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30 May 2007 Many commencements are over now and I trust everyone had fine weather, happy graduates, and that you’re now looking forward to just the slightest of summer lulls before fall enrollment opens. This week I’m in Chicago at Carol Aslanian’s sold-out conference exploring the possibilities and perils of online marketing. The record attendance is testimony that online marketing plays an increasing role in the recruitment of students, both “adult” and “traditional” in age. Indeed, the barriers between those two groups continue to fall. A marketing distinction may still exist between students looking for a four-year residential college experience, but many new high school graduates are also working and commuting more and sharing the characteristics of older students. The acceptance of distance learning is helping to erode those barriers. In working on a Customer Carewords project, we’ve done Wordtracker research for terms like “distance learning” and “online college degrees.” What’s clear is that both terms have moved beyond academic jargon and into common use by people in search of higher education. Distance learning is a term searched far more often than “online” degrees, but both are in common use. For those of you have asked what consulting services I provide, I’ve updated the relevant page at www.bobjohnsonconsulting.com/whatwedo.html with 5 activity briefs. Expect two more later in June. I’ll be doing variations of a new Search Engine Marketing workshop twice in July, first at the ACT Enrollment Planners Conference (www.act.org/epc/) and than at the eduWeb Conference (www.eduwebconference.com) Hope to see you there. And now here are your marketing news and notes for May. Exploring Marketing in the Second Life World If you’re thinking about extending your marketing to this new arena, you’ll benefit from reading through lessons learned from companies that have succeeded and failed. AdAge gives you the information from several ventures at adage.com/digital/article?article_id=116913. Right now, about 6.5 million people have registered on Second Life and about 30,000 people visit each day. AdAge reports the average age as 32 and describes the faithful as “individualistic, authentic and tech-savvy early adopters.” Can this be a useful tool for higher education marketers? Too early to say, but some are starting to find out. Case Western Reserve University was a recent Link of the Week selection for their Second Life effort. You’ll find a detailed description of what’s planned at blog.case.edu/case-news/2007/04/20/secondlife. 20 Ideas for Web Pages that Search Engines Enjoy Better to read a list like this than get bogged down in the technical aspects of how one search engine differs from another if you want to make your website more attractive to search engines. John Alexander offers 20 points to consider for “High Performance Information Rich” website pages. The most important message: focus on providing content that interests the people you want to engage. That may sound simple, but how often is the content of a web page planned with the visitors’ interests in mind? First on John’s list is an FAQ page. Second is a story to introduce and reinforce the most important theme of your website. Third are facts of special interest to, say, prospective students. College and university online marketing will benefit from better use of each of these steps. Is the academic profile of your entering students easy to find on your website? Do your FAQs for admissions still begin with “What year were you founded?” or “What is your mission statement?” Read the entire list at www.searchengineworkshops.com/articles/20ideas.html. Spam Isn’t Killing Email in 2007 ClickZ reports on a new Pew Internet survey showing that most people are using spam filters effectively to cope with continuing high numbers of spam email. Read the ClickZ story “Computer Users More Savvy About E-mail Spam” at www.clickz.com/showPage.html?page=3625976. Visit www.pewinternet.org/PPF/r/214/report_display.asp for the full 12-page report in PDF format. One point that illustrates the changes reported from 2003 until now: in 2003, only 16 percent surveyed reported that spam “was not a problem at all.” Today, 28 percent of those surveyed don’t think its a problem. We learn to cope. If you are collecting email addresses, don’t hesitate to use them at least once a month. And sending email weekly isn’t too often if you know people are reading them because the topics engage their interests and meet their expectations. College Cost Calculator Why aren’t more individual colleges offering this service online? Visit www.collegedata.com/cs/promo/promo_netcost_tmpl.jhtml and note the emphasis on learning “college net cost” to get parents to subscribe to this service. That is what savvy parents really want to know. Colleges can provide a needed service in advance of formal review of a financial aid application if they decided to do this. Imagine the email notice to parents after their child makes an inquiry about a particular school. And imagine the number of people who would then visit the page and do the calculations. Done right, a “net cost calculator” could create a significant marketing opportunity for colleges that would benefit from letting most people know as soon as possible of the possible tuition discount waiting for them. New Survey on Why Students Pick a College Monster Worldwide (yes, the job search people) has just released results of a new survey on how high school seniors this year selected the colleges they will attend. The number one factor is well known to many: availability of a desired major is most important to 83 percent of the graduates. Despite that, alpha lists of majors offered still are not always easy to find at college and university sites. “Availability of financial aid” was not far behind the majors offered. And this remains an area where precious few colleges have moved beyond the most general information online. For an exception, visit University of Toledo’s online financial aid form at www.financialaid.utoledo.edu/estimator/. The Monster report is here. 5 Tips for Cultivating and Converting Online Donors Sheeraz Haji outlines 5 steps to take to increase results with online donor cultivation programs. The first is simple but essential: “Offer compelling content.” The fifth is more controversial: “Extend your organization’s online presence to social networking sites.” Haji reports details of successful MySpace results for OXFAM and the ASPCA. Find the other three tips and references to other successful examples here. Marvelous 10 Step Guide to Email Strategy Jeanne Jennings has just posted Part 6 in an “Effective E-mail Strategy” series that started in March. Whether you’re experienced at this or just trying to respond to a question for the director of admissions or