Why Re-Engagement Campaigns Are The Ultimate A/B Testing Playground

Laura Rudolph
6 days ago
4 min read

You already know who they are. They clicked “Apply.” Maybe they even uploaded a transcript. Then... crickets.

No submission. No follow-up.

For most enrollment teams, incomplete applicants end up in a forgotten segment, added to a drip campaign, nudged a few times, and then left behind in favor of fresher leads.

But what if that was a mistake?

What if those incomplete applicants weren’t a dead end, but a testing goldmine?

Your live lab. Your control group. Your admissions sandbox.

You might be missing out.

You’re Sitting on a Testable Goldmine ✨

Incomplete applicants are one of the most testable audiences in your funnel.

They already know your brand.
They've taken meaningful action.
And now they’ve disengaged, which makes them the perfect segment to experiment with.t up.

You're not risking first impressions or alienating high-priority leads. You're working with students who’ve already paused and who give you space to try something different.

You can track exactly where they stopped. You can measure the impact of every message. You can test tone, content, format, timing and get immediate behavioral feedback.

It’s the dream scenario for enrollment marketers who want to improve performance without making massive changes upstream.

What Are You Actually Testing?

We talk a lot about A/B testing in terms of learning, and yes, that’s the foundation. But Re-engagement campaigns are a chance to test everything about how your audience responds and why.

When you run a subject line test, you're not just optimizing for opens. You’re uncovering what tone of voice makes a student stop scrolling. Is it curiosity? Helpfulness? Urgency?
When you send a plain-text message from a counselor, you're testing more than format. You’re testing authenticity, the feeling that someone real is reaching out, not just a CRM workflow.
When you play with different CTA styles like “Submit now” vs. “Still interested?” you're not just checking clicks. You’re identifying how your audience responds to motivation: pressure vs. permission, confidence vs. empathy.

Every re-engagement campaign becomes a behavioral readout and a peek into how your prospective students (and their parents) actually think.

What If You Don’t Just Learn, You Win?

Let’s me say it out loud: some of these messages are going to work.

What if one subject line reactivates 20% of your incomplete apps?
What if a plain-text email from a counselor gets more completions than every branded send you’ve ever deployed?
What if a single CTA — “Pick up where you left off” — becomes your highest-converting line of the year?

This isn’t just about marginal gains. This is about lift!

In an admissions cycle where every application counts, a successful re-engagement message isn’t just a learning moment, it’s momentum.

The Data Speaks Louder When the Stakes Are Low

Here’s the funny part: enrollment marketers often save A/B testing for their biggest, highest-stakes messages — open house emails, decision day campaigns, yield pushes.

But those are exactly the moments when you can’t afford to get it wrong!

Why not treat re-engagement as your low-stakes, high-learning environment?

Incomplete applicants won’t ding your brand if you get the tone wrong. They won’t bounce because of one imperfect CTA. And if they do? You haven’t lost anything — they were already disengaged.

The Most Overlooked Variable: Voice

Most teams obsess over design, content, timing and CTAs. But there’s one variable that changes everything: tone.

Higher ed has long defaulted to "professional", buttoned-up, institutional language. “We are writing to inform you…”“Your application remains incomplete…”

That tone might be safe. But it’s also ignorable. And students — especially Gen Z — ignore it all the time.

Re-engagement is your permission slip to flip the script. To sound like a human again.

Try something informal. Friendly. Even a little weird. Be a little funny. Use contractions. Lowercase subject lines. An emoji if it fits. Empathy always.

“Hey — looks like you left something behind. Want to pick it back up?”

It doesn’t have to be slick. It just has to be real.

And when you test voice shifts like this, you’ll start learning what feels right to your audience, and that unlocks everything else.

Why Re-Engagement > High-Stakes Testing

Most enrollment teams save testing for their biggest campaigns: open house pushes, admitted student days, yield email sequences.

But those are the worst places to get it wrong!

You can’t afford to misfire on your most visible campaigns. Which is exactly why you should be testing in your safest space: re-engagement.

These students aren’t reading everything. They're not hypersensitive to language. And they’re not new. You’re not blowing a first impression.

If your test email flops? No harm done.

If it lands? You’ve just unlocked new insights to power every other comm flow in your cycle.

Start Testing This Week: Here’s How

This doesn’t require a full strategy overhaul. Just pick one segment and one variable.

Here are five simple, high-impact A/B tests to try now:

Subject Line Style
“Reminder: Complete Your Application” vs. “👀 Still thinking about {{College}}?”

✅ Tests : urgency vs. curiosity, formal vs. conversational

Voice + Tone
“Your application remains incomplete.” vs. “Hey, looks like you paused. Want to jump back in?”

✅ Tests buttoned-up vs. conversational, institutional vs. personal

Sender Identity
From “Admissions Office” vs. From a real name like “Jasmine at Northbridge”

✅ Tests: institutional vs. personal connection

CTA Framing
“Complete your app” vs. “Pick up where you left off” or "Jump back in"

✅ Tests: directive vs. low-pressure

Timing
Send at 10 AM Tuesday vs. 8 PM Sunday

✅ Tests: attention and energy windows

Email Format
HTML template with brand elements vs. Plain-text “check-in” style message

✅ Tests: polish vs. personal tone

Bonus Insight: Use one test per campaign. Don’t overcomplicate it. Just isolate the variable, measure, learn and either scale what works or move on to the next test.

Final Thought: Stop Guessing. Start Testing.

You don’t need a rebrand to become a smarter enrollment marketer. You need a test-and-learn mindset and a place to safely experiment.

Your incomplete applicants give you both.

So start testing your voice. Your CTA. Your timing. Your tone.

Sometimes you’ll learn.

Sometimes you’ll win.

Either way? You’ll walk away smarter.

And maybe, just maybe, with 20 new completed apps you thought you’d lost.