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![We use “CakeMail” to communicate with our
prospective students
– Web-based mass mailing communication system
– Similar to MailChimp
– Can send email campaign easily
– Can personalized emails with any data (like firstname)
• Hi [firstname],
– Can add conditional logic inside templates
• [IF LEVEL EQ “UNDERGRAD”] …
– Can import any Excel file with data
Communication with prospective students](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/sarnagap2015web-150408165451-conversion-gate01/75/Take-control-of-your-recruitment-efforts-by-adding-powerful-tools-to-your-website-43-2048.jpg)
Uploaded byMarc-Olivier Ouellet
Take control of your recruitment efforts by adding powerful tools to your website
The document outlines Université de Montréal's strategy for improving recruitment efforts through digital tools and inbound marketing techniques, shifting from traditional methods to a more data-driven approach. It emphasizes the importance of understanding prospective students' online behaviors and employing tools for data collection and interaction, such as inquiry forms and personalized online viewbooks. The analysis of recruitment metrics indicates that students who engage with these tools are significantly more likely to apply to the university.
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Take control of your recruitment efforts by adding powerful tools to your website
- 1. Take control ofyour recruitment efforts by adding powerful tools to your website Marc-Olivier Ouellet, coordinator NAGAP April 2015
- 2. admission.umontreal.ca How many ofyou: – Feel confident that your recruitment efforts are worth it? – Can measure in numbers the effectiveness of your recruitment efforts? – Have a Customer Relationship Management system (CRM) in place? Questions
- 3. admission.umontreal.ca Learn how touse tools for your website that will help you get information about your visitors and interact with them Create a strategy that builds upon these new tools to accompany your prospective students in their decision-making processes Evaluate your recruitment efforts without the use of expensive and proprietary CRM and better target your actions Learning Objectives
- 4.
- 5. Université de Montréalat a Glance UdeM’s campus, comprising some 40 buildings, is clustered around the majestic Art Deco tower of Roger-Gaudry Hall at the heart of beautiful city of Montréal
- 6. admission.umontreal.ca +66 000 studentsin 16 faculties and affiliated schools Université de Montréal at a Glance
- 7. admission.umontreal.ca 2 650 professors- researchers 465research units $526M in research revenue Université de Montréal at a Glance 250 undergraduate programs (74%) 350 graduate programs (26%) 17 000 graduate students 7 870 international students from 120 countries
- 8. admission.umontreal.ca Office of Admissionand Recruitment – Recruitment of undergraduate and graduate students – Centralized admission for undergraduate programs – Decentralized admission for graduate programs – Separate from the Office of the Registrar – Separate from the Office of communication – 50 employees : 35 for admission / 15 for recruitment – We do not have a CRM – We have Oracle/PeopleSoft Campus Solution Internal Organization
- 9.
- 10. admission.umontreal.ca We live ina ever-changing changing world technologically and socially: – The Web is the # 1 source of information – Social networks more and more popular – Mobility-friendly sites are becoming a must-have – Web technologies have improved (HTML5/CSS3) – Consumer habits in terms of information have evolved Learn about students’ habits on the Web – Nielsen Norman Group publication is a great start : “College Students on the Web”, 2nd Edition Understanding the Global Context
- 11. Understanding the InternalContext Before • Salons • Student fairs • Distribution of brochures • Print documents • Tours in colleges • Face-to-face contact • Travels in targeted markets • Radio / newspapers ads • Mass marketing Target • Websites • SEO • Conversations on Facebook • YouTube videos • Webinars • Personalized e-docs • Targeted newsletters • Remarketing • Content marketing
- 12. Before “Let’s go findprospective students” Now “Let’s prospective students find us” Paradigm shift
- 13. To adapt tothis new reality and remain competitive, we had to review our methods and define a strategy Defining a strategy
- 14. Transforming our activities Traditionalrecruitment Inbound recruitment Field activities Travel on the road Web et new media Promotion and ads Wrriting content/ multimedia Promotion and ads Analysis Guidance, follow-up Field activities New media Web
- 15. From traditional marketingto inbound marketing Adopting the inbound marketing model Source: hubspot
- 16. Adaptation of MattanGriffel “Lean marketing Marketing” About “Growth Hacking” ACQUISITION ACTIVATION RETENTION REVENUE REFERRAL Source: Growth Hacking, http://slideshare.net/mattangriffel/growth-hacking
- 17. The lean marketingframework ACQUISITION SEO SEM SN PR Email Blogs Contests ACQUISITION = getting prospective students to come to your website
- 18. The lean marketingframework ACTIVATION = getting prospective students to sign up for anything that could lead to a repeat visit ACQUISITION ACTIVATION
- 19. The lean marketingframework ACQUISITION ACTIVATION RETENTION RETENTION = getting prospective students to become active
- 20. The lean marketingframework ACQUISITION ACTIVATION RETENTION REVENUE REFERRAL REVENUE = getting prospective students to apply to your university
- 21. The lean marketingframework ACQUISITION ACTIVATION RETENTION REVENUE REFERRAL REFERRAL = getting active users to refer others
- 22. Growth Hacking: measureconversions at each step 0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200 Acquisition Activation Retention X% Y%
- 23. Assessing our RecruitmentFunnel Public • I discover UdeM (notoriety) Suspect • I am interested in programs at UdeM Prospect • I interact with UdeM Candidate • I apply for admission at UdeM (and possibly at other universities too) Admitted • I’m admitted at the UdeM (and possibly at other universities too) Enrolled • I enroll at UdeM Google Analytics ??? ERP / Admission system ERP / Admission system ERP / Admission system ??? ???
