inbound marketing for education - 10 case studies - analysis by wsi

© 2013 -‐ Venturi Internet SA

Inbound marketing and Education:

10 Universities and Schools case studies in

USA and Europe

Benoit Gaillard

WSI is Hubspot platinum partner WSI Business Performance in Geneva April 19th, 2013

© 2013 - Venturi Internet SA 2 P a g e | 2

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Contents SUMMARY .............................................................................................................................. 4

1. FSGS .............................................................................. ERROR! BOOKMARK NOT DEFINED.

2. LIST OF COLLEGES WITH ONLINE MARKETING CAMPAIGN ................................................ 6

3. CASE STUDY ON THE OPEN UNIVERSITY ........................................................................... 6

3.1 BACKGROUND ................................................................................................................................... 6 3.2 OBJECTIVES ....................................................................................................................................... 6 3.3 STRATEGY ......................................................................................................................................... 7 3.4 RESULT ............................................................................................................................................. 7

4. CASE STUDY ON THE CALIFORNIA SOCIETY OF CERTIFIED PUBLIC ACCOUNTANTS (CALCPA) 8

4.1 REACHING OUT TO DESIRABLE MARKET .................................................................................................. 8 4.2 TARGETING HELPS IDENTIFY NEW-‐MEMBER PROSPECTS ............................................................................ 8 4.3 PARTNER MESSAGES OFFER MORE WAYS TO CONNECT ............................................................................ 9 4.4 CHALLENGE ..................................................................................................................................... 10 4.5 SOLUTION ....................................................................................................................................... 10 4.6 WHY LINKEDIN? .............................................................................................................................. 10 4.7 RESULT ........................................................................................................................................... 10

5. CASE STUDY ON THE STEVENS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY ............................................ 11

5.1 RAISING AWARENESS OF DEGREE PROGRAMS ....................................................................................... 11 5.2 COMBINING THE POWER OF LINKEDIN MARKETING TOOLS ...................................................................... 11 5.3 CONNECTING WITH TECH-‐SAVVY PROFESSIONALS .................................................................................. 12 5.4 CHALLENGE ..................................................................................................................................... 13 5.5 SOLUTION ....................................................................................................................................... 13 5.6 WHY LINKEDIN? .............................................................................................................................. 13 5.7 RESULTS ......................................................................................................................................... 13

6. MONTSERRAT COLLEGE OF ART ..................................................................................... 14

6.1 CHALLENGE ..................................................................................................................................... 14 6.2 STRATEGY ....................................................................................................................................... 15 6.3 SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION (SEO) ............................................................................................... 15 6.4 SOCIAL MEDIA ................................................................................................................................. 15 6.5 GRAPHIC DESIGN ............................................................................................................................. 16 6.6 PR ................................................................................................................................................. 16 6.7 CONVERSION OPTIMIZATION ............................................................................................................. 16 6.8 PAID SEARCH AND FACEBOOK ADS ..................................................................................................... 16 6.9 RESULTS ......................................................................................................................................... 17

7. SHERMAN COLLEGE OF CHIROPRACTIC .......................................................................... 18

7.1 CHALLENGE ..................................................................................................................................... 18 7.2 RESULT ........................................................................................................................................... 18


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8. UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN – ADMISSIONS WEBSITE ....................................................... 19

8.1 CHALLENGE ..................................................................................................................................... 19 8.2 PROJECT ......................................................................................................................................... 19 8.3 RESULT ........................................................................................................................................... 20

9. COLUMBIA COLLEGE CHICAGO ON FACEBOOK ............................................................... 20

9.1 AN INTEGRATED MARKETING APPROACH ............................................................................................ 21 9.2 CAN THE SCHOOLS APP PREDICT ENROLLMENT AT CCC? ....................................................................... 21 9.3 EXPOSING EXISTING CONNECTIONS .................................................................................................... 22 9.4 STUDENTS, FACULTY, AND STAFF FIND VALUE IN THE SCHOOLS APP ........................................................ 22 9.5 FOLLOW UP .................................................................................................................................... 22

10. IVY BRIDGE COLLEGE SCHOOLS APP-‐PROVIDING PEER-‐TO-‐PEER SUPPORT FOR ONLINE STUDENTS ............................................................................................................................. 23

10.1 INTRODUCTION .............................................................................................................................. 23 10.2 RESULT ......................................................................................................................................... 24

11. WSI REFERENCES .......................................................................................................... 25

12. CASE STUDY ON THE MBA CENTER ............................................................................... 25

12.1 BACKGROUND ............................................................................................................................... 25 12.2 CHALLENGE ................................................................................................................................... 25 12.3 SOLUTION ..................................................................................................................................... 25 12.4 RESULT ......................................................................................................................................... 26

