Have a great, safe Memorial Day Weekend!

I just wanted to wish all of my readers a happy, safe, Memorial Day weekend!

Thank you all for reading my blog, and thank a veteran this weekend. They give me and you the freedom to write blogs!

God Bless you and your family!

marketmpb

4% of budgets to social media??????

Good afternoon, and I hope you are enjoying this sunny day!

Earlier I was reading Razorfish's research on higher ed marketers are only using 4% of their budgets in social media.

I was surprised, but not shocked by these numbers. Also, look for article on this soon on www.ezine.com, where I am an expert author.

These days higher ed marketers have to prove ROI to their counterparts above them. Are the "big thinkers" having trouble seeing the value in social media? Remember social media does not grow student enrollment directly, that is what leads/inquiries, cost per lead is used for.

However, can you erase all public misconceptions using social media and view unsolicited feedback about your school in social media? Absolutely... again a great secondary tool to market your institution.

I would recommend using a little more than 4% :).

marketmpb

This is a shocker... do not have outdated content

Good evening,

This evening I was reading some fascinating things about outdated web content on colleges/universities.

Think about how that looks when you have classes that have already occurred or if you are a business, advertisements that are even outdated! Its not good.

You need to have the ability to quickly update information on your website, sometimes often. A great example would be imagine going out to the National Weather Service's website and seeing last weeks forecast. Would that alter your perception of the National Weather Service? It sure would.

Also, I feel content is more important when you are marketing out to prospective graduate students, they are much more interested in content, when the prospective undergraduate student wants to see photos, videos, instead of word rich profiles.

have a great night!

marketmpb

Twitter, marketing benefits

Good morning!

I am a relatively new user of Twitter (please forgive me), its very interesting that even casual tweets or links to this blog has increased my following. Lets translate that to marketing your school or business.

Lets say a school is out on a site like Zinch.com whereas students provide their profiles. Admissions folks should immediately begin to follow those people on Twitter. Think about the network opportunities you can have by just taking a few minutes and following. Does this person have friends that are going to attend the school? Dont high school friends tend to attend the same school? (in some circumstances).

I like to use the term "authentic helpfulness", whereas a prospective student (or customer) senses that you are trying to help this individual. For example, dont sell your school right away, answer their questions about the education process (or product if business), engage them in the process.

Maybe your competition is taking the time to follow them on Twitter!

enjoy this wonderful day

marketmpb

Adult Students and Social Media

(Great Piece I thought I would share with you from Bob Johnson Consulting)

source: bobjohnsonconsulting.com

Recruiting Adults: Email is More Important than Social Media

Sitting at Carol Aslanian's conference on adult student recruitment listing to Jennifer Copeland at Demand Engine report on initial results of a survey of 50,000 adults (drawn from files of 10 universities that volunteered to participate with about 10% response so far) on their preferences for finding or receiving information at three points in the recruitment cycle:

•Researching schools before making an inquiry ("stealth" mode is increasing)
•After making an inquiry
•After sending an application
90% Start with Search, 90% Prefer Iniitial Email and Mail Follow-up

Key findings so far:

•Before making an inquiry, 90 percent report using a search engine (Google, for the most part) to start their search. At this stage, phone use ranks quite low.
•After making an inquiry, 90 percent prefer email and direct mail for ongoing contact. Social media (including FaceBook and Twitter) rank low. Phone is now acceptable is just under 50 percent.
•Preferences don't change much after a person sends an application: Email and regular mail remain clear preferences, while phone rises to just over 50 percent and social media remain relatively low.

How can we measure ROI on social media?

In this ever changing world of social media and less budget, we are more and more held to the budget, even if you are lucky to have any budget (please see higher education).

I think that we can measure ROI several different ways. First, think of social media as an invaluable way into "consumer insight". Folks are talking back and forth regarding different brands (higher ed or business) pretty freely and comfortably. Think of this as free feedback, no surveys required!

Second, think if there is misinformation out there about your company or school, how much is that costing you? How much trouble would it be to have an individual sign up for multiple social media outlets to turn that around? That individual can get the message out rather quickly through those channels, hence more students or more revenue.

