Marketing Continuing Education in a KnowledgeDriven World

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Marketing Continuing Education in a
Knowledge-Driven World
UCEAs 90th Annual Conference
Karen Lebovich Karen Sibley Lipman
Hearne Brown University Liv Mansfield Casey
Turner University of Pennsylvania Lipman Hearne
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Goal of the session

• Explore concrete methods to collect and use
  information in effective program planning and
  marketing

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Session outline

• Knowledge you need
• About yourself
• About your current students/customers
• About prospective students/customers
• About your market environment
• About your brand
• Making sense of the knowledge

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Session outline (cont.)

• Putting the knowledge to work
• Case studies University of Pennsylvania and
  Brown University

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A few opening observations

• The traditional academy is driven by faculty
  continuing education is (should be) driven by the
  market.
• Continuing educators need solid information to
  prove to faculty that this is so.

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A few opening observations

• Successful marketing depends on effective and
  responsive product development. Effective and
  responsive product development depends on sound
  information.
• Blaming marketing for poor enrollments is
  probably only half of the story. Marketing is not
  necessarily a silver bullet, but it is essential.

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A few opening observations

• Programmers and marketers should always sit
  together at the program development table you
  cant afford a we/us situation.
• Research doesnt have to be expensive. Some is
  better than none.

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Knowledge you need

• About yourself

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Understanding yourself

• You probably dont know yourself as well as you
  think you do.
• Your success relies in large part on your
  institutions reputation, brand, etc.

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Understanding yourself (cont.)

• Talk to everyone
• Ask tough questions about
• Mission/fit with host institution
• Performance/product
• Finances
• Capacity and capabilities
• Construct a situation analysis strengths,
  weaknesses, opportunities, threats

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Knowledge you need

• About your current customers

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Understanding your current customers

• The power of the database
• Predictive modeling based on past performance
• Updating essential NCOA every six months
• Never destroy records

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Understanding your current customers

• The power of the database
• Demographics
• Name
• Address Phones
• Emails
• Birth date
• Occupation/industry
• Religion
• Income (discretionary)
• Ethnicity
• Gender

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Understanding your current customers

• The power of the database
• Psychographics
• Hobbies
• Reading interests/information sources
• Sports
• Cultural interests
• Academic/intellectual interests
• Lifestyle (clubs, religious activities, etc.)

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Understanding your current customers

• The power of the database
• Synchographics
• Communications/contact history yours and theirs
• Course/program history dates, tuition

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Understanding your current customers (cont.)

• The importance of target market segmentation
• Communicate differently with different groups of
  customers
• Purchase a database that can handle the
  information you need today and tomorrow plan
• Purchase a database that can organize and
  re-organize information as you need it to

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Understanding your current customers (cont.)

• Ask tough questions of your current
  customers/students
• Surveys
• Discussion groups
• Focus groups

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Understanding your current customers (cont.)

• Questions to ask, but only ask what youll use
• Brand/reputation/image
• Product appropriateness current and planned
• Product quality
• Customer service
• Student services/communications
• Information sources

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Knowledge you need

• About your prospective customers

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Understanding your prospective customers

• Who are they?
• Start with a geodemographic study of your service
  area
• Cost 10,000 - 15,000
• Claritas, Inc. product

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Understanding your prospective customers (cont.)

• Geodemographic study reveals predominant
  lifestyle clusters by zip code
• Middle America
• Midscale families, midscale towns
• Blue collar homeowners with some college
• Watch Daytona 500 on wide screen, read Outdoor
  Life
• Executive Suites
• White, Asian singles/couples, upscale, white
  collar
• Reside in first house or condo
• College-degreed
• Health club, travel, read Entrepreneur, watch(ed)
  Friends

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Understanding your prospective customers (cont.)

• Deliverables
• Color-coded map of your service area displaying
  locations of dominant lifestyle clusters
• Zip code-by-zip code listing of dominant clusters

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Understanding your prospective customers (cont.)

• Compare to your current customers
• Current customers are a good indication of where
  your base is
• For new programming, zero in on the customers
  most likely to respond

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Geodemographic comparison
Middle America
Mature Years
Midlife Success
Young Achievers
Other
Striving Singles
Executive Suites
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Understanding your prospective customers (cont.)

• Ask tough questions of your prospective
  customers/students
• Surveys
• Discussion groups
• Focus groups
• Target, dont blanket
• Gets the right responses from the right audiences
• Costs less

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Understanding your prospective customers (cont.)

• Questions to ask
• Brand/reputation/image
• Competitive position
• Product appropriateness current and planned
• Product quality
• Customer service
• Student services/communication
• Information sources

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Knowledge you need

• About your market environment

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• Competitor scans

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Competitor scans

• Information to gather, by institution or by
  school/unit
• Products content and credentials
• Product features price, location
• Market positioning declared value proposition
  or brand promise

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Example Competitor scan by product (cont.)
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Example Competitor scan by product (cont.)
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• Employment and industry trends

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Employment and industry trends

• Helps you stay ahead of the programming curve
• Multiple outside resources
• North American Industry Classification System
  (NAISC)
• Standard Occupation System (SOC)
• State government
• Compare to current student employment base or to
  corporate client base

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Employment trends by occupation
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Industry profile for current students
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Occupation profile for current students
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Industry profile for corporate clients
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• Influencers and intelligence summits

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Influencers and intelligence summits

• Uses decision- and opinion-makers
• Tests, confirms other data often more honest
• Offers nuance other sources might not reveal
• Provides political spin on information

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Influencers and intelligence summits (cont.)

