davenblogger

What Career Are You? Part 2

2008-12-12T18:36:00.010-05:00

In my last post I wrote about DU's content solution to a vendor contract for a mini DVD designed to bring leads to our website. (Did I mention this is year two of a legacy contract leftover from a recently departed Admissions head?) Our idea was to host a "career quiz" modeled after the quizzes you see all over the web, hosted on our domain and designed to capture email addresses for our lead database.

In this post I want to tell you how we're doing with that. Remember I said we had about 30 clicks on any of our urls on last year's DVD, and that these resulted in zero apps or visits.

So our goal was easy: Get more results - of any kind - than last year. Although I'd be the first to admit this is a lazy goal, for which I offer no excuses. Anyhow ... here's how things are shaking out so far.

Looking at conversions

The screens on the DVB all have links to our Visit and Apply pages. The quiz itself collects a name, high school grad year and email address before displaying results to the user. Each page of the quiz also contains a contact phone number and website address.

Number of DVDs delivered - 35,000
Number of DVDs in the field, Sept. - Dec. - 20,000
Visits registered - 16
Applications completed - 19
Email addresses collected - 824

Total conversion rate - 4.29%

Which is better than the expected direct mail response rate of .5% to 1.5%. Also, the DVB is still being handed out by admissions reps, so these are just "results so far."

But we won't do this again ...

I have to say, however, that next year I plan to duck out of this contract (it actually is renewed year to year and somebody jumped in and signed us up before we got a chance to show concrete reasons not to). Why?

I haven't calculated ROI on this yet, but here's what I know: We paid the higher ed vendor about $1 each for something we could have gotten much cheaper from our local fulfillment house (if we even decided to make such a thing, which we would not. We could have gotten similar results with the url printed on a frisbee or something). Especially given the fact that all content was sourced by us per the vendor's spec/template. This year we even asked for the specs and designed our own DVD sleeve because we were unhappy with the vendor's design last year.

In addition we took on the task, in-house, of concepting, researching, writing, designing and developing the quiz.

Even if it turns out to have positive ROI in the end, this is obviously not a smart way to work.

And so?

We still have a feeling the quiz is a good tool for generating interest in DU, so we've got plans brewing to put it to work elsewhere. I see a Facebook app in the near future ... Josh? :-)

Other suggestions out there? Leave a comment!

What Career Are You? Part 1

2008-12-07T21:11:00.028-05:00

Content can make all the difference

Davenport University works with a vendor that supplies "recruitment solutions" for higher ed admissions, one of these being a "your-school-here" mini DVD to be handed out at college fairs, etc. that are guaranteed to practically flood your website with leads.

Our first DVD, created last year, was five screens of copy and artwork we supplied to the vendor (plus art for the sleeve). It consisted of:

Repurposed video and a few photos (deadlines and budget didn't allow us to shoot anything new)
Copy with links to "Apply," "Visit" and, most important to a lead form, hosted by the vendor, that we could pull lead data from

We set up dedicated urls for tracking and waited for leads to pour in. None of it mattered in the end, however, because not many of the DVDs got into the field (long story). And from those few thousand that did, we tracked oh, fewer than ~~20 (yes, 20)~~ 30 visits to any of our pages, including the vendor's lead form. What went wrong? Take your pick:

A complicated snafu prevented the DVDs from getting into the hands of prospective students
The basic vendor template is boring and to craft anything better would mean a significant upcharge
DVDs are just so 1999

If you chose all the above you'd be correct. But we felt like a big problem was also a lack of compelling content.

So this time (we're in year two of a three-year contract) we decided to go beyond the vendor template and create something more. Yes, we still did the five screens of photos, copy and video snips. But we added a twist - something that users of all ages eat up on the interwebs - a link to an interactive quiz hosted off the DVD on the davenport.edu domain.

Introducing What Career Are You?

Go ahead and admit it. You've filled out at least one online quiz in your life. Whether to find a soulmate or the right diet for your body type, we've all done it. If you have a Facebook page, you know how popular quizzes are. And if any of your FB friends are in the same demographic as prospective students, you've seen how these things can spread.

Since DU is a career-oriented university, we thought it would be cool to deliver a quiz that gave prospects an idea of which DU programs might lead to careers they'd be interested in.

A few years back, Admissions had created a paper-based questionnaire loosely based on a Meyers-Briggs type of test that matched personality traits to career choices. So we had the basic structure of our quiz; it just fell to the web team to turn it into something interactive, which they did, using Drupal. Add in fun graphics and a little Flash from designer Josh, and voila! A fun - even useful - quiz.

The "Nexters" quiz, as we call it internally, offers a peek into personality traits and shows the kinds of DU programs that might match particular personality types. The program results are delivered - in exchange for a name and email address - in a sort of tag cloud, with the strongest matches in bigger, bolder type. Of course the results are "just for fun," but they do show the array of DU's programs, along with making some suggestions about what a prospect might be interested in studying.

Next - Part Two: How are we doing?

(If you take the quiz, please type Test after your first and last name so we don't contact you!)

Web 2.0 vs Design

2008-12-02T08:05:00.006-05:00

A quick aside from information architecture articles. Something I've been thinking about the past few days.

When I began designing for the web back in '95, I remember how all us 'new media designers' (as we called ourselves back then) thought we had it all figured out. We were ready to throw out all design conventions that came before us as we felt our medium was unique and didn't need to conform to stogy old design standards. Fortunately, for myself, I worked under an art director with 34 years experience in the print world, his name was Jon. Jon, I felt, was unique for an 'old timer'. He didn't feel threatened by us youngsters and even went so far as to want to learn about the web and it's implications on design. So, Jon and I spent the next 8 years working together and I learned the lessons of the past can be applied to current trends. During that time period, throughout the industry, a new design paradigm was created. One which combined the old with the new so to speak.

I think that the Web 2.0 design movement, in some ways, suffers from a similar blindness to the past in regards to design. It suffers from 'me too' sorts of conventions (reflecting, shiny buttons, bright palettes, puffy logos, rounded corners, etc.). It's a badge of honor, and a sort of back office joke, to have a Web 2.0 style site. I do appreciate many of the interface and layout conventions that Web 2.0 has given us. But, I think a lack of vision within the design community, the belief that form should be sacrificed in the name of functionality, and the limitations of CSS2 have caused us to sort of stall in our advancement of web design.

Let's leave behind the notion of what a web 2.0 site must look like. When I do a new layout, whenever adding an element, I always ask, "Why?" Does it serve a purpose of clarifying, advancing brand or adding functionality. If the answer is no, or "cause it looks cool or cause these sites are doing it", then it probably doesn't belong there.

Regarding form vs functionality, I am not advocating making pretty sites in lieu of usable sites. I leave that to the fine artists. But, a concept that is often over looked nowadays is the aesthetic usability effect. The notion that a user is more likely to spend the time to learn a new interface if it is pleasant to look at.

CSS2 has boxed is into a corner, both figuratively and literally. I'm hoping CSS3 allows us to break from some of the compromises needed for web design in the name of cross browser compatibility. Although, I'm not holding my breath on this one.