Also, engage these individuals in conversations. For example, if you are in higher ed, have students meet you once a week on a college forum, ask them questions, these students are typically very comfortable and familiar with this form of communication. If you are a business, engage as well, follow twitter, be friends on facebook, linked in, etc...... engage, engage, engage! More specifically, do not be afraid to ask an individual if they say something poorly about your school or company, and then learn from it.

Social media is a powerful tool to protect the brands reputation, be prepared to defend it! What does that cost the company if things are incorrect or unsatisfied customers???

These are all some ways we can better measure ROI, make it a little more tangible.

enjoy your evening!

matt (marketmpb)

Homepage Decline and my reaction

More and more customers are going straight to specific pages on your website, rather than the homepage.

In 2003, 39 percent of the page views for a large research website were for the homepage. By 2009, it was down to 19 percent. In one month in 2008, of the 70,000 page views a technology site received, 22,000 were for the homepage. For the same month in 2010, of the 120,000 page views the site received, only 2,500 were for the homepage.

Another technology website had roughly 10 percent of page views for the homepage in 2008, and by 2010 it was down to 5 percent. One of the largest websites in the world had 25 percent of visitors come to the homepage in 2005, but in 2010 only has 10 percent.

People don’t vaguely browse on the Web. When was the last time you arrived at Google and said to yourself: “I just don’t know what to search for. Someone give me a word.” As Web usage matures, it becomes more specific.

(source:giraffeforum.com)

(my reaction follows:)

I thought this was a great article and it really hit home to me. If you think about it, how many alternatives do you get when you search Google for lets say (University of Notre Dame) or Sea Ray boats.....

You get info for admissions, or different categories of boats, parts, accessories, its all over the place. You have to think about people's time as well, there is less and less of it these days, so people want a quicker find in their search engine usage.

Another great point here is that the customer or student controls the web, not the business or college, thats why folks love using the Web to find things, its puts THEM in control.

A great article from the giraffe forum!

marketmpb

Pay Per Click

Good evening,

I thought it would be relevant this evening to discuss pay per click and my thoughts around it.

Pay per click is defined as an Internet advertising model in which advertisers pay the host, only when the ad is clicked (source wikipedia). In a search engine situation, people typically bid on keyword phrases that would be relevant to the demographic audience.

The million dollar question is, Is it effective?

It is my feeling that Pay per Click advertising is not effective on its own, however if you incorporate SEO (Search Engine Optimization) along with it, it can be a very powerful tool.

Here are some tips:
-Only use social media pay per click as a secondary means of marketing (fraud can be high!)
-think wide, not thin (be diverse with your budget), in other words Yahoo and Google are great, but consider smaller mom and pop networks that reach your target audience as well
-make sure your focus is not too narrow (if it is, you might want to consider other forms of advertising besides pay per click!)
-do the math (make sure it makes business sense!)

enjoy your night,

marketmpb

Earning Trust

Good afternoon!

Its interesting to me how trust is now more important than ever because of the poor economy, increased competition, and consumer fatigue. Here are some ideas I had regarding how to increase/build trust.

-honor any promise that you make
-be very careful on how you word things
-use terms that are simple and very easy to understand, dont confuse
-send personal thank you notes, you would be surprised on how many who dont!
-after you have taken care of a customer well (ask permission), than use lots of testimonials, preferably peer organizations in your demographic audience
-be a leader/example in your organization, one that you would want your employees to follow

Trust is more important than ever these days, especially in these economic conditions.....

Enjoy your afternoon!

marketmpb

Some random marketing thoughts, and others!

Good evening, and I hope you had a great weekend!

First off, if you ever get the chance to go to the Hatfield McCoy Trails in southern West Virginia (www.trailsheaven.com) to ATV ride, by all means do it.

This is my second year going and it was simply amazing. The scenery is incredible, the trails are great, and people are super friendly.

I had some random marketing thoughts this evening that I thought I would share. First off, a former client of mine told me once "we advertise on the luggage rotunda on the local airport" and we have received incredible exposure, and some results.

That got me to think, hmmmm, lots of weary people traveling through the airport, they have to get their luggage (if the airline doesn't lose it :) ) and their eyes are fixated on this organization's message.

So some thoughts for tonight:
-advertise on a luggage rotunda, especially if its a local audience!

