College Consortium Project

Posted byMandi RoPosted inClass Projects, Graphic Design

MCO Survey of Public Relations 

Client: College Consortium

Amanda Roach

Location: Texas Wesleyan University and Online

Audience: Students and faculty at Texas Wesleyan University

Goal: To inform more students and faculty about College Consortium and the resources available to them.

Overview:  The College Consortium (CC) brings the sharing economy to higher education so colleges can collaborate to improve student completion through a backup inventory of online courses from aligned institutions.  Through our marketplace, Texas Wesleyan students can access pre-approved online courses anytime they need additional options to make progress, improve their GPA, or meet athletic or financial aid eligibility.    To see the inventory of pre-approved courses click HERE.

Key Messages:

  • College Consortium provides resources and opportunities for students at Texas Wesleyan outside of the classroom.
  • College Consortium allows students to collaborate with others all around the nation.
  • College Consortium gives faculty the ability to open their classrooms to students from other universities.

Objectives:

  • To inform more students and faculty about College Consortium and the resources available to them through it.
  • To get students to use College Consortium to communicate with other students in their online classes.
  • To increase College Consortium’s current Social Media following.
  • To increase the number of students actively engaging with College Consortium on Social Media.
  • To use social media and flyers to educate and inform students about resources available through College Consortium.
  • To increase the number of staff and faculty members engaging with College Consortium.
  • To produce advocates of College Consortium in students and faculty on college campuses.

 

 

 

Research:

Since one of College Consortium’s main objectives through this project is to increase their following on social media, it is important to research their current social media standing through research.

This table represents current followers on several social media sites:

Site: Likes/Follows/Searches: Post Frequency:
Facebook 17 Never
LinkedIn 71 Never
Twitter N/A N/A
Instagram N/A N/A
Google Trends Avg: 60/day N/A

 

  • The research found that social media postings on Facebook and LinkedIn were non-existent.
  • The research was unable to locate the College Consortium Twitter page despite numerous searches.
  • According to Google Trends, the term ‘College Consortium’ gets searched an average of 60 times a day, with little to none of these searches coming from Texas in November.
  • Further demographics on these likes/follows/searches were not available.
  • Additionally, of students this class surveyed, it appears that most have never heard of College Consortium.
  • According to students in the class, the best way to reach other students includes text, Facebook, Twitter, and an e-mail list once information is known.
  • Ninety-one schools are currently partnered with College Consortium.
  • 2236 Online classes are currently linked through College Consortium.

Additional research is necessary for someone with access to the analytics for each of these accounts.  What is the average age of a follower?  Male or female?  Are they college students, family members, faculty and staff, or something else?

It might be a good idea for someone that works for College Consortium to go through Hootsuite’s free platform training and their free social media marketing training.  For a company wanting to get their feet wet with social media, these courses provide a lot of information about what works, what doesn’t, and how to get to a good result.  Hootsuite has already done a lot of research that they publish in these courses, and since they are free, there is no reason not to take advantage of these resources.

Target Demographics:

Target demographics will be college students, including those currently pursuing a degree and those non-degree seeking (transient) students.  Additionally, a target should be faculty and staff at the partnered Universities as we aim for them to use this service more in their classrooms and promote it to their own students.  Most other demographics don’t matter, aside from geographic, where it might be helpful to target people within a thirty-mile radius of the partnered universities.  Facebook and Twitter allow you to target such demographics by using Hootsuite, a free online tool for scheduling and publishing social media posts.

Current online sites:

I was able to locate the following websites containing information about the College Consortium.

Social Media Tactics:
Develop a cohesive brand across all platforms, including the same profile pictures and cover photos and similar posts, but be able to adapt posts to each social media site’s strengths and weaknesses.  Ensure all information (address, e-mail, phone number, website link) is up-to-date across platforms.

Facebook:

  • Increase post frequency to at least once a week. People tend to look at Facebook daily and should be reminded of this service, but they do not wish to be spammed out with hundreds of repeated messages.  While once a week is probably not enough, unless it is fresh, new content, it probably shouldn’t exceed that by much
  • Encourage engagement with interactive posts to increase likes and shares. Host contests, ask people to describe their day using emojis, and respond to comments.
  • Start up a series of hashtags to monitor community engagement. (#CollegeConsortium, #AutomatingAcademicSharing)
  • Direct traffic to the website, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Encourage people to like and follow your other social pages and instruct them how to sign-up for e-mail and text lists.
  • Encourage employees to share these pages on their personal accounts to increase traffic flow and employee advocacy.
  • Find community influencers (Faculty/staff at universities) and encourage them to become company advocates by sharing posts and information about College Consortium to their own
  • Quickly respond to all messages that come through asking questions about College Consortium.

