Know-How Exchange : Strategy

If you hired me to advise on the "marketing side" I'd start by making the point that sales and marketing are on the same side ... just two different aspects of the marketing process.

Then I'd suggest that any campaign you implement needs to address customer needs as expressed by the customers themselves. Otherwise it's YOUR words pushing what YOU want to sell/communicate. Effective advertising addresses the customers' needs, not yours.

In a situation where the customers are clearly defined and relatively limited in number (i.e., hundreds, not millions), it's usually better to deal with them individually, not with a mass medium. You can call that "sales" if you want to, but it's clearly different from a broad marketing campaign that paints all targets with the same brush.

Now, once you identify the 2 or 3 most important needs your customers have, you might consider getting testimonials from satisfied customers and use those as the focus of your campaign.

Example: "XYZ School is better than any recruiting firm I've ever used, and the hires are the best we've ever had."

You can use different testimonials featuring different benefits in order to target each company with the message that will be most meaningful to them. (OK, that's "sales" again.)

My suggestions are obvious, but I'll offer them anyway.

1. Contact placement offices at other colleges that don't compete with your school in any way. Find out how they promote the talents of their students to local employers. Do they use one-on-one contact, or do they conduct marketing "campaigns"?

2. Talk with several local employers that have actually HIRED your students by working through the placement office. Find out what they're looking for when they contact your school. In other words, what do they expect your office to do in terms of matching their needs with your skills? How good are you at what you're already doing?

3. Talk with local employers to find out what you did NOT do well in cases where a local employer did NOT hire a grad you thought was well-qualified. Was there a miscommunication of what they needed -- or did you send someone who just wasn't qualified? Did the student lack some key skills that you could have identified as important in the upfront contact with the employer?

4. If you're looking to do a direct mail or other advertising campaign to these local employers, talk with other schools that have conducted such campaigns. What's the main selling-proposition that those schools have found to be effective -- the proposition, in other words, that generates inquiries from employers? I doubt that it's enough to say "Our students are ready to get down to business." I suspect employers are looking for some assurance that you've vetted these candidates for suitability.

And be sure to compare your market size with other colleges. Is your employer-market big enough to justify a marketing campaign, or would you be more effective if you make more personal contact with the key players, as others have suggested?

You clearly care about your students, and you know that some of them would be a good fit for positions at local employers. You just need to figure out what the barriers are that prevent employers from coming to you early in the hiring process. It's probably more than just a lack of "top-of-mind awareness" -- the fact that they don't think of your school first. But what are the real barriers?

I am probably going to sound repetitive but here is my two bit:

1. You need to build credibility in the employer's mind. Probably create a ideablender kind of site, help solve their problems and then highlight those achievements in your future campaigns. Maybe do it for free for the first employer and then incentivize for both students/employers.

2. Like the earlier post, you could certainly look at other colleges and add on a regional twist.

3. Forge online international alliances in BRIC countries (colleges/businesses/governments) and let your students soak in the global issues. The experience would be appreciated by the student and hard to ignore from the employers point of view. This would take time but should add value to your USP arsenal

Hope it helps..

Sharad