measuring the effectiveness of interactive media
DESCRIPTION
A webinar presentation co-hosted by Dan Karleen and Paul Baker for Academic Impressions, April 2007.TRANSCRIPT
Measuring the Effectiveness of Interactive Media
Introductions
• Paul Baker, senior communicator, Wisconsin Center for Education Research, University of Wisconsin-Madison
• www.wcer.wisc.edu
• EducationPR blogwww.pbaker.wordpress.com
Introductions
• Dan Karleen, director of new media products at Peterson’shttp://www.petersons.com/
• Syndication for Higher Education bloghttp://syndicateblog.petersons.com/wordpress/
Overview
I. Overview of new media channels/ tools: examples, strengths, measurables, outcomes
II. Communication planning: setting goals in terms of key audiences, influence level desired, time ranges, best new media tools
III. Measurement tools: their uses, strengths, weaknesses
IV. Evaluating outputs, outtakes, outcomes
V. Discussion & Next Steps
I. Overview of new media
• We are seeing rapid changes in communication:Video, blogs, podcasts, news feeds (RSS), social networking and bookmarking, New Media press releases
• Students have grown up in the world of interactive media.
• Higher education institutions are adopting interactive media strategically to remain competitive.
Blogs
Blogs
• Strengths: transparency, immediacy, 2-way communication
• Measurables: # posts, comments, links, visits.
• Qualitative and quantitative (audience knowledge & behavior, attitudes & values)
• Goal: audience engagement
Podcasts
Podcasts
• Strengths: convenience of subscription, bypasses spam, personal appeal
• Measurables: # subscriptions, downloads• Quantitative • Goal: Audience knowledge and awareness
News feeds (RSS)
News feeds (RSS)
• Strengths: opt-in, bypasses spam, focused content
• Measurables: # subscribers• Quantitative• Goal: audience knowledge and awareness
Networking sites
Networking sites
• Strengths: internal email and messaging, images, videos, & sound, linking
• Measurables: # friends, profile views, comments
• Quantitative and qualitative (comments)
Wikis
Wikis
• Strengths: collaboration tool, internal messaging, linkable
• Measurables: More search/Google presence
• Goal: more audience knowledge and awareness
Bookmarking and tagging
Bookmarking and tagging
• Strengths: Linking, networking, new resources
• Measurables: # shared links, fans, subscriptions
• Quantitative and qualitative
Flickr
Flickr
Flickr
• Strengths: hot site, comments, votes, linking, groups
• Measurables: # views, favorites, comments
• Qualitative and quantitative• Goals: knowledge & awareness
New media press releases
New media press releases
• Strengths: links to RSS feed, del.icio.us, photos, video, audio, Technorati, Digg, customizable,
• Measurables: quantitative• Goals: public awareness and knowledge,
media calls, links
Q&A Break
II. Communication Planning as the Cornerstone
Principles
• Your online efforts should integrate into your broader effort communication. You should not think in terms of two separate and independent campaigns.
• Consider your institutional or departmental goals, and the strengths and weaknesses of current communication strategies.
Principles
• Set realistic goals for new media tools. Consider the audience(s) of interest to your institution or academic unit; the degree to which you wish to influence audience awareness or behavior; and in what time frame.
• Consider the strengths and weaknesses of each of the above new media comm channels.
Principles
• You may already have access to more baseline data than you might have thought, from campus marketing surveys, focus groups, interviews, media monitoring, etc.
• If your unit has no baseline data, talk with your campus marketing staff, survey professionals, news office, admissions office, alumni relations, development staff, government relations office.
Examples of measurable outcomes:
• “Boost the percentage of applications from national merit finalists by 15 points in the next year”
• “Increase the perception of our campus as ‘the high quality brand’ in our state by 15 percent over the next year.”
• “Reduce the percentage of students arrested for underage drinking by 20 percent over the next two years.”
Principles
• What decisions do we want to be able to make as a result of our evaluations?
