I’m not a huge fan of admissions chats.  I think that the only people who attend them are the really psyched kids that you don’t have to waste time or resources marketing to in the first place (and BTW, those same kids will come to every single chat you do, along with IMing their admissions counselor every day of the week).  But a lot of admissions offices do them and if you’re going to do something, you want to try to make it as successful as possible.  Here are some tips for boosting the attendance of your chats: 

Chat Day/Time Selection: Make sure you know what TV shows are popular this season with your age group and DO NOT schedule your chat on the same day it airs.  During the school year, I found that 7-9pm was the best time - give the students time to get home from practice or whatever, eat dinner and settle down.  During the summer, I would hold the chats in mid-afternoon.  Remember, during the summer they are going to be sleeping in if they have the option, so make sure you do it late enough to appeal across time zones.

Marketing: Marketing the event as much as possible is key to a successful chat.  Make sure you communicate to the admissions staff so they are promoting the chat in communications with their prospects.

There should be at least two emails specifically marketing the chat - one 3-5 days prior to the event and one the day of, 15-30 minutes before the chat actually starts.  Most of your audience is going to come from that second email - they are going to be online when they get it and drop in.  However, the first email serves a different purpose: Make the call-to-action for the student to RSVP for the chat in advance and build a quick and simple form on your website to allow them to do that.  This is key.  It lets you know who is interested early, to give you time to do research, log into your system and find out what their screen name is ahead of time.  Make sure your RSVP form requires them to give you their home phone number.

The Day Of:  The time has arrived and your chat has started.  You’re armed with your list of RSVPs.  If your RSVPed attendees haven’t started showing up within fifteen minutes of the chat starting, it’s time to bust out your phone.  ”Hi, I know you RSVPed for our chat tonight but I haven’t seen you log in yet.  Are you having technical difficulties with the system?”  Some students really will be having technical difficulties (in which case you can walk them through it) but more often than not they just forgot and the phone call is a nice reminder.  I’ve seen phone calls like this boost a chat audience by up to one-third.

After The Chat: Make sure you keep track of which prospects attended the chat and make sure that touch-point is noted in your database.  It should be counted as a high level contact, since the student had to take initiative to attend the chat in the first place.  This will allow you to see if the same kids are consistently coming to the chat and what level they matriculate at, which will let you know if its a tactic that is worth continuing.