Using New Media in Advising & Promoting Your Centers

Your Official Source on U.S. Higher EducationEducationUSA.state.gov

Using New Media in Advising &

Promoting Your Centers

Marty Bennett, EducationUSA Marketing CoordinatorViktar Khotsim, American Councils/EHU, Lithuania

Erik van den Berg, Fulbright NetherlandsDragan Stojkovic, IAC, Serbia

Your Official Source on U.S. Higher Education

EducationUSA.state.gov

State of Social Media



Think about these numbers…• Google (started in 1998)

– 31+ billion searches each month (2009 avg)• Wikipedia (launched in 2001)

– Now has over 13 million articles written in over 200 languages– 78% of all Wiki articles are non-English

• YouTube (began 2005)– 13.3 billion views in December 2009

• Facebook (began 2004)– 400 million unique users (as of February 2010)– 60 million status updates/day– 100 million mobile users

• Twitter (launched 2006)– 1.2 billion tweets/month (January 2010)– 50 million tweets/day– 10 billion tweets as of March 4, 2010

• Blogs– 200 million+ blogs, 54% update daily



EducationUSA Social Media Footprint

• 2006– Nada, zip, zero, zilch

• 2007– StudyUSA Egypt– ?

• 2008– 2 blogs– 3 Facebook fan pages– Some scattered videos randomly available



EducationUSA in January 2009• 4 active Facebook groups, profiles or fan

pages• About a dozen videos that were online

somewhere• About 2-3 blogs with EducationUSA

content• Chats were the most common form of

social media usage



EducationUSA Today• YouTube over 6800 channel views, up

600%– 56 US college & university videos– 67 videos from centers worldwide– 18 career panel videos– 21 videos for US higher education audiences – And coming soon—international student interviews from 20+

countries & US admissions reps interviews

• Facebook over 3100 fans, up over 300% since 11/09– 90+ profiles, groups & fan pages



EducationUSA Today• Twitter

– 48 feeds– @EdUSAtips for US higher ed (430+ followers) – @EdUSAupdates for students (630 followers/1500% up)

• Blogs– 11 blogs (and counting…)

• New website — news & events feeds

• EdUSA Connects



VCO & TechnologyViktar Khotsim, VCO & Technology Coordinator

American Councils/EHU



Plan

1. Technology survey results

2. VCO project statistics and updates

3. Testing of the new experimental functions

4. VCO concept development: what is next?



Our web network:interesting facts

•1994- oldest website was founded•8 % of the websites created in the last century•98 % EAC has personal ECA web template•28 % don`t mentioned statistical information•Max and min hits per month, subscribers•37 % don`t mentioned number of subscribers



Internet-based advising

•E-mail consulting – 91.5 %•Discussion Forum-29.8 %•Skype advising – 21.3 %•Gmail chat – 8.5 %•FeeCall- 6.4 %•ICQ-6.4%•MSN Messenger-4.3%•Other – 4.3 %


EducationUSA.state.govEducationUSA.state.gov

Use of social media services

•Facebook – 82.9%•YouTube – 20%•Twitter – 14.3%•Vkontakte – 11.4%•Orkut – 8.6%•Odnoklassniki – 5.7% •LinkedIn – 5.7%



Examples on technology use

• Skype calls with US admissions

•DVC

•SMS

•Listserves

•E-mailing materials



Advisers needs in tech training

•Use of social media•Internet search•Video conferencing and webinars•On-line marketing•Work with video and audio files•Effective use of Excel and Access programs



VCO











VCO project in numbers

•Team of 29 advisers from 14 countries consult on seven languages

•Served 14.318 questions (as of 03.10.2010) – FAQ Project

•Visited up to 50.000 IP`s monthly

•Each 2 sec brings 3 more hits

•280 portions of useful information

•Local e-community: 7215 subscribers (as of 03.10.2010)

•Technology survey results



Project structure

EnglishCC

RussianCC

ArabicCC

SpanishCC

ChineseCC

French CC

Portuguese CC



VCO Consulting Technique

1. Inspirational sentence

2. Body of the answer:• template for “very basic” questions• directing for “labor-intensive” questions• tailored for “concrete” questions