So, let's move forward ... I'll admit I fell prey to the siren song of Web 2.0 ... it's smooth rounded corners, fun palettes and sexy reflecting logos. Web 2.0 has given us some great new standards in both graphic and interface design, so let's take those standards and move on to the next level.

Information Design, Edu and You

2008-11-25T08:17:00.009-05:00

I'm so excited to introduce a new blog team member and brand new blogger, Josh Isaak, web designer and much-esteemed (although he'd probably say much-maligned) colleague. Please welcome him. (And follow him on Twitter too!)

In his seminal work, Information Anxiety, Richard Saul Wurman lays out the basic principles of information architecture. As is often the case with such groundbreaking texts, the challenge lays not in understanding the authors theories and concepts, but in applying them in a practical manner to ones own work. Over the next few months, I will attempt to find that practical application with the field of higher ed and web site architecture.

The basis of of Wurman's work is the LATCH principle. All information can be organized in 5 different ways ...

L - Location
A - Alphabetical
T - Time
C - Category
H - Hierarchical

Let's explore these organization schemes in the context of high ed. This is in no way a comprehensive study of all possibilities, but more of skimming of the surface, to show examples of application. Next post is our first stop on LATCH .... location.

Twitter musings from 'back in the day'

2008-11-22T08:40:00.004-05:00

I wrote the following post on my blog Coit Avenue back in April 2007 - about a month after I got my Twitter account. (Ok, yes, there is yet another blog o' mine, mostly used to blog during the 2006 Michigan gubernatorial campaign, but also trying to be a more 'serious' counter to Things I've Seen ... I really need to become more focused in my blogging life.)

Anyhow, at the time I wrote this, far fewer people "got" Twitter. Now that its use is so much more widespread - well, at least your friends, bosses and coworkers have heard of it, right? - it seems fitting to haul this post out and dust it off ...

Why Twitter is about more than telling you what I had for lunch

Stowe Boyd points to this article from USA Today’s Andrew Kantor on the subject of Twitter. I’m struck by Kantor’s willful ignorance of what’s at the core of this social presence app:

Twitter is a bad, bad thing — not just because of what it does, but because of what it says about all of us and our need to be connected. Twitter's whole existence is based on the premise that we aren't yet in touch with one another quite enough.

According to Twitter, you see, we should be in touch every second — every moment. This is madness …

What is madness, I think, is Kantor's oversight of the fact that we already are all connected. It is the nature our world in which everything by design is connected to everything else. It is something our ancient ancestors instinctively knew – and instinctively acted upon, in order to live and continue the species. And, as we’ve gained in knowledge of the world that surrounds us, something we’ve sought after always to understand and express.

We’ve always looked for connection

Speech, songs, stories. Written language that begat books, letters. Printing that sparked the spread of ideas via books and newspapers. And with them the migration of people, both outward across the globe and inward to enclaves of villages, towns, cities. Widespread travel, telegraph, telephone, radio, television – a succession of means for making sense of our center, our connectedness. And then the internet, cellular phones, wireless communication – technology-enabled means for understanding the connections that are.

Don’t you see it? We don't impact the flow that is the universe. These all are just our own small means for tapping it, trying to understand it, living in what already is and always has been.

I’ve been watching a lot of old movies lately – those made in the 30s, 40s and 50s where making a long-distance call was worth a raised eyebrow, a second thought, even among those with means. Even I remember when long distance was reserved for Grandma, and only on a Sunday, when the rates were cheaper, and you hadn’t just seen her the weekend before.

But what is long distance today? A rarer and rarer consideration as I call my friend who is 600 miles away at any time of the day or night. And I fully expect that soon it won’t matter if I’m using “anytime minutes” or not. It certainly shouldn’t. It’s a primitive, holdover construct from what’s fast becoming history.

These are the people we live with

Critics of connection enablers like Twitter seem short-sighted to me. Twitter is just one in a succession of acknowledgements of the connectedness of the universe and everything in it. Of the flow that creates and sustains us all. A claiming of our own existence within that flow.

Overblown? Maybe, with regard to Twitter per se. But just ask yourself: What can you learn and know of the world and your fellow humans from even a short time spent with Twittervision (see how it’s evolving already)? That someone has too many choices for lunch (which is some kind of learning in itself)? Sure. But you can also see there’s an ice storm raging in Northern Europe. That it’s tomorrow in Australia. That someone in Italy, right now, is listening to an American rock song. That many many people speak in languages you don’t understand. That there is life beyond your street that you’ve otherwise had little glimpse of before now, that it’s always been there and it continues, whether you’re asleep, awake, indifferent.

These are the people we live with on this earth, and what they do and think and feel has effects beyond you, and vice versa. Yes, these are early adopters, yes they’re technology-enabled themselves, while most of the world isn’t yet. But the implications are further reaching than we can probably imagine right now. And it’s only the smallest beginning.

The (Recruitment) Long Tail

2008-11-11T20:42:00.006-05:00

Late-blogging (not live-blogging) the Stamats Integrated Marketing Conference
The (Recruitment) Long Tail
Brad J Ward
Butler University

The conversation is in the Long Tail

If the conversation - the answers, the dynamic content - isn't there, users (prospects) go elsewhere. (This is why we need blogging at DU)

Having this all on your website makes your job a lot easier-because ...

As participation increases, content increases and engagement increases. The more you can engage, the more likely they are to start/stay

Question on how to find bloggers:
Facebook ad: Do you want the coolest job on campus? Email me. Got 76 responses for 9 spots. Butler pays bloggers $8/hour for 3 hours a week

Cautionary to bloggers: Parents, peers, professors are reading.

Twitter is between the blog posts. It's not the tool for recruiting, but by embedding in the blogs, it enhances

Getting buy-in from the admissions reps has been a struggle (I can bet)

We are in the middle of a huge shift in how we communicate. You need a whole set of tools - not just one-way sell

Social media is people having conversations online

Return on conversation:

monitor the conversation - opportunity to make sure the information out there about you is correct

information in those conversations is ongoing and accurate; authentic, what prospects want to know

Seth Godin - It's not about what you think the (students) want ... it's about creating and assembling a collection of tools that captures the attention of people who truly care

Are you listening? (Get the RSS from Twitter on Davenport University; expand on my Google alerts - DU Panthers, etc.)

The train is coming - What would it look like if you could spend 20% of your time each week on new stuff? Four hours?( that would be so sa-weet I can't imagine. But I need to! )

Secrets:

Think niche - where can you really connect with certain kids? target. Become as good at narrowcasting as you are at broadcasting
One size does not fit all - no one strategy is the be-all
Lose control - you no longer control the conversation
Crowd source - example: give video cameras to your bloggers and tell them to go out and have fun
Think 'and' not 'or' - think bigger. Facebook AND MySpace
Understand 'free' - Most of these tools are; don't pay if you don't need to.
It's about relationships not technologies

Check out Class of 2012 research etc. on SquaredPeg.com

****How many apps did you get out of it? It's about the connection (YESSSS)

IM conversation with a colleague after I got home from #stamats08*

2008-11-09T17:50:00.009-05:00

*slightly edited

M: How was the trip?