- 24. Add tools onour website to interact with prospects Integrate tools to collect data about our prospects Create communication plan to guide our prospects Develop metrics and dashboards to measure and follow our recruitment efforts Our plan
- 25. Internally, we gatheredan informal “Web team” – Web Coordinator, junior webmaster, content editor – Responsible to designing features, prototyping wireframes, writing technical specifications, etc. – We do not own a CRM Externally, we worked with Web firm : – Expertise in open-source Web programming (PHP/MySQL and Typo3) – No expert in Higher-Ed – Focus on small incremental features Our resources
- 26.
- 27. admission.umontreal.ca If you wantto track your prospect, you will need them to register to your site Before to do so, think about the features that will want them to create an account on your site – To register to your events? – To access protected documents? – To submit an inquiry? – To generate personalized content? Tracking prospects
- 28. admission.umontreal.ca Our picks : –Submit an inquiry – Subscribe to our newsletters – Create an online personalized viewbook – Access to restricted online content – Register to (online and offline) events Features reserved for our registered users
- 29. Creating a Registrationsystem: login / connect
- 30.
- 31.
- 32. admission.umontreal.ca At UdeM, wechose to limit social login to Facebook, LinkedIn and Google – Twitter does not share the user email address – Social login promises to reduce barriers to register – Permission-based access to rich user data • Email, Name, Gender, Language, Birthday, Profile image, Location, Hometown, Age, Scholarity Disadvantages: – Maintenance – Not so easy to implement About “Social login”
- 33. admission.umontreal.ca Preferred modes ofconnection 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100% Highschool students Collge students Lycée students UdeM applicants Other university students Facebook Google LinkedIn Email
- 34. Social login promisedhigher conversion rate – Objective is to simplify the signup process – In our case, create an account with an email is fast too – According to “Blue Research”, 49% never use social login – Mains raisons for NOT using social login : • Don’t trust company to use information appropriately (49%) • Don’t want company to post to my feed (33%) • Concerned company will spam me or my contacts (16%) Need to further analyse this – Do A/B testing – Ask our students Source: http://fr.slideshare.net/Janrain/2014-consumer-research-social-login-and-personalization Food for thoughts
- 35.
- 36. admission.umontreal.ca Before 2013 : –All inquiries were filled online and sent directly by email – No history, no archive, no way to make any analysis In 2013: – We created an inquiry form that contained the same fields as our profile page and stored every inquiry in our new database – We asked for permissions to communicate with students Inquiry form
- 37. admission.umontreal.ca Highlights: – Over 28000 inquires were sent in 2014 only – We got a better understanding of the type of subjects asked throughout the year – We were able to be more proactive and listen to our students This fall 2014: – Encourage student to login with their account before submitting their inquiry (about 15% do) – We integrated our inquiry form with our Frequently Asked Questions to reduce number of repetitive questions asked Inquiry form
- 38. Examples of ourinquiry form
- 39. Highlights: – The abilityto push answers automatically based on the level of study and topic showed great results – In January 2015 only, we were able to reduce by 20% the amount of inquiries received compared to January 2014 • 4194 questions received compared to 4994 – According to Google Analytics, we have +8% visits on our inquiry form Inquiry form
- 40. admission.umontreal.ca Making use ofthis data Contact database Inquiry form Register form Analysis Newsletters
- 41. admission.umontreal.ca We developed abatch routine that extracts every day the data that we collect in a simple cumulative CSV file (Excel) With Excel, we can do many things! – Do analysis – Filter – Hide columns – Etc! Extracting this data
- 42. Communication Plan Public • Idiscover UdeM (notoriety) Suspect • I am interested in programs at UdeM Prospect • I interact with UdeM Candidate • I apply for admission at UdeM (and possibly at other universities too) Admitted • I’m admitted at the UdeM (and possibly at other universities too) Enrolled • I enroll at UdeM What messages do you need to communication at each step of the funnel? What is your target audience? What are your call-to-actions?
