UK university use of Weibo

China is the top market for international students in the UK with nearly 79,000 students enrolled in the academic year 2011-2012. (HESA) At the current 17% rate of growth, this could mean upto 12 5,000 Chinese students on campus by 2015.

While this is growth, the US is even more successful in marketing itself as a destination with a 25% year on year increase in their Chinese student enrolments (Open Doors 2012).

A key task for UK institutions is how can they fully tap the China market and differentiate themselves from other UK universities in what has become a dramatically more competitive marketplace.

Ernie Diaz who directs the work of a Weibo services agency in Beijing, says “the Internet has made connecting with prospective Chinese students eminently possible and it's a great irony that so few of these schools effectively use this approach," (China Daily News).  With Facebook and Twitter effectively banned in the country this means that universities need to engage on Weibo, now the world’s second largest social media channel.

Diaz continues, "Any study abroad candidate in China is actively online waiting for some direct communication with a university. The web presence is enormously important because the one thing that sells in China is word of mouth. If a school had a Mandarin speaker or a Chinese alumnus who could answer questions on popular message boards, students would be so knocked out the universities are taking time to connect with them, they would soon be telling their friends,"

While a 2012 survey of UK institutions on Weibo reported that 58% of them have a Weibo presence. However, the actual use of these accounts is patchy. I have examined the use of Weibo by the 10 biggest universities in the UK in terms of student numbers, (excluding the Open University) and the result is disappointing. Three of them have no Weibo presence while only half of them have an official account.

Leading the way is the University of Central Lancashire with its account operating out of Beijing http://weibo.com/uclan  attracting more than 26000 followers. The university of Nottingham’s China Campus has nearly 11,000 fans http://e.weibo.com/unncweibo.

Engagement with the accounts of the other universities is much more sporadic with Manchester Metropolitan University’s Tencent Weibo account having a mere 65 followers.

Worth a mention is University of Manchester’s account dedicated to helping Chinese students through orientation. Its 2000 followers show the potential; for using this medium in a more strategic direction.

UK universities are clearing missing out an opportunity for engaging with their number one market and building their reputation. The time to act is now.