Me: Great. Met a whole slew of my Twitter friends

M: Were they feathery looking?

Me: Not so much ;-)

M: Any big revelations or ideas?

Me: Yes. I think I want to blog for .eduguru :-D

M: uh huh. Cool. And that helps us or gives you a place to network?

Me: See, here's the thing. The people who presented at this conference are part of my network. And the fact that everyone got to meet each other off Twitter and off the blogs means that network is strengthened. For me the entire conference (well, almost) was in the conversation and dinner and drinks that happened outside the sessions.

This conference produced a whole other conference outside of the presentations - streaming video, videos of presentations, photos, blogging, a #stamats08 Twitter Search (where everyone's tweets are aggregated in real time, even people who weren't there), a Ning group.

THIS is social media - the networking, but most important, the relationship building. Plus it gives us a chance to see and understand what others are doing and what we might do with social media for recruitment, retention, alumni ...

Are you getting this all down?

M signed off
M signed on
M is idle

Hmmm. Did I bore her? (just kidding, M!)

Top Tips for Conversion Optimization

2008-11-08T09:32:00.003-05:00

Stamats Integrated Marketing Conference
Online Marketing:Top Tips for Conversion Optimization
Kati Davis

Conversion is a desired action a user can take when they come to your website
Indicates how often your visitors felt compelled to give you some information in return for something of value you offer

Important:

relationship building
helps you get the most from your budget
helps eliminate internal debates - site visitors decide what works
85% of traditional students use the web as their main or only source of information

Conversion examples:

request program packet
schedule a visit - key
sign up for information session
transcript evaluation
determine scholarship award
subscribe to newletter or other feed
apply

Goal is to optimize your pages so fewer bail from your site before performing a desired action. Constant tweaking and testing of landing pages will see an average 40% lift in conversions

Essential elements affecting landing pages:

Friction- any kind of problem reduces conversions
Incentives - special offers
Visitor motivation - if they really want to do the action, they will
Value proposition - how quickly the page conveys value increases convrsions

Conversion optimization tips

create targeted landing page for each purpose with one call to action - don't send them to the home page
identify top entry and most visited pages - why do visitors value them
keep pages simple - remove nav from landing pages; use white space
use keyword(s) on the page - increases relevance to user. increases google quality score - could reduce your cpc
strategic use of photos provides clarity, trust
don't ask unnecessary questions
make forms seem physically shorter - heck, make them shorter.
clearly state what user is getting for filling out form/taking action
be clear which fields are required
test forms for usability
make the thank you page work for you - add additional compelling content. 40% people who make one conversion on your site are willing to make another one
be graphically appealing (i.e., what does 'submit' mean?)
send followup confirmation email (confirms email address)
find other ways to connect - online chat on the page, online-only 800 number
tell them how you'll use infor they're giving you, i.e., not selling it
allow opt-ins to newsletters or contact from admissions rep (rather than automatic sending or contact)
focus on effective copy - 'you and your' not 'we, us, our'; bullet points, avoid jargon
state most important ideas at beginning and end of page
track everything - assign a source code to leads
test everything
look at examples outside higher ed

tools:
Google Website Optimizer
Free online survey services (Survey Monkey, Google Apps has one too)

What the Heck Do All These Numbers Mean?

2008-11-07T14:32:00.007-05:00

Stamats Integrated Marketing Conference
What the Heck Do All These Numbers Mean? Web Analytics in Higher Education
Kyle James, Wofford College

Are you listening to what your website visitors tell you?
How are you making web decisions? If you're not using analytics, you are wasting your time.

What is the purpose of our website?? Recruitment
#1 most important audience is prospective students

Intuition is good, but you need the data

Key Performance Indicators - 4 areas

Sources (campaigns and traffic)
Success (conversions)
Users (segmentation)
Content (sites, groups, pages)

What is important? For uDU - schedule a visit, apply

Benchmarking - look once a month or so
(traffic comparisons, demographics)

Alexa, compete, quountcast
edurank.nucloud.com
Website grader
Google analytics (need to check this comparison capability out in G analytics)

Nothing is exact - enables you to make educated decisions

10/90 rule - spend 10% of budget on tool and 90% on people who use the tool. (use the free solution like Google. We need to get way better at using it)

sitescan or wasp will tell you if analytics is on your page - and working

What do you do with this data overload?

Filters - like an all lowercase filter, www and no wwww - cleans up your analytic data

Destination url tagging - set up for print, email, facebook campaigns, etc.
more info: doteduguru.com/stamats/urlbuilder

tracking links - you can also track pdfs, etc with some extra code.
more info: doteduguru.com/stamats/tagging

helps you make decisions over time about where to make changes

Reports

Site search report - gives you good keyword info, who can't find what they want
Keyword report -
Content by title report - enhance content on pages acc. to what people are looking for
Referring sites report -
404 error page report - use info to customize your 404 pages where fails happen

Goals and conversions - most important to helping you make decisions

Measurement from offline campaigns - TV, radio, print, email

All RSS feeds should go through FeedBurner for analytics purposes and for clean feed

Web analytics 2.0 - qualitative data measurement

customer surveys 4Q, Survey Monkey - ask people what they care about, what they think
monitor social media growth - put links to watch vids, read blogs, subscribe to email - link back to your site rather than try to control or keep up social sites too much. Keep spreadsheets on each social site. Video analytics from You Tube
monitor your own identity

Take aways for web analytics

1. Set goals - business goals
2. Test test test (test? what tests? :-) )
3. Look at the trends - don't get buried in numbers
4. Set up a reporting schedule and track key metrics

Some specific goals:

x visits scheduled per month
x viewbooks downloaded
lower bounce rate on a specific page by x%
generate x$$ among donors with email campaign
promote and increase presence on a social network by x%

Here are Kyle's slides and a video of the presentation.

Press Release 2.0

2008-11-06T14:33:00.007-05:00

Stamats Integrated Marketing Conference
Press Release 2.0: Generating Buzz in the Social Media Era
Matt Herzberger

Transition from old press room:

move to blogging platform (Word press - why not? we have blogs set up there, ready to use. Check out news themes)
add multimedia
easier to digest (scannable, the web way)
easy to link to social media
easy for writers

Research

Check out NY Times
Look at socialmediarelease.org - see the template. Yeah - why ARE we writing in that same old way?

What you're trying to do - Make something people actually want to look at/read

Measure

Where - newspaper,msg boards, word of mouth, industry journals
How - Google Alerts, Technorati, Blog Pulse, del.icio.us

Check it for multimedia presentation - soundslides.com

Your web presence is everything out there about you whether you put it there or not.

Here are Matt's slides and a video of his presentation.

Implementing Technology with an Eye on ROI

2008-11-06T13:09:00.008-05:00

Stamats Integrated Marketing Conference
Eye on the Prize: Implementing Technology with an Eye on ROI

Karlyn Morissette Dartmouth

"Communications makes marketing tactics tangible"

Marketing steps

1. Set goals

What's success
Make sure they relate to business goals
Goals must be measurable

2. Plan communications - consider costs; inside or outsource?

Which medium?
What is strategy for each?

