Primary Research Group has published The Survey of Distance Learning Programs in Higher Education, 2010 Edition, ISBN 1-57440-147-5. 

The 200+ page report gives detailed benchmarking data from more than 50 participating higher education distance learning programs.  The report presents highly specific data on spending on various forms of marketing methods such as Facebook, Yahoo and Google ads, and ezine, magazine, newspaper, radio, billboard and television advertising, to mention a few.

The report also gives detailed information on trends in revenues, tuition, financial aid, enrollment and other critical issues for higher education distance learning program administrators. Coverage includes course development costs, use of new technologies, and efforts in assessment and tutoring.

The data in the report is broken out by type of size of college, for public and private colleges, for-profit and non-profit colleges, by size of distance learning enrollment, and by the scope of the distance learning program itself, those that aim at both traditional and non-traditional learners, and those focused exclusively on the latter.

Just a few of the report’s many findings are that:

†      Revenue for the programs in the sample ranged from just $58,500 to nearly $18.7 million with a median of $838,500 and a mean of about $3.13 million.

†      43.4% of the programs in the sample had administratively separate marketing budgets distinct from the overall marketing budgets of the sponsoring colleges. 

†      More than 55% of programs queried felt that the economic slowdown has led to higher enrollment in their programs, and only 5.56% thought it had led to lower enrollment.

†      Private colleges in the sample vastly outspent public colleges on marketing by a factor or more than 8:1.

†      32.14% of the programs in the sample have used magazine advertising in the past year and 16% have used billboards. 

†      Direct mail was most important for colleges offering 4-year degrees, and 21.43% of them said that direct mail was their most important advertising vehicle.

†      More than a fifth of the colleges in the sample plan to increase their spending on Google ads, while another 23.4% plan to hold spending constant and 4.26% plan to increase spending considerably.

†      Not a single college in the sample said that its retention rate for distance learning students had decreased in the past year. 

†      Colleges pay instructors or other course designer a mean of $1335.90 to develop a course from scratch.

The price of the PDF and print versions of the report is $149.00. Site licenses are also available. For further information view our website at www.PrimaryResearch.com.