Making your marketing strategy work in a Digital Marketing age

Sarah De Guzman, Marketing Manager

It's an exciting time to be a marketer. But equally, it's also a challenging one. Our customers' preferences are ever changing, and at a fast pace. And, with a digital first attitude our prospective students are 'always online' and are 'constantly connected', often will the expectation that we are too!

Modern day marketing -
always online.

Our potential students, or 'Millennials' as they are otherwise known, have grown up in an electronics-filled and increasingly online and socially-networked world. It's therefore become a pivotal moment in marketing, where the offline versus online debate falls to the way side, and the focus is firmly being placed on digital marketing just being the new norm for marketing, and our previously 'tech-savvy online users' are simply now just known as our potential customers. In other words, digital marketing is no longer an experimental innovation for us, it's a daily marketing necessity and a fundamental means through which to talk to, and reach, what we hope to be the newest crop of Bedfordshire students.

For us, failure to jump on the digital band wagon, would leave us out of touch with our millennial audience and lagging behind our neighbouring competitors. But simply placing ads isn't enough. The need to create communities, content (of the relevant sort) and rich media has never been greater.

With that said, we're going to be incredibly busy over the next few months as we start to implement the start of this year's Clearing campaign which will be predominately digitally led. Our photoshoots are about to take place in the coming weeks, where we'll be gathering a range of image-led and video content to support our digital drive over this important recruitment period.

Digital vs mobile first

Operationally, we've experienced a significant shift towards digital in recent years, which opens up a vast selection of tools and channels at our disposal. We're constantly seeing new digital platforms, websites and social media options springing up. Thankfully, we have a Media Planning and Buying agency to support us with that; helping us track down the latest innovations, trends and digital products so we can make sure we're promoting in the right spaces and are talking to the right people, whilst ensuring we're getting the best return (more on this in a future post). We're also working closely with our Digital Consultant on a regular basis who works alongside us to monitor the quality of our web traffic, and keeps an ever watchful eye on where online conversations are taking place so we can continuously refine our audience targeting and make sure our advert placements and content strategies are working hard and yielding the desired results.

Making good data decisions:
Analyse to optimise 

Ultimately, the one thing that we can not forget is that data is king. The amount of data which we can collate, monitor and observe on a daily basis provides a wealth of insight into our markets (existing or new) potential customers, and campaign performance as we track their journey. As Kylie mentioned in the previous blog post, the analytics we work with can tell us a lot about our customers, and how our promotions have performed, so we can make regular adjustments to ensure we're getting the desired results, whilst constantly learning, and adapting to ensure we're keeping ahead of the curve and are providing relevant information to inform decision making.

The ability to track all of our digital output provides valuable insight which informs our future working. We're looking forward to getting some dashboards set up ahead of our next campaign, enabling us to see in real-time how our work is performing and how we can optimise further.

An understanding of data, and the need to formulate digital and social content plans is key as part of our ongoing strategy. And, with an ever increasing competitive market place, and with more Russell Groups competing in Clearing each year, it's becoming crowded with more online marketing noise than ever before, and so the need for us to hold our own, digitally, becomes paramount.

Keep an eye on this blog for more updates on the Clearing campaign, coming soon. Interested to see what other universities are doing? Then why not take a look at Market Research Manager, Andy's Clearing blog to keep on top of the latest competitor innovations and observations.

Neat and orderly data

Beverley Hoare -Deputy Director Marketing

It’s the time of year when we write the marketing contribution to our department’s operating plan.  But before we can look forward we have to look back and ask ourselves and each other a few questions. Such as, ‘how did we do last year’?  What contribution did marketing make to achieving recruitment targets? Can we train cats to complete simple admin tasks?

Non-marketers often think there is a direct correlation between what we put in (investment and initiatives) and what we get out (students).  Marketers wish it were that simple.  How should we dis-aggregate the contribution of marketing from all of the other activities that contribute to a person becoming a student?  Brand, competitors, word of mouth, recommendations from others, outreach, face to face recruitment and press stories - all can have a positive, negative or neutral effect on the work of ‘marketing’ in achieving that ultimate registration.

But evaluate we must, as we need to predict behaviour – if we do this, then we should get that…

So, we love data.  It helps us to get a neat and orderly view of a pretty chaotic market place.  We need to analyse and evaluate, so we can aim to understand what is working and what is not. 

A Medjool Data

Final outcomes are important, but for us it’s every stage of the student journey, every channel, each message that is important to the understanding of impact.  Click through rates (CTR) opens and call volumes, live chat conversations and request a call back, registrants and attendance at open days, lead generation from prospectus and website, goal completions to page views and dwell time, impact of design and messaging all get a focus of our attention. 

