Education Marketing

The idea in question is “Sponsored Conversations” – not my name but a name that is coming in from the process that we’ve been debating here for a year or two.

In essence a professional copywriter writes a blog and/or a series of emails for you, which promote your product.   The posts can be posted under your name, or an invented name, as the writer takes on any persona which seems to fit.

For example the writer could take on the persona of a teacher, or an adviser, or a writer on education, or anything else that fits the bill.

In one sense there’s nothing particularly new in this since the world of advertising has used actors, voice-overs and staged situations as a means of promoting since radio advertising first appeared in the US in the 1920s.

What’s interesting is that despite huge declines in advertising in America last year the there was a growth of over 20% in sponsored conversations as a form of advertising – and indeed it is from America that the phrase “sponsored conversation” comes.

In the UK I rather think Hamilton House is at the forefront of the move into this field.  We’ve been writing ”sponsored conversations” for a range of company blogs and emails for several years, and we also have our own such emails sent to subscribers to the service.  Here teachers who subscribe are mailed a straight news item each week, and on a separate day a sponsored conversation email focussing on a particular product.   (Details are on http://www.emails.gs/emailteachersdirect.html)

During the 18 months we’ve experimented with sending emails to schools via our personal and subscription list during the school holidays, at half price.

Everyone who uses our personal and subscription list during the holidays gets a statistical report showing the open rate and (more importantly) the number of people who click through from the email onto a web site.

While the numbers who do this during the holidays and half terms is lower than during the term time, as an average they still hold up very well.

This is almost certainly for two reasons.

First it is because most teachers who have either subscribed to one of our news services or who have their own personal email address within the school, are able to access their emails during the holidays from their own computer (via the school’s learning platform if need be).

Second it is because the amount of email reaching teachers during the holidays and half terms is much lower than during the term.

It is generally true that direct mail in the holidays and half terms doesn’t work nearly so well as mail delivered in the term time – simply because the mail has to be sorted by the administrator and then physically picked up by the teacher in school. But of course neither of these restraints apply to email that goes directly to the teacher’s personal email address.

As always we only send each teacher a maximum of one email a week – which greatly enhances the chances of the email being read.

If you would like to see our list of personal and subscription emails please click on http://www.emails.gs/PersPrefLists.html (for personal lists) and http://www.emails.gs/emailteachersdirect.html (for subscription lists). You will notice that we have higher numbers on the lists now, and a number of new lists available.

To make a booking please call my colleagues in the sales team on 01536 399 000 or email Sales@hamilton-house.com Normally speaking I also say “or email me” but on this occasion please don’t because I’ll be away for a few days myself, so your chance of taking one of the available slots won’t get through.

Tony

Following my earlier comments about education in N Ireland, here’s the latest on education in Wales.

The heart of their latest initiative is the School Effectiveness Framework which “contains all the elements necessary to achieve substantial reform in raising the bar and closing the gap in student learning and achievement. The major strength of SEF is that it mobilizes and supports the whole system, ie tri-level reform at the school, local and government levels, or what we call whole system reform. The key at the next stage is quality implementation.”

Education Minister Leighton Andrews said: “Our School Effectiveness Framework will drive change, reducing the gap in achievement; promoting social inclusion; ensuring learning professionals constantly share knowledge and ideas; while offering an engaging curriculum, forging closer links between schools and communities.”

There is now a new School Effectiveness Framework website [www.sefcymru.org]. The site is a central hub for schools and local authorities across Wales to learn more about the framework, allowing them to explore examples of good practice and add examples of their own good work.

Tony Attwood

Nick Gibb, the new man at the Dept for Education is proving a bit difficult to tie down.

He is keen on the notion of letting heads get on with running their schools the way they want, unhindered by meddling from central government. That’s good news for all of us who sell into schools.

But he also has STRONG ideas, such as

Blazers and ties, classes set strictly by ability, children standing up when the teacher enters… the traditional approach.

Even before I saw the comment, “An unreconstructed 1950s grammar school agenda” that is what I was thinking.  At the grammar school I attended in the 1960s we did all this stuff – which doesn’t mean it is wrong, I’m just interested to see how it will all fit in today

Gibb says he favours traditional methods simply because they work.

So, if you make materials that fit into the traditional approach, this would seem to be your moment.

In the first joint press conference, coalition leaders confirmed they would introduce a Great Repeal Bill, the scrapping of the ID card system, the National Identity register, the next generation of biometric passports and the ContactPoint database.

They will also outlaw the fingerprinting of children at school without parental permission, and give further regulation of CCTV, ending of storage of internet and email records without good reason.   However in reality the Data Protection Act already says just that.

There has been nothing said on the policy of planning to supply free laptops and broadband for  low-income families.

But there’s another 4 years and 350 odd days to go.

Tony Attwood

England’s education system is now to be run through a newly formulated Dept for Education. The old Dept of Children, Schools and Families is no more.

The situation in Wales and Scotland remains unchanged, since their education system runs through the national Assemblies.

But the situation in N Ireland is not so clear.

The key statement from the minister is at http://www.northernireland.gov.uk/news/news-de/news-de-april-2010/news-de-210410-education-minister-announces.htm and this is what you need to read if N Ireland represents a serious market for you.

The key point is that there is money for consumables, but none for new capital projects.

The Education & Library Boards which have run education in N Ireland for as long as I’ve been involved in education are still waiting to be replaced by a new central body – the Education and Skills Authority – which will make N Ireland education the equivalent to a single LA in England. But until this happens there is something of a hiatus, which makes it difficult to sell anything other than consumables.