13. CASE STUDY ON THE STORK’S NEST CHILD ACADEMY ................................................... 26

13.1 BACKGROUND ............................................................................................................................... 26 13.2 SOLUTION ..................................................................................................................................... 26 13.3 RESULT ......................................................................................................................................... 27

14. CASE STUDY ON THE CORNERSTONE MONTESSORI PREP SCHOOL ................................ 27


15. CASE STUDY ON THE MILTON KEYNES COLLEGE ............................................................ 29


CONTACT US ......................................................................................................................... 30


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Summary

Colleges

LinkedIn SEO Facebook

Google

Adwords

Social

Media

The Open University X

The California Society of Certified

Public Accountants X

The Stevens Institute of Technology X

Montserrat College of Art

X X X

Sherman College of Chiropractic

X

University of Michigan

X

Columbia College Chicago

X

Ivy Bridge College

X

MBA Center X

Stork’s Nest Child Academy X

Cornerstone Montessori Prep School X X X

Milton Keynes College X X


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1. Objective of this study

It becomes more and more challenging for College and Universities to source quality applicants at an efficient cost.

The traditional methods of advertising show diminishing return on investment while consumers apply selective consumption. Welcome to the Consumer Republic!

We have researched some of the successful digital marketing campaigns that drove results for the education industry. You will find in this document 6 case studies in USA and Europe and 4 WSI references (chapter 11).

Conclusion: the education industry needs to move beyond digital solutions driven by traffic and conversions as KPI to focus on the candidate relationship. Identify the various personae of your target group, understand their motivations and barriers, provide useful content that facilitates the application decision, automate and personalize your web presence to implement this relationship in the digital age.

Inbound marketing is the proven process to manage the candidate relationship. Check out the EHL case study increasing international applicants by +59% with Hubspot: http://www.hubspot.com/customers/ehl

Hubpost is the leading marketing automation solution to enable the candidate relationship.

WSI, the largest network of digital experts worldwide, is one of the first 18 Hubspot platinium partners worldwide. WSI is active in Switzerland through WSI Business Performance.

Get in touch to understand the inbound marketing opportunity :

[email protected], 022 566 19 29.


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2. List of Colleges with Online Marketing Campaign

Below is the list of colleges with online marketing campaign:

S.No Name of the colleges Location

1 The Open University The UK

2 The California Society of Certified Public Accountants (CalCPA) The US

3 Stevens Institute of Technology The US

4 Montserrat College of Art The US

5 Sherman College of Chiropractic The US

6 University of Michigan The US

3. Case Study on the Open University

3.1 Background

The Open University (OU) is the UK’s only university dedicated to distance learning. More than

180,000 students are enrolled and about 70% of undergraduates are in full-‐time employment

sponsored by their employers. The OU is the largest academic institution in the UK and Europe

by student number.

3.2 Objectives

v Raise Awareness of the OU and promote the course offering amongst UK professionals

v Drive potential students to the Open University site to purchase a further-‐education

course.


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3.3 Strategy

v A branding campaign to increase the profile of the Open University amongst an

audience with high professional aspirations

v Spark debate on further education course

v Identify audiences most inclined to take a further education

v This strategy also provided the OU with the option to create a follow-‐up campaign to

LinkedIn users who had responded positively to the OU Poll

3.4 Result

v The campaign achieved high-‐levels of participation among users. The Linkedin Poll

question ‘What’s your opinion on doing a course to further or change your career?’

achieved 2,119 responses in less than two months

v 37% responded that they are interested in taking an OU course

v The advertising campaign across the LinkedIn platform achieved a CTR of 0.63%

v 51 comments from respondents extended the feedback and debate around OU. OU

advocates emerged from the poll feedback delivering credible user-‐generated

endorsements.

v Advertising on LinkedIn allowed the OU to reach a professionally-‐motivated audience.

The OU has gone far beyond the click-‐through-‐rate alone. Achieved brand engagement

and started offering various courses.


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4. Case Study on the California Society of Certified Public

Accountants (CalCPA)

4.1 Reaching out to desirable market

The California Society of Certied Public Accountants, or CalCPA, is the country’s largest state

accounting organization and the largest CPA association in California. CalCPA has 40,000

members in public practice, private industry, education and government. A key to the

organization’s future growth is attracting student members, who will become active

participants in the association as they mature into their careers.