Twitter:

  • Develop a Twitter Account if one is not already active.
  • Increase post frequency to at least three times a week. Twitter move much more quickly than Facebook does, so it is important to stay relevant and in people’s feeds.
  • Encourage engagement with interactive posts to increase likes and shares. Retweet fun messages from followers and be sure to like tweets where College Consortium is mentioned in a positive light.
  • Start up a series of hashtags to monitor community engagement. (#CollegeConsortium, #AutomatingAcademicSharing.)  Hashtags are crucial on Twitter so that community members can link together posts from all over with an overarching
  • Direct traffic to the website, Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.
  • Encourage employees to share these posts on their personal accounts to increase traffic flow and employee advocacy.
  • Find community influencers (Faculty/staff at universities) and encourage them to become company advocates by sharing posts and information about College Consortium to their own
  • Post short informational videos and infographics to increase knowledge of the company. Include key messages directed at students and faculty.

Instagram:

  • Develop an Instagram account if one is not already active.
  • Increase post frequency to at least three times a week. Instagram, like Twitter, is fast-moving and requires more posting to stay relevant.  Fresh content is always key, though!
  • Encourage engagement with interactive posts to increase likes and shares. Have a weekly game of people posting a photo of themselves on their college campus tagging College Consortium in it and offer up a small prize for the winner of a random drawing.  This will spread the news to their own followers very quickly, and college students love entering contests.
  • Start up a series of hashtags to monitor community engagement. (#CollegeConsortium, #AutomatingAcademicSharing.)  Hashtags are also very important on Instagram so that users may know exactly what the picture is promoting at a glance.
  • Direct traffic to the website, Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn.
  • Encourage employees to share these posts on their personal accounts to increase traffic flow and employee advocacy.
  • Find community influencers (Faculty/staff at universities) and encourage them to become company advocates by sharing posts and information about College Consortium to their own
  • Post short informational videos and infographics to increase knowledge of the company. Instagram is the best tool for this, followed by Twitter.  Just like on Twitter, be sure to include key messages directed at both students and faculty.
  • Use content producers from universities to out-source some of the work. Perhaps host a contest to students to see who can make the best commercial for College Consortium and offer a prize for the one that receives the most community involvement.  This would not only allow a lot of work to be taken from the company but could also encourage students to become involved and educated.

 

 

LinkedIn:

  • Increase post frequency to once a week.
  • Direct traffic to the website, Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook.
  • Encourage employees to share these posts on their personal accounts to increase traffic flow and employee advocacy.
  • Find community influencers (Faculty/staff at universities) and connect with them through LinkedIn’s network feature to build a relationship with them.
  • Quickly respond to all messages that come through asking questions about College Consortium.
  • Ensure that all employees have College Consortium listed as their current place of work with accurate job information.
  • Post job openings as they come available and encourage recent graduates to apply.

Website:

  • Direct traffic to LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook.
  • Quickly respond to all messages that come through asking questions about College Consortium.
  • Ensure the website gets updated regularly so that no outdated information is present.

  Texts/E-mails:

  • Post instructions for signing up for text lists and/or e-mail lists on social media. Those interested will do so, especially if an incentive is offered.
  • Send out e-mails and texts at most once a week. More than this and students will start to feel agitated and as though they are being spammed.
  • Texts should be brief and direct students to either take action or follow a link to learn more information.
  • E-mails can be longer but should be entertaining so that students will be likely to read them. Include graphics, videos, links to socials, and any important updates students should be aware of.
  • Encourage faculty and staff to sign-up for the e-mail lists as well (they are more likely to respond to this than they are to texts.)
  • Add a post to the Wesleyan Flame and/or Ram Life, an e-mail service that already goes out to students and staff, encouraging them to become informed about College Consortium.

Non-Electronic Tactics:

Since this is an online service, electronic tactics should be focused on.  They are also typically the best way to reach young adults with information and news about a product or service.  Even so, to build up an audience at the beginning of a campaign, it is smart to promote your site through non-electronic means to direct initial traffic.

