Email Marketing for Higher Education

Author Bio

            Ashley Hilton started her career in higher education at the age of 18 as a temporary employee at Utah State University’s campus bookstore in Logan, Utah. She turned her temporary status into an eight-year career at the bookstore, eventually serving as the e-commerce, marketing and systems manager. During that time, Hilton received a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration Marketing. Thirteen years later she’s still enjoying a career in higher education as the marketing and project manager for Weber State University in Ogden, Utah. Hilton is currently researching relationship marketing and how it can be used to increase student retention rates and reduce the time to graduation. A Disneyland enthusiast, Hilton plans to become a skipper on the World Famous Jungle Cruise following her higher education career.

Email Marketing for Higher Education

Email: It’s been around in one form or another since the 1980s. While it seems like email may become obsolete any day — after all, there are faster ways to communicate, such as texting, chatting and Tweeting — it has lasted far longer and proven much more effective than other digital advertising options despite having changed very little since its creation. Many new communications tools don’t have the staying power of email and are already on their way out by the time functionalities are made available to marketers, such as myself.  

Email isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. Email addresses are unique identifiers and are used for many business and personal accounts. Without them, we couldn’t create online profiles to access information, such as online banking and university student accounts, or obtain goods, such as retail orders and food delivery. There are more than 2.5 billion email users in the world, and that number is expected to reach 2.8 billion in the next year. Email has no true competitor on the horizon. If, however, one does surface, it will require a major cultural shift.

            A resilient technology, email is also a successful marketing tool. A study conducted by global management consulting firm McKinsey and Company found that businesses are 40 times more likely to obtain new customers through email marketing than social media. About 86.5 percent of Americans have email addresses while only 78 percent have social media profiles. While the number of social media users is increasing, it will never surpass email if email addresses are required to create social media accounts.

Why do I care so much about email? I am currently the marketing and project manager for Weber State University, and my main goal is to improve student retention and reduce the time to graduation. 

Since beginning my career at Weber State University, I’ve studied how to apply current and best marketing practices to higher education. Throughout my research, I’ve come across a common theme for increasing retention rates: having regular and personalized communication with students.

            Relationship marketing fosters customer loyalty and interaction. In 2003, Forbes had this to say about relationship marketing: “It is designed to develop strong connections with customers by providing them with information directly suited to their needs and interests.”

Email is a useful tool for relationship marketing, especially when there is specific information available about your customers. In my case, my customers are students. Using email and the power of relationship marketing, I am able to contact them with personalized information about their graduation status and provide them with regular updates to keep them on track.  

In the field of email marketing, little information exists on how best to engage students. Multiple studies are scheduled for Weber State University over the next two years to gauge best practices for email marketing. The campaigns will include

·      Informing students about unused financial aid funds

·      Contacting stop-out students to remind them about registration deadlines

·      Informing students who are registered for 12 credit hours that they can add more at no additional cost

·      Informing students of seats available in required classes

·      Updating students on their degree tracker progress

·      Encouraging students who qualify for an associate’s degree to apply

·      Getting students to take advantage of discounted or free summer tuition and books.

To find the best tips for email marketing in higher education, I researched the following areas:

·      Creating successful emails

·      Writing concisely

·      Retaining students

From this research, I’ve come up with nine tips and tricks to write the best emails for higher education audiences.

TIPS AND TRICKS

1. Understand Your Audience

Tone of message, time of day to send the email, best subject lines and whether to use images could all be different depending on your recipient.

Here are a few questions to consider:

·      How old is your audience?

·      What are the students’ areas of study?

·      What time of day are they likely to work?

·      How many credit hours are they enrolled in?

·      What is their class ranking?

·      What is their ZIP code?

These questions and many others can inform the subject line, call to action and content of your email and help you get the best results.

Luckily for universities, most of this information is already available. Tailored emails can be sent to segmented groups. For example, Weber State recently sent emails to students who had not accepted their financial aid. We sorted the students into two categories: those who were receiving grant funding and those who were receiving student loans. We wanted the messages to be different. We wanted to have a positive focus for grant students (free money) and an informational focus for loan students (the benefits of graduating more quickly).

For example, here was our message to grant students:

Don’t forget you still have scholarship funds left, so take advantage of your award and sign up for classes.