In a bid to boost its student membership, CalCPA removed yearly membership fees for

students, allowing them to join CalCPA for free if they are full-‐time or part-‐time students and

have not yet received a bachelor’s degree. “We want to make student membership a priority,”

explains Matthew Koontz, communications and marketing director for CalCPA. “By bringing

them in as students, they can help spread the message about accounting as a career choice to

their fellow students and we can also connect them to job opportunities.”

The challenge for CalCPA was getting out the word about the free membership. “We have 14

chapters in California, and we’ll have two to three events per week with each chapter,” Koontz

says. “Signing up students at events can be hit or miss – sometimes they’re very successful in

terms of attracting students, sometimes they’re not. This led us to seek out other ways to

connect with students and tell them more about the benets of CalCPA membership, like nding a

job or getting help with the CPA exam. We need to help them understand the value of the

membership, even if it’s free.”

4.2 Targeting helps identify new-‐member prospects

Koontz, working with interactive agency Colsky Media, decided to test online marketing for the

rst time in a bid to reach more students. “Students can be hard to track down,” Koontz explains.


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“They’re often in classes and have irregular schedules, so trying to bring them to events is dif-‐

cult.” However, tracking down the specic subset of students CalCPA needed – that is, California

undergraduate students with an interest in the accounting profession – was another hurdle to

overcome.

“It’s very difcult to nd people in this age range in California, studying this particular subject,”

explains Justin Colsky, managing director of Colsky Media. “We also advertised on Facebook,

but since the site does not offer a context of professionals, we didn’t know if our message was

even reaching the right audience.”

LinkedIn, on the other hand, offered a professional audience in tandem with targeting

capabilities, Colsky said. “The professional focus was more attractive to us, especially since we

wanted to build a long-‐term relationship with students who would soon be pursuing accounting

careers.”

LinkedIn’s personalized marketing solutions, such as Partner Messages, also appealed to Colsky

and Koontz. “With a Partner Message, we could go into detail about the benets of joining

CalCPA, which would be more difcult to get across in a display ad,” Koontz says. “We could be

informative while also using an informal tone, since it’s a one-‐to-‐one message.”

4.3 Partner Messages offer more ways to connect

CalCPA created a Partner Message with six key reasons for students to join CalCPA, and a link to

a landing page where students could sign up for membership. The Partner Message was

delivered to members of LinkedIn groups relating to nance and accounting, as well as CPA exam

prep groups. The combined open rate for the Partner Message was 40%, with a combined

clickthrough rate to the landing page of 15%. Combined marketing efforts, including the

LinkedIn campaign, CalCPA signed up about 1500 new student members between February and

April of 2012.


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“The ability to carefully choose who receives our messages helps us raise awareness of the

value of CalCPA membership with the right people,” Koontz says. “LinkedIn targeting is playing

an important role in helping us emphasize these benets with an audience that is traditionally

hard to reach.”

4.4 Challenge

v Drive membership among hard-‐to-‐reach students

v Reach specific demographic group by region and industry

v Identify targets before they have completed degree program

v Deliver in-‐depth messages about membership benefits

4.5 Solution

v Target members of finance, accounting, and CPA exam groups on LinkedIn

v Use one-‐to-‐one Partner Messages to cut through message clutter

v Provide membership benefit details to increase impact of message

4.6 Why LinkedIn?

v Ability to precisely target by professional interests as well as region and industry

v Professional audience receptive to messages about career growth

v Members self-‐identify interests and future career plans

v Partner Messages offers one-‐to-‐one communication

4.7 Result

v 40% open rate for best-‐performing Partner Messages

v CTRs up to 15%

v Helped contribute to a 47% growth of student members in three months

v Allowed Linkedin to be one of the top 20 of all web referrals to all of CalCPA.org


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5. Case Study on the Stevens Institute of Technology

5.1 Raising awareness of degree programs

Founded in 1870, Stevens Institute of Technology is located in Hoboken, N.J. just a stone’s

throw from midtown Manhattan. The school is well known for its engineering and science

undergrad and graduate degree programs – but as it began to roll out exciting new graduate

programs, its marketing experts realized that Stevens needed a boost in awareness, especially

among professionals considering going back to school for M.B.A. and other graduate degrees.

“Our new graduate program, Business Intelligence and Analytics (BI&A), is the first program of

its kind in the New York area, and one of only about 12 in the world,” explains Michael Schinelli,

Stevens Institute’s assistant vice president for marketing and communications. While the school

has 43 different graduate programs, Schinelli decided to focus marketing efforts on the new

BI&A degree, along with Computer Science, Financial Engineering, Systems Engineering, and

M.B.A. graduate programs – “our top performers,” Schinelli says.

