Social Web Callouts in Higher Ed

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BlueFuego Social Web Callout Research

15-Month Review
March 2009 - June 2010
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About the Research
BlueFuego has compiled data from 1,387 four-year institutions
in the United States, looking at which institutions are using social web callouts.

We have focused on 3 pages:
Homepage (school.edu)
Admissions Undergraduate Homepage
Alumni Homepage

85.7% of schools (1,188) now have a SWC on one of the three pages.

This is up from 74.8% of schools (1,037) in March 2010, 63.2% (877) in
December 2009, 40.5% (562) in August 2009 & 20.5% (285) in March 2009.

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Executive Summary
Social Web Callouts (SWC) have nearly reached full saturation on .edu websites
since our initial research began in March 2009.

There continues to be an increase in schools having SWC’s across all three
researched pages. In March 2009, only 10 schools had SWC’s on all three. 27% of
schools now do, showing an increase in Social Web usage across the entire
institution, as well as potential integrated presence/strategy between departments.

The presence of SWC’s has largely been fueled by standard template headers and
footers across .edu sites. This typically means the entire site is linking to one
presence, which is detrimental to each individual area’s efforts. For example, in
March 2009 there wasn’t a single undergrad admissions site with a LinkedIn callout.
Now, 62 schools do. This is due to LinkedIn being added to the global navigation.

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Social Web Callouts
90%

68%

45%

23%

0%
March 09 August 09 December 09 March 10 June 10

20.5% of schools (285) had a SWC on one or more of the three pages researched in March ‘09.
40.5% of schools (562) had a SWC on one or more of the three pages researched in August ‘09.
63.2% of schools (877) had a SWC on one or more of three pages researched in December ’09.
74.7% of schools (1,037) had a SWC on one or more of three pages researched in March ’10.
85.7% of schools (1,188) had a SWC on one or more of three pages researched in June ’10.

n = 1,387
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Social Web Callouts
40%

30%

20%

10%

0%

15.7% of schools (219) had a SWC on one of the three pages researched in March ’09.
25.0% of schools (347) had a SWC on one of the three pages researched in August ’09.
32.0% of schools (444) had a SWC on one of three pages researched in December ’09.
33.2% of schools (461) had a SWC on one of three pages researched in March ‘10.
29.5% of schools (409) had a SWC on one of three pages researched in June ‘10.

n = 1,387
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Social Web Callouts
30%

23%

15%

8%

0%

4.03% of schools (56) had a SWC on two of the three pages researched in March ’09.
11.6% of schools (161) had a SWC on two of the three pages researched in August ’09.
18.7% of schools (260) had a SWC on two of three pages researched in December ’09.
24.5% of schools (340) had a SWC on two of three pages researched in March ’10.
28.8% of schools (399) had a SWC on two of three pages researched in June ’10.

n = 1,387
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Social Web Callouts
30%

23%

15%

8%

0%

.07% of schools (10) had a SWC on all three pages we researched in March ’09.
3.9% of schools (54) had a SWC on all three pages we researched in August ’09.
12.5% of schools (173) had a SWC on all three pages we researched in December ’09.
17.0% of schools (236) had a SWC on all three pages we researched in March ’10.
27.4% of schools (380) had a SWC on all three pages we researched in June ’10.

n = 1,387
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Number of Researched Pages with Callouts per Institution
.edu homepage, Admissions and Alumni

One Callout Two Callouts Three Callouts

40%

30%

20%

10%

0%

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Where are the Callouts?
.edu Homepage
Admissions Homepage
Alumni Homepage

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Where are the Callouts?
.edu Admissions Alumni

37% 30% 32% 33% 34% 34% 34% 33%
37% 36%

32% 31% 33% 32% 31%

March ’09 August ’09 December ’09 March ’10 June ’10

n = 1,387
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.edu Homepages
Has Callouts Doesn’t Have Callouts

8% 18%
37%
45% 45%
55% 55%
63%
92% 82%


n = 1,387
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Admission Homepages

8% 17%
35%
43% 47%
57% 53%
65%
92% 83%


n = 1,387
13

Alumni Homepages

9% 20%
35% 40%
45%
55%
65% 60%
91% 80%


n = 1,387
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Number of Institutions with Callouts per Area
For all 3 areas, more than 50% of institutions now have social web callouts on their page.

