So watch this video.  And think about how this marketing approach applies to higher ed. Excercise a little patience and sit through the first 3 minutes.  Many of you will know this guy from 37signals and Basecamp.     

I bookmarked this video several days ago and I’ve been thinking about it ever since.  So often in higher ed we try to dance around strategizing, branding, and placing ads that say “we’re great”, …when all we really need to do is tap into our core strength: teaching.

Some people advertise, then sell.
Some people market, then sell.
Some people TEACH, then sell.

I know I know, this stuff is obvious.  The concept goes hand in hand with all the University Youtube channels springing up packed with lecture highlights and faculty interviews.  But it could go beyond that. 

We all know what the typical tv spot for a University looks like:

1. Smooth voiceover guy: The university of “insert name here”
2. transition so some statement obout the mission of the campus in the community
3. cut to excruciatingly coregraphed scene of students interacting in a research environment or campus beauty setting.
4. spend 12 seconds spouting facts and figures.
5. close with the logo/voiceover guy and tagline. 

Why not devote an entire commercial to a faculty member?  Spend 20 seconds on what you might call a “teachable moment”.   Develop a series of those commercials in the style of OnBeing.

If I were a marketing person,  and weren’t a pixel-pushing-html guy, that’s what I’d do with MY advertising budget.  There’s an institution out there already doing this.  I’m sure of it.

I keep getting emails from eSchool News.  And by emails I mean SPAM.  Here’s a case study in HOW NOT to treat somebody who previously (naively) signed up for your newsletter.

At his point I’m am morbidly curious to see how many times they’ll roll me thru the sequence of warnings.  I would have been fine with just continuing to receive the standard newsletter.  But they’d prefer to SPAM me with hollow deactivation messages. Twelve and counting!

You’re a newsletter focusing on academic technology. Take some lessons in email etiquette.

I’d never been the recipient of a major web-traffic surge until a few months ago, and I’ve been meaning to write about how it went down.

First off, my little blog here is silly.  Collegewebguy.com is never going to be something I attempt to “monetize” or put text ads on.  The returns I expect from this blog are limited to the arena of professional development.  I’m pleased and flattered when people react, comment, or share.  And I’m humbled that a handful of people actually subscribe to the feed.  So any kind of strange surge in traffic was out of place.  Strange in fact.

Back in April, I posted a few dozen screenshots of espn’s “E-ticket” web features and wrote incoherently about how they’ve done a great job of introducing feature-styled magazine writing to the web.  Basically the point I was making was that many designers get discouraged before they realize full possibilities of this medium.

Over a span of two or three days, the post got deluged with comments.  (Yes, 14 comments is a deluge, by collegewebguy standards.  shut up.)

Curious about traffic, I checked google analytics and there it was. 18,519 pageviews on that post over the course of 16 days.  It looked like an earthquake readout on a seismograph.  Web surfers love design eye-candy. (ie smashing magazine)  I’d predict at least 15,000 of those visitors didn’t read any of the post and just scrolled through the lovely screenshots, as many of the commenters assumed I was the designer.

But, I was immediately curious about where the traffic originated.  Did a popular blog link to my post?  Was it referenced in some kind of popular messageboard thread?

Of course with google analytics, the answer was a click away:

A little more investigation revealed who initially tagged my post on stumbleupon.  And now we’ve come full circle, with Mr EduGuru himself, Kyle James.

So Kyle James tags my post and kicks off an avalanche of attention for my little website.  I’d like to hypothesize that Kyle is some kind of heavy hitter, a trendsetter, a StumbleUpon VIP.  He tags something and has thousands of followers who in turn, also tag it, visit it, promote it, etc.

But this hypothesis isn’t completely true.  Maybe one of Kyle’s followers on StumbleUpon is the big hitter.  Or a follower of a follower.  In any case, social media makes it easier for people who hold a particular shared interest to unite, and share.  It’s really empowering to think that something I posted appealed to a particular subset of people(web design internet nerds), and they told each other about it.

In conclusion / Lessons Learned

1.  StumbleUpon can pick your site up and take it for a ride. The same can certainly be said for Digg, Delicious, and others. These forms of social media can bring a huge boost in traffic, if, you post something deemed interesting and if, the right person picks it up and shares it.

2.  Apparently the formula for increased internet traffic is to send a link to Kyle James, or hope he reads your blog and “discovers” you.

3.  A question. Let’s say a public university with a regional outlook is mainly focused on communicating with prospective students within a 200 mile radius.  What good does a major spike in web traffic through social media accomplish, if the visitors are coming from all over the world?  In traditional terms, isn’t that similar to getting a press release on an international wire, when perhaps all you want is local media attention?

I would assume that social media which localizes attention to specific geographic areas is what most universities need, or can directly benefit from.  ..Just something I’ve been thinking about.  If you have any thoughts.  Please share.

So tonight I’m enamored by a new found video podcast from the Washington Post. They call call it “On Being”

Particularly interesting is the post production of these videos.  Subjects are obviously interviewed in front of a white background, and they are attentive to capturing great sound.  But the camera angles.  Wow. The camera angles keep you interested.  So many takeaways here.  This is superb storytelling.

Jennifer Crandall (from the quote at the beginning of my last post) is credited with performing the interviews AND editing the video.  I’ve done a bit of googling. New York Magazine interviewed her specifically about the OnBeing project.  A great short read.

I liked the idea of telling other people’s stories. I know that sounds cliché. Basically, I thought this would be the most direct way of doing it.

…I try to make them as comfortable as possible. When I’m interviewing them there’s no one else in the room—unless I’m interviewing a kid, in which case their parents are always welcome. It’s important for me to come across as sincere as possible, and to let them know I have great interest in what they have to say. Eventually, they warm up.

“I don’t like to focus on the technical aspect of anything,” says video journalist Jenn Crandall “I like to overcome it so that I can just focus on the aesthetic aspect.”

Here are the tools that let her and her colleagues at washingtonpost.com do just that…

Very strange coincidence.  This very afternoon I was appreciating the quality of the multimedia/podcast offerings of the Washington Post. Only yesterday by searching for “slideshows” on itunes did I come across the Photo Stories podcast.  I wondered what it must be like to work there.  The multimedia approach to storytelling, the tools, the mentality.

Wonder no more.  Just a few hours later a new feed reader link pops up from my delicious network, and amazingly it’s an Apple Video Profile of WashingtonPost.com.  Watch the video.  It’s pretty good.

washingtonpost.com is a leading online news destination and an innovator in the online news experience. Its eight million readers are active and engaged web users who come to washingtonpost.com for more than just the latest headlines. They look for — and take advantage of — the latest in cutting-edge web technologies. World-class reporting and award-winning content remain at the heart of washingtonpost.com. It also provides the latest in online tools, enabling its readers to be more than just passive receivers of the news — they become a part of the news and join a national and global community of debate and ideas.