Stevens Institute was conducting display advertising campaigns on popular career websites, as

well as retargeting campaigns via ad networks.

“All of these campaigns offer different benets at different price points,” Schinelli explains.

“However, the retargeting conversions don’t come from websites where we had a brand

presence, and these campaigns didn’t offer ways to carefully target the audiences we needed

to reach. We wanted to have an affiliation with a professional network on which we could

create a share of voice about Stevens, and could saturate the messaging more frequently.”

5.2 Combining the power of LinkedIn marketing tools

Schinelli saw the opportunity to create this brand presence on LinkedIn, using a combination of

marketing tools: Partner Messages, display ads, and self-‐service pay-‐per-‐click LinkedIn Ads.

“With LinkedIn, we wanted to test the benefits of a 360-‐degree campaign,” he explains. “We


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wanted LinkedIn members to see our messages more often, hopefully in different ways. The

brand objective was to be recognized across the LinkedIn network as a premium provider of the

programs we offer.”

The marketing goal, he adds, was to encourage people to click through to Stevens Institute’s

inquiry form – the first step toward making a formal application for a degree program. For

Stevens Institute, a key advantage of advertising with LinkedIn is its targeting capability – and

specifically, the fact that its members indicate their career goals and interests beyond just the

jobs they’ve held. “They don’t just say, ‘This is what I used to do, or this is what my company

calls my job,’” Schinelli says. “They join LinkedIn groups not only based on what they’re doing

today, but based on jobs they’d like to get in the future, or tasks they’d like to get better at.”

5.3 Connecting with tech-‐savvy professionals

For Partner Messages, Stevens Institute targeted LinkedIn members without graduate degrees

in the New York City metropolitan area, using a pitch about building technology related skills.

For display ads, the school targeted New York area members with group affiliation and job

functions relating to the degree programs it are marketing, such as Computer Science and

Financial Engineering.

Since launching its advertising on LinkedIn in mid-‐2011, the Partner Messages have achieved

open rates as high as 21% and click through rates as high as 12%. During the campaigns,

LinkedIn became one of Stevens Institute’s top 10 referral sites to the school’s graduate

admissions department – leading Stevens to shift some of its media budget from Career Builder

to LinkedIn.

The campaign around the new Business Intelligence and Analytics degree has helped Stevens

Institute build mindshare and drive more inquiries for information about the program, Schinelli

says. “That’s good to see for a new launch,” he explains. “LinkedIn is helping us reach the tech-‐


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savvy, business-‐minded individuals that we need to connect with. Being able to target

geographically as well as by group affiliation, and developing the brand presence, are really

adding up.”

5.4 Challenge

v Raise awareness of degree programs

v Drive inquiries from prospective students

v Create a brand presence in professional online community

v Deliver messages to hard-‐to-‐identify graduate degree candidates

5.5 Solution

v Deliver Partner Messages to regional LinkedIn members

v Target display ads to relevant LinkedIn Groups

v Launch self-‐serve pay-‐per-‐click LinkedIn Ads for message saturation

5.6 Why LinkedIn?

v Tech-‐savvy, professional audience

v Ability to create brand presence across online community

v Members self-‐identify interests and future career goals

v Targeting by geography, education level, jobs, and group affiliations

5.7 Results

v CTRs up to 12% for Partner Messages

v 21% open rate for best performing Partner Messages

v Increase in information requests for new degree program

v Building conversations with precise audiences


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6. Montserrat College of Art

As a case study, Montserrat College of Art (MCA) represents a unique blend of SEO, social

media, and public relations successes. First, consider that MCA, with only 400 students, is small.

It has a history of relatively rapid new president turnover and a student body with tuition

funded, in a large part, by scholarships and grants. In the past, the college has had issues filling

classes, attracting out of state students, and gaining visibility online.

When McDougall Interactive (McDougall) began working with MCA, prospects, recruits,

students, faculty, staff, and the general public were – as they continue to – judging colleges by

the quality of their website and presence in search and social media. Unfortunately the MCA

website was dated, there were no rankings other than branded search terms, and social profiles

were weak, at best. In addition, public relations efforts had been largely for hyper local events

attracting only hyper local media.

Before moving forward, McDougall met with the President and Marketing director, as well as a

dozen other key people to make sure McDougall truly understood their brand, business, and

marketing needs. McDougall quickly realized that the brand message was unclear and

suggested some brand strategy research by partner at Arnold Advertising. McDougall did

interviews with faculty, staff, students, and parents. We then created a mission statement and

a tagline (“See What You can Do with an Art Degree”) which were presented to the board.