• What kinds of indicators do we need?
Indicators
• Common indicators of reach: percent of target audience enrolled, percent of target audience aware of service, participation rate.
• Common indicators of reputation: number of favorable reviews or awards; number of community partnerships.
Example: Admissions
• Audience: Prospective students and their parents
• Measurables: More applications from high performing students
• Data source: long-term admissions stats• Comm channels: blogs, videos, web site,
Example: Public relations
• Audience: The news media, legislators, parents, other key audiences
• Measurables: Favorable perception, willingness to collaborate
• Data sources: surveys, focus groups, opinion polls, clipping library
• Comm channels: RSS, videoblogs, podcasts, YouTube,
Example: Government relations
• Audience: state legislators• Measurables: Amount of change in
awareness or visibility of an issue, key stakeholder groups engaged in an issue, legislation passed.
• Data sources: liaisons, lobbyists, legislative research bureaus, news clips
• Comm channels: web site, RSS, email
Q&A Break
III. Measurement tools for new media
• Overview, strengths, and weaknesses of each tool
Technorati
Technorati
• Strengths: almost immediate blog tracking, “buzz,” top searches, top tags
• Qualitative and quantitative• Weakness: limited to blogs
Google alerts
Google alerts
• Strengths: keyword and phrase tracking, very customizable, includes news media and discussion groups as well as blogs
• Quantitative and qualitative
Google Trends
Google Trends
• Strengths: Analyzes a portion of Google web searches to compute how many searches have been done for the terms you enter, relative to the total number of searches done on Google over time.
• Weaknesses: limited to Google News• Measurables: spikes in media coverage
Blog stats
Blog stats
Blog stats
Blog stats
• Strengths: # visits, post views and favorites, referrers, out-clicks
• Measurables: topics of most interest to your readers, both in views and in comments
• Goals: engage readers in dialog, boost search rankings
Flickr
Flickr
• Strengths: networking, comments, communities
• Measurables: # views, favorites• Weaknesses: More recreational than
scientific, but some qualitative and quantitative information
Feedburner
Feedburner
• Strengths: lots of kinds of stats• Weaknesses: just one of many measures
of RSS feed reach• Quantitative, not qualitative
Evaluating outcomes
Your communication evaluation should:• Clearly identify the evaluation criteria. • Map communication flaws as well as
appropriate practices.• Provide innovative responses for the
organization to improve its communication. • These criteria are generic but their
application to your organization will be unique.
Qualitative and quantitative outcomes
• Paul began blogging and podcasting to reach new audiences, increase awareness of WCER research, increase WCER’s web presence
• Cross promotes each comm channel• Podcast has subscribers and has received
favorable reviews
Qualitative and quantitative outcomes
• Blog has subscribers, inbound links, comments
• Wikipedia entries appear in Google searches
• WCER web site ranked higher in Google ranks
Outcomes
• More email newsletter subscription requests per month
• New professional contacts with education media and business
• Conference speaking engagements; WCER presence at more K-12 events
Drawback
• Caveat: this all takes time away from other responsibilities
• Maintaining a blog can take up to 20% of one’s time
Ball State U. student blogs
• Goal: to better portray campus life to prospective students and their parents
• Ball State asked 12 students to blog in fall 2005.
• Promoted the blogs with postcards mailed to high school seniors. A few months later the student blogs received more than 11,000 visits per day and resulted in press clips.
• To evaluate blogs’ effectiveness, staff interviewed prospects and parents during campus tours and summer orientation.
• “We have not tried to quantify our ROI but can say confidently that the value we have received has far outweighed our cost," says Ball State’s web content coordinator.
Q&A Break
Next steps
• Talk with your communications team about your overall communication strategy.
• Weigh the benefits and costs (mostly person-hours) of implementing some or all of the new media we have discussed today.
• Take advantage of existing baseline data
Contact us
• Paul BakerWisconsin Center for Education [email protected]
• Dan KarleenPeterson’[email protected]