With all this data we can get a measure of return on marketing investment – and ultimately aim to answer the problem that is – if we put this in we will get this out.  We can make more informed decisions and improve the effectiveness of campaigns and budget, while keeping an eye on what our competitors are doing, of course.   

That’s why we love data…

Winning isn't everything, but the will to win is everything

By Sarah De Guzman, Marketing Manager

So much data, and so little time
to write awards...

As the 2015 September recruitment cycle officially comes to a close, it's time for us marketers to bury our heads in the mountains of metrics that we've put in place, on our usual quest to evaluate our performance and effectiveness, to demonstrate ROI, and to churn out those all important reports which provide valuable insight to inform our future work. Whilst on the one hand it's quite an intense aspect to our roles, with many an hour spent crunching numbers, and getting bogged down in the data wondering why I didn't pay more attention in maths classes at school, I quite like ploughing through the reams of insight and analysis to do a round up - it's always nice to see our contribution, and to assess our highlights and successes (as well as identifying what we can do better, which is a constant learning curve and central to all that we do). But as many of our regular readers will know, I'm also guilty of writing reports for dual purposes. That's right, I'm a cereal award-writer, and I'm not ashamed to admit it!

Who needs sleep when you
can write awards!

Since I started writing awards in 2013, we've gone on to win eight awards, with two award wins and a Heist short-list in this year alone, which we're mightily proud of. Winning, and even being short-listed for these coveted awards is a massive coup for the team, and I'll be the first to admit that it's nice to see the office adorned in our achievements. Not only is it a great big pat on the back and morale booster, but it's great to be recognised by our peers and the wider sector, as being the best in the region, or nationally at what we do.

And so, with all of the report writing that's going on at the moment, we'll soon be able to see if we have some pieces to enter early next year, when awards season for us typically kicks off. In the meantime, I thought I'd share some helpful hints and tips on writing a winning award entry, should you choose to give it a go for yourself in the new year...

Before you start

Look beyond the marketing hype
- do the facts speak for
themselves?

First things first, before you do anything you should assess your goals and ask yourself these questions:

• Why I am doing this?
• What do I want to get out of it?

Writing awards is a lot of work, so make sure it's worth your while. In other words, be brutal. Is your initiative really good enough? Remove the bias, and look at the facts. Does it stand out, and do you have the evidence and hard facts to back up your claims?

Getting started

Be individual - sometimes small
or niche can win big

So once you're certain of what you're setting out to do, it's time to search through the different awards, and scour the categories to see what's on offer, and where you think you might be able to contribute and make a submission. It's always worth noting the deadlines at this point, to make sure all your award writing won't be in vain. Once you've selected the categories it's time to write that entry!

Tip: Really consider your category and who you may also be going up against. Whilst we all want to win big, sometimes the niche categories make for an interesting and successful submission. And whilst we fully believe our initiative is amazing, you never know what, or who, you're up against.

Writing that award winning entry
So it's time to write that entry. Anyone can write and submit entries, but to secure the short-list, it requires time, effort and dedication.

1. Research previous winners - and take a look at their entries - most winner's entries are hosted online, and can provide a great resource when looking at format, and the level of detail needed
2. Really look at the entry criteria - and the questions that you're being asked. Stick to the point at all times, and keep the entry focused on fully evidencing the success and ROI of the work
3. Keep it concise - brief and to the point. Most awards have strict word counts, and so you have to make every sentence and every word count - cut the waffle
4. Keep it simple - whilst it's important to include the relevant lingo and jargon in the entry to showcase your expert knowledge, remember who your reader is - they may or may not be a specialist in that particular area, and they have many to read! Keep it simple and understandable - after all, if they don't get your point, you won't get the marks
5. Be bespoke - tailor the information to what is being asked, and the specific category - especially if you're entering the same initiative for multiple awards. A simple copy and paste job will not do
6. Make it pretty - spend sometime on the layout, and devise the sections so that they correspond with the criteria and questions being asked, to make it easy for the judge to give you marks. But make sure you know the restrictions on including graphs and images (in most cases you can place these in an appendices if these are allowed). 
7. Make it stand out - showcasing new initiatives, or novel ways of working and achieving your objectives provides a great way to catch the judges attention. Think our Clearing Flash mob from the 2014 Clearing campaign. Different is interesting. But only include it if it's relevant and you have a point to make.
8. Make it personable - in some entries they ask why you should win. Whilst the stats are great here to evidence this, don't shy away from adding a personal narrative. If it's relevant, talk about the people involved and play on the emotive aspects. Celebrating real people and real achievements is great, and adds a bit of personality to the entry.