6.1 Challenge

When McDougall initially began working with MCA, the college had almost no visibility in the

search engines (outside of branded organic search terms), no social media presence, no Pay-‐

Per-‐Click (PPC), and no major public relations successes. More importantly, the college was not

filling all classes and was only attracting regional students. McDougall goal was to not only

increase visibility – online and in the media – but to sign up more non-‐scholarship students and


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to reach more funders in the art world. Additionally, McDougall wanted to position MCA as a

thought leader in the elite art community

6.2 Strategy

McDougall belief is that Internet marketing is most powerful when businesses use a variety of

integrated tactics that feed on each in a symbiotic way.

6.3 Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

McDougall started with SEO because, given the incredible number of searches for topics related

to art, McDougall felt that nationally-‐ and locally-‐focused search engine optimization was an

essential activity. First, McDougall focused on the site itself to ensure that it had clean URLs and

search engine friendly site architecture. Next, McDougall attacked keywords ranging from art

colleges and art schools to phrases related to majors and careers like animation colleges and

graphic design careers. At the same time, McDougall optimized large volumes of individual

course areas with local geo targeting (e.g., Beverly, MA, Massachusetts, etc.). McDougall also

optimized the long tail keywords in blog posts.

6.4 Social Media

Initially, McDougall redesigned the college’s blog and transitioned it to an on-‐site URL at

http://www.montserrat.edu/blog/ to take advantage of the SEO boost and to grow the overall

size of the website, with the eventual goal of releasing a series of blogs on various topics to

attract links and social media attention. The next step involved setting up MCA’s Facebook

brand page – which became a high priority action item after McDougall discovered that they

were using the community page format. McDougall then embarked upon a course of content

creation that included SEO-‐friendly blog posts, info graphics, photos, and videos – all of which

were shared on various social destinations to created social buzz.


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6.5 Graphic Design

McDougall created a new look for just the home page while a budget was being created for a

site redesign.

6.6 PR

Starting with the 2010 Annual Art Auction, McDougall provided information, materials, and

access to all local (North Shore) media outlets, consisting of daily and weekly newspapers. Only

two weeks into the initiative, when the Auction was held, McDougall had generated so much

coverage that at least 150 people walked in who only knew about the event through publicity

generated by McDougall Interactive. By consistently pushing out news releases ranging from

local events, thought leader segments like the Encaustic conference, and wild stuff like Gorilla

Girls, McDougall sought to gain traction in a wider variety of art communities nationally.

Throughout the next year, McDougall focused PR efforts on exhibits in the College’s gallery and

had MCA news repeatedly covered in the Boston Globe, the region’s largest daily newspaper, as

well as all local dailies and weeklies. During this phase of our PR efforts, McDougall suggested

that the College uses the phrase “See What You can Do with an Art Degree,” positioning the

school as an important avenue for young people to understand and join the “creative

economy.”

6.7 Conversion Optimization

The online applications and continuing education areas were optimized and new calls to action

on the home page were tested with Google Website Optimizer.

6.8 Paid Search and Facebook Ads

Google Adwords and Facebook Ads were effectively used in small, cost-‐effective doses to drive

traffic to summer workshops.


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6.9 Results

For the first time in its 40-‐year history, MCA has a waiting list of applicants, and McDougall have

generated leads from states such as a Colorado where the college has never had enrollment

before. Below are just a few of the media highlights:

v WGBH-‐TV, Boston and nationally

v Cover and features in ArtScope, Art New England and Art News

v Boston Business Journal

v The Associated Press

v Boston Globe (frequently for exhibitions) major FRONT PAGE coverage of “For The

Record.”

There was a strong increase in visits to the MCA website and SERPs penetration for targeted

keywords. Through SEO, we had a 1,454% increase in top 50 results of Google organic search

engine results pages. Rankings in the first six months included #1 in Google for the keyword

“Art Colleges” For a local art college to beat RISD and the rest of the national / larger schools,

we feel this was a phenomenal success.

Furthermore, PPC successfully drove a significant increase in enrollment. McDougall used

Google Analytics to track all of the sources driving traffic to the application pages and summer

workshop pages, and tracked major increases in goal conversions. With shared management,

McDougall increased the college’s Facebook engagement to over 700 likes with a large increase

in page visits.


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7. Sherman College of Chiropractic

Sherman College of Chiropractic has 40 years of experience providing students with a

comprehensive chiropractic education, preparing them to enter the field as primary health care

professionals who are highly skilled, compassionate, ethical and successful. On its 80-‐acre

campus in South Carolina, Sherman offers a first professional degree program unique in its

approach to health care and known globally for the skill and art of chiropractic delivered by

graduates.

