The challenge
Santa Barbara City College (SBCC), located in Santa Barbara, California, set out to re-engage two distinct groups of prospective students:
- Those who had previously attended but stopped out
- Those who had applied but never registered for classes
Reconnecting with these groups required a thoughtful approach. The college needed an outreach strategy that could drive measurable results without adding workload to staff. The goal was to motivate students to return by making the reapplication and registration processes as seamless and accessible as possible.
The solution
Over the past three years, SBCC has partnered with Motimatic to design and execute a targeted, scalable re-engagement strategy. By delivering personalized content across multiple social platforms, Motimatic helped SBCC move students from awareness to action—prompting reapplications and registrations efficiently and at scale.
Re-Engagement Strategies That Worked:
- Reconnecting with the Right Students: SBCC reached back more than eight years to identify and target a broad pool of students who were most likely to return.
- Turning Interest into Action: Together, SBCC and Motimatic developed a tailored messaging sequence that first encouraged reapplications and then, once a student reapplied, automatically shifted focus to registration.
- Meeting Students in Their Digital Spaces: Motimatic reached more than 71,000 students across six social media platforms, ensuring messages appeared where students naturally spend time online.
The results
SBCC successfully re-engaged hundreds of students while keeping staff workload minimal. The campaign not only drove 565 total student actions (reapplications and registrations) but also expanded SBCC’s digital reach, generating over 1.3 million social engagements. This scalable approach has proven to be a sustainable, data-driven model for long-term student reactivation.
In their words
Motimatic’s scalability was the defining factor in choosing the right engagement partner. They helped us reach tens of thousands of students on social media with minimal staff effort. We care deeply about our students who once attended SBCC, and with Motimatic’s support, we were able to welcome hundreds back this Fall.
Amanda Jacobs, Marketing Communications Specialist: Santa Barbara City College