About this episode

Mitchell Borges discusses how students trust peer information over official university communications and shares strategies for enrollment marketers to build genuine connections.

In an era where students trust a peer on Instagram more than a university's official website, how can enrollment marketers cut through the noise and build genuine connections? This week on The Signal: On Air, Jeff Dillon sits down with Mitchell Borges, Director of Marketing for ASUCD at UC Davis and a researcher who has spent years studying how social media actually influences student enrollment decisions. Mitchell shares eye-opening findings from his doctoral research, revealing that students are heading to Instagram comment sections to ask strangers about tuition because they perceive peer-to-peer information as more authentic than official university communications. He explains why empowering students to create content is the single most effective strategy for building trust, why out-of-state students rely more heavily on digital discovery than their in-state peers, and how his own team grew Instagram followers from 4,000 to 14,000 by letting students take the lead. Mitchell also delivers a critical wake-up call about the April 2026 Title II accessibility compliance deadline, warning that social media—often an afterthought in accessibility conversations—will be one of the…

People in this episode

Host: Jeff Dillon

Guest: Mitchell Borges

Topics covered

• student trust
• social media influence
• enrollment marketing
• content creation
• accessibility compliance
• peer-to-peer information

Keywords

• student enrollment
• Instagram
• authenticity
• digital discovery
• content workflows
• micro-trends

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: ASUCD, UC Davis

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