7.1 Challenge

Sherman College of Chiropractic needed to update their website analytics for a more in-‐depth

understanding of user behavior and to get assistance with their online marketing strategy. The

college also wanted to know the increase in number of enrollments compared to previous year.

7.2 Result

v Updating website analytics to better model user behavior, including the use of funnels

to look at individual segments of the user base

v Increasing overall traffic, with a focus on organic search inquiries, lead generation, and

strategies that put visitors in direct contract with the school, such as applications,

inquiries and campus visits.

v As a result, the number of enrollments that occurred in August 2012 exceeded the total

number of enrollments in all of 2011. Traffic increased, both from organic traffic by 98%,

and mobile traffic by 154%, with an overall rise in visits of 43%.


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8. University of Michigan – Admissions Website

8.1 Challenge

It is difficult to eclipse the University of Michigan in size and performance. Whether it is the

number of people on the Ann Arbor campus (58,000) or the number of living alumni still

connected to the University (460,000), Michigan can steamroll the crème de la crème of the

private Ivies. As the birthplace of the Peace Corps and the training ground for the entire Apollo

15 crew, the Wolverines pride themselves as being the “Leaders and Best.”

8.2 Project

When the best in higher education wanted to redevelop their web presence, to make the user

experience best in class, they came to Stamats, leaders of strategic communications in higher

education. Michigan wanted three tasks which are inquire, visit, and apply—easy to complete

for key audiences. While streamlining these tasks is the right thing to do, with over 30,000

phone calls a year and a similar number of applications submitted, our job was monumental. It

was critical that the 1.5 million annual visitors found what they were looking for, and the

website converted visitor inquiries into action.

Employing industry best practices, Stamats developed a website showing Michigan’s

personality and strengths. This site allows individuals to find the information they are looking

for without taking them to unconnected links; uses analytics to measure results and user

experience; and showcases the Block M which represents all that the University of Michigan

brand has to offer.

In the college panoptic approach, the Stamats team carried out integral web design processes

such as discovery, architecture, and usability testing; creative concept development, testing,

designing, and writing; and social media workshops. Analytics benchmarking and

communication sequence mapping were part of our comprehensive plan. The collaborative

meetings and insights resulted in a change in the organizational structure; a review of the


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overall communication process; and a strategic evaluation of how content was being gathered

and shared.

Stamats continue to work with the University of Michigan on a variety of projects where we

design and customize research, branding, digital, and creative solutions for them.

8.3 Result

v Stamats developed a website showing the university personality and strengths.

v Allows individuals to find the information they are looking for without taking them to

unconnected links

v Uses analytics to measure results and user experience

9. Columbia College Chicago on Facebook

Columbia College Chicago is one of the country’s largest institutions devoted to arts and media,

with 12,228 students from all across the US. Although CCC is highly effective at fostering

interest in its programs and culture among prospective students, the institution needed a

stronger online community to foster engagement between current and prospective students1.

After experimenting with some of the traditional tools on the market, Matthew Green, CCC’s

Director of Student Communications, realized traditional tools weren’t reaching his students -‐ a

majority of CCC was active on Facebook, but no tools on the market integrated with Facebook

in a compelling way. He decided to implement the Schools App.

1 Source -‐ http://www.inigral.com/successstories/Columbia-‐College-‐Chicago/


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9.1 An Integrated Marketing Approach

To help boost adoption, CCC aligned their Schools App launch with their New Student

Convocation. Within 24 hours, hundreds of students had added the Facebook application.

Within 20 days of the application’s launch at CCC, over 25% of admits who ultimately enrolled

in CCC had added the Schools App. By the time school started, over half of CCC’s recently

enrolled students were using the application.

9.2 Can the Schools App Predict Enrollment At CCC?

For Columbia College Chicago’s (CCC) Class of 2014, the Schools App was a crucial tool for the

students and the admissions department alike.

It was found that students who signed up for the Schools App at least two months before

school started were about 16% more likely to ultimately enroll than users who added the

application closer to the first day of school. This suggests that users who add the application

early are excited about the school and likely to attend, and can be considered a positive

correlation for admissions departments looking to predict yield.

Ultimately, 94% of the candidates who signed up for the application enrolled and showed up

for the first day of school at CCC. (In other words, a Schools App user was 7x more likely to

attend CCC than not attend.)

By the time school started, student engagement in the Schools App was at an all time high.

Over half of CCC’s enrolled students had signed up for the application. Students were active in

the application, adding 100-‐300 pieces of content daily.