Tony Attwood

Michael Gove is the new schools minister. He’s been the shadow secretary of state for children, schools and families since 2007 and is said to be the man who developed the policy through which parents and charities can set up their own schools free of local authority control.

From the non-political viewpoint of those of us who sell into schools, this could be good news. He’s been “doing” education for 3 years, and brought in a new idea. If the schools do go ahead, they will need ICT, books, carpets, light bulbs, awnings…

Mr Gove has stated that he is in favour of “traditional values in the classroom”. Among his views as set out in opposition are…

• Pupils should wear ties
  
• Ex-soldiers could impose discipline.
  
• Tougher teacher training with all teachers having a lower second degree or above.
  
• Education is about “introducing young people to the best that has been thought and written… The beauty of poetry and drama. The discoveries of science. They symmetry of mathematics. For me, it is awakening people to the glories to what humankind has been capable of producing over millennia.”
• Setting by ability
  
• Turning all schools that have been in special measures for a year into academies.
  
• Abandoning inspection of the best schools, unless parents complained or results fell.
  
• Not counting vocational qualifications in the league tables
  
• Reduction in the size of the DCSF
  

I was right on one score – the new government will go forward with the policy of giving extra money to schools with higher numbers of pupils from poorer backgrounds.

The Liberals pledged £2.5bn on top of the existing schools budget for this policy.

Hope that helps – although I don’t guarantee any of this will actually be implemented.

Tony Attwood

If you write promotional emails and send them out to customers and/or prospective customers, but then do no more with them, you are (in my humble opinion) missing a trick.

These self same emails can have a second use – they can go on your blog.

I have tried a number of experiments with blogs made up of nothing but emails, as well as blogs made up of postings on highly unlikely subjects, and in all cases increased readership results.

And where there are readers, there are potential sales.

These readers find the site through Google searches, google alerts and the like. And of course since all your past entries on a blog stay there over time your readership grows.

I’ve experimented with this in several ways, and these are the readership figures we are currently getting (these are individual readers per month)

www.blog.woolwicharsenal.co.uk 26,000 per month

A site that records the activities of a football club 100 years ago, with a few excursions into other historic periods. I think this is fairly obscure stuff, not least because no one has done anything remotely like this before but the readership is very constant.

www.blog.schools.co.uk 30,000 per month

Copies of the education adverts that Hamilton House sends out for customers by email.

www.dyscalculia.me.uk 5,000 per month

A very specialist site with a modest amount of information on relating to the special need of dyscalculia (the maths form of dyslexia). This site took various articles that we did, and put them together as a fixed site, so it does not grow.

These numbers show that readership can be found (none of the sites are promoted through any advertising) simply by putting information up. And as the blog.schools site shows, simply putting up advertisements can work. As the Woolwich Arsenal site shows, obscure items can also work.

If you would like to talk through how this is done, give me a call. If you would like us to put up a blog or web site for you, we can do this for minimal cost. There are details of the blogs on http://www.hamilton-house.com/blogs or call me on 01536 399 013.

Tony Attwood

The most commonly discussed element in marketing to schools is obviously the issue of selling to the teacher or other person in the school – writing the promotional material in a way that is appropriate for a teacher, and choosing who you should send to.  It’s the one bit that we tend to spend most time on.

But there are two other elements which must be taken into account if you are looking to have a complete picture of marketing.

The second element involves knowing what your competitors are doing.  By this I don’t mean having someone snooping around their offices, digging through the dustbins, hacking into the computers, and tapping the phone lines.  If you want to do that, I leave it up to you, and can offer no support.

What I mean is knowing…

a) what their current adverts look like

b) what benefits they are pushing (if any) and how they are answering the point “why you should buy this product from me?”.

c) what they are doing on line in terms of web sites and blogs.

All of this information is valuable because it allows you to differentiate yourselves from the competition, and makes it much easier for you to establish your presence in the market, so that people hear your company name and then say, “oh, you are the guys who…”

Fortunately, most firms don’t do this sort of research, just as most firms sell on announcements rather than benefits – which makes your life easier if you choose to do it.  You end up with information that your competitors don’t have about you.

The third element is knowing what is happening in the marketplace.  For example, knowing what the school budgets are like, if schools are trying to hold back on purchases, and so on, how the “rarely cover” arrangements are being implemented in primary schools, and so on.

Your business can have a downturn because you get your marketing wrong (the first element) or because one of your competitors gets his marketing right (the second element) or because there is a change in the marketplace.  If house sales go right down, your sales will go down.

I am not suggesting that you then act to change the economy (even I with my super human powers of marketing can’t do that) but it is vital to bring this element into sharp focus, so that you can adjust your marketing campaign to accommodate the market.

What some firms do is say, “there’s no point advertising now, the market is really flat”, while there are others who just ignore the market conditions, and keep going as before.

I think both approaches miss a trick, because it is often possible to use the market to your advantage even when it seems to be on its knees.

But you do have to be sure that you have reasonable information here.  You need to be talking on the phone to people – not trying to sell them things but instead asking them insightful questions about how their market is going, where they are finding opportunities and so on. It is interesting what people will tell you when you show a real interest in their companies and their businesses.

A good marketing campaign puts all these elements together – the way of reaching potential customers, the knowledge of what the competitors are up to, and research among customers and potential customers as to what is going on in the economy in relation to your area of interest.

I’m so certain these three elements are vital that we have put all three elements into the HHM Velocity package, so that our clients can create and disseminate the adverts as well as research the competition and the market place at the same time, all for one monthly fee.  There are details on www.velocity.ac – then click on “Education”.

Or call 01536 399 000, and ask for one of the Velocity team – we always like to chat.

Tony Attwood