Best Practices for Targeted Email Campaigns - Part I
This is the first in a series of blog articles about the best practices for using targeted email campaign to help employers hire college students looking for internships and recent graduates searching for entry level jobs and other career opportunities. This series is based upon a targeted email recruitment advertising campaign best practices white paper co-written by Jason Bakker of Campus Media Group and me.
Introduction
Today’s high school and college students lead active lives. To catch up with them, you will have to reach them where they live: the Internet.
In 2003, the U.S. Census Bureau determined that out of 14.9 million graduate and undergraduate college students – both full- and part-time – nearly 90 percent of them used the Internet from home, while 68 percent used the Internet from school. In other words, virtually every college student uses the Internet at home, school, or both. That’s pretty astounding. It’s no wonder so many businesses have turned to the Internet, especially email, as a means to reach today’s young consumers.
Thanks to PDAs, smart phones, Blackberries and Internet access on most standard cell phones, students can check email messages from anywhere. They are able to respond faster as well. So, the smart recruiter will capitalize on this. Naturally, it is wise to target this audience when sending out mailings. Typically, people with .edu email addresses are students and spends a good portion of their time on campus, says Pan Stein for iMediaConnection. Although they may not be given temporary email addresses, high school students do often receive temporary logon capabilities while on college campuses for special summer programs. While on campus, they are accessing personal emails that can be targeted by college recruiters hoping to entice motivated students to their campuses. The key to getting your college or your company noticed is to capture their attention right away. The best way to do this is by understanding how they think when surfing the Web or checking their email addresses.
Purpose
The purpose of this series of blog entries is to give an overview of how email has evolved in college student’s lives and those students can best be reached via email by college recruiters – both those who hire students and those who work for university admissions offices to enroll students.
1. College Students and Email – Attitudes and Trends
College students use the Internet to research everything, search for jobs, and communicate with friends and professors. Besides using email, they communicate via chat rooms, instant messaging, and online groups. In addition, a rapidly increasing minority write blogs. So, clearly, the Internet provides a sizeable place to reach tomorrow’s movers and shakers.
Thanks to PDAs, smart phones, Blackberries and Internet access on most standard cell phones, students can check email messages from anywhere and respond faster than ever before. A smart recruiter will leverage this. While some marketers believe that it is best to deliver commercial emails to students using their .edu email addresses, years of experience in this field has shown CollegeRecruiter.com that the best practice is actually to email the students through their AOL, Earthlink, Yahoo!, Gmail or other such personal addresses. The reason? Because schools and corporations have tight anti-spam email filters that frequently delete commercial emails even when the intended recipient has opted in to receive those mailings. But personal Internet Service Providers (ISPs) such as AOL and Earthlink are willing to work with commercial mailers by permitting mailings (whitelisting) organizations such as CollegeRecruiter.com which are able to provide the ISPs with proof that all of the recipients of the mailings have opted in to receive the emails.
According to Steve Jones in “The Internet Goes to College,” a report written for Pew Internet and American Life, 72 percent of college students check their email at least once a day. Such a statistic proves that email is definitely an effective means of communication – provided you grab your target audience’s attention. They tend to scan their email messages rather than read them, so you must first attract them with a subject line that resonates with them.
The 18-24 year old audience is informed, sophisticated and understands that they are being marketed to. Organizations which are fortunate to work with stellar, award winning creative teams may be able to succeed in getting their message to stand out by using humorous messages, but the vast majority of organizations should simply and clearly state in their email the purpose for the email and the benefits to the recipient should they choose to click through to the sender’s site or otherwise take action. Regardless of the approach, it should be noted that the study by Jones revealed that 37 percent of college students forward emails to friends, so a message that is well received by one student will often be forwarded to one or more of their friends. This pass along effect can greatly amplify the impact of a campaign.
High school and college students have, for the most part, been exposed to the Internet since kindergarten. They are used to and often prefer receiving information via email, but they have to be interested in your opportunity - and you have to communicate to them what you have to offer in a way that is relevant, direct and entertaining, otherwise you’re just wasting your time and marketing dollars.
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