3. Execute
4. Assess

What happened? did you meet your goal?
Did that result in a return? (Conversion)
How can you improve for the next time.
Share your success - make it tangible, give it context, offer recomendations

emarketing is not different from marketing in other media - above 4 steps apply

Use email marketing to -

increase applications
register online for event
online gifts (online OR by phone)
start a conversation?

Facebook ads - they're all pay per click. Inexpensive , successful

Blogs are good for -

Real stories of student experience
Interaction with current students
Make announcements, calls to action
Insight into your audience

Social Networks are good for -

Having fans, friends, followers is valuable
Engaging students over the summer (would have been great for that TouchNet rollout, hey)
Allow alum a way to interact and share with each other

social roi
what would it cost to disseminate infor
how much did you save in 'sugar off'

Key takeaways

Goals first, not technology
Measure everything
Dollarize your results to calculate roi
Ask what you can do better next time

Digital Strategy for Higher Education

2008-11-06T11:30:00.009-05:00

Stamats Integrated Marketing Conference
21st Century Marketing: Digital Strategy for Higher Education
Fritz McDonald

Update Nov. 8: I don't know why I didn't publish this earlier. Here it is

The web is becoming the tool of choice for prospective students searching out colleges.

Content is the #1 issue with college websites. Are we focusing on the prospective students audience to the detriment of our other audiences?

Colleges and U's adopting social media at twice the rate corporations are - Dartmouth research

How do you make it work?

1. Start with strategy - connect with vision and values ... um, yes
2. People first, then technology
3. Start small, focus, grow
4. Dialogue not monologue
5. Coordinate digital tools
6. Focus on content
7. Work for viral
8. Message control - we aren't entirely in control anymore. We are now managers of conversations rather than senders of messages
9. Audience driven
10. Build trust
11. Demand Metrics
12. Provide a deeper level of engagement- users have expectations
13. Build sustained relationships with your audiences

What to Do

1. Rethink your marketing
2. Be authentic See Colgate University for use of social media
3. Be multidimensional
4. Be web centric
5. Worry about usability - usability is part of your brand
6. Integrated marketing. SEO = contact, - soc media = relationships, print = emotion (allows for a fun viewbook!), web = experience, Traditional Marketing = support
7. Let them make content
8. Content must be portable, human
9. Include everyone, including Alum
10. Optimize your site
11. Decide by data
12. Develop a listening strategy
13. Be creative and usable
14. Collaborate
15. Don't intrude - prospects not willing to be contacted by text or IM

All social media builds community. That is the point

Understanding Generation Y

2008-11-06T09:05:00.009-05:00

Stamats Integrated Marketing Conference
Fully Wired and Fully Mobile: Understanding Generation Y
Jennifer Corriero, TakingITGlobal

Net Generation Attributes of Technology Use (Net gen: b. 1978-1999 - 79.8 mil.)

1. Influential - 50% of the world's population is under 25. 20% between 10 and 17. High spending

2. Connected - Social media is like air to them. They're participating, sharing, creating, living it.

They're digital natives, enthused by technology.
Use the internet to make many decisions: college, car purchase, medical, job, financial, where to live, etc.
55% of US teens use social networks like Facebook or MySpace.
Less distinction among work, learning, play - multi-tasking is pervasive

3. Diverse - Personalization, customization are key

Current US teen market is most multicultural ever.

4. Enabled - There's a shift away from the hierarchy to the network

People expect to be able to participate, whether up front or in the back channel. Expect involvement in decision making
57% if teens on the internet can be considered content producers. "Anyone can be a producer, publisher ..."

5. Aware - they're socially conscious and more activist

Building Bridges to the Next Gen

1. How relevant is your brand?
2. Is your recruting engaging, exciting, inspiring? See Cirque Du Soleil jobs site
3. Do you showcase your innovative practices
4. Do your students and alumni stay connected?
5. How are you using the social web?
6. Are you communicating your current thinking? News, current events, faculty interviews, ask an expert, blogs, etc.
7. Have you explored virtual worlds?
8. How open are you? iTunesU postings
9. Do you listen to your customers Dell Ideastorm
10. Is technology integrated across the curriculum

See Rachel Reuben's report - I think I've seen this ... I'll report back.

#Stamats08 - the back channel, etc.

2008-11-06T01:29:00.010-05:00

Stamats Integrated Marketing Conference

Some of the best information sharing and networking happens on the back channel and in the halls, the bar - someone's suite - after hours. (Thanks to @bradjward, @kylejames, @MHerzber, @KarlynM, @JeremyWilburn @jesskry and others - great to meet you all!)

Twitter - #stamats08

UStream

Flickr group

Secrets to Online Recruiting Success

2008-11-05T12:58:00.024-05:00

Ok, here I am at the Stamats Integrated Marketing Conference:Technology, Collaboration, Results after not having blogged here almost since my last Stamats conference in Chicago last July.

Sorry about that. I just feel like I have little to say in this world where there are so many universities doing so many cool things ... We have some good ideas that hopefully we'll be able to start implementing, but we have some catching up to do, to say the least.

Secrets to Online Recruiting Success
Paul Zastrow
Brenda Harms

Paul took the lead with Brenda chiming in until we got to the Adult Recruiting portion of the session, where she took the floor on her area of expertise. This was almost too much information for a single two-hour presentation. They did a great job though and finished on almost a breathless, "There! we got through it all!" note at 3:00. No other sessions followed, however, so there was plenty of time for questions and answers.

"Visiting the college's website" is ranked by 43% of prospective students as "very helpful" in their college searches. This puts the website as #5 among the top information sources - behind the #4 financial aid brochure, #3 talking with an admissions representative, #2 the catalog and, always #1, the campus visit.

I've noted this before, but it bears repeating in the face of that stat: Fully 25% of applications come from students we never knew about until they applied. Being positioned to serve these "stealth applicants" makes it more important than ever that the website is everything it needs to be.

(Note: That "financial aid brochure" is something we should look at as well - is it complete and easy to understand? Could we enhance it in any way?)

Further, according to the latest TeensTALK survey (2006, Statmats), a full 84% of teens say that the web is one of the most important tools in their college search. What I'm blogging here is my biggest takeaway from this presentation.

Five components of online college recruiting

1. Website

Be easy to navigate
Be relevant
Be clear – it's all about scanning. Various entry points.
Be current – use CMS for quick easy updates
Make quality content available- make sure it’s worth it. Delivers the experience. Interesting, relevant
Find a singular voice – esp. in top three tiers. Should be written by one person or small group
Refresh regularly - We are going to push this with our next redesign
Be interactive – ex.: tuition calculator

2. Push technologies

Email- allow prospects to email current students in addition to admissions reps, etc. They consider email to be an appropriate medium to use with older people or for sending complex messages.
IM – 72% would IM somebody if they could. 21%have IM’d a recruiter or student worker. But can you do it on their time? If not, don't try it.
Text – interesting – put this at the bottom of the list for recruiting

3. Search engine marketing

85% of traffic is originated in a search What are they searching for? Desired major/career, location attributes, college information sites, type of school, ranking
Optimize – two kinds of search: organic and paid. 85%of users click on unpaid results. Must be in positions 7-10 in organic listings to be clicked on.
Determine keywords for a page – program or brand relevant. 5-7% of words in text should be keywords. Copy, headlines, page title, metadata. Need to keep on top of this though - search algorithms are constantly changing. This is a continuous job - my best source (VP of IT) says that these days metadata isn't what it once was as a determiner of where your site will fall in organic search.
Pay per click – Best suited for different or iconic programs. Less effective than organic search over time. Proprietary keywords like MBA can be cost prohibitive. People who respond to pay per click are looking for immediate response. If you can’t get back to people in 24 hours, don’tbother. MUST track this and prove ROI. We need to take a fresh look at this - it may be much more cost effective for us to target a few choice programs with AdWords.

