Evaluating strategic marketing in higher education through social media: A study with reference to Saudi Arabia

In the general education system of Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is an attractive and potential market for educational services having nearly 75% of the students in the total region. As the demand for primary and secondary education increases, the demand for higher education is also increasing in the Kingdom with a total strength of 1.7 million students pursuing higher education by the end of 2014. However, the enrollment at the post-graduate level is very low; the Saudi government is planning to diversify the university education and expected to increase the enrollments at a minimum of 5% every year in all the universities located the Kingdom. So, there is a need to increase the enrollment of students in the Kingdom at undergraduate as well at post graduate levels. However in United States, among the universities, 95% are adapting all kinds of social media tools; it is unclear if the universities in the Kingdom are not realizing the importance of establishing social media networks to reach their potential students for the enrollment in various courses as well as establishing good communication network among the stakeholders of the sector. Even to do so, one institution needs a better social media strategy to attract the students by means of various social media blogs such as Linkedln, Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter and many other channels. Today, entry of private universities and the institutions offering online educational services in the Kingdom are focusing on creating brand value and conducting educational programmes and activities by using virtual communication technologies. Therefore, majority of the institutions of higher education are recognizing the trend of social media usage and attracting prospective students by following and observing such trend all around the world countries. In this context, the present study has an overwhelming objective of identifying the strategy to adapt the social media in marketing of higher educational institutions in Saudi Arabia.