Other thoughts:
-Make a connection with customers on their terms (what makes them click, survey them, engage, engage, engage!
-Make sure you know exactly what a consumer whats to achieve logically and emotionally, key in on emotion!
-be very specific and know exactly who you are targeting and make sure your message is consistent across the board...

May God Bless You

mpb

RSS Feeds, made simple

I am not the most technical person on the planet, but I thought I would discuss RSS feeds, because they are very much revolutionizing the internet.

RSS Feeds (Really Simple Syndication)is a family of web formats used to publish frequently update content (such as blogs, etc). This can include full content to an article or just a quick summation to another website. For example, another author could subscribe to my blog using my feed and see a snippet of this article or more.
My feed to this blog is: http://marketmpb.blogspot.com/feeds/comments/default?alt=rss

(that is my shameless plug to subscribe :) ) You may also click the white/orange box too.

The data format typically used now is "2.0", although there are a lot of other data formats out there and available.

Feeds are regularly checked for updated content. They are also a great way to drive traffic and get your site up in the big "search engines".

Here are some tips:
-subscribe to other blogs rss feeds that you have interest in
-make it easy for someone to subscribe to your rss feeds
-engage other experts in your field to drive traffic!

Enjoy your day,

marketmpb

Good morning and thank you!

Good morning all,

I just wanted to thank all of my readers on the blog so far. I installed a couple of traffic tools last night and am very happy to report that traffic is growing rapidly.

thank you and enjoy!

Matt

Integrated marketing, alive and well!

Good evening all,

I thought I would share my thoughts tonight on "integrated marketing" and how its still very much alive.

Integrated marketing is defined (source wikipedia) as a "holistic approach to marketing communications, in other words using many channels to get your message out.

These days colleges or businesses need to use pay-per-click, SEO, blogs, RSS feeds, micro blogs, etc. These tools can be used to get an inside on what the consumer is thinking, what makes them tick? Also, think of it as a soup can on a store shelf, that can is strategically placed at end aisles in front of registers, etc,, or the most visible place....

Is your product more visible than your competition using "integrated marketing"?

mpb

Some thoughts on best ways to raise awareness

Good evening,
I thought I would share with you some of my thoughts on some of the best ways for your business or school to raise awareness:

-analyze your message and get it consistent across the board
-join and participate in social media conversations, engage in blogs
-build and nurture relationships online and make it easy for people to find you online
-conduct regular and comprehensive surveys in your demographic market, offer incentives for participation!
-engage, engage, engage!

mpb

Some more thoughts on experiential marketing

Its interesting how the 2.0 world these days are bringing human beings (who desire community) and the digital age together....

Whether its a college or business, I think that every employee is a marketer, from top to the bottom.

I think many times(especially colleges) discount the power of word of mouth. A student who has a great experience tells someone about it and unfortunately a person with a negative experience also tells them about it as well.

Experiential marketing is defined as attraction by logic as well as emotion. If you are a college or a business, are you attracting by emotion?

How can you attract better by emotion?
-appeal to a number of senses (and logic)
-connect with a student (or business consumer) on many levels
-make a very quick, candid impression
-consider advertising on a airport carriage round (more on that later!)

mpb

Marketing to graduate and adult online students

(Apologies to my readers) I had to switch computers and had trouble getting in...

I thought today I would talk about marketing out to graduate and adult students...

Some things to keep in mind/tips:
-always know your local demographic (50 or so miles around campus), always target the largest metro areas close to you...
-build up your brand online, use services such as gradschools.com or the GRE Search Service (two best in my opinion), use content rich profiles, and buy names in specific geo/content fields you are looking to market for
-promote your healthcare plan (if one exists) and promote tuition reimbursement!
-online graduate programs that will sell (think what is the marketplace dictating?)
-follow up and track, ROI!

mpb

Some thoughts on graduate student (experiential marketing)

Earlier this afternoon, I met a wonderful lady from Northern Kentucky University, one of their marketing coordinators. We got into a discussion about experiential marketing for graduate students, it struck some thoughts I had....

Experiential marketing is a concept that integrates elements of emotion, logic, and general thought processes.

This process looks to reach out to a person's sense of comfort and pleasure, which is logical as well.

I think this hits home with graduate student recruitment/marketing.

Prospective graduate students look to attend school within 50 miles of their location, typically somewhere they are very familiar with.