And here was our message to loan students:

We noticed you aren’t enrolled for classes this spring. Remember that you have a Financial Aid award to help you pay for school, so don’t forget to sign up for classes.

2. Identify Your Message

Once you understand your audience, make sure you know what the purpose of the email is and keep your goals in mind throughout the writing process.

            In the book “Email Marketing Demystified,” Matthew Paulson breaks down the body of an email into seven types of messages. Four of these apply to higher education and are listed below with examples:

·      Announcements. When something big happens that affects or is of interest to students, faculty, staff and/or alumni, an email should be sent. The criteria of what qualifies for an email likely has been created by university administration and may differ depending on privacy settings or selected contact preferences for students on each list. An example of an announcement email at Weber State University is the Code Purple emergency notification system. When this notification system is activated, all university students, staff and faculty receive a notification email.  For example:

This is a Lock Down DRILL. Take 3 minutes to think about and discuss what you would do in a real incident.

·      Sales and Marketing. Emails of this nature are meant to notify the audience of products, services or events. At Weber State, we often use these emails to promote graduate programs. An undergraduate student or recent graduate from the Department of English may receive an email about the Master of Arts in English program with information on how to apply. For example:

We have identified you as an outstanding English student and would like to encourage you to continue your education as a graduate student.

·      Newsletter. These emails contain useful and interesting content for specific groups of people. Weber State sends multiple newsletters, such as our Davis campus newsletter, an IT newsletter, a Staff Advisory Committee newsletter and our CyberCats e-newsletter. The CyberCats e-newsletter is sent monthly to students, faculty, staff, alumni, etc. This newsletter spotlights a few areas on campus, lists upcoming events and publishes helpful items for alumni such as resume tips or career fairs. For example:

Weber State University will be participating in the RMACAC Phoenix College Fair. Please come see us. The fair will take place at the ASU Tempe campus from 12-2:30 p.m.

·      Feedback. Since your email audience is part of your target audience, you may as well ask for opinions. When Weber State’s Office of Marketing & Communications created a positioning statement for the university, we wanted to get audience feedback. An email was sent to students, faculty, staff, alumni and community/donors soliciting their opinions on the positioning statement. Results from this survey provided enough information to move forward with implementing the new positioning statement. Our email read like this:

Your participation in this survey is greatly appreciated, as it will ultimately result in a better understanding and articulation of Weber State’s unique place in higher education.

3. Keep it Concise

You are competing for one of your readers most valuable resources — their time. Inboxes are full of emails from different sources. Don’t wait to get to the point. If readers open your email, they need to be rewarded immediately with the information promised in your subject line.

Your emails will be skimmed for relevant information. Using bullet points, count downs and short lists gives the reader an idea of how much time they’ll need to invest in reading your email up front. In a split second, they will decide if they’re going to read your email or move it to the trash folder. When the content doesn’t lend itself to a list, use short paragraphs so they can easily sift through the information.

Don’t worry about providing your reader with all of the fine print and required information; that’s what websites do. The purpose of your email is to let your readers know you have something of interest to them, and that by clicking through to your website, they can gain more information.

4. Write Your Subject Line

            The subject line is the first line your reader will see and is an invitation to read more. If it’s poorly written, your email won’t be opened. In a survey conducted by Chadwick Martin Bailey, a custom market research company in Boston, 64 percent of people reported that they choose to open an email based on the content of the subject line. Readers won’t have a chance to see or click on your content if they never open the email. Your click-thru rate is entirely dependent on your open rate.  

Matthew Paulson, author of “Email Marketing Demystified,” also addressed different types of subject lines. Of the 11 listed in his book, the following nine apply to higher education:

·      Curiosity: Which teacher has made a difference in your life?

·      How to: How to get free textbooks for summer semester

·      Humor: Your mom called, she said you should graduate

·      Numbers: You’re 24 credits away from graduating

·      Shocking: Attend summer semester for FREE

·      Testimonial: I made my dream happen at Weber State

·      Tips: Take 30 credits over three semesters and graduate faster

·      Warning: Your financial aid is about to expire!