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9.3 Exposing Existing Connections

In the college’s weekly newsletter to the campus, “In The Loop,” CCC features a handful of

popular posts in the application, engaging interested students and boosting traffic and

discussion.

In one month, CCC student Nora found other students who were interested in doing a

marketing summer study in Prague with her, Meryle (a sophomore), found a sculptor, and Tess

(a first-‐year student) found a web designer to build her portfolio site through the application.

9.4 Students, Faculty, and Staff Find Value in the Schools App

After Student Communications started seeing success engaging students within the application,

other departments began to use the Schools App to build involvement and community on

campus as well.

Residence Life used the application to help students meet their future room and hall mates by

giving each hall floor its own Interest within the application, allowing students could talk to

their peers in the dorm before moving in. The first floor to get all of its residents to join the

Schools App won a pizza party, courtesy of Student Affairs.

After a 7.0 magnitude earthquake devastated Haiti, Green announced on the Schools App that

several campus groups were looking for students to volunteer for relief efforts. Students

responded enthusiastically and used the application to brainstorm how best to contribute.

9.5 Follow Up

Two Years Later, CCC Still on Facebook. Our recent survey of undergraduates at Columbia

College Chicago about the first year impact of the app had several central themes. People were

able to look for common interests with students they had not yet met, and being able to see

which students were in their building (even down the hall!) and in their classes.


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Students appreciated the opportunity to meet these students with whom they’d be in close

contact prior to arriving for the commencement of the school year. Other students said the app

helped to ease their last minute nerves and ask questions in advance of their arrivals. A

substantial number of students are using the application to network. Students mentioned

getting roles for films and other artistic collaborations that emerged from participation in the

app.

10. Ivy Bridge College Schools App-‐Providing Peer-‐to-‐

Peer Support for Online Students

10.1 Introduction

Ivy Bridge College, an online two year college, is a seamless way for students to earn their

associate’s degree before transferring to one of its many four-‐year partner institutions. Ivy

Bridge College is a joint venture between Altius Education, a company based in San Francisco,

and Tiffin University, located in Tiffin, Ohio2.

Ivy Bridge provides unparalleled support services and a guided academic pathway for their

students. The Schools App is a key tool that their staff uses to provide support and facilitate

connections between their geographically dispersed students.

The student profile of Ivy Bridge is varied, with both traditionally-‐aged and adult learners. It’s

typical to find re-‐entry students, single parents and younger people that have faced challenging

life experiences. Many of them have not been to school in a long time, and may have found

education extraordinarily challenging until enrolling at Ivy Bridge. For students like these, the

2 Source -‐ http://www.inigral.com/successstories/Ivy-‐Bridge-‐College/


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support and services model of Ivy Bridge College provides a new hope for a brighter academic

future.

Despite high frequency contact with faculty and Success Coaches, many students report that

they would still like to feel more connected to one another. Their E-‐College learning platform

provided by Pearson, while an effective LMS, does not facilitate the types of emotional

interaction and bonds they wish to form with one another. This is where Ivy Bridge on

Facebook comes in.

A core group of students has attached themselves to our Facebook App and has used it to build

important relationships. They visit the application while they are on Facebook to post updates

on their coursework, ask questions and talk about their positive experiences with Ivy Bridge.

They also discuss more personal matters, like interests and passions, and even challenges at

home.

10.2 Result

The facebook uses are profound. It has built awareness of the other types of students attending

Ivy Bridge, facilitated friendships that otherwise never would have happened and most

importantly, has provided a unified platform for them to support and encourage one another.


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11. WSI references

Below is the list of colleges with online marketing campaign implemented by WSI:

S.No Name of the colleges Location

1 MBA Center France

2 Stork’s Nest Child Academy The US

3 Cornerstone Montessori Prep School Canada

4 Milton Keynes College The UK

12. Case Study on the MBA Center

12.1 Background

MBA Center is a formation organization formed by a dozen of centers in the world. The heart of

its activity is the preparation for the tests like GMAT or TOEFL, and coaching to prepare the

entrance in MBA.

The previous website of MBA Center, technologically out of date, generated traffic by offering

to the visitors complete information on tests like GMAT as well as the access to free tests. But

no conversion strategy was implemented.

12.2 Challenge

v Identify website visitors as leads and allow the conversion in customers

v Allow the worldwide development of MBA Center

v Develop the sales of tests and online formations

12.3 Solution

v Development of a multilingual website including e-‐sales, an event calendar with online

reservations, online tests and an organization by sub-‐fields according the implantation


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v Implementation of MBA Center local phone number

v Chat module allowing online conversation

v Detailed subscription form

12.4 Result

v The new website allowed negotiating partnerships like HEC. The website includes a page

for partners’ presentation.

v Promotion of international development.

v SEO on 18 keywords: 2 keywords appeared in first page at the beginning of the

campaign, and after 3 months 10 keywords appeared in first page of Google results.

v Following the optimization of Adwords campaigns by WSI, the number of visits

generated has been multiplied by 1.6 compared to the previous month where it was

directly managed by the client.

