Drop the Megaphone: Tools & Techniques for Omnichannel, Multilateral Communication

Prospective students, applicants, enrolled students and influencers are all awash in a flood of traditional and non-traditional education options, and they are all inundated by a torrent of advertising, recruitment and reminder messages, in print, outdoor, mass media, websites, social apps, and search results. Time is precious, attention is scarce, and patience for the traditional “firehose” of outbound communication has worn thin – at every stage of enrolment. What’s more, expectations have skyrocketed for personalized, interactive, on-demand information – in multiple channels – in response to natural language questions.

Across industry sectors, the worlds of web, social, phone and face-to-face sales, marketing and support are rapidly converging. In response, higher ed institutions have been deploying teams of social media, telephone and outreach ambassadors to engage current and potential students in two-way conversations. They’ve also been investing in sophisticated technologies to maintain contact databases, automate follow-up and communication touchpoints, predict applicant decisions and student needs, and provide 24/7 personalized answers, advice and guidance.

Many smaller institutions have focused on “high-touch” strategies to grow applications, improve conversion and heighten retention, by doubling down on personal attention, student ambassadors, in-person events, active social channels and carefully crafted communications. Larger institutions have deployed high-tech tools to transform marketing, recruitment and success initiatives at scale, including CRMs, AI chatbots, predictive analytics, virtual community platforms and personalized adaptive technologies.

Whether your preferred approach is high-touch or high-tech, and whether you work in marketing, recruitment, enrolment or student success, the goal of communication should be the same: engaging your stakeholders in responsive dialogue, delivering the information they want, in the way they want, at the time they want, and ultimately building a vibrant community based on affinity and multilateral interactions.

In this 3-hour interactive workshop, marketing strategist Ken Steele will outline the fundamentals of bidirectional communication and multilateral community-building, share world-class examples for PSE marketing, recruitment, conversion and retention, and prompt participants to share their own experiences and insights. You’ll have the opportunity to reflect on your current strengths and weaknesses, and come away with plenty of food for thought and bright ideas to consider.

Featuring:

Ken Steele

Higher Education Strategist,
Eduvation

Ken Steele is Canada’s best-known higher ed futurist, facilitator and consultant in branding, marketing and innovation. As a former Shakespeare scholar and instructor, technology consultant, marketer and entrepreneur, Ken brings a unique, wide-ranging perspective and divergent thinking to college and university strategic planning, marketing and enrolment management.

Worldwide, more than 30,000 higher ed professionals have come to know Ken as a definitive source of breaking news, bright ideas, strategic foresight, and thoughtful insight. He co-founded Canada’s largest PSE market research firm, created a leading daily news digest, and has written dozens of articles and white papers, and hundreds of research reports and environmental scans.

Ken monitors worldwide developments shaping the future of higher education in real time, writes a free daily newsletter (the Eduvation Insider), produces a video webcast (Ten with Ken), and convenes national roundtables of higher ed marketers. He sits on eCampus Ontario’s Virtual Learning Advisory Committee, and has consulted with hundreds of colleges and universities – from New England to New Zealand – helping them interpret market research, understand their competitive context, distill their institutional “Brand Chemistry,” and nurture a culture of innovation across campus.

If you haven’t heard Ken speak before, take a look at his introduction video here.

Integrating DEI Into Your Daily Actions & Larger Initiatives

You’ve heard, read, and learned a lot about diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) recently. But do you feel confident and equipped to implement DEI in your daily work? Do you know how to effectively integrate DEI in your projects and practices?

For diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives to be successful they require organizational and individual commitment, cultural change, and time. DEI is a process, not a destination and evidence shows that workplaces that genuinely embrace DEI foster increased productivity and innovation as well as higher levels of meaningful engagement by employees and stakeholders.

To this end, most post-secondary institutions have invested in DEI training and education over the past few years. We have learned about unconscious bias, discrimination, microaggressions, intersectionality, and a whole host of ‘isms.’ Now we are at the point where we need to purposefully integrate this knowledge into the daily actions that form our work. Each individual in an organization has a responsibility in moving the needle forward on cultural change.

In the first half of this 3-hour interactive workshop, you will learn how to practice inclusive leadership regardless of whether you are in a formal leadership role. Inclusive leaders at all levels of an organization are the catalyst to sustainable change.

In the second half of this workshop, you will learn how to apply a framework to create and review policies, programs, services, and practices using a DEI lens. Using this framework, you will be able to ensure the work you produce is culturally relevant, considers a wide range of perspectives, and is fundamentally based on justice and inclusion.

Featuring:

Blessie Mathew

Director, Career Centre and Experiential Learning,
University of Alberta

As Director of the University of Alberta Career Centre and Experiential Learning Blessie Mathew’s portfolio also includes the Undergraduate Research Initiative (URI), and Women in Scholarship, Engineering, Science, and Technology (WISEST). Each unit connects broadly in their goal to support students, postdoctoral scholars, and alumni in engaging in career development and experiential learning activities that help them build the skills, knowledge, experience, and connections they need to progress in their careers resourcefully, and with hope and resilience. With over 25 years of experience in student affairs and DEI work, Blessie is committed to and engaged in the daily work of equity, diversity, and inclusion--if any one of us is oppressed it means all of us are oppressed.