Subject lines that sound personal are more successful than those that sound professional. Consider sounding like a friend instead of a business or an institution. Address the recipient by name, if possible, and use text that sounds peer to peer. Radicati, a technology market research firm, found in its survey that 85 percent of respondents prefer subject lines in lowercase. Lowercase subject lines seem more likely to be coming from a personal acquaintance and will get higher open rates.

A good rule of thumb for a subject line is to keep it to 50 characters. This, ideally, is enough space to get your point across but concise enough to attract attention and be readable on mobile devices.

5. Write Your Call to Action

While there are similarities in the approach to writing subject lines and calls to action, they will likely differ in tone. Subject lines can be personalized and fun — you want to grab your audience’s attention. A call to action — the text that prompts your readers to take action, usually to click through to a landing page — needs to give clear direction. When writing a call to action, start with a subject and a strong command verb. Adverbs should be avoided, as calls to action with adverbs have the lowest click-thru rates.

The Hubspot publication “How to Create Effective Calls-to-Action” provides the following 10 steps to optimize calls to action:

1.     Make it clear.

2.     Let it stand out.

3.     Make it actionable.

4.     Keep it above the fold.

5.     Create the right context.

6.     Make sure it’s relevant.

7.     Tweak based on different sales stages.

8.     Keep it aligned with the landing page.

9.     Optimize your landing page, too.

10. Keep testing.

After some recent A/B testing at Weber State, we were surprised to discover that traditional calls to action performed better than casual or fun calls to action. “Register for Classes” had an 8 percent click-thru rate, whereas “Use That Easy Money” had only a 4 percent click-thru rate. A few examples of successful calls to action recently used by Weber State include:

·      Schedule an appointment.

·      Register now.

·      Get started.

6. Design Your Email

            While text is arguably the most important part of your email, images can still cause a reader to click or trash your email. It is better to have no design than to have your email cluttered or distracting. If the image takes away from your main message, don’t use it.

            For the purposes of emailing current students, it is important that your email match your university’s branding guidelines. Students are familiar with the brand and will have a higher level of trust for your message if it matches the rest of your university’s communications. Consider having a basic template that is predesigned with your university’s color palette, fonts and logos. Then your text and relevant images can be added to the base template.

            Make sure any images you use are relevant to your message. Along with the text, images need to deliver on the promise made in your subject line. If you don’t have an image that fits, it’s better to leave it out. Avoid stock images, if possible. Using images of your actual students adds to the credibility of your message.

7. Make Your Email Deliverable

            Even a well-written email runs the risk of landing in a spam folder. There are a few steps that can be taken to increase the chances of your email reaching your recipients’ inboxes. 

            Many universities have internal means of contacting students, but it could leave them at a disadvantage for email deliverability. Most often the software used by universities to track the course catalog and student information is a very strict system for security reasons. Because of these extra securities in the niche area of higher education, there aren’t many software solutions available that can sync with the central authentication system. Those solutions that are able to sync with the database are somewhat archaic and lack capabilities as far as function and tracking. Going with a third-party provider that is not connected to the student/course database may be an option, and most of these email service providers (ESPs) have configured their software to have the highest possible delivery rates. If you are unable to use an ESP, email verification protocols such as Sender Policy Framework, Domain Keys Identified Mail and Domain-based Message Authentication can be followed to decrease your chance of being flagged as spam.

            Sender Policy Framework (SPF) can validate whether the administrator of a domain name has authorized an email. Mail servers will check for an SPF on inbound emails to verify authenticity and will sort or flag as spam if the SPF is not present or correct. There are many resources available online to guide you through setting up an SPF.

            User engagement can also determine whether your email will go to inboxes or spam folders. If a recipient marks every one of your emails as spam, or deletes it without opening it, his or her email provider is likely to begin sending all of your emails to the spam folder. This is another reason to write engaging content. If you can get a recipient to open and click on your email, your next email is more likely to be delivered to the inbox.

            Replies have a bigger impact on future email sorting than opens or clicks. Including a question that your recipient is encouraged to respond to by replying to your email is an option for gaining future deliverability.

            The CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 requires you to include an unsubscribe option. Although it may seem counterintuitive, having a visible and easy-to-use unsubscribe function in your emails can reduce your spam rate. The easier you make it for recipients to unsubscribe to your list, the less likely they are to report your email as spam to their email service providers.

