a shifting paradigm

Copyright 2010 Market Data Retrieval

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MDR’s Free Webinar Series

July 15, 2010

A Shifting Paradigm:The Growing Role of

Social Media in Education Marketing


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MDR’s Free Webinar Series

• Focused on helping our customers stay on top of opportunities and changes in the market.

• Copy of the slides and a recording of the session will be sent to you tomorrow.

• You can submit a question at any time using the Q & A button in the lower right corner of the screen.


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Today’s Agenda

• Discussion of how to add social media to your marketing programs and turn your customers into your best advocates

• The latest advice and examples of how other organizations in the education market are successfully using social media to engage with customers to build brand and reputation

• Insight into how education businesses are measuring their efforts


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Sandy FivecoatCEO and FounderWeAreTeachers

• Sandy Fivecoat is the founder and CEO of WeAreTeachers, a social and business network for teachers, schools, associations, and education marketers designed to enable members to share, connect, and collaborate. WeAreTeachers provides both a platform and Social Media Optimization services to marketers in the education sector.

• Ms. Fivecoat is an established and respected executive coach, having spent the past three years managing Fivecoat and Associates, a consulting firm whose client list includes Dell and Standard & Poors, and education technology firms.

• Ms. Fivecoat's previous industry experience includes Senior Vice President of Sales for Lightspan, Inc., and Area Director of public sector sales for Apple Computer. Prior to her work in the private sector, she held numerous positions in education, including policy leader as the first director of education technology for the state of Texas.

• Ms. Fivecoat has been a teacher, administrator, and university researcher. She is a graduate of the University of Texas at Austin, from which she holds both master’s and bachelor’s (cum laude) degrees in mathematics and computer science education.


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Lee WilsonPresident and CEO

PCI Education

• Lee Wilson is President and CEO of PCI Education, a leading publisher of supplemental education products for students with special needs and learning differences. He has more than 20 years of experience in the K-12 sector. Prior to joining PCI, Wilson operated Headway Strategies, an Austin-based education consulting firm. He has held leadership positions in marketing and sales at Harcourt Achieve, Pearson Learning Group, K12Planet.com at Chancery Software and spent seven years at Apple Computer.

• Lee is an active participant in the K-12 education industry, which he writes about at The Education Business Blog, the number one blog about educational publishing. In addition,Wilson serves on the Board of The Association of Educational Publishers and is a former member of the Education Division Board for the Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA). He has researched and written many articles and reports, most recently "Best Practices for Using Games & Simulations in the Classroom: Guidelines for K-12 Educators," published by SIIA in January 2009.

• He earned a master of business administration degree from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and a bachelor’s degree in history and political science from Princeton University.


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Take Our Poll!

Q:

Does your organization have a corporate twitter account?


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Three Case Studies

• Traditional supplemental catalog publisher, declining catalog sales, tough supplemental market

• Major technology provider, needed a closer solution, focused relationship with classroom teachers

• Very large consumer and school tech company, wanted broader advocacy among teachers, and a way to improve open rate for email campaigns


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Significant Shifts in Online Behavior, Consumer Expectation…

• YouTube is the second largest search engine in the world.• 78% of consumers trust peer recommendation; 14% trust

advertisements.• 30% of Americans engage actively through social media

with companies.• 93% of Americans believe a company should have a social

media presence.• 56% of American consumers feel a stronger connection

with and better service from those companies that engage using social media.


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Marketing Evolution

• Social Media layered onto traditional practice• Interruption versus Permission marketing• “Drip” versus “Dump”• Social influence marketing versus traditional lead

generation• Engagement as emotional, as well as intellectual• Participation over time versus all at once• A conversation not a monologue


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“Engagement” Defined“Engagement is creating the heightened state where a customer connects with a brand through a true experience related to shared core values. It is reciprocated by the customer and is a long‐term connection that must be nurtured over time.”

From Junta 42, 2010


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“Engagement” De-Constructed• Heightened State – A reason to engage (contest, call

to action, best practice sharing, participation chain)• Where and When – Relevant, purposeful, timely, easy• Connect With Brand – Thought leadership, product

quality, need fulfillment• Shared Core Values – Emotional, positive impacts,

respect for educators and students, sense of giving back, cause

• Reciprocated by Customer – Content and products worth sharing, a reason to participate, support of professionalism

• Long Term – Continuous support versus “drop selling,”asking for input, addressing problems over time, evidence of listening versus just focus groups


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Reputation MATTERS…YOU, Your Company, Your

Customers


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Q:

Do you have a corporate blog?

