By Myra McGovern Director of Public Information, NAIS [email protected] Can You Hear Me Now? New Approaches for Promoting Independent Schools.

By Myra McGovern

Director of Public Information, NAIS

[email protected]

Can You Hear Me Now? New Approaches for Promoting Independent Schools

Traditional media relations

Social media relations

Measurement

Facilitation techniques

Part 2 Overview

Traditional media relations

What is it?

Responding to inquiries Pitching stories

Press releases, press conferences Letters to the editor Social/ multi-media releases Coverage of special events Op-eds

Working with the media

Be friendly, fast, factual

Remember that you’re always on the record

Know what they’re interested in, what they cover

Have a good news angle

Provide context

Use journalistic style

Form relationships

Respect deadlines

Have a good media database

What is social media?

Social Media Prism

Most frequently used by independent schools

Facebook

Photo sharing (i.e. Flickr)

YouTube

Blogs

LinkedIn

MySpace

Who’s On Facebook?

Source: IStrategyLabs http://www.istrategylabs.com/?s=facebook+stats

Who’s On Facebook?

Source: Facebook Social Ads on 4/27/10. http://www.facebook.com/ads/create/

Source: Facebook Social Ads on 4/27/10. http://www.facebook.com/ads/create/

Who’s on Twitter?

19% of internet users use Twitter.

median age = 31

The more devices someone owns, the more likely they are to use Twitter.

Sources: http://www.hypebot.com/hypebot/2009/10/survey-who-uses-twitter.html, www.comscore.com, http://www.socialmediatoday.com/SMC/174901

What is SEO?

Search engines (like Google or Yahoo) list the most relevant web pages first. The top pages in a search list usually get the most hits. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a process for increasing the traffic to a website. Easy ways to improve your listing… • Use language on your site that people search for.• Add keywords to the back end (meta tag and title tag)• Check out http://www.seomoz.org/• Also consider Search Engine Marketing (SEM)

What can social networking media do for you?

Connectedness

Relationships

Engagement/ Involvement

Trust/ Authenticity

Benefits of Social Media

Admission

Identify prospective families Help new families connect and learn the culture Identify the school’s biggest advocates and

involve them more closely Establish a word of mouth campaign

Alumni Affairs

Locate lost alums and reconnect Keep alums engaged Help young alums connect to more established

alums in the same industries

Communications

Another way to get info to families Target media that your constituents use Segment audiences Showcase your school as a model for learning

Development

Identify donor prospects Find out what your donors are interested in Acknowledge or reward donors publicly Mine the data

Head and Business Office

Put names and faces together—learn all the players

Build community Determine metrics for different programs Help parents meet other parents Encourage volunteerism & support Establish your school as a thought-leader

What are the downsides?

Time

Lack of control

Failure to thrive

Downsides of social media

Where do you start?

Plan strategically

What are your goals (hint: a goal is not “create Facebook page”)

Drive donations? Admissions? Alumni affairs?

Look at your marketing plan—what are you trying to do?

Begin with the end in mind

Start Small

Pilot a small initiative to engage current supporters first. Then expand.

Share photos (if you have releases)

If parents blog about an event at your school, share it on the school’s Facebook page or website

Start an alumni link on LinkedIn

Nurture quality

Quality, not quantity

Get to know your fans

Growing your fan base: Ask your fans to invite people they think should be involved

Establish presence on parent networks

Learn the culture and tenor of an online community before commenting

Use an RSS feed to save time

Measure/ track

Unique visitors, frequency of visits, comments, others sharing your content…

Who should oversee it?

Most often PR… or marketing

Often a young staffer.

– Young staff might know the technology, but do they know the strategy?

– Empower them to learn. Give them strategic goals and creative freedom.

How do you get buy-in?

Tie it to strategy. Make language understandable (lay off the lingo). Tell people the goals and how you will measure your success.

For individual tools (i.e. Facebook)—recruit thought-leaders and influencers to spread the word.

Include address in your signature block

Post photos. Encourage people to comment

Leverage technologies

Blogs to establish you as expert

Facebook to amplify media relations

Follow reporters—what are their interests? They’ll likely follow you too.

Encourage engagement. You can’t control it.

LISTEN

Springboard- Drive people back to your site—for donations, applications, etc.

What else?

Tough questions

What about using real names?

What if students tag themselves in photos?

What if you learn too much about your students?

How have other schools established boundaries?

Measure effectiveness

Measure for success

Outputs, outtakes, outcomes Tone Topics Impact

Delahye Impact Score measures…– Premium placement

– Headline

– Initial mention

– Extent of mention

– Dominance

– Visuals

Facilitate strategic discussions

Shape the future of your school

Think big picture Talk about strategy, not just tactics Explain how what you’re doing influences the

school’s future (admission, retention, development, legislation, hiring)

Use hard data

Additional resources

Groundswell : Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies. Book by Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff.

Twitter, Meet Facebook —podcast (NAIS members)

Strategic Marketing Planning – a how-to document to help you plan (NAIS members)

Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations. Book by Clay Shirky.

Join NAIS at www.facebook.com/NAISnetwork and www.twitter.com/NAISnetwork !

An Independent School magazine article (winter 2009) “Can You Hear Me Now? Social Marketing and the Social Web” discusses online tools schools are using to “test the waters” of social media to communicate with alumni and others.  It also addresses ways to face/embrace unofficial online communication about one’s school.

At the Independent School Educators Network Ning, you’ll see a running feed of recent Twitter posts by independent schools. This will give you an idea of how some schools are using Twitter to connect with families and alumni.

“Recipes for Success: Independent schools break the mold when it comes to social media” – blog post from communications consultant Michael Stoner links to case studies of innovative social media uses by independent schools.

Building Bridges with the Press http://www.nais.org/transact/Bookstore.cfm?sn.ItemNumber=146020

KD Paine PR measurement blog http://kdpaine.blogs.com/

Education in the News news headlines about independent schools via e-mail (NAIS members only) – www.nais.org/go/listserves