Comparative Analysis of United Arab Emirates and Catalonia Universities Social Networks

In an increasingly competitive educational environment, the use of social media has become a very important marketing tool for universities to attract and retain students. This study aims to analyze and compare the social networks behavior of universities in the UAE and Catalonia. To do so, the number of followers, posts, and likes that these institutions had on social networks were studied. The data were obtained from the official accounts of the universities on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, during February and March 2024. The results reveal that the universities in each region focus their efforts on different networks. Thus, the UAE entities concentrate their efforts on Facebook and Instagram, showing a great superiority over the Catalan ones, attracting more followers and achieving more engagement on them. Likewise, the universities of Catalonia stand out on Twitter and YouTube, where they achieve more interaction than the UAE universities. However, the publication effort of Catalan institutions is not rewarded by their interaction in relative value. This analysis provides valuable conclusions for improving the digital marketing strategies of higher education institutions on social networks, but it is also of great value because its results can be extrapolated to other service organizations.