Today's U.S. presidential inauguration reminds me to ask what higher ed advancement might learn from Obama's re-election. It feels a little like dejà vu from Obama's first presidential campaign, when many of us wondered whether Blue State Digital's grassroots tools would transform alumni communities and fundraising online.
That didn't happen. One reason is that most of our profession sat back and waited for folks like Blue State to show up and teach us their ways. They did show up – sort of – but their solutions seemed expensive relative to our budgets, and it wasn't clear that they could resolve the difference between fundraising for Barack Obama and fundraising for graduate fellowships. Some good came of it though: many of us began to ask how donating to a time-bound, cause-related effort compared with supporting a college annual fund.
In 2013 the lessons aren't about building email lists or solicitation via text message. TIME Magazine's Swampland blog explained that it's all about "the secret world" of "data-crunchers."
Some simple lessons for us:
Mashup data from disparate sources to gain novel insights For example, overlay geography with behavioral profiles.
Limit the number of data sets you use at one time Related: Correlate and aggregate data sets.
Rank audience members via predictive modeling Correlate it to your campaign's priorities.
Rank likelihood to volunteer Giving potential isn't the only thing to rate.
Test and measure This helps assess the best ROI among possible next steps.
Behavioral data comes from many platforms and channels Examples: Recurring payments; text messaging; email appeals; online donations.
Finally, there's a key difference between political campaigns and education that is not mentioned:
In political campaigns, candidates make the case for supporting a movement, a cause, or a set of values.
In schools, colleges, and universities, we characterize our needs as those of an organization, a capital project, or a place.
Is political parties' approach to messaging broadly applicable to a university? If so, how? If not, why not?
Whatever the answer, I think we still have much to learn from the so-called secret data crunchers and their insight based on data and analysis.
Can you publish any public information about an alumnus in the form of a class note?
An acquaintance recently said he was "mortified" that his alma mater had found some information about him online (probably in another organization's newsletter), and then re-purposed it as class news in the Alumni Notes.
My first thought was, "So what?" If you publish an article, win an award, or keynote a conference, people are going to talk about it, and it will likely be published on someone's website. And if it's on a public site, it will be indexed by Google and will be searchable. Or it will turn up on Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn, without breaching any privacy policy or Terms of Service.
My acquaintance explains that "including that note implies that I wrote that in to the office and volunteered that information to be published in those pages." The point, he said, is not whether the information is public – it's whether he would want it broadcast to his alumni community. The answer to that is impossible for the alumni office to know, without asking him.
["It implies that I volunteered that information to be published in those pages"]
Does your institution have a policy for this? Is it easy for alumni to find and understand that policy? Do you get complaints from alumni whose news you collected elsewhere and re-published (either in print or online)?
[We use] news submitted by alumni, news submitted by their employers (usually about promotions, awards, etc.), and news from stories in the press that mention the alumnus/alumna and his or her affiliation with the university.
Another reader said:
The major caveat is that the alumnus/subject must verify and approve before printing.
The book consists of a hard copy (loose-leaf) physical edition, supplemented three times a year with digital updates that reflect new developments, best-practice examples from across Europe, and hands-on advice. The target audience is European education professionals navigating an increasingly international landscape.
Subscribers to the volume get online access to digital versions of all the Handbook's articles – useful for those who are constantly traveling because of the international role they play.
A description, full table of contents, and pricing information are available from the Handbook website:
I don't make any money from people purchasing the volume; but I'll gain great satisfaction if it helps a few Alumni Futures readers with their everyday professional challenges.
I recently met Don Tapscott, a leading author and speaker on technology and innovation. He graciously invited me to contribute to the blog he writes for Huffington Post. My article there appeared on March 23, 2012, and I am including a brief excerpt below, with a link to the original article for those who would like to read the rest.
Excerpt:
Many alumni associations stubbornly cling to the idea that alumni relationships should be hosted on a .edu website. But we've grudgingly populated Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter.
And many of us haven't yet acknowledged that online social platforms aren't broadcast outlets. People join Facebook to share their interests, ideas and activities with friends and family, to tell stories about what matters to them. They don't join to download a PDF of the press release announcing this year's teaching awards.
[Associations cling to the idea that alumni relationships should be hosted on a .edu website]
Communities like ours must learn to maintain slightly more modest expectations about how alumni will interact with us online.
And yet, things are changing at last. Several signs point to a more effective accommodation between alumni associations and the online ventures that have usurped their roles...
How do you build and sustain an effective professional network?
Specifically, he asked to hear from
...those who have been in the field [of international education] at least 5 to 10 years re: successful approaches...to building and sustaining your professional connections. Has it become easier or more difficult over time? Do you think the focus and context of our work creates unique opportunities to build professional connections?
