Virtual Tours for Independent Schools

For King William’s College in the Isle of Man, the statistics speak for themselves: nearly 16,000 visits in just a few months! It doesn’t take long to understand the reasons why this might be the case..

 

Firstly, the school has been simple but effective with its presentation of the tours. The school’s website features a link to the virtual tour on its home page – the first page you land on as a prospective pupil or parent gives you instant access to a guided tour of the school and its fantastic facilities. Instantly you get a true feel for the environment – something that photographs or videos cannot really do, despite still being valuable marketing tools themselves. Making the tour so accessible is crucial to anyone investing in this technology as a marketing tool – don’t hide it away on sub pages, get it out there! 

 

Secondly, I believe it is very much down to the that that Independent Schools having a global catchment area. If you are trying to appeal to pupils from Europe and Asia, etc.. you will no doubt be competing with a whole host of other Independent Schools in the UK, all of whom may be equally difficult logistically for those pupils and their families to visit in person. A virtual tour really is the next best thing to actually being there and gives schools an edge on the competition as well as being hugely engaging and immersive. With the interactive content you can embed (read more about this later on) it is essentially the ultimate digital prospectus.

 

Our virtual tours are based upon a 100% accurate 3D model that gets created through a 3D scanning process that uses Infrared. The main body of King William’s College was scanned in around 4 hours, with one of my colleagues carrying out separate scans of areas that were separate to the main building, such as the Chapel, DT Block, Boarding Areas and the Sports Hall.

4K hi-res 360 degree images are captured during the scanning process and overlaid on top of the model to arrive at a stunning 3D virtual tour. Having this level of hi-quality imagery leads to a bonus by-product in that you can download any image from any angle or area of a tour – perfect for marketing brochures or a website, and all without spending anything on a separate photographer!

Showcasing the school’s boarding areas and common rooms was a big emphasis for the marketing team at KWC. Vitally important as the teaching and learning environments are, the “behind the scenes” areas need featuring to allow overseas pupils to begin to get excited about how they will be spending their time away from the classroom.

Judy Bell, Marketing Officer at KWC is thrilled by the results and even more so at their phenomenal engagement statistics!

 

 

 

For all enquiries and a free consultation regarding all media services for your school, please get in touch with us:

 

0151 638 6283

 

Written by Simon Sloan, Operations Manager, hi-impact