open rates 3 times higher than blanket e-mail campaigns, as reported in one recent effort at Butler University.

SEO and social networking can be valuable components for admission recruiting along with student recruiting software solutions, to help your institution draw the best and brightest to fill the ranks.