Activity of universities in social networks. Correlations of rankings, students, followers and interactions

The Internet and social networks are widely used by students. For higher education, which operates in a highly competitive environment, marketing is a fundamental tool for universities to distinguish themselves and attract new students. Social networks are one of the best options for influencing university choice. The objective of this study is to analyze the relationship between some indicators related to universities and their use of and results on social networks. We carried out quantitative correlational research to study the number of students and ranking position as university indicators as well as the number of followers, posts, and interactions (likes, comments, and shares) weekly and per post on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube. Data were collected from 83 Spanish universities over 14 weeks in 2021. Correlation analysis showed that the number of students is closely related to the number of followers and interactions, although to varying degrees. The position of a university in the rankings exhibited a particularly significant correlation with their number of followers on almost all the networks. In addition, the higher the university in the ranking, the higher the number of interactions per post that it obtained on Facebook and Twitter. It was also found that universities with more followers had more interactions (likes, comments, and shares) with their posts. Finally, the number of posts was found to be positively related to the interactions per week but not to the interactions per post. This study has identified some significant relationships between the characteristics of all Spanish universities and their performance on four social networks, which may help universities become better at acting and communicating on them.