Make your university website Genuinely Helpful

Attract more targeted visitors and raise your conversion rate

Your university website is the one channel you fully own and control. It is where almost every prospective student ends up at some point, no matter how they first heard about you. If that experience is confusing or incomplete, you lose time answering the same questions and waste money on campaigns that do not convert. 

This course builds on my book “Genuinely Helpful – a practical guide to effective university websites” and helps you apply its principles to your own website. You will work through a practical framework for making your website more visible, easier to navigate and more convincing for prospective students and other key audiences. 

The course is designed to help you and your team: 

  • Make your website more helpful for students and staff, so you answer fewer repetitive questions. 
  • Improve visibility in (AI) search by offering clearer, more complete content. 
  • Increase conversions from existing traffic before spending more on new campaigns. 

All formats are live and include a certificate of completion.

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  • Central marketing and communications teams responsible for the main university website. 
  • Faculty and programme marketers who own key pages such as programme, subject or research pages. 
  • Web, content and digital teams planning a redesign and needing a shared framework before briefing agencies.   
  • Teams who are not planning a full revamp but want clearer, higher-converting pages and better SEO from their current site. 
  • Leaders who want to reduce internal debate about the website by aligning around student-centred principles.

What you'll learn in this course

The course gives you a structured path from “nice but noisy website” to “genuinely helpful and findable”. 

You will learn how to: 

  • See your website through student eyes across the full decision and enrolment journey. 
  • Improve key pages so they actually address student concerns and lead to action. 
  • Improve visibility in search and AI platforms by aligning structure, internal links and keywords with user needs. 
  • Prepare for a website revamp so you don’t end up with a prettier site that performs worse.   
  • Build a realistic plan for ongoing improvements instead of “big bang” projects only. 

Throughout the course, you will work on your own site: real pages, real structures, real questions from students and staff. The aim is to leave with concrete changes and a clear roadmap, not just ideas.

Choose the format that fits you

All formats are live and based on the “Genuinely Helpful” framework. Each participant receives a certificate of completion.

1-on-1 training

€ 1,000 / person

  • Two half-day online sessions with Guus. 
  • Pre-course “quick check” audit of your website. 
  • Hands-on work on your priority pages and structure during the sessions. 
  • Final 30-minute follow-up session about 3 months later to review progress and unblock next steps. 
  • Certificate upon completion 
  • Ideal for educational entrepreneurs and one-person teams.

Full-day Online team workshop

€ 2,500 / team (max 10)

  • 2 half-day online sessions for your (cross-functional) team in MS Teams. 
  • Pre-course “quick check” audit of your website. 
  • Mix of short inputs, examples from other institutions and exercises on your own site. 
  • Joint review of key journeys (e.g. “search → programme page → enquiry”) and identification of bottlenecks. 
  • Group work on programme pages, subject pages or information hubs using “Genuinely Helpful” templates. 
  • Clear list of quick wins you can implement in the current CMS, plus bigger changes to feed into future revamps. 
  • Ideal to align different teams (central, faculties, IT, content) about your website and chart a way forward.

Full-day in-person team workshop

€ Price on request

  • Full-day workshop at your campus or staff event. 
  • Tailored agenda built around your goals: revamp preparation, programme-page refresh, SEO and/or AI visibility, or conversion improvements. 
  • Hands-on exercises using your own pages, analytics and search data where available. 
  • Space for facilitated discussions between marketing, faculties, central services and IT about priorities and trade-offs. 
  • Follow-up summary and recommended next steps so the work continues after the day.

Is this course right for you?

This course is right for you, if: 

  • You feel your website is not pulling its weight. 
  • A redesign is being discussed and you want to ensure it leads to a student-centred website that converts.   
  • You want to improve visibility and conversion first, using what you already have, instead of waiting for a big rebuild. 
  • You need a shared language to discuss website changes with colleagues outside marketing.

It is probably not the best fit if: 

  • You are looking for an in-depth technical CMS or UX design course. 
  • You are not in the education sector and do not work with student-facing websites. 
  • You do not have the resources to implement improvements decided on during the workshops 
  • You do not have the bandwidth to commit to the workshops and afterwork. In that case, it may be better to leave the analysis to me and order a student recruitment audit instead.
Guus Goorts delivering an online workshop on his laptop

Practical questions (FAQ)

How much time should we plan for the course?

The sessions take two half days (or one full day). I also advise to free up recurring time in your weekly schedule afterwards to make sure the improvements actually get implemented.

Do we need to have read the book first?

It helps if you are familiar with the “Genuinely Helpful” book, but it is not required. The course covers the core ideas and applies them directly to your website. Participants often get more value from the book when they read it after the workshop, as a reference.

Does this only make sense before a website revamp?

No. One use case of this course is to align the team before a redesign, so you do not end up with a prettier but less effective site. But even if no revamp is planned, there is usually a lot you can do by improving content, structure and key pages within the limitations of your current CMS.

Can we combine this with Google Ads or Analytics training?

Yes. These topics are very much interrelated. We can discuss a combined programme during the intake.

Do participants receive a certificate?

Yes. All participants will receive a certificate upon completion of the course.

Can we pay by invoice rather than online?

Yes. If you prefer an invoice, we can arrange that after we confirm the format, dates and group size.

Ready to make your website genuinely helpful?

Whether you are preparing for a revamp or want to improve what you already have, this course helps you turn your university website into a foundation for more effective, less stressful student recruitment.

1-on-1 training

€ 1,000 / person

  • Two half-day online sessions with Guus. 
  • Pre-course “quick check” audit of your website. 
  • Hands-on work on your priority pages and structure during the sessions. 
  • Final 30-minute follow-up session about 3 months later to review progress and unblock next steps. 
  • Certificate upon completion 
  • Ideal for educational entrepreneurs and one-person teams.

Full-day Online team workshop

€ 2,500 / team (max 10)

  • 2 half-day online sessions for your (cross-functional) team in MS Teams. 
  • Pre-course “quick check” audit of your website. 
  • Mix of short inputs, examples from other institutions and exercises on your own site. 
  • Joint review of key journeys (e.g. “search → programme page → enquiry”) and identification of bottlenecks. 
  • Group work on programme pages, subject pages or information hubs using “Genuinely Helpful” templates. 
  • Clear list of quick wins you can implement in the current CMS, plus bigger changes to feed into future revamps. 
  • Ideal to align different teams (central, faculties, IT, content) about your website and chart a way forward.

Full-day in-person team workshop

€ Price on request

  • Full-day workshop at your campus or staff event. 
  • Tailored agenda built around your goals: revamp preparation, programme-page refresh, SEO and/or AI visibility, or conversion improvements. 
  • Hands-on exercises using your own pages, analytics and search data where available. 
  • Space for facilitated discussions between marketing, faculties, central services and IT about priorities and trade-offs. 
  • Follow-up summary and recommended next steps so the work continues after the day.

Not sure which format is best for you? Contact me and I’ll be happy to advise.

In the Genuinely Helpful – Field Notes, I share one practical idea you can try on your site or in your campaigns. Every two weeks.