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Virginiawesternvcca2008.Express Yourself 1221580791412216 8 1
- 1. By Margaret Boyes and Debbie Weeks Virginia Western Community College How does a community college “Express Yourself” without a printed schedule?
- 15. Fall Booklet It arrived about two weeks after the postcard
- 17. Postcard #2 It arrived about three weeks after the booklet, and two weeks before the opportunity to enroll for courses ended.
- 23. Our course schedule booklet– the OLD way…
- 24. 2007-08 academic year’s booklets Our semester booklet– the NEW way…
- 25. Web advertisement Leaderboard advertisement on Roanoke.com, the online version of The Roanoke Times , promoting fall registration and driving viewers to our web for course listings.
- 26. The redesigned web schedule
- 27. Fall ’07-June mailer Promoting the new initiative- the postcard series
- 28. Postcard series Fall ’07-August mailer
- 29. Postcard series Spring ’08-October mailer
- 30. Postcard series Spring ’08-December mailer
- 31. Second iteration Our semester booklet
- 33. Postcard series-second iteration Fall ’08-July mailer
- 35. Enrollment Comparison-Fall ’06-Fall ’07 First fall semester without a printed schedule. As of October 22, 2007, the college’s Fall FTES were 2.6% above Fall 2006. Through October 22, 2007
- 36. Enrollment Comparison Fall ’07-Fall ’08 FTES Second fall semester without a printed schedule. Through September 9, 2008 As of September 9, 2008, the college’s Fall FTES were 7.4% above Fall 2007.
Editor's Notes
- READ SLIDES. At this time, we were in the beginning stages of introducing a new branding initiative since part of the feedback we received from a market research study revealed that our community did not have a strong recognition about the college and what we offered, even though the college had been advertising for the last few years. As a side note, Virginia Western, prior to 2001 rarely advertised, if at all.
- The departments on campus were very concerned…Admissions, Counseling, Administrative Staff, Faculty, Office of Communications. Admissions staff said they were interacting with students who did not have a computer, and even if they did, it was dial-up, not high speed Internet access. They estimated about 30% of the potential students they saw were in this situation. However, we had a safety net during this time period as we had hired Sandra Golden Associates to do a community perception study.
- As part of the study, the Goldens conducted 14 focus groups including the President’s Cabinet, Student Services staff, Faculty, Students, Institutional Advancement. Additionally, the Goldens interviewed high school college counselors, and high school students. The feedback we received is that people were getting their college information through the schedule. With the exception of administration, no one was in favor of eliminating the printed schedule. READ the slides… What did they find? This statistic recently came across my desk, and it is that 61% of consumers prefer direct-mail over any other form of promotional contact (e-mail, telemarketing, etc.) The dilemma we faced was: If our awareness needed improving, how could we eliminate a valuable tool that appeared to be very useful for employees and potential college students?
- After hearing the news, we tried to speak with administrators to change their minds, especially as part of the data we had was supported by Sandra Golden’s focus group results. We proposed producing the schedule one more semester, especially since it was fall, our biggest enrollment opportunity, then utilizing a phase-out approach to eliminating the schedule. The directive was still that we were eliminating the schedule. So, I asked Sandy for the names and numbers of colleges she worked with who had eliminated the schedule. She suggested two. One responded to my request. It was the Community College of Baltimore County. They began to eliminate their course schedule in phases starting with the summer of 2002.
- Some market data they had revealed that an area they were mailing to was not coming to their college. So they started eliminating there. Then, they began scaling back the mailings from that point. To still communicate with these residents, they mailed instead a fold-out recruitment brochure promoting the upcoming semester, registration options and offerings. They had also stopped mailing schedules to their currently enrolled students. They received post cards instead. This is a big community college and even though Virginia Western is no way near their size, this feedback was valuable. Additionally, in their schedule, they had a creative ad, which I have with me, if you’d like to see it.
- These next two slides outline what they did. I chose to include this data so you would have an outline of how they handled their situation. PAUSE a moment for people to read…
- In recalling a conversation I had with one of their marketing department staff, one of the things she said was that the elimination of the schedule did not affect their enrollment negatively at all. I have not been able to contact the marketing rep to see how they are doing today, but again, I’m sharing this information as an example of how another college eliminated their schedule.
- The rumor mill was running rampant. Finally a meeting was called to clarify that although there was not going to be a mass distribution of our printed schedules (we printed 140,000 books), there was going to be a small number of schedules that would be printed by our printing services department and available on campus to those who would like to pick it up or have it mailed to them. (I believe we printed 500 books) We also agreed to publish a phone number where a good majority of the time, when someone called, they would get a person versus a machine. We utilized our student ambassadors to help fulfill the mailing of the schedules and to answer the calls. (We logged 75 people who called to request a book be mailed to them.) We also changed our website and introduced a way for students to see if/when a class was close to becoming full. We made viewing our courses online more user friendly.
- Here’s how we did it…
- Initially we implemented a marketing strategy, which I used at another position I held with another company. The good part about what we needed to accomplish was the time. The registration period was limited and in a scenario like that, you get your message out quickly, consistently and regularly. So we decided to use direct mail – again based on the market research data results-- and send a postcard first to our service region. This is postcard #1. It went out late June to arrive in early July as fall registration began mid-July.
- Next, we sent a 16-page combination marketing/information booklet, which arrived the week of registration. This arrived the same time that folks normally would have received our course listings. To develop content for this booklet, we met with our deans to determine what should be included in the booklet. Marketing received only two pages, the rest, in our opinion was dry copy, but it was an effort we were all making to try to keep this transition smooth.