Take Our Poll!


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Why Avoid Social Media?

• They might say bad things about us?• We can’t control the conversation.• We have tight brand guidelines.• ROI is impossible to measure.• The volume is too small to bother with.

• Guess what? You never did have control.• They are already saying bad things; you are

just not hearing it.• Metrics exist, but they require a paradigm

shift.


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• “Stick to your knitting.”• Don’t abandon traditional marketing, BUT do

adjust and re-allocate resources.• “Build it and they will come” does not work.• Build a HOME FIELD and AWAY GAME strategy

(website home base versus outposts).

Aligning Social Media to Your Business


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From Brand Awareness to Brand Advocacy

From Junta 42, 2010


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Brand Advocacy

• Customers become partners.• Don’t try to control the conversation• Make sure User Generated Content (UGC) is

EASY to develop.• Give UGC a long shelf life.• Distribute, syndicate content—even AWAY from

your site! • 1/9/90 rule• Video is very viral, but hard to create. • Build a website for CUSTOMERS, not for

ADVERTISING.


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How Do You Fill the Rain Barrel?

• In buckets – monsoon style• In teaspoons – mist style


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Measuring Results and ROI

• WEAKER Measurements– Page views– Views/visits– Number of comments

• STRONGER Measurements– Actionable clicks over page views– Prospects and conversions over comments– Blog sentiment ranking– Keyword rankings– Email marketing open rates– Ever more granular, informed email campaigns– Participation Chain metrics– Amount of UGC with your brand– Shelf life and relevance of UGC– Level of distribution, syndication of UGC


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What Does This Mean?

• Goal – 600 Leads• Dump – Traditional Marketing

– 60,000 Pieces direct mail: 1% response– Major trade show: $30,000-$50,000

• Drip – Social Media– 10 Online opt-ins a day over 60 days


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Advice for Measuring and ROI

• Social Media is NOT advertising, so requires different measurements.

• BLOGGING is a necessary part of your brand strategy.

• Direct Marketing is still essential; social media provides a reason and longer shelf life for DM.

• Measure the “drip,” not the “flood.”• Above all—pay attention. 2010 is the year of

metrics in social media.


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Q:

Does your organization have a resource who spends 50% or more time on social media?

Take Our Poll!


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Case Studies• PCI

– Catalog/Web Integration– Blog/Twitter– Microgrant– Morgan’s Wonderland – Opportunity

• Dell– Teacher-created lesson plan repository– Local PR and success stories– Teacher-bloggers for EDU4U site

• Leapfrog– Contest to find more teacher advocates– Product seeding– Dramatic improvements in open rates when email was

tied to a social media campaign


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Where You Might Want to Be…(Chris Brogan’s List*)

• Wordpress.com• Flickr.com• Gmail.com (Google Accounts)• Yahoo.com• Discus.com• Delicious.com• Twitter.com• Facebook.com• Openid.org• Brightkite.com• WeAreTeachers.com• EdWeb• Curriki

*About Chris Brogan: http://www.chrisbrogan.com/about/.


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Other Tools to Consider• Tubemogul (help get videos watched)

• TweetDeck (manage multiple feeds)

• coTweet.com (manage Twitter activity, follow up, etc.)

• Bit.ly (shorten, track, share links)

• Twitalyzer (measure influence, signal, generosity, velocity, clout)

• ReTweetRank (measure-tweets)

• Twitter.grader.com (grade twitter influence)

• Klout (measures influence on social topics)

• Hashtags.org (find categories of conversations)

• Twubs (organizes content by hash tags)

• Tagal.us (dictionary of hash tags)

• Twitterfall (helps track trends and discussions)

Something interesting to watch on YouTube:Social Media Revolution 2

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lFZ0z5Fm-Ng


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Q & A

Sandy FivecoatCEO and FounderWeAreTeachers

[email protected]/sandy5coat

twitter.com/weareteachers

Lee WilsonPresident and CEO

PCI Education [email protected]

www.educationbusinessblog.comtwitter.com/pcieducation

MDR is the education market’s first choice for sales, e-marketing, direct marketing, social media, and research solutions. Powered by the most complete, current, and accurate databases available in the industry, MDR can help you grow in the K-12, higher education, library, early childhood, and related education markets.

To learn more about MDR’s sales, e-marketing, telesales, and direct marketing solutions, call us at 800-333-8802 or visit www.schooldata.com.

a shifting paradigm

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