Tired of All That College Spam?
If you, like most students, have been bombarded with spam and direct mail from colleges, you might be wondering how they got your name. Well, unfortunately there are several ways, many of which cannot be avoided, but one of the major sources of spam is college search websites. Right now, if you google “online college search”, “find a good college” or “find a college for me”, you will most likely be directed to a site that will claim to offer a service to help you find a good college. Unfortunately, many of these sites exist solely to gather your contact information so they can sell the information to schools. Not all sites do this, but the sites that do, seem to have the deepest pockets. Because some of these sites spend up to 63K per day — that’s right, I said 63 thousand dollars — on pay-per-click advertising, they rise to the top. So, how do you make sure you don’t get caught in one of these spam machines? Here are our recommendations:
1) Avoid sites that ask for your contact information upfront
2) Read the disclaimer to see who they will be selling your contact info to
3) Ask your college counselor what they would recommend
4) Visit a few sites to see if you get the same answers
5) Start with myUsearch.com, the only truly objective site on the web
6) Try sites that offer reputable services other than search engines such as publishing, test prep, etc. Petersons.com, Collegeboard.com or Princeton Review’s Counselor-O-Matic are not as objective as myUsearch.com, but they are pretty good.
