Benchmarking Your Campaign
What are some other benchmarks you could use to determine the success of your PR campaign?
Sending out a questionnaire or asking questions about the PR campaign would be a good item to start.
Setting up a phone to call once they see the article to be entered in a drawing for a mug or something tangible to see the results in a period of time that would show a direct link.
My school uses surveys to get our students' opinion on our events. Some of our best suggestions come from our current students.
We rely heavily on our email marketing as well as social media. The programs that we use have trackers to show us which people opened, clicked on the various links, as well as forwarded the PR material. This helps us understand what the various prospects like to see and read.
Julie, Great idea! Thank you for posting!
Elizabeth Wheeler
I use surveys as one technique. The speaker fills out a survey and the students fill out a survey as well. The key element is to actually listen to what each has to say and for them to see results. For example, we recently held a career fair for our students. Afterwards, I had them complete a survey on how they felt about it and what we can add to make it better. I have incorporated every suggestion into the next career fair to show them that we want to make it better. This gives the staff more credibility. Another level of measurement is how many enrollments or clients did we gain from this event. If no interest was sparked for new prospects, they maybe some work needs to be done to make the event better .
Edwina ,
Another great idea! Keep them coming!
Dr. Jean Norris
Another benchmark could be the number of students retained from a specific event.
That sounds like a good approach, Michael. Do your admission representatives ask as well?
We typically use surveys. Also our application for admission has a field for "How did you hear about SAE?".
To me the best benchmark is word of mouth. If people are talking about your your PR campaign you know that the buzz is growing.
Great suggestions. How do you capture the feedback of your attendees after an event?
Some benchmarks you could use include, turnout at an event, extent of media coverage, and feedback on whether or not to repeat something in the future.
Charlotte, that's a great idea. Too often we forget to just ask the question. However, we have to be ready for any answers we may receive.
Dr. Jean Norris
As stated below the best benchmark is to just simply ask the prospect how he/she hard about the school and a survey would also help.
That's a great place to start, Shan and can provide you with a great deal of helpful information. What are some other ways you might measure to see if your PR campaign is successful?
I usually will ask a potential student how they heard about us. This way I know what is working and what isn't.
Hi Patricia,
It sounds like you put a great deal of thought into the information you gather regarding your campaigns throughout the year. How do you feel this is working for you at this time and is there anything that you would change?
Thanks for your post.
We do use different campaigns during the year and track them in our CRM database, from initial contact, responded, declined and the best one, purchased, whether it be a class, book, etc. So the main benchmark for us is if they purchase a class. Other campaigns were to justify costs spent at trade shows, or download something from our website, or attendance in a complimentary webinar, raffles showing a return in future attendance/alumni, etc
