Ideas, insights and inspirations.

Does anyone feel that the current crop of social media apps and tools resembles the produce section at your local supermarket? There are so many social media channels to choose from and just like fruit and vegetables, you need to choose the right ones for a delicious dish. Core social media platforms Facebook, Twitter and Google+ are the standard bearers and like the lettuce in a good salad. Some social media tools such as Instagram and Pinterest share the same premise but function with a different flavor and heat like all of those colorful peppers in a green grocer’s case. Have you ever noticed those weird shaped alien looking fruits and vegetables like Buddha’s Hand or Romanesco? They look really cool but you just can’t find a good use for them yet… sort of like the social media tool Chirp. Then there are various types of hybrid fruits like the the pluot (plum and apricot) and tangelo (tangerine and pomelo) … Continue reading

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In an earlier post on preserving session state for analytics sake, I described a challenging technical hurdle, and mentioned the importance of thinking outside the box when researching possible solutions. Recently, a similar challenge presented itself. We were moving a client’s blogs from their servers to ours, and they wanted to change the URL for one of them. Generally, this is not a problem. However, the blog in question had garnered a great deal of social proof (Facebook and LinkedIn shares), and those share counts would be lost with the URL switch. Since social proof is increasingly important in winning customers in the Digital Age, we needed to ensure that this didn’t happen. A cursory search said that this couldn’t be done, as social proof counts were all based on the domain name in the URL. Being creative problem-solvers, we refused to accept that. By reframing the problem, we found a way to alter the URL of the social share, based on the original post … Continue reading

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There is an old saying here in Pittsburgh: you can’t get there from here, which refers to the difficulty in getting around due to all of the rivers and streams in the area. I don’t think it’s said to be discouraging, as much as it is said out of laziness — directions tend to be a bit convoluted*. However, if there’s a will, there’s a way. In my prior work with a university, I was confronted with a technical challenge. How could they follow a prospective student’s path from their website, through an embedded third-party inquiry form, and back to the academic program landing page they started on, without losing session state? Oh, and they wanted to capture this in their usual Google Analytics dashboard. No pressure there. Conventional wisdom dictated that this was not possible; the student would be considered a third-party referral upon return from the form submission. I wasn’t convinced. After a bit of research, I found the solution … Continue reading

Although social media does not yet outrank traditional recruitment efforts like websites and viewbooks, you can’t argue the growing role that social media plays in the lives of today’s college applicants. A recent Pew survey found that of U.S. 13-17 year olds, 71% were active on Facebook, 52% on Instagram and 41% on Snapchat. Time suggests that prospects are researching their top picks on Instagram, just not in the way one might expect. Social media savvy prospective students are taking advantage of the uncensored hashtags and geo-tagging systems. Instead of following a schools official highly curated viewbook style Instagram account, prospects can gain a real look inside their dream schools by using hashtags and geo-filters to see photos posted by real students in real time. It’s clear that students want to see what’s really happening on campus when class is not in session. The challenge is to portray your college as a place that prospective students can see themselves attending … Continue reading

Have you noticed promoted pins showing up in your Pinterest feed? Last month, Krystal shared how Pinterest boards and pins are being utilized to their fullest to attract, reach and inspire (Pinterest and your Business). Pinterest is continuing to find ways to grow within their 100 million Pinner community.  They introduced a paid advertising feature called Promoted Pins. These are just like regular pins, only you pay to have them seen by more people. While this feature was initially launched last spring, it’s still in beta and only available to certain business account holders in the U.S. Below is a snapshot of how baby retailer Carter’s is utilizing promoted pins to push their Christmas clothes while a Pinner is looking for baby toy ideas for Christmas. How can you use Promoted Pins? A promoted pin is essentially a paid ad on Pinterest. You can geo-target by location, demographics and devices, to reach customers who are searching for or have shown an interest in … Continue reading

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It’s a community of more than 100 million people, and it’s changing the way consumers interact with businesses through social media. A visual bookmarking tool used to save and discover everything from vacation destinations and parenting tips to the latest fashion trends, Pinterest can help your business reach new audiences, connect with customers, contribute to SEO and even sell products. Fast facts about today’s Pinners (aka Pinterest users): 67% under the age of 40 70% save pins 83% would rather follow a notable brand than notable people $100,000 average annual household income Here are a few examples of some businesses that are using Pinterest to reach new customers and keep them coming back for more. 1. Knorr With upwards of 20,000 followers and nearly 30 boards for everything from “Date Night Recipes” to “Latin Inspired Recipes,” Knorr is showing Pinners how to get the most out of their quick and easy pasta side dishes. 2. The Home Depot With Nearly 340,000 followers, The … Continue reading

Most people draw a clear line between conventional marketing of products and services, and social marketing, which broadly defined applies marketing principles to change human behavior in order to improve health or benefit society. But what happens when you bring a social issue forward that almost nobody knows even exists — one that goes to the very heart of an American ideal as old as the Declaration of Independence. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal. True in countless respects, but not when it comes to gauging a child’s future academic success. Some children simply are born “gifted” or “talented” — and that wealth of talent spreads equally across all segments of the American population, regardless of race, religion, geography or family income. Researchers count about 3.4 million academically gifted American school children in grades K-12 who happen also to be poor. Here is where the story gets interesting. Year after year, grade after … Continue reading

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It’s simple. It’s about people, their stories and their relationships. It’s about compelling storytelling. It’s about telling stories with great photographs, great videos and intriguing ideas. If you follow these three guidelines with your social media, you will be very successful. Learn more about our social media marketing services.

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While your faculty and students may have taken the summer off from their college assignments, you know that the work of higher education brand building never ends.  Today, and every day, your college brand continues to do its daily work — on your website, social sites and across the continuum of digital and human conversation. As new and returning students unpack in residence halls and faculty reclaim their offices, it’s a good time of the year to ask: What can we do to renew our college brand for the 2014-2015 academic year? We offer five steps forward: 1. Begin investing in first impressions. That could mean redesigning an initial search mailing aimed at rising high school juniors, or rethinking training for new and returning student tour guides. First brand impressions hold great potential — but can also be overlooked. Given the number of campus visits that students (and parents) make, it’s worth preparing your student guides. Can they really translate … Continue reading

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According to Inside Higher Ed, “About two-thirds of high school students use social media to research colleges, and more than one-third of those students use social media to help decide where to enroll.” So why do colleges and universities post unsharable content to social channels that are designed for sharing? Posting the merits of your curriculum, class schedules and holiday wishes for your current students has a certain amount of utility. But is that content, which could easily be relegated to a page on the University’s main site, being shared with prospective students? Probably not. Social media is about people. People use it to post pics of themselves and friends. People use it to promote their righteous cause. People use it to find righteous causes to support. So it’s no wonder that posts about inspirational alumni, professors and community leaders get passed around much more than a post about summer scheduling. The University of Pittsburgh recently shared a tremendous story … Continue reading

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