This made me think about my own practice in this area over the past decade or so, and here's my answer:
I don't think there's anything unique about my profession's opportunities for building professional connections.
[This made me think about how to build – and sustain – an effective professional network]
For me, network-building and maintenance come mostly from the following channels, methods and sources:
1. Speaking at conferences
Presenting ideas and experiences attracts input and collaboration from people with similar problems and interests.
2. Publishing in the profession
Writing for my peers in journals, magazines, websites, and blogs (such as Alumni Futures) generates global interaction, brainstorming, and debate around shared interests and challenges.
3. Using tools to connect with others
LinkedIn is a perfect example of a tool that accomplishes a traditional function (professional networking) in a new way (online).
4. Serving the profession
As a volunteer leader or as a contributor via professional organizations such as CASE, EAIE and other groups, on organizing committees for conferences, and in other capacities, I have met countless others who share my interest in developing deeper connections and a broader network.
How do you build and sustain your professional network?
Leave a comment.
Image: Visual representation of my current LinkedIn network, from LinkedIn Labs. Click to view larger.
This week they share some specific outcomes from these efforts, as well as a few challenges and success stories.
Key Outcomes from LinkedIn Thunderbird counts 25% of its 40,000 alumni among its LinkedIn Group. Here are key results, with "how to" tips:
Outcome 1: Countered the impression that Thunderbird didn't do enough to help alumni obtain jobs Katie Mayer, alumni relations coordinator, says: "Complaints about this issue have decreased from several per week to virtually none." How did they do it?
Posting jobs and career tips regularly
Giving real-time access to Career Management Center staff
Encouraging alumni to post job openings
Actively matching alumni with one another for networking
Outcome 2: Identified and tested a new giving opportunity How did they do it?
A Campaign appeal via LinkedIn, through a Group notification (which hits e-mail boxes and posts automatically as a "Discussion"). The appeal was a direct ask from Mayer, their community manager.
"This was the second-most successful appeal of any kind all year, resulting in more than 100 gifts in a few days, plus numerous comments – all positive."
Not over-reaching. Mayer: "This tool is powerful, so we’ve decided to use it only once per year. There was something about asking as a person, instead of as the institution, that touched this group."
Outcome 3: Created a closer relationship with alumni Thunderbird now communicates with alumni more via LinkedIn than via e-mail. Mayer: "There's a more personal connection because of the profile photo and bio. Alumni feel that they already know us when we meet in person."
Outcome 4: Generated more balanced Group conversations A larger number of members means more diverse viewpoints, instead of a handful of vocal alumni.
[Thunderbird communicates with alumni more via LinkedIn than via e-mail]
Key Outcomes from Twitter Half of Thunderbird's content is purely informative and focused on international business – it is a global management school after all. Thunderbird's Mayer and colleague Samantha Novick subscribe to various digital news outlets to get timely content to share with followers.
For fun sometimes they'll post trivia questions from The Economist Book of Facts. Novick: "Since more than half our students are international, we Tweet holidays around the world. We schedule Tweets for certain times to take care of our alumni who are in time zones throughout Europe and Asia."
Outcome 5: Positioned Thunderbird on Twitter as a source of insight on relevant, important issues "It bolsters our credibility and fosters lifelong learning," says Novick.
Outcome 6: Increased alumni engagement Fast responses, retweets, favoriting their tweets, lists, mentioning them when they mention Thunderbird, and remaining transparent – even in controversial issues – all these factors increase interaction.
But what about Facebook? Mayer: "We are focusing our Facebook presence toward prospective students, and haven’t generated as much interest with our alumni via Facebook." In other words, they have chosen specific channels and are pursuing an intentional strategy that fits their communication and engagement goals.
["It was an honest – and at times upsetting – discussion"]
Case Studies: Experiments Good and Bad
Mayer mentions two controversial experiments that generated mixed responses.
A rap video (with student callers and Thunderbird's president dancing) generated negative student comments on YouTube. "They felt it looked unprofessional for an MBA school. Alumni mostly found it humorous, but the project was time-consuming and we couldn't measure its impact, beyond a brief increase in web traffic."
Thunderbird's Director of Annual Giving asked the LinkedIn Alumni Group, “Why wouldn’t you give?” This generated more than 100 comments, some criticizing the school and others defending it. Mayer says it was "an honest – and at times upsetting – discussion that resulted in institutional changes as well as some online gifts."