  • Put up flyers around campus that advertise College Consortium. Make them both visually appealing and informative and place them in high-traffic areas.  Though there could be benefit from leaving them up all semester, the beginning of the semester and registration/advising weeks should be the most important times to inform students about this service.  Perhaps refresh the fliers with new colors or designs near these times in the semester to attract fresh attention.  Always reinforce key messages on these flyers, both directed at students and faculty.
  • Use a QR code on the fliers that allow students, faculty, and staff to quickly and easily sign up for a text list, e-mail subscription, or directs them to the website/social media page.
  • Perhaps one of the large poster kiosks around campus would be a great place to put up some information near the beginning of the semester. I know these tend to get a lot of attention from students and could raise awareness of College Consortium for students to use throughout the semester.
  • Though this is a partially electronic tactic, it would be a good idea to host contests for students that promotes them becoming involved and informed about College Consortium. Contest ideas can include making a commercial, designing a poster/flyer, getting the most fellow students to sign-up, or random drawings from social media posts that College Consortium is tagged in.  Prizes can include anything from small Starbucks gift cards, an Amazon credit for textbook rentals, t-shirts or other merchandise, or even $1,000 scholarships.
  • Have Orientation Leaders talk about College Consortium to incoming first-year students and tell advisors to reinforce the message to those that are already enrolled in classes. This personal interaction will cause a lot of students to want to know more information, and the reinforcement every semester from advisors will help them to remember that this service is available to them.  It will also cause the advisors, most if not all of whom are professors at Texas Wesleyan, to be more aware of College Consortium as well.

Evaluation:

Social media tactics can be measured by numbers in analytics like new page views, new likes/followers, the amount of engagement in comments and messages, and the number of shares and retweets you are receiving.  If these numbers go up, then that means the campaign is doing its job in reaching new audiences and making them interested in this service.  If these numbers are not increasing at a steady rate, re-evaluate and see where you should stop effort or try a new tactic.

It will take a bit of time for these numbers to take off since College Consortium’s online presence has been dead throughout its existence.  Once the word gets to a few opinion leaders and on-campus advocates, however, the numbers should begin to increase rapidly.  Patience is key in waiting for this result, so it is important not to get frustrated if a campaign is not immediately yielding results.

Additionally, if this campaign takes off on social media, there should be an effect on the number of website subscribers.  If numbers on social media are increasing, but there is no new traffic to the website, remember that the point of having a social media following is to direct them to signing up for the service online.  Reinforce this through messages to followers on social media, and perhaps ask followers what their favorite thing is about using College Consortium.  This should cause website traffic to increase.

Thought Leaders/Influencers:

On campus, it is important to talk to advisors in all departments so that they can reinforce the message that College Consortium is available for students and can help them collaborate with others.  In addition to advisors, some on-campus people at Texas Wesleyan that might be good advocates include:

David Monge, the Assistant Director of New Student Experiences: David is over orientations for new students, so if College Consortium would like to be a topic of discussion to incoming students, he might be an excellent one to contact.   He would also be the one to contact about putting posters up around campus, where these posters are allowed, and could potentially help get on-campus groups involved in spreading the word.

Barbara Barnhart, Assistant Director of Student Engagement: Barb also helps with all orientations for new students and assists with overseeing on-campus groups and clubs.  She is currently the faculty sponsor for PAC, the Programs and Activities Committee for Texas Wesleyan University.  If an on-campus event were to be hosted to promote College Consortium, she would be the one to contact about it.

Joe Brown, Dean of Freshmen: ‘Pro Joe’ would be a good contact for spreading the word among freshmen.  He teaches a Freshman Academic Success Course at Texas Wesleyan and assists all other teachers of these courses with their syllabi.  Additionally, he is often in contact with many students of all academic levels, so he could quickly get the word out about just about anything on campus.

Dennis Hall, Vice President of Student Affairs and Dean of Students: Dennis helps with all orientations and makes a point of introducing himself to each student throughout the day.  He is highly involved with groups and activities on campus and could help address any questions that might arise about advertising College Consortium around campus.

Allen Henderson, Provost: Allen is already involved with assisting College Consortium with webinars, so he is a good bridge between Texas Wesleyan University and College Consortium.  He is great at answering any questions that may arise and could help get the word out to students through mass e-mails.  Students may be more likely to read an e-mail from him than they would be to read one addressed by College Consortium.

