The importance of working with a good agency

The team are currently looking ahead to the 2019 publications. I’ve recently updated the tender briefs and met with agencies.

As the HE landscape becomes more competitive, we need to find different ways to engage with our audiences and ensure our campaigns and publications work harder to showcase the benefits of studying at Bedfordshire. This is why working with a good agency on these projects becomes ever more important. Working with great agencies is imperative; an agency needs to understand the sector and challenges within HE but also the challenges and direction of the University.

We realise that as the landscape changes, we as a university are becoming more demanding in our requirements and expectations of agencies. And also being a marketing team of three, means we’re looking for an agency that can very much be an extension of the team whilst supporting us on our publication projects; from quickly understanding our needs and reacting through creative solutions, to seamless project management, which in turn makes our job that little bit easier.

3 steps to finding the right agency:

We're currently testing our undergraduate
2018 prospectus, to see what
prospective students think  

• Look for companies who have sector experience – they need hit the ground running but also come up with solid creative approaches to briefs
• Set up an initial chat – meet with agencies to find out more about them and also give them an opportunity to find out more about you. This in turn will mean should they tender, there creative approaches will hopefully match the brief and give us something to consider/worth with 
• Be specific – be clear on what is it you need/expect from an agency. Make sure briefs are clear and take into account market research (we’re currently testing the UG 2018 publication). Tenders should also allow you to showcase relevant proof points, to ensure agencies are capable of delivering what is needed 

It’s also important not to expect a ‘readymade’ creative solution to briefs – when we meet new agencies we want to see a clear rationale for design concepts being presented, and a good understanding of the audience and the brief set. We’re then happy to take a readymade option – if one is presented – or work with the appointed agency to develop a design approach.

So as we embark on the 2019 publication tender, I’m excited to see what agencies can bring to the table!

Speak soon,
K

Reflections from the IoIC Excellence Awards

I don’t think anyone starts out in their career with the goal of winning awards, unless you’re an Olympic athlete or something like that of course!

A lot of the time, because what you do at work becomes second nature, you don’t realise how amazing it is.

I’m definitely someone who likes to work away in the background and I find praise difficult to take in, often because I think ‘I’m just doing my job’ and don’t deserve it.

Winning one of these would be nice!

I’ve been thinking a lot about awards recently. Not only because our Marketing colleagues are busy with their submissions for various things, but myself and Jenny, Bedfordshire’s Internal Communicates Manager, recently returned from York after making the shortlist for an Institute of Internal Communications (IoIC) award.

Sadly we didn’t take the top prize but we did get an Award for Excellence which we were very happy with. We also got a certificate which has pride of place on our desk.

The National Railway Museum was the perfect venue!

Although my background is in media relations and external communications, I have been more and more involved with internal communications as my career has progressed, something that I’ve really enjoyed.

I felt like a bit of impostor at the ceremony because the staff newsletter is Jenny’s creation which she set up and took care of long before I joined the team. But when I stopped and thought about it, I remembered that the newsletter is a team effort.

Me and Jenny work together to get it out every fortnight and we work hard to make sure it is full of things our colleagues across the University want to know about.

So I guess I want this post to be a reminder to everyone to take a moment and look at what you have achieved recently. Look at the do-to list you’ve managed to complete. Look at the piece of work you’ve finished that you’ve been working on for weeks. Think of the impact you made to a colleague by helping them out or making them a cup of tea when they needed it.

When you are close to something, you forget what a positive impact you’re making. We don’t have to be rocket scientists or anything that fancy but our efforts in our jobs do matter and do make a different. So take a moment to give yourself a little pat on the back - you deserve it.

Springing into action

Sarah De Guzman, Marketing Manager

The January UCAS deadline date may now be a thing of the past, and Clearing still remains some way off, but life for the Beds Marketer hasn't quiet quietened down yet. Far from it actually! This so-called 'in-between' period, is a critical part of our recruitment cycle - where simply driving applications and pushing 'apply now' messaging isn't enough.

Conversion is key

Between January and June, we're working on a campaign known as Conversion - where the focus is firmly placed on nurturing leads. We do this through sending out a series of tailored, personalised and bespoke communications to our applicants and offer holders at key times over the Spring months to keep them engaged, as we support their decision making and guide them through the next stages of the recruitment funnel. There's a lot of content curating that goes on in the team - so you may see us out and about on campus quite a lot as we showcase the student experience, our fantastic facilities, and provide a lot of functional information that helps inform and influence.

A treat to get out of the office

On top of the day-to-day marketing work, March presents a nice treat for the team, as we get to get out and about even more than usual, as we get involved in graduations.

I'd like to say that a lot of planning goes into this, but we just embrace the mayhem. We've discovered over the years that to get the most from the events (from a marketing perspective anyway), you have to get right into the very heart of it - so no pre-planning and scheduling of interviews. We're there as they come out of the church, are diving out of the way of all the hat throwing, and are capturing those very real, raw and genuine emotions of celebration.

A really nice, warm and fuzzy part
of our jobs :-)

Graduations are a really nice thing to be part of. Yes it can be chaotic on campus, with swarms of excited graduates trying to get their gowns, get their pictures taken and make it in to the Church on time, but for us, it's really rewarding to see the ultimate 'end goal' - our students achieving their dreams, as proud family and friends look on. It's also a time for us to have a touch point with our outgoing students, and to hear their experiences, their stories, and share their words of wisdom; after all they are the people who have lived and breathed the Bedfordshire experience over the last few years, so who better to speak to and hear from?