Finally, Mayer tells a cross-platform success story:
"We divided alumni globally into geographic regions and pitted them against one another. Some regions were very competitive – there was a buzz about it across platforms. The best aspect is that it allowed us to discuss giving every day without angering or upsetting anyone. A tweet might say, “D.C. knocked New York out of first place this week! Who will win it in the end?” We updated a leaderboard every week and the winning region's donors' names were published in Thunderbird Magazine, they got a letter signed by the school’s president, and formal recognition at Homecoming. And little prizes along the way kept it fun."
These tangible examples show that online channels can drive meaningful, measurable engagement with alumni around the world. I found the lessons useful – did you?
Add to these ideas, or react to them, by leaving a comment.
Photo: Thunderbird campus (Glendale, AZ, USA) by Kristen Jarchow. Used with permission.
This article is written by Andrew Gossen (@agossen), Senior Director for Social Media Strategy in the Division of Alumni Affairs & Development at Cornell University, and informal advisor to Alumni Futures.
QR ("quick response") codes are finally entering the North American mainstream. Just a year ago, most advancement professionals had never heard of them. Now all you need to do is read a magazine or check out the Twitter activity around #qrcode to discover how much interest there is in the codes' unique ability to connect physical objects to the mobile web.
As is often the case, higher education lags behind the private sector in adopting a new technology. It’s an encouraging sign, therefore, that people are experimenting and beginning to take advantage of QR codes. QR codes add additional dimensions to the static print pieces that have been staples of institutional advancement for so long – business cards, postcards, posters, and more. Most of the attention thus far has focused on the connection between the real and online worlds. However, Asian and European designers have realized that QR codes have potential as visual objects in their own right. This approach, called design QR, has enormous implications for branding in higher education.
[Design QR has enormous implications for branding in higher education.]
The QR code gets the job done, but there’s not much to recommend it graphically.
However, these basic QR codes contain much more data than is actually needed for a scanner to read them. This means we can alter a percentage of the image without making the QR code unreadable. And code designers can include colors and logos or illustrations in their designs. As long as the colors stand out in sufficient contrast, the scanner doesn’t care if it’s black and white or purple and blue.
Combine these two variables in the hands of a good graphic designer, and you have a branding opportunity. Here at Cornell, we’ve begun to experiment in this area.
For Reunion, we wanted a new, unconventional QR code for our Reunion Mobile website. University Communications’ Design Director Clive Howard worked the iconic McGraw Tower into the design, adding visual pizzazz and a Cornell theme (click the images to view larger versions).
By selecting sufficiently contrasting colors, he provided a number of choices for the design. All of them point to the same site:
Thanks to these options, our marketing collateral appealed to alumni more than last year's merchandise. Which of these t-shirts would you rather wear?
He used Cornell’s red and white color scheme over a silhouette of the city skyline and the Statue of Liberty, elegantly evoking the prospect of a formal Cornell technology and applied science presence in New York City.
The use of QR codes in North American higher education must continue evolving in this direction – it simply makes sense to do so.
[What are the challenges of using Design QR in your marketing efforts?]
Clive shared his thoughts on the practical challenges of design QR:
The goal is to create a strong graphic that is easily understood but that does not add to the busy-ness of the existing QR code.
Once you have selected a visual element (such as McGraw Tower), you delete elements of the original code and test to see if it still works. The added graphic should be as large as possible without interfering with the code's translation. Test the code on as many devices as possible and monitor successful web page launches.
Color contrast plays a huge part in readability by scanners. The code needs enough contrast to register the differences. Once again, test to verify that it works.
Color also plays a large part when reproducing the QR code on promotional pieces. For example, for Reunion 2011, we adjusted the screening process for the t-shirt application to make sure that the QR code could be read on fabric.
The mobile web is growing rapidly, and QR codes effectively connect the physical world to the Internet. At the same time, they can serve as an additional component of an institution's or an event’s graphic identity.
When I first read about the Library of Congress’s Flickr project, I couldn’t wait to check it out. It made me think about how schools could benefit from digitizing their photographic archives. I spoke with others at my alma mater, Proctor Academy, about putting our archives online for public viewing. Scanning the collection would make it more much widely available but I thought that the impact could be even greater. Could we turn these assets into a form of social currency?
I hoped that pushing photos from Flickr out to our Facebook and Twitter networks would start conversations and increase the sense of community online. The photos would serve as conversation starters, or ‘icebreakers,’ putting people at ease and creating a reason for them to engage.
Before we could begin we needed to get organized. We set up a Flickr account, and started scanning and posting photos one hundred at a time. Initially, rather than focusing on ‘conversations’ (currency), we set out to simply build our collection (assets). After we had about two thousand pictures posted, we began publishing links to the photos on Facebook.
Early on we learned a number of valuable lessons. Many photos failed to generate interest because they were from too far in the past, or because they had uninteresting captions. Relying heavily on the ‘Insights’ from our Facebook page, we refined our photo selection process and overall approach. The gender, age, and location of our audience helped us better determine which photos to post.