.edu Homepage Admissions Alumni

60%

Majority

45%

30%

15%

0%

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What are they linking to?
.edu Homepage
Admissions Homepage
Alumni Homepage

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.edu Homepage Links
March August December March June

60.4%
78.1%
Facebook 87.8%
92.5%
96.1%
24.5%
64.4%
Twitter 76.1%
79.9%
84.4%
34.9%
44.5%
YouTube 59.5%
62.3%
65.7%
0% 25% 50% 75% 100%
n = 106 (March), 247 (August), 509 (December), 626 (March 2010) and 769 (June 2010)
Read as: “Of the 55.4% of schools who had SWC’s on their .edu homepage in June, 96.1%
were linking to Facebook and 84.4% were linking to Twitter.”
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.edu Homepage Links

17.0%
21.0%
Flickr 23.1%
25.1%
26.0%
2.8%
9.3%
LinkedIn 14.5%
16%
16.5%
17.0%
12.3%
MySpace 9.9%
9.1%
8.2%
0% 8% 15% 23%
Read as: “Of the 55.4% of schools who had SWC’s on their .edu homepage in June, 8.2%
were linking to MySpace.”
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.edu Homepage Link Growth
Facebook Twitter YouTube Flickr LinkedIn MySpace

100%

75%

50%

25%

0%

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Admissions Homepage Links

64.6%
80.9%
Facebook 83.4%
87.8%
93.6%
14.2%
45.6%
Twitter 50.7%
61.8%
67.2%
24.8%
29.8%
YouTube 37.6%
45.9%
53.3%
0% 25% 50% 75% 100%

n = 113 (March 2009), 235 (August), 489 (December), 599 (March 2010) and 735 (June 2010)
Read as: “Of the 53.0% of schools who had SWC’s on their Admissions homepage in June
2010, 93.6% were linking to Facebook.”
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Admissions Homepage Links

8.0%
12.3%
Flickr 14.9%
17.4%
19.4%
18.6%
9.9%
YouTube Embed 8.6%
8.2%
9.4%
11.5%
10.2%
MySpace 7.2%
7.0%
7.3%
0.0%
3.4%
LinkedIn 6.8%
8.2%
8.4%
0% 5% 10% 15% 20%
Read as: “Of the 53.0% of schools who had SWC’s on their Admissions homepage in June
2010, 9.4% have a YouTube embed.”
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Admission Homepage Link Growth
Facebook Twitter YouTube Flickr YouTube Embed MySpace LinkedIn

100%

75%

50%

25%

0%

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Alumni Homepage Links

82.3%
87.2%
Facebook 86.5%
91.2%
95.1%
11.5%
40.8%
Twitter 49.2%
55.3%
59.7%
40.0%
42.2%
LinkedIn 45%
43.1%
44.4%
0% 25% 50% 75% 100%

Read as: “Of the 60.4% of schools who had SWC’s on their Alumni homepage in August, 95.1%
were linking to Facebook.”
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Alumni Homepage Links

10.0%
18.4%
YouTube 26.1%
29.1%
33.4%
4.6%
12.1%
Flickr 13.9%
18.2%
18.6%
10.7%
11.7%
MySpace 9.5%
6.7%
6.7%
4.6%
5.3%
YouTube Embed 4.9%
4.5%
1.8%
0% 10% 20% 30% 40%
Read as: “Of the 60.4% of schools who had SWC’s on their Alumni homepage in August, 33.4%
were linking to YouTube.”
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Admission Homepage Link Growth
Facebook Twitter LinkedIn YouTube Flickr MySpace YouTube Embed

100%

75%

50%

25%

0%

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This data is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No
Derivative Works 3.0 US License

You are free to share, copy distribute and transmit this work under the following
conditions:

Attribution - Attribute the work to BlueFuego, Inc. and link to

Noncommercial - You may not use this work for commercial purposes.

No Derivative Works - You may not alter, transform or build upon this work.

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