University Business - October 2008 - (Page 55)

INTERNET TECHNOLOGY It’s the Community, Stupid! A seven-step plan to raise and nurture any community online By Karine Joly B LOGS, WIKIS, PODCASTS, videocasts, YouTube, MySpace, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and more have made their way into the world of higher education. Whether you work in admissions, communications, marketing, PR, student services, advancement, alumni relations, web services, or information technology, it’s impossible to ignore these dynamic new technologies. Yet it’s easy to get blindsided and miss that it’s really not about the technology but the community. While we can’t predict today what the next Facebook or YouTube will be, we can get ready for the online communities of tomorrow. It might take a village to raise a child, but what does it take to jumpstart and nurture a thriving online community? A bit of luck, a lot of work, and this seven-step plan I developed for the closing keynote speech I gave in July at the eduWEB conference in Atlantic City, N.J. 1. Don’t think you know what your institution can do for your community members. Ask them what they want. It’s very easy to think that we know exactly what our target audiences want based on our professional expertise, personal experience, or simple hunches. However, this is not always the case. at’s why it’s very important to poll the members of your targeted community, whether they are high school seniors, current students, graduates, young alums, or donors. Find out about their needs, their expectations, and their preferences straight from the source before starting any social initiative. Favor an online survey over focus groups, since your resulting initiatives will let this step last months. e web is a very dynamic and reactive space, so early movers always get an advantage. 3. Be unique (and irresistible) by providing exclusive content to your community. Let’s be realistic. Your constituents live busy lives—oﬄine and online. With so many online social spaces at their ﬁngertips, they need for your institution to oﬀer something really special to get and keep their attention. Providing the opportunity to network with peers and friends won’t cut it, especially if you choose to set up your own private platform. Facebook, MySpace, and LinkedIn, the three major players in online social networking, are already providing this kind of service to millions of users. Don’t waste your time (and your institution’s money) trying to compete with the big guys on their turf. Instead, diﬀerentiate your online community initiatives by providing exclusive content designed to ﬁll the needs of your target audiences. If you can oﬀer exclusive access to information and resources your community members won’t ﬁnd (at least not easily) at the social networking malls of the web, you will increase your chances to have them visit your own little social workshop. What kind of exclusive content should you oﬀer? For prospective or admitted Karine Joly is the web editor behind www .collegewebeditor.com, a blog about higher ed web marketing, public relations, and technologies. She is also a web editor for an East Coast liberal arts college and a consultant on web projects for other institutions. In today’s crowded social web, it’s all about engagement and speed. be implemented on the web. Ask what you can do for your constituents, in order to make sure you fulﬁll a need and don’t add to the communication overload. 2. Ask yourself, what do we expect from this relationship? What is the core mission of web, marketing, communication, and PR professionals working in higher education? When you start to think about it, the answer is really simple: You are all in the relationship-building business. Every day, you are trying to do your best to build long-lasting relationships with the constituents of your institution. Consequently, you should identify and deﬁne your goals for your interactions with the community. At this early stage, spend some time spelling out quantiﬁable goals: more inquiries, more applications, better yield, better buzz, more donations, etc. A few weeks, at the most, should be enough to come up with these goals that will help you measure the success of your social initiatives. Don’t universitybusiness.com October 2008 | 55 http://www.collegewebeditor.com http://www.collegewebeditor.com http://www.universitybusiness.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of University Business - October 2008

University Business - October 2008
Contents
Editor's Note
College Index
Company Index
Advisory Board
Behind the News
Viewpoint
Admissions
Future Shock
On the Hill
The Changing Chaplaincy
Stop, Thief!
Chief Business Officers Speak Out
Independent Outlook
Internet Technology
What's New
End Note

University Business - October 2008