- 43. We use “CakeMail”to communicate with our prospective students – Web-based mass mailing communication system – Similar to MailChimp – Can send email campaign easily – Can personalized emails with any data (like firstname) • Hi [firstname], – Can add conditional logic inside templates • [IF LEVEL EQ “UNDERGRAD”] … – Can import any Excel file with data Communication with prospective students
- 44. Examples of targetednewsletters
- 45.
- 46.
- 47. admission.umontreal.ca We produce annuallyour Guide d’admission : – Hybrid between University catalogue and a Viewbook – It contains descriptions of all undergraduate programs offered at UdeM, including : • Admission Requirements • Program Structure (courses) • Career Prospective • And more… Admission Guide
- 48.
- 49. admission.umontreal.ca Before 2014: – Printpublication of 350 pages, printed in 29 000 copies – Distributed to students and high school counsellors throughout the province of Québec – Time consuming and costly to produce This fall: – Limited print version for high school counsellors only – Online personalized online version for students Admission Guide
- 50. Allow students toadd programs to their guide Creating the online version
- 51. Allow students tocustomize their guide Creating the online version
- 52. Allow 20 programsby guide No limit on the number of guides Mandatory and optional documents Description of all courses inside the programs selected Content based on type of students (foreign vs local student), cycle (undergrads or grads), etc. Allow to name the guide, delete, modify Allow to order a print copy Options for students
- 53.
- 54. To encourage students tocreate a guide, we launched a contest Simple rules: 1. Create an account 2. Create a guide 3. Submit an application Get a chance to be reimburse your application fees Contest « Collect your possibilities »
- 55. Personalized guide onInstagram
- 56. admission.umontreal.ca Linking the datawith your ERP
- 57. Use prospect’s emailaddress as unique key – Otherwise, use firstname, lastname and birthday Perform “search and map” function in Excel How to map your prospect data with your ERP Excel magic! Website Database Peoplesoft Reports
- 58. Return on ourefforts4
- 59. admission.umontreal.ca Feature Cost (inUS$) Registration / Login Personalized Viewbook 30 000$ Inquiry form with integrated FAQ 4 000$ Extraction data to Excel fil 1 000$ Design 5 000$ TOTAL 40 000$ Development Costs
- 60. In 8 months,over 16 500 individuals created an account Explorer Accounts High school student 3% College student 22% Lycée student 9% UdeM Student 14% UdeM Applicant 23% Student enrolled in another university 18% Other 11%
- 61.
- 62. Level of study 1ercycle (Baccalauréat, Majeure, Mineure, Certificat, etc.) 74% 2e cycle (Maîtrise/Master, DESS, etc) 20% 3e cycle (Doctorat) 5% Stages postdoctoraux 1%
- 63. Winter 2015 Analysis Suspects •Website visitors: 435 671 Prospects • 4 021 explorers Applicants • 8 837 applicants Admitted • 6 185 admitted Enrolled • 2 782 enrolled Period: September 1st 2014 and December 1st 2014 – All level of study 2% submitted an application 11% submitted an application 5x Prospective students that had an Explorer Account of 5 times more likely to submit an application 0.9% created an account
- 64. Fall 2015 Analysis Suspects •Website visitors: 570 377 Prospects • 6 560 explorers Applicants • 27 365 applicants Admitted • TBD Enrolled • TBD Period: December 1st 2014 and March 1st 2015 – All level of study 4,38% submitted an application 37% submitted an application 8x Prospective students that had an Explorer Account of 8 times more likely to submit an application 1,2% created an account
- 65. Undegraduate 71% Graduate 29% 4 100+ personalizedguides were generated 44% of students that created an online viewbook submitted an application for Winter or Fall 2015 – Compared to 30% who did not Personalized Viewbooks Canadian 2% Foreign 50% Québécois 48%
- 66.
- 67. Growth Hacking Model 435671 4021442 570377 6560 2427 0 100000 200000 300000 400000 500000 600000 Acquisition Activation Retention Winter 2015 Fall 2015 37%1%
- 68. admission.umontreal.ca Imagine new featuresthat will convince students to create an account at an early stage – Improve conversion rate from visitors to explorers – Landing pages – Redesign our login/sign-up page – Allow visitors to register to our events – Propose member-only fun quizzes Ideas for future developments
- 69. admission.umontreal.ca Improve our analysis –Linked our application data with our explorers data daily through a batch job to simplify our analysis Synchronise our mailing lists with our explorers data – Change from “CakeMail” to “Mailchimp” – Automate communication based on set of criteria, like field of interest, stage in the funnel, birthday, etc Ideas for future developments
- 70. admission.umontreal.ca Any question? Slides areavaiable on Slideshare – slideshare.net/marcolivier_ca Contact me : – Marc-Olivier Ouellet – mo.ouellet@umontreal.ca – @marcolivier_ca – www.linkedin.com/in/mouellet Discussions