Ithaca College developed a student-written magazine called Fuse to showcase campus life from a student perspective. The goals were to reinforce the college's messaging, provide peer stories and engagement, and improve recruitment metrics. Fuse is published 4 times a year with 40,000-50,000 copies printed. It is written and photographed primarily by paid student staff. An accepted students social network called IC Peers was also created, which saw engagement correlate with increased enrollment yields.

1. Bonny Georgia Griffith, Associate Director for Recruitment Marketing, Ithaca CollegeTom Torello, Vice President of University Relations, Pace University Peer-to-Peer Communications: Changing the Way We Connect with Prospective Students

2. Changing the paradigm

3. Changing the paradigm

4. Key Elements of Ithaca’s Peer-to Peer strategy Student-written magazine Student voice in traditional publications Infusing College’s website with student voices Social network for accepted students Social media team

5. Overview Print magazine and web site Written by students Mostly photographed by students Designed by professional design firm Designed to look like consumer publication Four issues per year 40 – 50,000 printed each issue

6. Goals Showcase Ithaca’s vibrant academic and campus life Reinforce the College’s core messages Provide a vehicle for authentic, peer-to-peer stories and peer-to-peer engagement opportunities via interactive features such as blogs, Q&As, and more Provide more frequent, meaningful contact with our prospect pool Drive inquiries -- specifically, registrations and magazine requests through myIthaca, our prospective students portal Improve yield conversion rates from inquiry to app, and reduce summer melt by keeping paid students connected to campus happenings

7. Content All Fuse stories are approached as content packages. Every story has one or more web hooks. Hooks include original blogs, Q&As, videos, and connections to other relevant content -- inside our site or elsewhere. Web elements are considered up front, and wrapped into an assignment, where possible. Bonus web content is referenced in the print issue.

9. Current feature

11. Costs Student staff paid $10/hour Most students work under 10 hours/week Freelancers paid flat fees Digital cameras, video equipment, incidentals for staff Print and design budget of $200,000/yr Retired publication budget used as seed funds Issues mailed at periodical rate

12. Fuse is a content engine. A constant stream of fresh stories from a student perspective that can be easily syndicated throughout the website, used in e-communications and in print publications.

20. Recent e-blast with Fuse

21. Current viewbook

22. Challenges Finding the budget Choosing a good design team Finding (and keeping) talented students Campus pushback around letting go of traditional communications But what’s the payoff?

23. Do you remember receiving a copy of Fuse magazine in the mail recently?

24. What was your first impression of Fuse?

25. Did you read Fuse?

26. What did you like most about Fuse?

27. Did you visit the Fuse web site?

28. Did you learn anything new about Ithaca College from the stories in Fuse?

29. Did reading Fuse change your opinion of Ithaca College?

30. How does Fuse compare to other things you've received from colleges?

31. Blogging No formal group of bloggers Special event based blogging Olympics FLEFF Integration of blogs throughout site Aggregation of blogs More and more information presented on the site is in “blog” format that allows for feedback/discussion

36. IC Peers IC Peers Integrated with myIthaca portal Accepted students only 4200+ active users in 2009

37. Student, faculty and staff ambassadors provide support Many ways to connect via complex search options Public and private messaging tools Forums and groups functions encourage conversation

40. 2009 Results More than 40% of accepted students registered 63% of accepted students who created profiles and posted a photo enrolled 29% of accepted students who created profiles but did not post a photo enrolled 4% of accepted students who did not create a profile enrolled

41. New social media team Created Social Media Manager position Work study students tasked with social media interaction Addressing issues on Wikipedia and other 3rd party sites 2673 followers 4238 fans