Failing to plan, is planning to fail

But most of all. It's important to allocate time to this. Balancing writing award entries alongside the day job is a challenging task. Conducting research and analysis to collate the evidence is time consuming but a crucial aspect, as without the evidence it's just an opinion piece. And carefully constructing an entry to satisfy the criteria takes focus and determination. So be prepared to put in the hours if you take it on. But if you secure the short-list it's always a nice rewarding feeling.

Tip: Carefully select your award categories and make sure that the stats stack up. After all, no matter how proud of the work you are, if you've spend ages pulling an entry together which has weak evidence, you won't get very far. It's important to remember quality over quantity.

What to do if successful
After submitting, make a note of the short-list confirmation date - after all that hard work, you want to make sure you know if you made the cut!

If you've made it to the short-list, here's what you do next:

• Shout about it - it's great news, why wouldn't you? But get in touch with the press team and give them all the details
• Get your seats booked - for the coveted 'do, and get planning what to wear (check if the 'do has a theme or dress code)
• Befriend twitter - especially on awards night. Many awards have their own twitter handle and hashtag and encourage you to tweet throughout the evening - great for fun and profile raising 
• Talk to us - keep the MARC department (and the press team) informed of the evenings events - whether it was a win, or not! Being short-listed in itself is an amazing achievement
• Make space - in the office to proudly display your winners or finalist certificates and awards

Writing awards has many rewards, and I'm not just talking about the certificate if you win. Quite often, we're so busy with our day-to-day work that taking the time to truly reflect on our achievements and performance passes us by. Being able to see success, and just how well a piece of work or an initiative has performed is great. So if you do write award entries and go on to win, great! But remember, it's not just about the winning.

Spreading festive cheer; Xmas parties and planning

By Sarah Hampton, Marketing Manager

We've got our list, we're checking it twice, and we're going to find out who's.... leaving on time to make the Staff Christmas party next week.

Full speed ahead as
the Jan UCAS deadline
approaches

For many offices and departments, as the festive season approaches it's a time to start winding down; a real chance to kick back, relax and enjoy the masses of mince pies and festive cheer as the holiday season approaches. But that's not quite the case for the Marketing team over in the Atrium, as December is often one of our busiest months, second only to August when it's Clearing. It's a real crunch time as we make the most of the last few weeks available to communicate with our enquirers and promote the many benefits of joining the University of Bedfordshire before the UCAS deadline in January. So, whilst term may have officially ended and the cold winter weather sets in, things are truly heating up over in Marketing HQ as we go full speed ahead to action our core enquirer activity.

Today is the day of our open evening! There is still time to book: http://t.co/yXOmx1LvST pic.twitter.com/UbeWXTxF5M
— uniofbeds (@uniofbeds) December 10, 2014

The last week has seen the Marketing and Digital Marketing teams working hard to promote a festive open evening. This event wasn't originally planned into the recruitment schedule, but was a quick response to some unforeseen events taking place in the town which resulted in our November event having to be postponed at the last minute. Not to be deterred, the team set out to rework all of the campaign visuals, and devise new marketing plans to push out the new event details, with the help of our CRM team as they communicated the new event details out and encouraged sign ups. The event was a real success overall, and we're pleased that we were able to successfully retain some of the enquirers who had originally signed up to attend the event in November.

New 'Apply Now' artwork

All change, all change!
Now that all open days are officially over for the year, it's time for a quick change of all the campaign artwork again, as we move from plugging our on campus visits, to driving applications directly to UCAS for 2015 entry. We're also busily working away on our conversion newsletters, 13 applicant newsletters to be precise. These are the very first communications that our applicants will receive from us, and so we're aiming to get them off to print just before Christmas, so they're ready to be mailed out almost as soon as we get back.

For those who know me well, you'll know I love a good report and a bit of Marketing data. And so in the last few weeks we've been exploring how we can better track the impact of our work. After a number of meetings and after bouncing a few emails back and forth between the marketing and digital teams, we've finally got a new tracking url system agreed and in place, thanks to Paul in the digital team. It's much easier to recall and recognise than the previous tracking we used, and should provide us with much more insight into engagement with our materials. So watch out for this url popping up in the new year across our marketing materials.

Although it's an incredibly busy time, we always somehow manage to find some time to have some fun along the way. And what better way to get into the festive spirit than by donning our best festive favourites for Christmas Jumper Day.

Rockin' around the Christmas tree (left to right):
Krystle, Clare, Sarah, Beverley and Kylie.

As the year comes to a close, we wish you a very Merry Christmas from everyone here within the Marketing team. Stayed tuned to read more about our key initiatives in the new year.