In order to keep the ‘student survey campaign’ fresh and relevant to the students, we try to vary the approach each year with one ‘headline feature’ that changes annually.
In 2018, the Student Survey Wall was an installation piece on the campus for the duration of the campaign and in 2019, we introduced a full digital campaign whereby we used professionally shot video both on campus and online in paid and organic campaigns to convey our messages.
The approaches are case studied below:
Case Study 2018
The goal of the campaign for the student survey for 2018 was to engage students on campus with all aspects of the student survey;
- what the survey was;
- the goals of the project;
- achievements to date on a local level;
- immediate incentives or prizes for completion;
- call-to-action.
The challenge was to come up with a way of encapsulating all of this messaging in a single installation. The team chose to do what became known as ‘The Student Survey Wall’.
The wall, 43 metres in length literally shows a speaker, followed by soundwaves that stretch the full length of a particular corridor leading to the main services area of the Institute. The tagline – ‘Your feedback is music to our ears’ sets the installation in context – the focus is all about ‘feedback’. As the student walks along the corridor, the first message is a definition of the what the Student Survey is all about, and this is followed by the various improvements in the college which were instigated by the results of previous surveys from studentsurvey.ie. These results are integrated into the soundwave artwork. Further along the corridor, a text block describes the small gifts and various prizes that students who complete the survey are eligible to receive.
Case Study 2019
We recognised the need to engage personally with students on the campus but equally with students online with digital content. Our goal was to create one campaign which met these 2 objectives using the following elements:
Class Visits
With the support of the lecturing staff, the Students’ Union visited all relevant classes to ask them to complete the survey and explain the importance of doing so.
Survey Hub
The survey hub was an area set up in IT Carlow’s main central services building (CSB) which had a computer and a prize stand to encourage students to fill out the surveys. StudentSurvey.ie merchandise, sweets and other giveaways such as phone accessories were available at the stand for those who completed the survey.
Printed Material
A number of foam board signs were hung in the main building of IT Carlow to identify the survey hub and attract students. An area between the LRC and a popular social space was selected for the Hub as we felt this would maximum footfall and possibly capture people who were happy to stop and give time to completing the survey. IT Carlow also printed out personalised handouts to give to students on campus to create awareness around the campaign and encourage students to fill out the survey.
Promotional Videos
IT Carlow launched a series of 4 ‘piece-to-camera’ style videos to roll out the campaign:
- IT Carlow Students Union - Have Your Say
- IT Carlow Students - What students want
- IT Carlow Students - Prizes to be won
- IT Carlow - We Listened
The videos were set up to play in the ‘survey hub’ which was live for the three weeks of the campaign and on all of our social media platforms.
Social Media - Paid and Organic
We created three ‘swipe up’ digital adverts for our Instagram channel. The call to action at the end of the videos was for viewers to click through to the StudentSurvey.ie website to complete the survey. The videos were shared across social media and boosted as advertisements on Instagram and Facebook from 25th February to 17th March. Total of €500 was spent to boost the ads on social media. Organic posts were shared daily across Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn which included IT Carlow and StudentSurvey.ie branded images with a link on each post to fill out the survey.
Website
A section of IT Carlow website slider was dedicated to StudentSurvey.ie to allow any visitors to the website to see the survey taking place at the Institute. A live clickable link on the slider brought visitors to the StudentSurvey.ie website to fill out the survey. The link was easily accessed on the website to ensure those who wanted to fill the survey out on their mobile phones could find it easily.
Rationale
According to Biteable, (2019), video is the most effective element in a digital marketing strategy for 2018/2019. ‘78% of people watch online videos every week and 55% view online videos daily’ (Hub spot 2019). IT Carlow wanted to communicate to the students online in a creative, streamline and consistent way and given its effective reach, video was the chosen tool.
The videos were shared on social media to reach our target audiences across our 3 campuses in Carlow, Wicklow and Wexford. Those who were not on social media could see the videos displayed on TV setups on campus. This approach meant the IT Carlow could reach students both on and off campus with a single message over the course of the campaign. The survey hub and printed material were also used to attract those on campus during the day and in the evenings. IT Carlow have a large number of Lifelong Learning students who attend night and evening classes on campus. The print material created awareness for those students with the aim to encourage the students to fill out the survey.