4. Web 2.0

It’s the way millenials view the web. Radical shift in marketing.
Participatory culture. Content creates community.
64% of teens are content creators.
700+ institutional Facebook pages have been created (as of Dec. 2007)
33% of colleges do admissions blogging. Fuhrman University has made a serious investment in blogging. Pay their students, give video cameras to them for their posts. Caveat - If you are going to engage in these efforts, you MUST be authentic. No marketing speak. Millenials see through all that.
73% of teems upload photos. More people want to see photos than video. DU has a Flickr page, here. How about a photo contest? GVSU does this to get photos for the front page of their site.
And how about video? YouTube's market share is 74 million viewers (Dec. 2007). See Roanoke College's YouTube page (check it out - it is fun!) Can we brand our YouTube page?
On the flip side - Universities are beginning to search web 2.0 (Facebook pages, etc.) to research potential students.
Con – You will have to cede your brand control somewhat to students and users.

5. Third party sites

We don’t always contol these. But we need to know what others are saying. People are looking for the ‘real’ story by searching blogs, other sites, etc. Examples: The Princeton Review, College Confidential. Monitor this stuff, but you can’t impact it directly.

No project management? Manage anyway

2008-08-11T20:03:00.004-04:00

This week we'll be scrambling to get some last-minute (read: almost too late to be of much help) student communications out regarding upcoming changes in the way they do business with the university. And so here are some 'musts' from the "If I had it to over again" department:

Do not hand your part of the project off to the new guy just because the project is just beginning and you figure 'what better time to hand off than right from the start?' Do not do this especially if the market and/or audience is your area of expertise. Do not do this - and this is tricky, I know - even if your boss thinks it's a good idea. I guarantee it will come back to bite you in the end.

Don't accept the vendor's idea of project management. The vendor is only concerned with getting their product into your system. It is not concerned with your programs, processes or particular situation. Even if the vendor presents you with a plan for development and implementation, develop a plan on your side of the project and follow it.

Try to make sure IT manages the project. IT in general is great at project management. I am only being half facetious here. If somehow the project does not fall into the IT realm (unusual - almost everything has an IT component), then manage it in marketing/communications, probably the second-best project managers in the place.

Recognize the early warning signs that the communications portion of the implementation is not going well: Satellite locations begin asking for separate communications for their students only, even though this is an enterprise-wide launch. Fliers and posters start showing up around campus that you've never seen before. Suggestions for emails, announcements and portal postings come in from all corners of the university.

Run interference asap on communications: Drop everything and get the word out as best you can; you can smooth ruffled feelings and egos later. It doesn't matter how you got here, you now need to rev up your efforts and get your communications back on track so your students aren't caught in the lurch at the end of the month when the project comes to fruition.

Because in the end, whether the project was well managed or not, you are responsible for the outcome. Make it a good one, if you can.

Stamats Integrated Marketing Conference - Take aways

2008-07-27T20:58:00.004-04:00

There were many more presentations at the Stamats Integrated Marketing Conference than the four I highlighted last week. I tried to present here those that I felt were most worthwhile for DU.

There was repetition during the three days - which can be good or bad, I suppose, and there were breakouts I didn't go to, of course, plus a couple of things that just plain didn't pass my 'who cares?' test.

If you read nothing else here, do read these takeaways from the conference.

Davenport has owned the adult market in the past - we need to sharpen those recruiting skills and get back into it. The economy, especially in Michigan, and the demographics demand it. One immediate 'fix' - help adults find what they need on our website.
We have a good brand position, but we need to strengthen it. Careers is the word we own, and we need to aggressively run with it.
We'd do well to invest in some strong, memorable (award winning wouldn't be bad, either!) creative to help cement our brand promise in the minds and hearts of our audiences, internal and external.
We must strive to create our brand as experience in the minds and hearts of our audiences. We have a very good start with our new employee orientation - we need to build on that across the university and extend the promise of that experience to external audiences as well.

Brand lessons from Fritz's brand presentation

Strong brands are built on research, character, and vision
Strong brands require an enduring commitment
Strong brands get everybody excited
Strong brands are built on strategy that works for you
Strong brands tell strong stories
Strong brands need equally strong communication vehicles
Strong brands build strong relationships
Strong brands evolve over time: your marketing should evolve with it

Statmats Integrated Marketing Conference: Building Brand

2008-07-26T19:31:00.006-04:00

Building a Brand for Colleges and Universities in the 21st Century
Why it still matters

Fritz McDonald
Stamats

Prospects are tuning us out -

Information overload - Average consumer is exposed to nearly 3,000 commercial messages a day
People are leaving traditional media - newspapers are dying, loss of messaging with TIVO, iPods, pop-up blockers, etc.
The web is becoming traditional media

Marketing efforts seem more and more futile

Target audiences more fractionalized - parents, adults, grad students, etc
Spending more, getting less
Technology is the future - but how do we leverage it?

... And there are problems

Prospects are going to the competition
Enrollment declining; applicant pool shrinking
Competition for best adult students is fierce
Alumin involvement/giving is flat - young alumini harder to reach
Graduation, retention and satisfaction rates fallin
Not attracting best employee candidates
Negative word of mouth is leaking out

A strong brand can break through these challenges

Strong brands bring people together - create contagious passion
A strong brand can last forever - has enduring impact on everything we do

A brand is -

Intangible—not just a look, letterhead, or logo
Action—a promise that an organization makes to its most important external and internal audiences
Signifier—tells the world who you are and what you stand for
Expectation—delivers a feeling through experience

Brand = position = your name

Goal of all branding - own a word in your marketplace. What is DU's word? Careers
Preparing students for careers is our most valued position
When someone thinks careers, DU's name should be first in their minds
The essence of brand marketing and positioning is in the power of your name

Higher education brands

Usually involve clarifying/strengthening, rather than creating a brand
The most effective brands are built from your institution's core values

Challenges

Successful brand marketing is more than anything a function of institutional will
Must focus outward toward customer rather than inward

Build a brand

Make a brand promise that matters
Communicate the promise (internal communication, training! DU's employee orientation is an excellent start; internal communication is strong and needs to get stronger)
Live the promise
Strengthen the promise

Your brand promise must be

Understandable
Important
Believeable
Distinctive

Your messages must be

Relevant (understandable, important, believable, distinctive)
Repeated
Remembered
Noticed!!!