Before long we felt comfortable taking risks with our images and captions, trying hard not to take ourselves too seriously. Humor through photo or comment was often the best icebreaker. We realized humility was also key to starting conversations. Mistakes happen –occasionally we misidentified people, places or dates, and sometimes found that our mistakes led to the best conversations of all. We also selected photos from upcoming reunion years and focused on programs we knew our alumni were invested in and would love to respond to.
It might sound a bit illogical not to announce what we were doing. In fact, we just started and let whatever would happen, happen (read Seth Godin’s latest book, Poke the Box, if you’re looking for inspiration). Once a week or so we posted links to archive photos on our Facebook page or tweeted about a photo. It was great to realize our initial hunch was correct – that there was endless opportunity in digitizing archives. And as we found out soon enough, the rest takes care of itself.
In a Bloomberg article titled Ivy League Alumni Quit Admissions Interviews as Success Slips, Ivy admissions volunteers complain that they have less "influence" than ever in the undergraduate admissions process. They recommend many students for admission, hardly any of whom are selected by the university. According to the article, an alumnus interviewing applicants for the University of Pennsylvania saw
his acceptance rate [fall] in the past five years. None of his recommended students made it in. The frustration was part of the reason he stopped donating to the school a few years ago, he said.
I will refrain from sharing here my thoughts on this donor's logic. Meanwhile, though, the University's web site describes the volunteer's role as "an exceptionally meaningful way" to remain involved with the school. So there's a conflict between the intended outcome (a meaningful way for the alumnus to be involved) and the actual outcome (a disgruntled alumnus publicly criticizing the university).
For several years I was an alumni interviewer for Brown University. As an experienced alumni professional and as an admissions volunteer, I have always been baffled (and frankly, irritated) by alumni who complained that they "didn't get anybody in this year."
The volunteer's job isn't to "get people in." It's to meet candidates and share their impressions with the admissions staff.
The Director of Admissions is the one who "gets people in."
[Alumni interviewing is not really an admissions function...]
A seldom-mentioned aspect of alumni interviewing is that in most cases it's not even an "admissions" function. Alumni admissions work is a volunteer opportunity first and foremost. It keeps alumni engaged with the school, without handing them enough responsibility to make the professional staff uneasy. The biggest risk is that it alienates people like the Penn alumnus quoted above, who think their job is to be an advocate for almost every would-be undergrad they meet.
As volunteer roles go, alumni admissions work has much to recommend it. But institutions should be transparent about just how much influence alumni will have in admission decisions. Failure to lower alumni expectations may contribute to the problem at institutions where alumni are complaining.
[Failure to lower alumni expectations may contribute to the problem...]
Alumni should see the admissions volunteer role as a way to meet smart, ambitious young people in their own community, and to help admissions professionals calibrate their definitive judgment about individual applicants.
Alumni and admissions staff members, for their part, should be honest about the relative importance of alumni interview reports and try to find other, more meaningful volunteer roles for alumni who think of the process as a contest whose goal is to "get kids in."
As mentioned recently, I surveyed the Twitter profiles of 150 alumni organizations that use (or have used) Twitter. I asked 10 questions about each profile, gathering information on links, photos, logos, account names and more. Then I drew on that information to generate 10 easy-to-replicate best practices.
The first part of the white paper reviews the ways that alumni organizations commonly configure their Twitter profiles. Those of you who just want to learn the best practices can start on page 7, where the 10 suggestions begin.
Note: This is not a survey of the content that is in the tweets – I'll look at that early next year. In the spirit of taking a narrow topic and exploring it in depth, this white paper looks only at the Twitter profile information.
I hope it helps you configure your organization's profile to be more effective. If you like it, click the "Tweet this White Paper" button on page 2 of the paper to tell your Twitter followers about it! (Do this from your individual account – your alumni probably won't care that much...)
Bonus: Twitter Profile Worksheet! (Score your profile to see where you can improve!)
As a fun (and fairly subjective) aid to self-improvement, I put together a simple Twitter Profile Worksheet[45kb PDF] for organizations to use. Download and print the PDF, then for each of the 10 best practices from the white paper, mark how your alumni office Twitter profile measures up. There are four levels for each practice. Yes/No choices, however, give you just two options. For example, you either have a URL in your Twitter profile, or you don't.
To find your score: Mark the number of times you selected each response, apply the multiplier and add the resulting scores to get your total.
A quick look at the practices where you scored "1"s and "2"s (i.e., the lowest scoring areas) will guide you to the quickest improvements.
Hope it helps – and if you feel like sharing your result, leave a comment telling us how you fared.