Award season has sprung

Not only is it a busy time in the recruitment cycle, and a busy and bustling time to be on campus as we see our students graduate and celebrate their success, but it's also the start of award season (did I mention the word busy enough here?). And that means many an hour spent dusting out the evaluations, reflecting on our metrics and performance, and crunching data in our best efforts to cobble together a solid entry or two! Beverley and I have spent a good few hours devising our award entries over the last few weeks - after all, these things take a big commitment to carve out the perfect submission. The Heist awards are notoriously difficult, and there's always a lot of fierce competition amongst the creme-de-la-creme of the HE world all vying for those coveted marketing accolades; and so to stand out from the other university big boys, we have to really know our data, be able to evidence our success, and convey a compelling story about what we've achieved.

Hurrah! That's our 2nd award submission done and dusted, and entered for the @heistawards. Go #TeamBeds #heist2017 #marketingteamoftheyear pic.twitter.com/vpQxoiFHoU

— Sarah De Guzman (@Sarah_Hampton) March 16, 2017

This year we've entered our Clearing 2016 campaign for the Best Undergraduate Student Recruitment Initiative, and we've also had a go at entering Marketing Team of the Year. We've never entered a team award before, but we've implemented some great projects and strategic initiatives over the last 12 months, which in turn have yielded some great results, and so we've decided that this is the year to share the story of the Beds HE Marketer. Wish us luck! We'll keep you posted on the short-list in the coming months, but for those of you who, like us, are well into awards season, take a look at the work you've done and see whether you have what it takes to enter - check out my previous blog post on writing award entries, and assessing whether you've got the evidence base to lead you to success.

Achieving great press coverage

Running the press office for a university like Bedfordshire is an amazing job; and I have a feeling I may find anywhere else after this dull.

The adage ‘no day is ever the same’ really comes into play here – in fact no hour is ever the same!  Where else can you one minute be arranging an interview with a student on international placements, to the next sorting out filming for documentary for Ch4 on cyberstalking, to the next be pitching out case studies about our amazing female academics for International Women’s Day.

The University of Bedfordshire’s Press Office really is an inspiring place to work.

We’ve had particular success in highlighting our reputation around applied research. Over the past year we’ve covered everything from a new way to teach PE, England’s teenage pregnancy strategy, alcohol abuse in the over 50s, care robots, and 3D printing new limbs (a hand for an 8 year old boy – and it works).

The University’s applied research is easily relatable and the media understand its impact on people’s lives.  Our recent press coverage has included the Today programme, the Times, BBC Online, Newsnight, BBC Breakfast and 5Live.

However the press coverage for our latest piece of applied research on care robots exceeded even my wildest dreams.

It’s a great story – we’re helping to develop culturally aware robots that can improve the care of the elderly. It’s an international collaboration funded through the EU and the Japanese Government and has multiple international partners. Our role is evaluating the project - does it work?

The research was covered everywhere from the Today programme, to 5Live to the Times to BBC online; it was also picked up the Press Association. This was the same day that Trump put his Muslim travel ban into place but we still made it on to the BBC homepage for about four hours which was very exciting.

The return on investment for this piece of work was incredible.

We had over 300 individual pieces of coverage.  The print coverage alone gave circulation figures of 12.5m and it generated around 6bn unique page views.

If you want to find out more about this story take a look at this footage of Dr Chris Papadopoulos who leads on this research for the University, being interviewed by John Humphrys on the Today programme.

What's in an award?

Beverley Hoare, Deputy Director of MARC

Why do we bother to enter awards?  It’s a lot of time and effort for potentially nothing, isn’t it?

Gearing up for awards season

Well the Marcomms team have been busy submitting entries for a range of marketing and communications awards with HEIST, CIPR and IoIC, so I guess they think there’s a point, but here’s a few thoughts from me on why I think they are important.

A win or making a shortlist is a pat on the back - recognition from our peers that we are achieving the highest, most innovative standard of work.

We can learn from others who are showcasing their own best practice – they set the bar and we try to raise it.

We gain clarity about our achievements and what we had to do to make them happen.  The looking back exercise, pouring over data and evaluating ourselves is critical for future performance; the award submission provides the focus and motivation to make us reflect.

Busy cobbling together this years' @heistawards entry for @uniofbeds. Nothing beats an afternoon of number crunching data 🤓💼📊📝 #heist2017

— Sarah De Guzman (@Sarah_Hampton) February 22, 2017

It helps us to network; awards ceremonies are some of very few opportunities to get out of the University, share experiences with others and cement relationships with peers.

We can dress up and celebrate our achievements together, as a team – being nominated has a contagious effect on our mood.

Our @Beds Newsletter has been short-listed

I can say that all this effort has given us a pretty good run of award winning over the last 5 years, but wins at HEIST have alluded us recently.  So we’ve tried even harder and submitted a more solid entry this time.

I’m delighted that in the latest run of awards we have been shortlisted by the IoIC for our staff newsletter ‘A new lease of life for staff news’.  Jenny and Caroline will be attending the ceremony in York later this month and will hopefully come back with a piece of crystal for the bulging trophy cabinet. Watch this space…