Brands tell stories

Distinctly
Emotionally
Creatively
Convincingly
Consistently

Advertising isn't enough - you must be memorable

Stand-out creative is a MUST
Creative must arise from your strategy
Creative must operate on multiple levels of integration - think everywhere, everything
Creative must work through traditional and non-traditional touchpoints - those we haven't thought of before
Work from digital out - not the other way around
Creative must deliver an experience

Launch internally

Make it a show - to build support with internal audiences, help them own it, too
Present brand portfolio, including the rationale and creative
Provide guidelines on how to communicate the brand, how to live the brand

Launch externally

Launch it - don't just leak it.
Do the easy-obvious things first, celebrate early successes
Communicate success - especially those that impact bottom line directly
Show outcomes - not just the output
Stay in it for the long haul - tweak where you need to, keep it going; don't quit or change course

10 brand domains - places your brand needs to be seen, heard, advanced and lived

Mission and Vision (Your brand begins here)
Finance and budget
Academic affairs
Student recruiting and financial aid
Student development/retention
Advancement and alumni relations
Facilities planning
IT
Marketing
HR

In other words, the brand is not just Marketing's domain, so ...

Help people understand their role through communication, training and development
The entire university experience must deliver on our brand promise
Enlist others across the university in brand stewardship
Review regularly to maintain, freshen, strengthen the brand

Building and maintaining your brand is the same type of long-term commitment that we make to building academic quality or our campus master plan.

Our goal is to build brand equity among internal stakeholders and external audiences.

Over time, a successful brand strategy will become
the central organizing purpose for the institution
and will be indistinguishable from a successful
strategic plan.

Stamats Integrated Marketing Conference - Creating a Web 2.0 Plan

2008-07-22T21:44:00.006-04:00

Still here at the Stamats Integrated Marketing Conference in Chicago. Blogging a few things I find particularly of interest.

Creating a Web 2.0 Plan
Fritz McDonald and Lara Marsh
Stamats

Note: For the purposes of this presentation it seems, Web 2.0 is defined in terms of its social media aspects.

Web 2.0 foundational principles

Participatory culture

Active vs. passive users
Millennials are highly skilled web users.
Content creates community
Content belongs to everyone
Open platform vs. closed portal

It's about making and sharing content

Creating content is a social act.
64% of teens online are content creators
Primary function is to display user content.
Attracts users and creates traffic.

Three institutional approaches to social media

1. Build your own network

Develop and support a network people will want to join. Create something different. Model success of other social media sites like Twitter. Create value – what can you give, what service can you provide? Example: Financial Aid advice. Build a community around something you already started. – comments on DU's Virtual Tour for example. Don’t think gimmick, think value
Map your audiences: where are they, what do they care about most? Design for their content consumption preferences
Define foundational content: informative, engaging, build sustained relationships. How will you share? User-generated/institution-generated mix - enabling user generated content is key.
Build the site: who leads the community (community management team), what size will you take on, features, look and feel
Recruit community members – internal, external ambassadors, invite target audiences inside and out, be transparent/don’t manipulate. Promote your site to generate traffic, participate in at least 5 social networks such as LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube. Visit forums, make announcements to friends, send to email lists. Direct marketing, advertising, collateral also
Link content to content sharing sites – bookmarklets, etc. (we have sharing tools on www.davenport.edu: email this, Del.icio.us, Facebook, Digg, Technorati, Google , Yahoo!, Reddit.

2. Join in and participate on a network

Understand the community ground rules. Study dynamics, language, styles. Listen to the conversations – most important. Fit in. Share your institutional character
Decide platform – blog, social network/combination. New Facebook Platform is specifically for institutions.
Avoid traditional marketing pitches
Work with the community – add value, offer advice, service, knowledge. Be transparent. Avoid institutional jargon – talk to them in their language. (Sees Target’s corporate Facebook page as one of most successful.) Don’t just put up photos and say "Call us." Offer discussion or Q & A on "Why go to college?" for example. (Note to web team: The NEXTERS!)
Participate in forums and message boards - discussion thread to create brand ambassadors.
Commit – time, resources (community manager is a must), link outward, guide, respond. Rules: members are advisors, encourage candor, pay attention to what members initiate, keep experimenting/innovating

3. Employ other 2.0 technologies/approaches

Blogs – most popular choice. Try not to censor. 70% of social networkers say they read others’ blogs. You don’t have to respond to trolls, but you must respond to legitimate questions and concerns (use moderated comments)
Photo posting on sites like Flickr – 73% of teens upload photos. You get comments, a chance to join in the discussion. Davenport's Flickr site is here. We could do much more with this.
Video – key is enabling comments. Keep authentic as possible. DU has posted our TV spots and a few other videos on YouTube, also embedding the videos on our website. This needs further attention, too.

Conclusion: Davenport has done a few scattershot things, none of them particularly strategic. We need a concerted, sustained effort toward our social media strategy this year (and we will!).

Stamats Integrated Marketing Conference: Marketing in the Age of Engagement

2008-07-22T12:50:00.005-04:00

The Stamats Integrated Marketing conference, Chicago, day two: Monday morning's keynote by Tim Williams, founder of Ignition had some good nuggets.

Marketing in the Age of Engagement without spending a fortune on advertising
Tim Williams, Ignition

Marketing in the "Age of Engagement" is not about shouting at strangers. It’s about building connections with friends.

By 2011 the internet will become the #1 advertising medium in the world.

Last week more people watched YouTube than watched the top 10 network television shows.
All media except magazines are in decline. Internet is up – fastest growing medium. Search is fastest growing segment of the internet

The new reality

Mass vs. One- to -one communications
Mass media channels vs. Everything as channels
What vs. where and when
Brand as perception vs. Brand as experience
Exposure vs. Engagement
Controlled communications vs. Open conversations
Long-term campaigns vs. short-term measurement (visitors, clicks, time-on-page, for example)

Your relevant message must occur in a relevant time and a relevant place. Move beyond the big creative idea to the big media idea. Example: Milk gallon with Cheerios label

Think of Google and/or YouTube as your home page - it is where people are looking for information about you.

You need to engage in the online conversation. Do not offer defense or positioning/marketing messages - offer helpful information. (Check out the conversation going on at Urban Planet about DU. How do we engage with that?)

Treat consumers as the new media. They’re out there telling stories, talking about their experiences to such a degree that it transcends traditional media.

1/3 of all adults have created content for online.
How do we harness this enthusiasm for the consumer to be a content creator?

4^th dimension of advertising = ambassadors. That’s what you want to create

10 steps to creating a social media plan

List Keywords and search phrases that describe your organization, brand, competition and industry. Resource for this: AdWords
Define size of social media universe for your keywords. How many are searching for those terms? Check using Google Blogsearch
Determine the size of your brand’s social media footprint
Diagnose your brand’s online reputation. Watch with Google Alerts, Technorati
Identify the purpose of you social media program: build positive brand awareness, manage brand’s reputation, improve search engine rankings, drive relevant traffic
Select right tools: blogs, videos, widgets and gadgets, profile pages on social sites
Create contact strategy for key influencers – engage the evangelists, neutrals, detractors. You want especially to engage the evangelists (student blogs)will be a good way to do this)
Listen, participate and engage in online conversation. Make useful comments, provide useful information, provide useful links. STOP selling/controlling. Participate
Constantly measure and refine. Nielsen BuzzMetrics, ,BuzzLogic, Umbria. Dedicate time to it - at least 1/2 day a week devoted to monitoring what's out there.

