Today, higher education institutions are pumping out huge amounts of information to their students, faculty and staff, alumni and other audiences. Such a flood of communication is difficult to manage consistently and in many situations is out of control. A constant stream of emails is sent to anonymous lists that are almost never reviewed and trimmed, devaluing the impact of email messaging and causing annoyance in the recipients. Often, these emails are not tracked and no metrics are being captured on how effectively they are being received.
The good news is that tools exist to solve most of these issues – you just have to know what they are and how to best put them to use. By putting into place a robust news management system, making full use of your email system and utilizing a subscription management service, your institution can exponentially increase the effectiveness and efficiency of its news communication flow. Each of these systems serves a particular purpose to streamline how news is managed but the use of each should be part of an overall communications strategy to ensure greatest effectiveness.
News management system
A news management system allows you to direct the collection and distribution of all newsworthy information coming out of your institution through a central point. These web-based systems allow each department to add their own news to a central queue. This allows you to manage consistency of messaging, control the timing of news releases and announcements, eliminate redundant communication and decide on the appropriate medium for delivery of each news item.
Email system
Although all higher education institutions already have their own email systems, many are not making use of the full range of capabilities. Most institutions are not harnessing their tracking capabilities to note click-throughs, bouncebacks and other pieces of information that can help you know which messages are effective and which are not. Rather than sending all outgoing communications to all constituent emails, segment recipients into particular groups and target your messaging to those groups. You might have one email newsletter that focuses on your institution’s athletic teams, others that focus on the awards and achievements within particular departments, another that reports on the study abroad programs, etc. This will allow you to limit the amount of emails going to each inbox and produce more engaged recipients.
Subscription management service
Don’t just decide yourself how to segment your constituents because you might be wrong about what they want. It is critically important, and clearly more valuable, to find out from the end consumers of the information exactly what interests them – let them tell you what types of content they want to receive by utilizing a subscription management service. These services, which can either be customized for your institution or be purchased as a one-size-fits-all solution, allow users to sign up through your website for email lists that fit their interests. By allowing their choices to drive your messaging, your constituents will feel that the institution is paying attention to them and their needs and improve their overall outlook.
Making use of these simple but effective tools can take your communications process from one that is chaotic, overwhelming and aimless to one that delivers information in a consistent, targeted and meaningful way.