- Coinciding with direct mail was this ad, which appeared in our main Roanoke newspaper three times throughout the registration process. We received great placement and it also helped to diversify the way in which we were getting our message to our community. The timing for this ad was also during the weekend folks would have normally received our schedule in the newspaper. Additionally, we placed ads in our community newspapers frequently to be in the forefront of people’s minds. Plus, we utilized Internet advertising with our local media partners.
- We followed up our direct mail strategy with this final piece, a reminder postcard, about two weeks before the end of enrollment for fall courses. The time frame here is this was mailed in early August to arrive in mid-August. The message was upbeat, short and touted the benefits of going to our website to register for classes. Again, we let people know they could call to have a schedule mailed to them. Also know that even though we are showing you our print materials, we also produced three commercials using the Express Yourself theme. The commercials played randomly as part of the purchased air time. The commercials were not sexy by any means, but the intention behind them was not to dazzle our community. It was to inform them of options available to them at Virginia Western and to bring our college to their top of mind awareness.
- As I mentioned earlier, in addition to this major change with the schedule, we were planning to launch a new marketing campaign. The no schedule situation expedited our efforts to implement the campaign sooner. Virginia Western now uses Express Yourself. We believe the message, timing of the mailings and look of the piece contributed to the success of our enrollment, despite eliminating the schedule. And, as you saw, our message was Express Change. These two words said everything we needed it to say, plus taking it one level deeper, most people who are dissatisfied with their current job situation are looking for a change. Also, one nugget of information the Goldens shared with us is that to be recognized and recalled, it was best not to vary your look every time, every semester or every year. During her focus groups Sandy asked the high school students and guidance counselors about Express Yourself, and they liked it. For us, the reason we chose it was that the theme aimed at what researchers label the millennial or “me” generation. Also, we felt that regardless of labels, a basic human quality is self expression and that’s what education through our college allows people to achieve. The Goldens also reminded us about using out top 10 reasons and with our quest to get more students to register online, we needed to tout the benefits of online registration.
- Additionally, we chose Express Yourself because it hit the mark by allowing for flexibility of messaging, visual flexibility and showcasing the college creatively.
- It also allowed for a great tag line with a memorable message, some of which you see here. Also, the Express Yourself logo you see at the bottom right is the next iteration of the theme, which now has “career, transfer, enrichment” as part of the campaign.
- In addition to all of this, Sandy also stressed the importance of using Testimonials Creating a family look and many other ideas, some of which are relevant to marketing and many of which are relevant to other departments of a college including student services, retention, recruitment, research and curriculum delivery.
- I will now turn the presentation over to Debbie, who will carry you through her process for integrating the visuals.
- The college’s course schedule booklet consisted of 48 pages for fall and spring semesters and 32 pages for summer semester. It was printed on a lower grade paper with no varnishes. It was four-color on eight of the pages only. These booklets were distributed by our local newspaper, the Roanoke Times. Subscribers received the booklet in their Saturday newspaper. Nonsubscribers received the booklet in their mailboxes.
- The college’s new semester booklet consists of 16 pages for each of the three semesters. It is printed on a better grade gloss paper with varnish. It is four-color throughout. These booklets were distributed by US postal service to all postal customers’ mailboxes. We kept a family look by using a consistent color palette, images of our students, consistent use of “Express Yourself” tagline and message, and font styles.
- To maintain the consistent look, the image of the student was also used on one of the postcard mailers. We were promoting the college’s online schedule. You’ll learn more about that later in our presentation.
- The college’s web schedule pages were redesigned to be more user-friendly. It shows current and maximum enrollment for each course. This gives students a push to register if the course is close to becoming full. Also it is important to note that the web schedule gets updated regularly so the information stays current. With a printed document, some of the information would be incorrect by the time it left the printing company.
- This is an example of Fall semester’s first postcard.
- Fall semester’s second postcard.
- Spring semester’s first postcard.
- Spring semester’s second postcard. We did not produce a postcard for summer semester.
- As Maggie mentioned earlier, the college’s tag line went through a second iteration. The semester booklet has evolved as well. After one year of booklets, our president wanted a new look. He wanted to see something that had a certain flow. He’d seen other college’s work that included illustrations as part of the graphic look. Our desire to make it more of a marketing piece was also reinforced by his directive. The example you see is phase two. In keeping with the established look and feel, we remain true to the color palette, tag line and font styles.
- The newest iteration has more of a magazine-type look.
- I’ll turn the presentation over to Maggie, and she will tell you how it went.
- The result? SUCCESS. READ THE SLIDE WITH THE RESULTS. Also, we ended up overall with about a 3% increase in enrollment for fall 2007. Now, that might not knock your socks off, but remember, we were facing declining enrollment, and our enrollment for the semesters following have been increasing to the point where we had record enrollment in fall 2008.
- The elimination of the printed course listings did not seem to have a detrimental effect on enrollment, as you can see by some of our data. We feel that by repeating the “no printed course schedule” message in all our forms of media made the transition successful.
- For 2008, as you can see we are at approximately an 8-percent increase over last year’s figures.
- READ SLIDES
- READ SLIDES
- READ SLIDES. When you add up the costs for the two postcards, plus the booklet, the cost is roughly $60,400, BUT, we were able to achieve three direct mailings and keep our name in front of the citizens in our service region, which is good marketing.
- READ NOTES FROM THE SLIDE.