Just start somewhere, but start now.

Conclusion:

Move from broadcasting to narrowcasting.

Broadcasting: A little content for lot of money reaches a few people.
Narrowcasting: Alot of content for a little money reaches many people.

Stamats Integrated Marketing Conference - How to Reach Adult Students

2008-07-20T23:05:00.006-04:00

Well, here I am at the Stamats Conference in Chicago, today through Wednesday. I'll be posting notes from sessions as I'm able. I won't be live blogging as I'd planned, since, inexplicably there is no wireless internet available in the Marriott's 4th floor conference rooms. It's only in the lobby and the 2nd floor conference center. Go figure.

How to reach adult students and nail down what they want from an educational experience
Brenda Harms, Ph D.

The college recruiting marketplace is a perfect storm – 3 ‘gales’

Changing demography
Rising cost to attend
Increased competition for students and donor dollars

Colleges traditionally are slow to differentiate themselves in the marketplace.

Marketplace realities

Half the populations lives in the south – 10 states
Youth population in MI will decrease until 2010
9% decrease in HS grads in MI to 2018
by 2015 36% will be students of color. Many students of color are uncomfortable at private school

Predictions

Increased enrollment among: Students of color, adults, seniors, commuters, part time students, women
Public school enrollment is on the rise; privates are in a tough spot
Globalization of higher ed. is on the rise
Erosion of US as world education leader
More US students are going abroad to study

For-profits have things to teach us

Customer service is key. Probably the biggest single thing you can do at your school
Career placement
High-demand curricula – need to be able to change on a dime. New curricula – most institutions can’t roll out new programs very quickly
Flexible academic calendar
Pricing and cost – financial aid availability/marketing
Scale economies and operating efficiencies
Online programs. Business and industry across the country are comfortable with online degrees, vs. 20 years ago. Only higher ed still turns up their noses at online

Students increasingly don’t get the difference between public, private and f0r-profit institutions.

Students don't understand the meaning or implications of accreditation. Neeed to educate prospects on that.

Who are adult students?

No clear definition – blurry line. What is DU definition?
If you’re not 18, living residentially, and going full time, you are an adult – one definition.
Only 16% of students are 18-22 and attend fulltime.
The over-25 population is the fastest growing population for the last 30 years.
Today's student: 40% are part time, 40% – two year school, 47% are 25 or older, 58% are 22 and older

Motivators: Why do adults enroll?

Major life transition
Career change
Career advancement
Educational requirement for job
Second or third career
personal achievement/fulfillment

What they look for

Flexible schedule
Convenience (in and out parking, one-stop – make it easy through the entire enrollment/financial aid sytem) Adult students will leave easily if you make them jump thru hoops … btw, adjuncts (real world experience) faculty a plus with adults
Credit for Life experience
Accelerated completion – time is money.
Valid learning experience – not here for the social life
Multiple learning alternatives – nights, weekend, online

Top 4 considerations

Flexible schedule
Cost to attend
Transfer in credits
Convenient location

Major concerns

Paying for school
Managing time between family and school (postcard ‘to the child of …’ says ‘we understand your life’)
Managing time between work and classes

How are they finding you?

96 % are looking at your WEBSITE - needs to be something on your site that says “adult learners” see Ivy Tech’s site – half traditional/half adult.
89% are contacting admissions office directly
78% general web search
70% word of mouth

How to use this info

leverage adult student motivators (above) in marketing, program creation, services
Pull heart strings (tell stories - marketing)
Discuss potential income (be program specific)
Graduate level – market position, authority and power
Educate students on actual costs
Personal success stories that address the issue of time and work
Promote top considerations (above)/ desired attributes
Promote that 'other thing' that makes you better – everyone lists costs, convenience, flexibility. Example: DU could tell individual faculty stories as a way to promote academic excellence

10 ways to get it right

Recognize differences in adults learners vs. traditional students in recruiting, programs, services
Invest in human capital and training – staff, faculty. It’s about service.
Leverage personal enrichment factors.
Explain the great mysteries of financial aid. Consider adult student-only scholarships (a few hundred dollars works wonders – shows person someone is interested in making an investment in them.)
Website – you need an adult student presence there! Address the adult student’s key concerns.
Examine/reconsider your institutional policies toward adult friendly policies for giving credit for life experience (even 3 credits is something - you don't have to give away degrees!) and for transferring in college credit
Leverage Personal Enrichment in marketing. If it makes you cry, use it. Tell stories - they get a lot of mileage. The ‘what are you waiting for?’ angle. “where do you want to be x years from now?”
Take lessons from the for-profit world: Recruitment – immediate and next day call backs. Retention – personal, individual advising
Make sure you can deliver on what matters most to adults: Flexible scheduling, cost, convenience
Take a hard look at your internal processes: financial aid processes, advising, phone service, website.

Final note: DU has a good marketing budget for adult recruiting, plus good, adult-oriented customer service in some areas, most notably in locations away from main campus. We have in the past been very good with the adult learner market. But by not have an adult learner section on our website, we are losing the advantage of our biggest single marketing tool

First "One DU" Commencement

2008-04-27T20:54:00.005-04:00

Waiting for Mom to emerge from the arena after the ceremony

I would not have gone to commencement at all if not for the fact that I hired a photographer who was not familiar with Davenport University. So I thought I'd better attend so I could make sure he got the right people in the right shots.

It was billed the "first one-Du commencement ceremony," in other words it's the first time that grads from all of our 21 locations converged in one place for a single commencement ceremony.

Thirteen hundred grads walked, receiving master's, bachelor's and associates degrees, plus diplomas. We also conferred two honorary doctorate degrees during the ceremony.

We took a chance by not setting a limit on tickets, and nearly filled the 8,000+-seat Van Andel Arena. But all came off without a hitch, and what I feared could be a long hard day-into-night turned out to be a wonderful afternoon to mark this very special occasion for the grads and their families.

Special kudos to the commencement team who put this grand, gargantuan event together, especially Director of Records Robin Kauffman, who (I believe) took on most of the logistics and planning, and to VP for Academic Services Dave Fleming, who accomplished the task of reading out all those names (impressively correctly!) with humor and flair.

Looking forward to next year when we'll graduate the first class to start as freshmen at the new main campus in Grand Rapids. And good luck and good life to all of you new grads of DU!

-Cross-posted at Things I've Seen

Our students take technology for granted. Do we?

2007-10-01T18:09:00.000-04:00

The recent report from the Educause Center for Applied Research, The ECAR Study of Undergraduate Students and Information Technology, 2007 has some interesting findings for higher ed, if not all that surprising. I say not surprising, but for boomer administrators, of which my school has a great many, the findings underline the need to keep up the chase after at least technology familiarity. It's an undertaking that's easy to push aside in our busy-ness. But we can't afford to.

