Social media as a promotional tool in higher education in Malaysia

Undoubtedly, marketing is an important tool to position and brand Higher Education Institutions (HEIs). Nowadays, higher education is facing big challenges, which have made a lot of HEIs interested in attracting more students. Likewise, education marketing division in the Ministry of Higher Education (MOHE) Malaysia was set up for the purpose of promoting Malaysian higher education. In recent years, with the rising importance of social media, many promotional tools like traditional print and broadcast media have faced major challenges, as many newspaper and television channels lost their audiences. Overwhelmingly, the majority of Malaysian HEIs are beginning to embrace some forms of social media for promotional purposes. This research is mainly descriptive and explanatory, and partially exploratory in nature. The collected data will be qualitative and quantitative based on survey questionnaires and semi-structured interviews on the application of social media in promoting Malaysian higher education. Beside these methods, secondary data collection from an analysis of Malaysian HEIs´ online social communities will be conducted.