Also, as my new friend from NKU mentioned, any online outreach needs to be "content rich". Soon to be grad students do not care about photos or videos, they want content, content, content!

Ads on the internet for your graduate school needs to catch someone's attention quickly and hold that attention long enough to have an impact. The new website with Loyola Graduate School is a great example. They make it easy and seamless for a prospective grad student to attend.

By appealing to as many senses as you can you can engage your prospective graduate audience and make them want to attend!

mpb

Lunch time thoughts around online student growth

We are in a very interesting time in higher education. With the economy the way it is, we are seeing a huge growth in online (masters degree) students. The market is indicating the "for profits" (Kaplan, Phoenix, etc) are in a much better position to capture these students than non profits are. Students find masters online education more accomodating than their in class counterparts. The non-traditional graduate student typically is married, has a family, and a full time job. I have also seen a lot of folks involved in business careers or laid off from business careers come back for a masters in online education (teaching) or nursing. The point here being is that these folks find those industries very secure, versus the high pressure, unsecure nature of the business world.

mpb

Social Media, which site do you find most effective?

Click here to take survey



mpb

7 More Steps to a Successful Postcard Campaign

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Some social media goals for universities

I thought it would be interesting to share some social media goals that I have heard from colleges and universities, I hope it helps you!

-build relationships with existing alumni using social media tools, hence increasing enrollment
-connect prospective students to current students using these tools, have them share stories
-share stories with fans on facebook, have a goal to increase a certain percentage of fans per month, year, etc...

mpb

Home addresses for students

http://money.cnn.com/2008/03/06/smbusiness/marketing_to_students.fsb/index.htm

Interesting thoughts on home addresses

(source cnn.com)


mpb

Strategies for marketing to prospective graduate students

Create a strategy(makes sense right :) )
-collect past and present student testimonials, identify strengths and weaknesses of the programs
-dont be afraid to be aggressive
-showcase the program, use free resources as well as paid (social media :) )
-respond rapidly (within 12-24 hours) and personally to inquiries
-identify target undergrad programs, areas, and demographics of students, go where the students are!
-provide health insurance (fyi: most programs dont!)

mpb

Some tips to succeed in social media

Here were some thoughts I had on how to succeed in social media:
-Be humorous, when appropriate
-Defend your brand vigorously
-Dont just use one outlet (eg. Twitter), use multiple!
-ROI ROI ROI, measure any results you can
-Create up to date useful web content
-Assign a web content team


mpb

Great article on mobile versus online marketing

source (emarketer.com)
http://www.emarketer.com/blog/index.php/mobile-advertising-more-effective-online-ads

Its interesting to note that I thought the online ads would be more effective, it just continues to show how much everything is moving at the iphone, blackberry level.

mpb

Social media marketing for International Students

Some good stuff...
source: global campus

Survey highlights and findings:

International departments are using as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube for outreach and recruiting which is similar to domestic admissions practices. Some respondents noted using country specific sites in addition.
The responsibility of social media outreach activities fall upon a variety of staff across departments. As institutions learn more about their online community’s needs and goals, departments are collaborating and sharing responsibilities to provide relevant information to their online communities.
Videos, pictures and blogs are the most popular content being shared on social networking sites. Half of respondents use alumni and current students to contribute to social networking sites. Of those, international students or alumni write blogs and produce videos about their experience.
University staff use social media to reach international students because students are already there to start a conversation with and because it’s cost-effective.
The top three benefits of social media use for international student recruiting and outreach are direct contact with international students, more interaction with prospective students and building better relationships with prospective students and families.
The top drawbacks of social media use are the ambiguous results, the lack of guidelines and information on effective strategies and unfamiliarity with changing technologies.
Like others across industries, international departments are experimenting with different metrics but lack guidelines for measuring efforts and success. Some universities reported using Facebook metrics (though no respondents noted that they count the number of retweets (RT) and mentions (@) on Twitter). Others suggested they measure results by the amount of interactions in their community such as questions and responses and RSVP’s to events by students. There was a noticeably lower response rate in the metrics section compared with the previous section.
University staff need to redefine the concept of a ‘lead’ from a social site and need to develop a tracking system to follow those leads from first contact on social networking sites through to application and ultimately enrollment.
Universities stressed the lack of guidelines as a challenge to using social media for international student recruitment. There is an immediate need for information on best practices and strategies in the international education community.

