Closing your engagement gap.
What is the engagement gap? In the simplest terms it’s difference between the number of people who are members of your official community, or that you are in touch with formally, and the number who could, or should be. In this article we discuss ways that gap can be closed, to increase the quality and quantity of those engaging with your institution.
For example:
In the above case there is an engagement gap of somewhere between 2500 and 4500 people.
The benefits of having as many of your alumni in your community are self-evident, be it your targets around fundraising, bursaries, scholarships, or just general support, the more people you can engage the more successful you are likely to be.
But why is knowing my engagement gap useful?
Understanding the size of your engagement gap can be extremely helpful for several reasons:
Setting engagement goals
As with any other project, having clearly defined targets against which to plan and assess success is critical. Understanding the size of your engagement gap gives a quantifiable base against which to set targets for growth of your community.
Understanding where to find your target audience:
Breaking down your analysis as in the example above, means you know where to find potential community members, it also gives you a much clearer idea of those who are active online. Knowing where potential members of your community have a presence can help you be more targeted in your campaigns and communications, using your resources and budget more effectively.
Giving value
As alumni and development professionals you will have a host of tools at your disposal to attract members to your communities, but essentially it comes down to providing value…you offer something of interest to potential community members, and in exchange, they provide you with their information.
Once a user has provided their contact details, it may be as little as telling you their name and email address, they have crossed the ‘anonymity threshold’. This is the key point in community building, anonymous traffic is now a person with a name, a person who can start building a stronger relationship with their alma mater.
Most programs look to provide this value in three main forms:
News
Many alumni will simply not be interested in current events in the organisation, as one alumni put it to me ‘why am I interested in what these people are doing, they’re younger than my children’.
Events
Undoubtedly the most powerful tool in building communities is getting people together, but this realistically will only happen a few times a year at most, and is often impractical or impossible for alumni who have moved away or abroad.
Networking
Another common tool is provision of networking opportunities, usually through some sort of community site, this can be particularly attractive to younger alumni who are early in their careers but will be significantly less appealing to those who are retired or nearing that point.
Whilst these three elements are undoubtedly of interest to many alumni, they will never appeal to everyone. So what can you do to provide interest (and therefore value) to all?
How can you close that engagement gap?
Make the informal formal
For almost every educational institution there are informal communities in existence, most commonly in the form of Facebook groups. As the people here are doubtless passionate about the organisation, why not look to them for assistance in spreading your message and getting more people registered with you.
Frequent and relevant communication
Like any other form of marketing, attracting members, to your platform is an ongoing process which requires you to be reaching out to your prospective audience on a regular basis with frequent communications. The challenge here can be finding relevant content to share on a regular basis.
Utilise your champions
Doubtless you will have a small number of alumni with whom you are already very actively engaged, they will almost certainly be in touch with at least some of their cohort, asking them to reach out to their network.
Create ‘FOMO’
Look to create FOMO, nothing gets people motivated like the idea that they are missing out. Keep your best content behind a registration wall and just tease it on social media and via marketing to pull in users.
Utilise your history
Any organisation with alumni has a history, it might be long and storied, or just a few years, but this is still a treasure trove for both content and user interaction. Sharing your history not only gives back to your alumni (the value people are looking for), but ticks two major boxes for engagement; personalisation and nostalgia.
Personalised marketing has been shown to be almost thirty percent more effective than generic marketing, and what could be more personal than content relating to the recipient themselves! Nostalgia on the other hand has been shown to increase feelings of social connectedness to others and make people feel loved and valued, both ideal for building a community.
Your organisation may well already be saving your history for posterity in some form but why not utilise it as a way to generate engagement. This is where SocialArchive can help.. it is designed to turn history into engagement and has been proven to help grow alumni communities and support development goals.
Don’t forget that almost all of the above also applies to keeping members interested and active in your community, it’s great to get people on board but if you can’t keep them coming back they will eventually drift away and they will be lost to your community as details get out of date.
If you’re interested in finding out how to use your history to provide frequent personalised and engaging content to your community, why not arrange a demo to view SocialArchive® in action!