India: EducationUK February 2016 Post Exhibition Counselling Day

Education UK exhibitions in India are one of the most popular recruitment and profile raising platforms for UK institutions. During the exhibitions, visiting delegates get an opportunity to meet prospective students who are interested in studying for a UK qualification. 

At the exhibitions, UK institutions are able to provide only basic information about their courses to visiting students due to high footfalls at the event.  This results in the participating institutions relying on other offline and online platforms including education agents for follow up and conversions to applications. 

Post the Education UK November 2015 exhibitions, SIEM India piloted the post exhibition counselling day across three cities. 

These sessions were organised to take place post each exhibition in Delhi, Mumbai and Kolkata. The format involved UK institutions and the British Council taking appointments with students at the exhibition for a counselling session scheduled for the next day. SIEM team provided the venue and administrative support at British Council offices.

The pilot attracted a lot of interest from the sector and received a good uptake from the UK sector. However, during the November exhibition most delegates could speak to the students that visited their stalls and there were no appointments booked for the next day.  Since there were no confirmed appointments in Delhi and Mumbai, the counselling day in these cities didn’t take place while in the city of Kolkata we cancelled the event with mutual consent with participating delegates.

However, due to the high interest in the Counselling Day programme and on popular request, we are proposing to pilot the post exhibition counselling day again at the February 2016 exhibitions as the feedback received from delegates from the November leg indicated they would be happy to participate in this initiation again.

Dates:

7 February: British Council Chennai: The exhibition in Chennai will be held on 6 February

8 February: British Council Bangalore: The exhibition in Bangalore will be held on 7 February

10 February: British Council Hyderabad: The exhibition in Hyderabad will be held on 9 February

12 February: British Council Pune: The exhibition in Pune will be held on 11 February

Format of the event:

Participating UK institutions should invite/inform prospective students they met at the Exhibitions, for a one-on-one counselling session at the British Council offices. British Council will be taking appointments on behalf of these UK institutions. All delegates will need to direct their visitors to the British Council stall for a counselling session appointment for the next day. These sessions will also be promoted via digital and social media platforms. This is an excellent opportunity for UK institutions to follow up immediately and convert students. Since there is space constraint at British Council offices, we will be able to offer space to UK institutions on first-come, first-served basis only. The sessions will be delivered in a table/chair format and participating institutions will be requested to carry their branded table cloth and a medium to small size standee.  We would also encourage and welcome UK alumni participation for the counselling session along with the delegates.

Benefits for the participating UK institution:

·   Participating UK institutions will get a chance to have an exclusive one-on-one counselling session with the respective student database collected  at the exhibition

·   An opportunity to convert prospective students into applicants who are in the process of deciding their international study destination

·   Less dependency on other offline mediums  for follow up, as this platform entails direct and immediate follow through with the leads generated at the exhibitions 

·   Opportunity to directly recruit

Costs and Important notes:

·  Participation fee: £250 at each city.

·  Event will be from 11.00 am to 3.00 pm

·  Only two representatives from each institution will be allowed to participate. No agents will be allowed to participate

·  The event will run subject to a minimum and maximum number of participants at each city

·  If we don’t receive enough appointments for the counselling day; it may lead to either a no show from students or cancellation of the event. In such a situation a 20% charge (£50) will be levied to the participating UK institution. This charge will be staff cost for the time spent by staff member in each city in organising the event.

Whom to contact:

For any further information about the event or to participate, kindly send an email to Shruti Khanna on Shruti.khanna@in.britishcouncil.org with the name of the cities you’d like participate in latest by 27 January 2016.