Grassroots Marketing

Very interesting "grass roots" marketing campaign for higher education

http://www.tobaccofreecollegesnc.com/elements/files/grassroots-marketing-strategies.pdf

Some interesting prospective graduate student facts

I thought you might be interested to know the following recent research on prospective graduate students and their search behaviors:
- 7-10 mins spent on graduate search directory
- no more than three clicks to find their school (otherwise they abandon)
- typically done on a Monday evening between 7-11 pm
- over 59% want to attend a grad school within 50 miles of their house

what do you think?

mpb

Welcome to my new (and improved) marketing blog!

previously marketmpb.sosblog.com

Please visit early and often!

thanks!
Matt Blum
(aka marketmpb)

International Student Marketing

International Student Recruitment can be tricky and some schools commit to it and others dont. Some things to remember:
-international students are the most profitable for an institution (and I dont mean to degrade students as money)
-international students are great ambassadors for the university
-international students showcase diversity on campus, a goal for most institutions

Some markets to look at:
Top growth: China, India, South Korea
Some others: Vietnam, Turkey, Kuwait (govt sponsors students fully to attend English in Kuwait)
Australia
India

Read the recent news about Indian students getting beat up in Australia?

mpb

Leveraging social media

I think its important to leverage social media, any way possible. For example, if there is a significant demographic of students on a forum, blog, etc discussing your competition, consider advertising in front of those folks, brand a consistent message in front of your competition. Dont students deserve a choice?On a college forum, consider advertising directly in front of your top competition, you do want to be seen with them? Understand from an ROI perspective that this is a branding exercise and ROI is hard to measure in a situation like this.Any type of branding or marketing you must be a little bit uncomfortable with not knowing all of your return on investment.mpb

Brand Supportive Logic

Well I think its interesting, hope you do too :)In today's competitive world of higher education, its very important for an institution to think "brand supportive"Colleges need to tailor their degrees and programs to their desired audience(s)A great example would be the huge influx of working adults back to school, colleges and universities are making it more appealing for a working adult to go back to school Duke University began this trend of inviting students back 20 years ago.Strategic plan and be brand supportive!mpb
03:22:41 am . 09 May 2010

Brand Management Strategy Higher Education

Please remember an effective brand management strategy can be maximized only if the brand carries a promise -- and if every member of the academic community is committed to fulfilling that promise...-make sure academic curricula is up to date to serve the changing needs of the marketplace-ensure that the students feel a sense of belonging (community) at every level -do what you can to improve the student engagement at every level, website, vendors (advertising), etc....make sure 2-3 clicks tops to get to the application from a vendors website
mpb

5 things to think about when branding

5 things to think about when branding your college
Focus on strategic goals, how many leads do you need?, how many applications? , what do you need to reach your goal?Be Consistent (a lot of times I see schools doing 8 different things), with all of your marketing materials and messages, including adsMake a commitment over a long period of time, lots of times things are only done for 12 months, go for more!Focus on the product... the type of education provided at your institutionSeriously consider how many more students can you really handle... do not be like Poly!mpb
06:09:17 pm . 07 May 2010

Marketing out to graduate students

Marketing out to today's graduate student
In today's world of education marketing, a graduate marketing professional needs to use every available tool to them, of course on a shoestring budget. Some of my thoughts:-advertise to your own undergraduates, use free options here (post notices of grad fairs, bulletin boards, anything internal)-encourage the admissions folks to have a weekend "telethon", this can and does generate a nice chunk of leads quickly-advertise in professional conferences and leverage NAGAP and CGS however you can -to attract the local audience, consider radio and local TV advertising-to attract a wider regional or national audience consider graduate website directories, such as gradschools.com and consider the GRE Search Service, both I highly recommend-be very consistent with all marketing publications and websites, students want to see the same things-consider using online testimonials from students you are trying to attract on a gradschools.com and link it to your application-list the chain of command in your graduate admissions office (you would be surprised by how many grad schools dont), make yourself accessible!-Leverage your current graduate students, these are great sales folks for you, ask them for a testimonial!-get feedback from students who turned the school down, find out why, and who did you lose them to ?mpb
04:48:00 pm . 07 May 2010
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