the annual fund coordinator, I’d be very surprised if you didn’t find something useful here. Part 6 includes the range of professional fees charged for email writing and design services. Visit www.clickz.com/showPage.html?page=3625197 for the first article. At the end, you’ll find links to each of the others. Mizzou Blog on Web Communications Visit interface.missouri.edu/ and sign up for the RSS feed for this entertaining and information blog on web communications from talented staff at the University of Missouri-Columbia. The May 25 entry by Chris Blose on “How to trick people into reading” on the web deserves special attention. Chris make the case that people are much more likely to read website news articles when they tell a special story that gets attention right from the start. This is another example of how the old world mixes well with the new. For a story on Maya Angelou, for instance, Chris notes how actually attending the lecture and interviewing the speaker resulted in a much more entertaining story than might have bee presented by a traditional press release. A traditional press release? Probably read by almost nobody. On the website, or anywhere else. Follow this blog for new ideas about how to improve your web communications effort. University of Phoenix Update on Growth, Earnings, and Legal Problems Apollo Group reports earnings and enrollment increases over the last quarter in a May 21 press release here. Over 90 percent of tuition revenue is from University of Phoenix and the release cites a continuing increase in enrollment. But as you might expect, much of the space recounts changes that Apollo has had to make in earlier financial reports as it works to satisfy SEC complaints. Marketing on a Small Budget with Little Time If you can relate to that headline, then you’ll likely find something of interest in the results of Nancy Schwartz’ 2007 survey on trends and indicators in non-profit marketing operations at 350 organizations and foundations. Lack of resources and leadership support are reported as major barriers to stronger marketing efforts by 55 percent of people responding. At the same time, over 60 percent of respondents don’t track marketing results and so they have little objective basis to plan for expanded marketing efforts. For the details, visit www.nancyschwartz.com/2007_nonprofit_marketing_survey.html for more details of the survey results. Free Keyword Tool at Wordtracker If you’d like to check the relative online popularity of a particular word or phrase, try Wordtracker “suggestion tool” at freekeywords.wordtracker.com. Remember that most people search using two or three words. If you want to see how many more people search for “college scholarships” than “college loans,” this is a fine place to start. Search Engines Pay Attention to Wikipedia Who is responsible at your school for monitoring the content at your Wikipedia website? Somebody should be doing that at least once a month. When people search for your college or university, do they end up at your website or at the Wikipedia equivalent? If that seems like a silly question, try a Google search for your name and see if the Wikipedia website comes up in the top four or five results. In my recent website wanderings, these schools came up fourth on the list of Google search results with their Wikipedia sites: Hofstra University, McDaniel College, and University of Toronto. Keep in mind that Wikipedia is now among the 10 most popular web destinations in the United States. Check your listing at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page. Take the Wikipedia search test now at www.google.com. Website Design and Website Usability Jakob Nielsen is back with “The Myth of the Genius Designer” at www.useit.com/alertbox/genius-designers.html. Nielsen is taking issue with folks who claim that a great website design eliminates the need for usability testing. He’s not saying good designers aren’t important, just that they can’t by themselves guarantee an engaging website. My Upcoming Presentations in 2007 Share questions and answers with people like yourself who are building a competitive edge in higher education marketing. Hope to meet you at one or more of these events! May 30-31, Chicago, IL: The Aslanian Group, Advanced Online Marketing. Details are at www.aslaniangroup.com/events/default.asp. June 4, Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island: Canadian Council for the Advancement of Education National Conference, “Marketing Communications and New Technology: Keys to Successful Engagement.” Program details are at www.ccaeconf.org/en/. June 14, Calvin College, Grand Rapids, MI: Council for Christian Colleges and Universities,Communications Conference, “Writing Right for the Web” and “Communicating in Today’s World: The Challenge of Integrating Print, Web, and Email.” Conference schedule is at www.calvin.edu/news/cccu/schedule01.htm. July 18-20, Chicago, IL: ACT Enrollment Planners Conference, “A Marketer’s Guide to Better Search Engine Visibility” (pre-conference workshop) and “The Evolution of Publications in an Internet World.” Expect a website link soon. July 22, Baltimore, MD: eduWeb, Keynote presentation. Follow development of the conference program and read the conference blog at www.eduwebconference.com. Expand professional growth opportunities on your campus. Host a seminar to increase the Online Marketing skills of people on your campus and get a better ROI on your future investments. Schedule your presentation in 2007 soon. Contact me at bob@bobjohnsonconsulting.com. That’s All for Now Be a marketing champion on your campus.
Bob Johnson, Ph.D. (bob@bobjohnsonconsulting.com) Bob Johnson Consulting, LLC I offer consulting services personally to colleges and universities and together with the marketing experts at these partner firms: Aslanian Group offers market research and enrollment management services to colleges and universities to increase their market share of adult students. Learn more at www.aslaniangroup.com. Creative Communication Associates is a 22-year leader in the design and implementation of marketing communication strategies for colleges and universities. Learn more about CCA at www.ccanewyork.com. Gerry McGovern offers unparalleled expertise in customer-centric website content and the Customer Carewords research program to identify what that content should be. More about Gerry at www.gerrymcgovern.com. mStoner helps colleges and universities with Internet strategies and website development to meet changing audience expectations, technologies, market pressures, and institutional positioning. For the details, visit www.mstoner.com. TargetX brings the power of the Internet to recruit students and communicate with alumni through higher education’s only integrated suite of online tools. Explore what’s possible at www.targetx.com. Newsletter Archive
2 December 2008 |