3. Call to action sentence (invitation)















VCO experimental functions

•Call center•Instant messaging center•Adaptive consulting module•Re-direct center•Consulting in narrow fields of study•Audio instructions•Listen to the website?•FAQ Audio Center•Collection of EducationUSA on-line advising links











Re-direct of questions



VCO concept development

•Transformation into EducationUSA internet-based advising hub: consult, re-direct & linking

•Sharing EducationUSA information in more topics, more languages, more formats and by using more tools

•Test new experimental functions and monitor internet based advising efforts of our competitors (TAC)


Social Media

Use of social media:

Experiences of the Fulbright Center in The Netherlands

Erik van den Berg

http://www.fulbright.nl



Social Media

• The Dutch approach:

• Brainstorm session

• Do’s and Don’ts

• Comprehensive strategy



Social Media

Suggestions• Viral effect• Use alumni• Contest• Movie clips• Banner• MSN Chat sessions• Discuss use of institutionalized Facebook page



Social MediaFollow up• Twitter:

– http://twitter.com/vandenbergerik

• Skype advising:– http://www.fulbright.nl/?menutree=6|53

• Trailers:– http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7WIgWE2dIvE

• Banner• Approach individual alumni• MSN chats


From Zero to Recognition

Dragan Stojkovic

IAC

Belgrade, Serbia


Starting Point

• Start small

• Ask users what they like

• Don’t start what you can’t maintain

• Add features as you go, one by one









Searching…

• More content = more search results

• Follow alerts, respond where needed

• Set up internal search

• Verify your content before publishing – it is all kept somewhere

• Combined languages of operation















Advertising

• Google Ads

• Local ads systems

• Online media

• Social Media









Expand and Upgrade

• Add new features regularly

• Make your website grow

• Keep services in beta version to the final decision on future use



Collaborate

• Google Apps as the unique tool

• Gmail, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter

• Support ticketing system

• Discussion boards, Blog

• Comments

• Mailing lists



Updates• Update often – No Empty Waves

• Connect Facebook, Twitter, Blog

• Expect possible problems – plan B on how to inform clients

• Establish VIP space for breaking news and early announcements

• Share the content from other web sites







Avoid problems

• Don’t mix personal and business accounts (or “Please don’t play Mafia Wars”)

• Ambitious start must be followed by the constant work

• Keep developing services in “beta” status



Webinars• Easy to start in seconds

• Announce early, describe it in details

• Importance of good training and being in charge during sessions

• Consult participants before the session, confirm topics





Webinars

• Limitations

• Technical difficulties

• Check equipment



Updating to 3.0

• Applications for handheld devices

• Services for cell phones, PDAs

• Virtual advising

• Combination of several social networks

• Know your users

• Constantly check for new developments




EdUSA Connects



EdUSA Connects

– By REACs & Advisers for US institutions– By US Reps for Advisers– REACs & Advisers online meetings– Country meetings (e.g. Russia, Ukraine,

Turkey)– Center events for students– Live online college fairs



Next Steps

• EducationUSA.info – public/student views– Expanded video content– Archive of EdUSA Connects presentations– Advisers’ corner advice blog for students– Creation of a mobile version of the EdUSA site for student views

• EducationUSA.info – internal EdUSA family– Creation of center/country pdfs for U.S. visitors and for adviser

U.S. visits– Revision to online training course for beginning advisers– Launch of a center statistics database

• Student tracking • Monthly/quarterly reports



Questions & Comments• Thank you• Danke• Grazie• Merci• Bedankt • Дзякуй • Tänan • Köszönöm• Shenorhagal em • Paldies • Obrigado

• Ačiū • Dziękuję • Спасибо • Хвала • Ďakujeme vám • Děkujeme vám • Hvala • Tack • Teşekkürler • Спасибо • Gracias

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Using New Media in Advising & Promoting Your Centers

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