I know, it's not always easy. But consider this, according to the report:

These students, many of whom have never known a world without personal access to information technologies, often take them for granted and integrate them seamlessly into their everyday lives.

What does that mean, integrate ... into their everyday lives? Here's a great example: I overheard a colleague recently telling another that she still needed to keep paper files of invoices, even though these are scanned into a database by the finance department. "When you can show that you can quickly and easily locate an invoice and provide a copy, then maybe we can consider not having hard copies on file."

Are you kidding me? It's easier, faster and more reliable to search a database than locate an invoice in a paper file. Yet we continue to keep the hard copies because it's what we're comfortable with. I'm betting anybody under 35 would search a database without a second thought. And our students? That a document - or almost any other piece of needed information - is online somewhere is a practically a given. Hard copy? What would you want that for?

That kind of mindset change is what I'm talking about. As long as we boomers continue to print things out to read them (except, maybe, longer documents), resist the power of online sorting and storage, make edits on hard copy instead of using Word's track changes (or better yet, an online document writing and sharing system), wait for an email when an IM would have taken care of the problem already, we can't begin to comprehend the world our students live in, much less communicate effectively with them.

Granted, this is only a minor implication gleaned from this report. The bigger picture looks at technology and its integration into learning. But grasping the minor points and making even the smallest mindset change is essential if we want to effectively reach our prospects where they live.

Props to Calvin

2007-08-30T17:12:00.000-04:00

Texas A&M web designer and blogger Matt Herzberger recently pointed to Calvin College's site in his del.icio.us links. The prestigious Christian liberal arts college is one of our local gems, and I like what they're doing with student profiles in the prospective students section.

Nice photo with an intriguing lead on the front page, appealing story and photo when you link through. Plus you can share the story on facebook, del.icio.us, Digg, Google, etc. Six stories to choose from. Well done! (Thanks, Matt!)

Visitation program can drive enrollment up

2007-08-15T21:35:00.000-04:00

The GR Press reports today that the local private institution Aquinas College has another record number of freshmen enrolled for the fall.

The college is expecting 445 students from 14 states when freshmen begin moving in Thursday. That is up from last year's record of 428.

A press release on the Aquinas site goes into more detail, citing more students "taking advantage of the college's special AQ Days programs" as part of the reason for the enrollment jump.

Here at DU we soon will launch our own comprehensive visitation program. It will kick off later this month, and it includes special Panther Preview events, CU @ DU Saturdays and Junior Days, along with specially scheduled group campus visits and one-on-one counseling sessions.

We all know that the campus visit is a top "decider" for students making their college choices. DU has lots to offer, so showing off our main campus in a big way can go a long way in convincing prospective students that we have what they're looking for. We'll be launching a special microsite for sign ups soon, so stay tuned.

The importance of real

2007-08-14T16:42:00.000-04:00

Since I'm so new to higher ed, I'm open to anything and everything I can find about marketing in this arena. Which is why I attended eduWeb in Baltimore last month (see my conference blogging at my other blog). Which is also how I am finding bloggers like Karlyn Morisette, who presented at the conference. She's interactive recruiting manager at Norwich University and she blogs at Interactive Recruiting.

She had a good post last week about the importance of "being real" with prospective students:

They are out there getting the real story, whether you like it or not. Prospective students already place admissions offices very low on their list of credible sources of information when it comes to getting information about a college. They get it. It's marketing. You're trying to sell them because you have beds to fill. Want to really get their attention? Give them unmoderated blogs. Give them student produced content on your website instead of hidden on YouTube. Allow prospective students to e-mail, IM or chat on boards with current students without your moderation. Show them that you're not afraid of showing the real experience your students are having!

Why? Because, she says, rightly, I think:

... At the end of the day, you're going to build so much more credibility with your audience by being real with them. Kids are smart and they know how to filter. They have a million messages thrown at them every day and they decide immediately which ones are going to garner their attention and which ones aren't. Using the right technologies to communicate with them is not enough. To make it past their filters, you have to use the right technologies in the right way. To make yourself stand out, you have to be real and encourage your students to be real.

I've been through this lack-of-transparency thing with another employer, in another job, in a totally different industry. The "be real" mantra holds, no matter what business you're in. You can't hide, bury 'indelicacies' or push out cookie-cutter, jargon-filled marketing messages and expect to win buyers' (students') hearts. In the internet age, there are too many ways for the 'real 'to be found. We might as well embrace it.

We've got RSS

2007-08-13T22:36:00.000-04:00

Our web team just configured an RSS feed for the News & Events section of the Davenport website. Works great in Firefox and IE7 - they still have to get it going in IE6, which is what most people still use.

Will people subscribe? I'm doubtful right now. Do we need it? Yes! I do believe we need to get our information to prospective students, parents and donors in as many ways as we can, RSS being just one of them. And yes, we have a ways to go on that score, but we're working on it.

Now the pressure's on me, though, to keep that section of the website super up-to-date. Which I should be doing anyway, of course.

HighEdWebDev Conference

2007-08-10T16:35:00.000-04:00

Oh, I forgot to mention that the reason I found this HighEdWeb discussion list in the first place was that I'd read somewhere about a conference this group is holding this fall. When I found the conference details, I also found the list.

So HighEdWeb, short for Higher Education Web Professionals is HighEdWeb is "an organization of Web professionals working at institutions of higher education. We design, develop, manage and map the futures of higher education Web sites."

Their conference, HighEdWebDev2007 is coming up October 14 - 17, in Rochester, NY, October 14-17. (Can I go?)

List of analytics tools

2007-08-10T16:25:00.000-04:00

Through the HighEdWeb discussion list, a webmaster recently asked for recommendations on web analytics tools. He wants to replace the one he's currently using. The group came back with this list, which the requestor quite thoughtfully (I thought) compiled:

· Urchin 5 Web Analytics Software
http://www.google.com/analytics/urchin_software.html

· ClickTracks Visual Web Analytics
http://www.clicktracks.com/

· NetTracker Web Analytics
http://netinsight.unica.com/Products/nettracker.cfm

· Google Analytics
http://www.google.com/analytics/

· WebLog Expert
http://www.weblogexpert.com/

· Clickheat
http://www.labsmedia.com/clickheat/

· Mach5 Fast Stats
http://www.mach5.com/fast/

· Funnel Web Analyzer
http://www.quest.com/funnel-web-analyzer/

HighEdWeb List

2007-08-10T16:19:00.001-04:00

I joined an email discussion list the other day called HighEdWeb and now my inbox is being hit with people's questions and answers.

I know it sounds odd, but I've never participated in an email discussion group or a listserv or anything like that before. (Although I have done message boards and forums and I'm not fond of either). So at first I wasn't sure I wanted to slog through all that email. Then I thought this could be a good way to learn and share information with other .edu content folks and web geeks.

If I come across something useful, I'll post it.

Placeholder blog

2007-08-10T16:08:00.000-04:00

This is a placeholder blog until

a) we think of a better name and
b) we design a better template, or
d) we move this to Typepad or WordPress. :-)