8. Perform A/B Tests

            A/B testing (also known as split testing) is one of the best things you can do to increase your open and click-thru rates.  To conduct an A/B test, you deliver two versions of an email. In order for the test to be successful, only one thing can differ in the two versions. A difference in open or click-thru rates can be attributed to the variation. Whichever version has the highest engagement can become a model for creating future emails. Some examples of A/B testing I’ve conducted at Weber State are listed below:

·       Call to action

• A: Register Now
• B: Get that easy money

·       Subject line

• A: It’s not too late to enroll.
• B: Not registered yet? Sign up for Spring.

·       Personalization

• A: Dear Student,
• B: Dear ##First Name##,

When A/B testing, also consider the text in the body of the email, the headline and images. By reviewing the results of each A/B test you will begin to understand how to best engage your audience. Every communication should yield a higher open rate, and you will have much more qualified content for your audience.

9. Track Results

            Whether or not you’re A/B testing, make sure you are tracking results. Knowing what has been effective is the best way to inform future communications. Items that should be tracked include:

·      Subject line

·      Message content

·      Call to action

·      Images

·      Time of day

·      Day of week

Consider past emails each time you’re creating a new one. Ask yourself who your audience is and review past emails for what was the most successful. Each time you adjust for a new email, your open rate should increase.

Interview with Industry Experts

            I had the opportunity to interview three email marketing experts who work at Penna Powers: Stephanie Miller, public relations director; Nick Giustino, social media strategist; and James Taylor, UX/UI designer and developer. We had a conversation on best practices for email marketing, and I was able to ask if they had any recommendations for applying these practices in higher education.

            My conversation began with James Taylor, who is responsible for the user interface. He recommended getting an email service provider (ESP) to manage email blasts. One of the benefits of having an ESP is you are able to upload custom templates. This can ensure that you have consistent branding and anyone who is sending emails on behalf of your university will need to use one of the approved templates. “This template should include design elements with your university’s branding and logos,” Taylor said. “The user should be able to tell exactly who the email is from before they read any text.”

            I asked Taylor if he had any recommendations on how design-heavy an email should be. Taylor said there is a happy medium between design and content. “The purpose of the design is to represent your brand and style, but it can still be simple,” he explained. “You don’t want things to be flashy or distracting. Just use two to three sentences and a clear call to action.”

            You don’t want the email to be too long or even answer all of the readers’ questions. You want to give just enough information that you peak their interest. “Write no more than four sentences per email,” Taylor recommended. “Our goal is to convince them they want to visit your website.”

            Nick Giustino had two recommendations for building an engaged audience and increasing open and click rates. The first was to build audience segments. “Your ESP can provide tracking code for your website, and it can create a new list of a more qualified audience based on their interactions with your emails,” he said. His second recommendation was to plan a “drip campaign.” “Something like applying for grad school may seem overwhelming for some,” Giustino said. “You should consider a longer campaign where you send them instructions weekly on what they need to be doing along the way to prepare their application.”

            Giustino also discussed headlines (subject lines) and calls to action. “When competing for a reader’s inbox, content is key,” he said. “Work on creating catchy and relevant headlines.”

            Stephanie Miller also has helpful information on writing for email: “Treat every headline like a billboard. Keep it six to eight words and really catchy. It’s the only way you’re going to get that open.” Miller also pointed out that an email is a mass communication, and that is what your audience is expecting to see in their inbox. If there is any way to personalize it, you’ll stand out. “Even just having their name in place of a generic salutation is going to increase your engagement rates,” Miller said.

Conclusion

            Email is a valuable resource. It engages students and provides a vehicle for relationship marketing. By informing students about their graduation statuses through email, you can have an impact on student retention.

            Just remember who your audience is and keep your information clear and concise. A/B testing and tracking results will help you tweak your messaging and increase your engagement rates.

Helpful Resources

https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/improve-your-email-subject-line#sm.00000g1x02eus7dhuvagkr35jf50c

https://blog.kissmetrics.com/

“Email Marketing Demystified” by Matthew Paulsen

“How to Write Short” by Roy Peter Clark

http://blogem.ruffalonl.com/category/retention/