What Marketing Pieces HAve Been Most Successful

Parents Forum
21

<p>Positive impressions made at Brandeis by well run admissions office on day we visited, very well done presentation -- to the point, right level of information, having answers to questions, never letting annoying parents or students get the discussion off track, and a very insightful, enthusiastic interviewer who introduced himself to me -- the whole thing seemed professional, yet not oversell.</p>

<p>Bad impression at Tufts -- presentation was meandering, repetitive, crowded and felt assembly line. Perhaps that is not the fault of Tufts, but of our timing in the year... but if you are going to do a presentation in a large lecture hall you need to plan on a more powerful speaker or more visual aids! We also found the folks in the admissions office to be grouchy. When we got there, all the chairs were taken, I was still recovering from major surgery, I asked very nicely if there was somewhere else I could wait and they could barely look up. (He didn't apply.)</p>

<p>Skidmore we had mixed responses to. The presentation was overly personalized to the presenter; he told us more about himself in relation to Skidmore than the hard facts about the school. We liked a lot of the material they sent us -- it was quirky and interesting, in some ways it was like Chicago's, but artsier.</p>

<p>MIT's website (he wound up not applying) was elegant -- what all websites should aspire to. Simple, clear, direct and the simplist of many to use. (In contrast, some of the state schools were bears!)</p>

<p>My son noted that U. Rochester was the only school to give him a T shirt after he interviewed!</p>

<p>Northeastern had wonderful marketing... and they threw money at us... so we are going up again to see what we think separate from the marketing!</p>

<p>Our biggest laugh was over a pamphlet from Lehigh after we visited... Lehigh was our first visit and a terrible match for my son... I wasn't going on the tours with him, we would compare notes after... and the first thing we commented on was that we had BOTH counted how many students were wearing the exact same brown Lehigh sweatshirt (which he found too conforming for him; others would love the school spirit!) So we get the booklet.... and right on the cover is a large group of students with the same haircuts and the same... brown sweatshirts! That clinched the no application for him! (So, actually, it was GOOD marketing, in that it helped applicants see if the school felt like a good match!)</p>

<p>S</p>

22

<p>The MIT website is not slick! There is nothing creative about it--you'd think they didn't even have a Media Lab for chrissakes. My computer animation guy wouldn't even look at MIT after that website. Opened the homepage and said "Forget it." </p>

<p>Check out the RISD website, the Brown website, the SCIARC website, Escape Studios website, the Architectural Association website (live podcast on home page, pretty darn cool), Tisch School of Arts, Yale School of Arts (buggy though), and USC School of cinema and Television.</p>

<p>Those are slick websites. I reckon that 95% of the universities are operating twenty years behind the times with their websites. They a re still focused on brochures and snail mail for customers who send 1000 texts a month, operate one or more web pages on their social lives for heck's sake, buy all their kit off of craigslist, check Youtube every day for the funniest clips, download mucis fromthe last 40 years like they just discovered it and live in cyber space like it's no biggie! Heck, my 18 year old hired animators, composers and graphic designers from all over the world--from his forums. He pays them from Paypal. It's his fluid life.</p>

<p>I'd tell those marketing geniuses to snap out of their 1990 stupor and get with the cyber reality!</p>

23

<p>It is a matter of opinion I think re the MIT website: note the use of the adjectives "slick" vs. "elegant." As a matter of personal taste, my son and I were very impressed by how CLEAN and intuitive the MIT site was. </p>

<p>Again, one is not necessarily better than the other... I was an early user of Google and people used to wander by my computer to make fun of me... the same folks who liked to add animated smileys to every "me too" email. Thank goodness for divergence of taste, or the world would be quite boring! </p>

<p>And, while I have the most uncluttered electronic desktop in my office, I have the messiest material world one... </p>

<p>But we are in agreement that most of our kids are way ahead of the college admins in terms of the wired world...</p>

24

<p>What type of content made me think "Wow!" ?
The financial aid supplement sent out by Princeton, that showed average grant figures for students with family incomes upwards of $150,000 and even $200,000.... Extremely generous - I was shocked.</p>

<p>The opposite -- mailings that ranked high on the Crappy-ometer--
Can't remember the specific schools, but there were several who sent flashy brochures that seemed to have a dumbed-down, "cool" slant.</p>

25

<p>I agree with lspf -- dumbed down brochures featuring co-ed intramurals and kids digging in Inca ruins were the kiss of death in our household. A few marketing materials were favorably viewed, but only if they confirmed what was learned during campus visits. Catalogs were useful, but only a few colleges provided them.</p>

26

<p>Must agree that Harvey Mudd was memorable (though not on the list at our hosue for the current child). Just about anything that included a bit more substance was more likely to hang around and get put into the college file. After a certain point in the process, the brief personal notes added to letters made a huge impact.</p>

<p>Worst piece we got was a Swarthmore DVD, which I don't even remember why we watched. I think child was modestly interested at one point until we saw that film - OMG!! Absolutely would NOT have stepped foot on that campus after seeing 10 minutes of that.</p>

<p>Personally, I'm just glad to be able to clear out the file and take a breather before starting again with child 3 (though even he has started to get bits and pieces of camouflaged scholarship "scammish" type mail).</p>

27

<p>I wouldn't call it successful marketing, but my D did receive an interesting college brochure. The cover page included her picture along with 3 other students who participated in a summer program. They used that brochure and also included the same picture on the webpage for about a year. My D was about ready to ask for royalties. My D was accepted but enrolled at another college.</p>