Fred Slabach, President: While talking about influencers around the Texas Wesleyan University campus, it is important to note the man at the top of the list.  While President Slabach is very busy and might not have a lot of time to personally address questions, if College Consortium wants to become a big part of campus life at Texas Wesleyan, it might be a good idea to contact President Slabach at the early stages.

 

Consistency across Campaign:

When starting up a marketing campaign, it is important to ensure that your brand identity is very consistent or people will get confused by the number of mixed messages they are receiving.  Because College Consortium has not developed a brand identity online or on-campus, it is important to take many different things into account when trying to build a cohesive image.

All online accounts should have the same profile picture to build an easily identifiable link from one account to the other.  Often, especially for brands first starting up, it is important to use the brand’s logo as the profile picture as that is easy to remember for those viewing your page.

It is also important when advertising to keep a cohesive idea of your brand’s look – similar fonts, colors, and styles.  If every advertisement that comes out has a drastically different look, viewers will have a hard time associating each advertisement with your brand.

College Consortium

Sample Timeline of Actions to take:

December 2018:

  • Obtain a Hootsuite Account for managing social media posts quickly and efficiently.
  • Create a Twitter and Instagram account for the brand.
  • Begin updating all social media to ensure that all information is currently correct and begin producing posts so that when the campaign launches the social media sites will not look completely bare. Bare sites are often seen as illegitimate and students might be scared away from following the page.
  • Produce content including posters, advertisements, and a few short videos. Some good and free websites to use for basic graphic design are Canva and Piktochart.  Remember to keep all of these designs consistent with the brand image.
  • Contact David Monge about putting up posters around Texas Wesleyan University in the Spring 2019 semester. Additionally, bring your campaign to the attention of Allen Henderson and Fred Slabach.

January 2019:

  • Place posters around campus advertising College Consortium to students. Include a QR code they can scan that will direct them to a social media page or the website.
  • Continue producing content to post on social media sites, including at least one post per week on Facebook and at least three per week on Instagram and Twitter. These can be simple one-sentence updates, or they can be video advertisements.
  • Purchase some sponsored advertising from Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Hootsuite can assist with the best places to place your ads and when the best time is to run them.  It can also help with targeting specific demographics like college students in a certain geographical area.

February 2019:

  • Continue posting consistently to social media accounts and consider purchasing more sponsored advertising if needed.
  • Consider contacting Barbara Barnhart to set up an on-campus event promoting College Consortium. This can be anything from setting up a booth in front of the library to setting up a bounce house and handing out small giveaways to students for liking the Facebook page or signing up for a College Consortium account.
  • Evaluate campaign thus far. Have there been new likes and followers on social media sites?  Has the College Consortium site received new sign-ups?  What is working well, and what could use improvement?

March 2019:

  • Contact academic advisors and ask them to let the students they are advising know about College Consortium’s services.
  • Continue posting consistently to social media accounts and consider purchasing more sponsored advertising if needed.
  • Evaluate campaign thus far. Constant evaluation is critical, especially when starting a new campaign like this.  Let go of anything that has yet to work and focus more time, energy, and resources on what has worked.

April 2019:

  • Contact David Monge about incorporating College Consortium into the summer orientation information. This can be anything from providing hand-outs to students and families or having a presentation about what College Consortium has to offer.
  • Continue posting and evaluating what is working online.
  • Update posters around campus and use posters to instruct students to ask their advisors about College Consortium. This will refresh the advisors and hopefully get the conversation moving between students and faculty.

May 2019:

  • Host an online contest open to students from all partnered universities to make a commercial or graphic advertising College Consortium. Offer a prize to the winner of this contest in exchange for you getting the rights to their advertisement.  This way you are getting students involved, posting about College Consortium, and can outsource work to students.
  • Contact Joe Brown about incorporating information about College Consortium into the Fall 2019 ASE classes for incoming first-year students. While the freshmen will have hopefully heard the message at orientation, this would be a great way to reinforce that message while the students are on-campus.
  • Continue posting and evaluating what is working online.
  • When the semester finishes, send out a survey to students that are currently enrolled in College Consortium asking for their opinions of your campaign. Offer an incentive like a drawing for an Amazon gift card to those that complete the survey.
  • When the semester is finished, be sure to take down all posters as you don’t want outdated information being present when the new semester starts back up.