13. Case Study on the Stork’s Nest Child Academy

13.1 Background

Stork’s Nest was advertising through traditional methods of Yellow Pages, radio and local

newspaper ads. Their original website was 100% Flash and not recognized by the search

engines. Due to the downturn in the market, enrollments were dipping.

They needed a measurable way to attract new visitors to the school for enrollment.

13.2 Solution

v Build a new website using the WSI eFusion platform.

v Optimization of the website for local place search in the spring of 2009.

v PPC campaign using the call-‐to-‐action of “free initial registration worth $75”. For

existing families, they were able to access easily downloadable calendars.


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13.3 Result

v Over 150 leads with approximately 50 new enrollments both full-‐time and part-‐time,

since starting the project.

v Email marketing to follow up with prospective families that did not enroll but showed

interest.

v From a search engine perspective, the website ranked page one for the following

keywords: “Daycare Rhode Island”, “Day Care Rhode Island”, “Daycare East Greenwich,

Daycare Warwick”, “Daycare Smithfield”.

14. Case study on the Cornerstone Montessori Prep

School

14.1 Background

Prior to working with WSI, Cornerstone Montessori Prep School had no digital marketing

strategy and was only seen online for keywords related to the company name. Their lead

generation consisted of advertising in Yellow Pages, educational directories, educational

magazines, referrals and the sign outside their school.

14.2 Challenge

They needed to increase enrollment to keep the school going.

14.3 Solution

v Redesigned the school’s website using the WSI eFusion platform and optimization of the

website pages: implementation of specific forms on the website for job employment

inquiries, to book a tour of the school and a more detailed Admissions Application.


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v PPC campaign for 3 months to generate immediate traffic to the website.

v Creation of a content marketing blueprint, competitor report.

v Monthly SEO campaign focused on article marketing and link building.

v Recently, WSI also created a custom Facebook page for the school and are in the works

of designing a blog for the principal.

14.4 Result

v The school is on page 1 of Google for terms related to “Toronto Montessori School”.

v When the new website went live and we started generating traffic from Google PPC ads

and Facebook ads, they were receiving 3 calls a day as well as people dropping in to ask

for a tour of the school and several online inquiries.

v In addition, over the last year:

o 32 people signed up for their newsletter

o 27 people completed the Admissions

o Application Request

o Almost 100 inquiries for more information came in via the contact form

o Inquiries from other organizations interested in working with the school came

through

v They did not renew advertising with Yellow Pages or any of the other subscription

except for the one online directory that is sending them more traffic.


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15. Case Study on the Milton Keynes College

15.1 Background

Milton Keynes College is a well-‐known college within the UK providing school leavers with 317

part-‐time and full-‐time courses and diplomas. The marketing department is very experienced

and the website receives over 25,000 visitors on average per month. However, they had only

recently started experimenting with social media and were looking for a consultant to assist.

15.2 Challenge

WSI’s goal was to help the college raise brand awareness amongst 16-‐19 year olds within a 20-‐

mile radius of the city of Milton Keynes. In addition, we wanted to generate increased course

bookings through a pay-‐per-‐click (PPC) campaign, which was solely targeting competitor college

search phrases.

15.3 Solution

v Social media brand awareness campaign, including a secondary PPC campaign. WSI was

responsible for developing the project, creating the content, setting up the platforms

and managing the daily updates. The project was set as a 3-‐month brand awareness

campaign. WSI targeted competitor universities and colleges within a 20-‐mile radius of

Milton Keynes College.

v Creation of a landing page that would target users searching for competitor colleges and

universities and drive the traffic to that landing page with a focus on signing up for

courses with Milton Keynes College.

v Facebook campaign: driving traffic to a Fan Page offering weekly contests and prizes

while providing daily updates and interesting content.


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v WordPress blog was launched and used to feed interesting and relevant content to the

Facebook page.

v YouTube videos featuring current students were fed into the Fan Page.

15.4 Result

Over 8 weeks of targeting a 20-‐mile radius around Milton Keynes:

v 500 fans joined the Fan Page

v 30 video views per day

v 4-‐8 interactions per post

v 464 Facebook page views per day

v Competitor PPC campaign generates 3090 website visits

v 202 phone call enquiries and 21 booked courses to date

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