• Phone interviews with key influencers
  government, political, business, community, media
• Best conducted by third party
• Dont choose cheerleaders alone
• Group discussions intelligence summits

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Knowledge you need

• About your brand

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Understanding your brand

• Brand is the sum total of the tangible and
  intangible characteristics that make an
  institutional offer distinctive and create ones
  impression of the institution the promise.

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Understanding your brand

• Brand is more than a name or a logo. It creates
  expectations and makes a promise to fulfill those
  expectations. A powerful brand has relevance, top
  of mind recognition, and, if truly successful, it
  provides the only solution to a particular need.

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Understanding your brand

• Brand exists in the mind of the marketplace you
  probably already have a brand (institutional and
  unit)
• Institutions can only re-position themselves in
  the marketplace to manage and influence their
  brands

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Understanding your brand (cont.)

• Brand differentiates you from your competitors
• Brand is the place the market will concede to you
• For the customer, brand cuts through clutter and
  aids in decision-making

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Understanding your brand (cont.)

• To determine brand
• Ask external constituents
• What they think of you and what they know about
  you
• What they want, need, and expect of you

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Making sense of the knowledge

• Using a data matrix

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Data matrixing

• Organizes information for decision-making
• Can be organized by many different variables

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Data matrixing by proposed product (cont.)
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Data matrixing by proposed product (cont.)
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Putting the knowledge to work for you

• Creating a strategic marketing plan

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Strategic program development and marketing plan

• For existing or proposed products
• Rests on your CE units value proposition or
  brand promise
• Encompasses both image and retail

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Strategic program development and marketing plan
(cont.)

• Plan includes (for the unit)
• Overarching value proposition or brand promise
• Image-enhancing, brand-building strategies

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Strategic program development and marketing plan
(cont.)

• Value proposition or brand promise
• Focuses on your units benefits
• Connects those benefits to audience(s) interests
• Distinguishes you in the marketplace
• Answers the question So, whats in it for me?

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Strategic program development and marketing plan
(cont.)

• Plan moves on to include (for each product or
  product line)
• Messages for target audiences based on overall
  value proposition
• Retail strategies
• Retail tactics to further strategies
• Evaluation mechanisms

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Case studies

• University of Pennsylvania
• Brown University

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University of Pennsylvania
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Post-baccalaureate Pre-Health Program

• Preparation for medical, dental, veterinary, and
  graduate schools
• Two distinct programs based on student background
• Pre-health
• Special science

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Post-baccalaureate Pre-Health Program

• Understand the audience
• Students
• Undergraduate advisors
• Medical school admissions officers

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Post-baccalaureate Pre-Health Program

• Understand the issues
• Rising enrollments
• High caliber students
• Meeting the needs of exceptional students

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Post-baccalaureate Pre-Health Program

• Understand the issues
• One Program Director responsible for
• Outreach
• Recruiting
• Curriculum
• Advising
• Networking

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Post-baccalaureate Pre-Health Program

• Understand the issues
• Assessment of students to choose the Penn program
• Price
• Program
• Reputation on institution
• Internship/volunteer opportunities

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Post-baccalaureate Pre-Health Program

• Understand the issues
• Outcomes and program quality
• Acceptance to top medical schools
• Penns reputation in Arts and Sciences

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Post-baccalaureate Pre-Health Program

• Understand market environment
• Identifying the trends
• Medical
• Dental
• Veterinary

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Post-baccalaureate Pre-Health Program

• Understand market environment
• Evaluate the competition
• Pricing study
• Program features and benefits
• Identify market niche

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Post-baccalaureate Pre-Health Program

• Understand your brand
• Penn Brand
• School of Arts and Sciences
• International reputation for excellence
• Distinguished medical and research faculty
• Award-winning scientists
• Numerous research grants
• Groundbreaking research

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Post-baccalaureate Pre-Health Program

• Brand benefits
• Penn Pre-Health
• High touch advising
• Distinguished faculty
• Flexible scheduling options
• Internship/volunteer opportunities
• Increased Web functionality

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Post-baccalaureate Pre-Health Program

• Making Sense
• How to put this knowledge to work?
• Strategic vision shared with college deans
• Allocation of resources for marketing and
  recruitment
• Exploration of certificate options
• Enhancement of extracurricular programs
  (workshops)

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Brown University

• Special Studies
• Summer Studies
• Conference Services

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Combination of programs

• A small community outreach program
• Merger of this with large summer program
• Additional merger with conference division
• The challenges
• Accomplishments
• Moving forward

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Initial observations

• Research is essential
• Campus support and respect must grow
• Faculty participation is key
• Our student communities need to be defined and
  their interests understood

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Rhode Island employment by sector
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Rhode Island demographics Age distribution
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Rhode Island educational attainment
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Research project goals

• Research is essential
• Age, Gender, Income, Education
• Psychographics
• Magazine, Book, Media Choices
• Politics
• Leisure Activities
• Life Stage
• Single? Married? Children (What age?)

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Enrollment by category
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Existing students
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Much work to do

• New program design to garner the support of our
  internal constituents
• Policy clarification
• Development of new standards practices
• Review of current enrollment patterns and
  additional efforts
• Focus groups and more student input
• New marketing efforts