28

<p>In May my son will be graduating from a school that never sent him a single letter, brochure, pamphlet, baseball cap, school paraphernalia or a phone call with a scholarship offer. Johns Hopkins also had the worst web site of any major university. He didn't even visit the school before accepting an offer of admission. JHU did it the old fashion way -- they offered him an excellent academic program in the major he was interested in.</p>

29

<p>I found the interviews to be very useful as well. Although they vary as do most other things, they gave me a much better impression/reinforced existing impressions of a college as compared to the sites and marketing materials.</p>

30

<p>Venado, JHU has changed over the years. They now send admitted students a bumper sticker.</p>

31

<p>It is always easier to write about the worst rather than the best: My oldest daughter is a very bright and activist young woman, she is now doing human rights work in Guatemala.
She received an expensive, full-color brochure from the University of Southern California that had a list of the ten best campus make-out spots. We laughed and wondered who had that particular criteria at the top of their list.</p>

32

<p>My kids always like a good tour. Some schools don't so much as take you inside a building. Others give you a great sense of the school, allowing prospective students to peek into the athletic facilities, the library, dining hall, the student center and a typical dorm room.</p>

33

<p>One of the Ivies encourages prospies to sit in on classes. I shoved S2 in one, saying "Go on! It's probably the only chance you'll get to sit in an Iny classroom!" Due to jet lag, I thought he might sleep therough the 9 am 90 minute class--but he came out and he was on fire. He made a bee line to the bookstore to buy the textbooks and he dove into them and didn't re-emerge for several days.</p>

<p>No matter what the outcome of his app--that was the ultimate marketing experience I've seen. I will always be greatful to that professor and the school for allowing him that glimpse. It absolutely confirmed his major, for one thing.</p>

34

<p>edad,</p>

<p>Yes, I remember the bumper sticker which he got after he was accepted.</p>

35

<p>dogwood23--I had the exact same reaction to the Swarthmore DVD! I was seriously considering it until I watched it...and into the trash it went. Hehe, all my friends liked it though.</p>

36

<p>icubyte - was that just coincidental or some bizarre marketing ploy? Yikes!</p>

37

<p>edad, Eeek. I can't imagine seeing my DD's face on a marketing brochure for someplace she didn't even attend.</p>

<p>DD1 and I attended two colleges on consecutive days. </p>

<p>Denison rolled out the welcome mat, had major breakfast refreshments, recordings playing of their music groups, tours of all the buildings, coupon for a free gimme (water bottle or whatever). Nice sunny day, too. </p>

<p>Kenyon was more "quaint". Tea and coffee for refreshments, quiet environment, no gimmes, raining cats and dogs. We left when we were en route to the dining hall on the opposite side of campus (the near one was being reworked).</p>

<p>DD1 also looked at web sites. If she couldn't find her way through them that college fell off the heap. There were still plenty left to look through.</p>

38

<p>I agree that Harvey Mudd's mail was quite eye-catching, but if everyone's stuff looked like that, it would lose its unique quality. I especially liked the one that said "JUNK MAIL" across the front -- I kept it for a while, I believe.</p>

<p>Quite honestly, I completely ignored the one-page letters from colleges. I read a few of them, but they were mostly filled with compliments to my "hard work" and "progress," as well as encouragement to consider their university. The letters had no information about the college whatsoever, so I ended up tossing them.</p>

<p>It is very useful when universities provide a list of offered majors, a range of SAT/ACT scores for accepted students, and other statistical information about their current freshman class. This makes it easy to see if it is a good academic fit or not, without having to spend too much time searching through a website.</p>

<p>Also, every college should make sure that the information they've given to college search sites (such as collegeboard.com and princetonreview.com) is completely accurate. These websites enabled me to find the schools I'd never heard of before, but ended up being good fits.</p>

39

<p>WRT printed materials, my son liked Carleton's postcards and the little things Reed sent him. He really loves getting course catalogs, which we call "college p<em>rn</em>". What he didn't like were overly glossy, "slick" prospectus guides -- Oberlin springs to mind. Their "FEARLESS" campaign really turned him off. </p>

<p>Other standouts: Chicago's "Life of the Mind" book, Swarthmore's tiny little essay booklet, "The Usefulness of Uselessness", the Carleton brochures that were mostly white on the cover. Virtual communites, especially the Reed LJ community, and to some extent, Chicago's application blog. </p>

<p>Turnoffs: Anything that was predominately pictures with no comments. Son felt that schools that sent picture-only brochures didn't have anything to say to him, and he didn't expect to pick a school based on pictures. (The worst example of this is an art school that sent my younger daughter a 400 page tome that was less than one sentence per page, just a few words that over 3-4 pages made up a sentence. It was just one page of pictures after another, and no, there wasn't a section in the back with more information.)</p>

<p>Son also didn't like schools that sent something almost every day, or spammed him with "Why haven't you applied?" email, like Arizona State or things like that.</p>

40

<p>joe-- having shopped many many colleges recently, hopefully #1 son soon done, D on deck, I'd say the single best marketing piece I saw anywhere was the Skidmore "Creativity" campaign. Having visit-fatigue, all we really wanted to know was how a particular school was different....they all claim great food, strong semester abroad, etc...the differentiators are very blurred. Skidmore does a great job expousing their creativity theme in every mailer, during the campus visit, everywhere. I was very impressed how well this simple message helped clarify my S's opinion, & mine....relative to many other LACs we visited. I'd say this marketing theme approach would be less needed for reknowned schools like MIT, the Ivies, etc....but very effective IMO for a less-known small school looking to quickly build an identity with their customers. Of course, in order to design such a campaign, the theme has to be simple AND accurate....took some soul-searching to figure out a theme (or school character) worth advertising I'd guess.</p>