At the end of this six-month campaign, do a big evaluation.  Look over analytics from the beginning of December to the end of May and see what has changed and what has stayed the same.  Look over surveys that students completed and see what they liked and didn’t like.  Talk to some of the faculty members that you engaged with and see how they believe this campaign performed and how they think College Consortium assisted them through the Spring 2019 semester.  Make adjustments based on the feedback.

Continue consistently posting throughout the summer so that students do not forget about your service, but take summer as a chance to evaluate and plan for the Fall Semester.  Always be planning and ready for the upcoming semester and always be monitoring any incoming activity.

Tactic Example #1: Commercial Contest

  • In early April, post to Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram that you are hosting an ad-making contest open to students at every university partnered with College Consortium. If needed, pay to have these run as ads across the platforms.  Target these ads to students in the geographic areas around the partnered universities.  Advertise a scholarship prize for the winner of the contest in exchange for the right to use their ad.
    • Twitter: Calling all students! Enter your best #CollegeConsortium advertisement for a chance to win $1,000 in scholarships!  More info: link.linky
    • Facebook: Hey, students! We want to see your best #CollegeConsortium advertisement.  This can be a graphic, a 30-second video, or a 60-second video.  The best advertisement in each category wins a $1,000 scholarship!  Interested?  Check out our website for more info and to enter: link.linky
      #ConsortiumCommercialContest #Scholarships
    • Instagram: Check out our website for details on how to win a $1,000 scholarship through our #ConsortiumCommercialContest! linky
      #CollegeConsortium #Scholarships
    • Ideally, all three of these would contain a graphic that features College Consortium’s logo, their website link, and a bit on information about the contest including when entries are due and how to enter.
  • Have the contest close in early May. All entries must be posted publicly to Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter with the hashtags ‘#CollegeConsortium’ and ‘#ConsortiumCommercialContest.’  This way they will be easy to find across platforms and activity can be easily tracked through Hootsuite.  You can also have specifics on the website as to what you want the students to include in their ads.  (Logo?  Website link?  Explanation of services?  Key messages?)
  • Announce the winner in each of the three categories (Graphic, 30-second video, and 60-second video) within a week of the contest closing. If you wait much longer than this students will forget about entering, and that’s not what you want!
  • Run these ads across social media platforms in late July/early August so that as students go back to school for the fall, College Consortium is on their minds.
  • Evaluate this strategy at the end of the contest. How many entries did you receive?  How many impressions did you get based on this contest?  How much was one of your hashtags used?  Were the submitted advertisements of good quality?  Is it financially worth it to run this contest?  If the answers are positive, then consider making this contest an annual event.  If not, reevaluate by talking to some of the students that entered and see what they think might work better.

Tactic Example #2: Posters around Campus

  • In December, create at least two different poster designs targeted at Texas Wesleyan students/faculty. Include a logo, website link, a tagline that relates to one of the key messages, and a QR code that can be scanned through smartphones that directs to either social media or the website.
  • Contact David Monge about putting these posters up around campus. He will be able to explain any rules and restrictions about where posters can be placed and how many can be placed.  Posters also must always get approved through his office before going on display.
    • Target areas should include Eunice and James L. West Library, Brown-Lupton Campus Center, Oneal-Sells Administration Building, Polytechnic United Methodist Church, and the dorms. These areas are highly-traveled by students and will provide the greatest opportunity to be seen.
  • Monitor posters once a week to ensure they are still where they need to be and have not been defaced in any way. The last thing you want is for students to draw inappropriate content on your poster!  Replace any posters that need to be replaced.
  • In April, repeat the process with a different design encouraging students to talk to their advisors about College Consortium. Promote classes that are partnered through College Consortium on some of these posters, as well.
    • A good design idea that might attract a lot of attention at this time of year is to include a few ‘Finals Study Tips’ and relate these to how College Consortium can help.
      • For example: “Finals Study Tip #3: Work together with others in your class.
        ‘Two heads are better than one,’ and even more heads are better than that!
        Need help finding other students in your online classes?  Check out https://www.collegeconsortium.org/!  There you can connect with students from all over the nation that are in the same class as you.  The best part?  It’s totally FREE!
        *QR Code Here*
    • Evaluate this strategy at the end of the semester and see if website/social media traffic was affected any when these posters went up. If so, then it is a successful strategy that should be repeated next semester.  If not, conduct some research with Texas Wesleyan students and find out what might work better.

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