Social media, advertising, communication strategies discussed at Academic Senate
Updates regarding the Central Michigan University social media sites, advertising efforts and fundraising campaign information were among topics of discussion during Tuesday's Academic Senate meeting.
Sherry Knight, associate vice president of university communications, presented an update on University Communications and its current campaigns.
"University Communications is focused on serving the university as a whole," Knight said. "Our goals are to support enrollment objectives, increase awareness and enhance CMU's reputation and focusing on the experience behind the degree."
Knight said all of their efforts are aimed at a specific audience, namely prospective students and their influences such as parents and school counselors, current faculty, staff and students, alumni, legislators and supporters.
University Communications currently has 20 staff members, responsible for carrying out all of the duties of the Office of Communications.
"In the past year, our office has sent out 180 news releases," Knight said. "We have to prioritize which news we release, and we prioritize news that supports our goals."
The idea behind news releases is to broadcast happenings within the university to outside news agencies with the goal of getting hits and traffic to the cmich.edu website.
Recent success stories of news released by university communications include pedestrian-powered energy, which was covered by the Associated Press as well as CBS Detroit; Invasive Species research, which gained nationwide coverage, the military tuition grant, which was picked up by the San Francisco Chronicle and the International Film Festival, which was covered by Chicago Magazine.
"Getting picked up by Chicago Magazine was significant for us, because Chicago is one of our main out-of-state recruiting locations," Knight said. "The festival was featured as something unique to do and encouraged people to visit Mount Pleasant."
Knight also reported a new advertising campaign with Pandora Radio, focused on the Grand Rapids market, and said the university has experienced great success with its campaign.
"Our ad with Pandora runs twice every half hour I believe and has led to more than 8,000 clicks to the cmich.edu website," she said.
Other issues discussed during the meeting include a fundraising campaign that raised $822,000 for scholarships. The majority of donors, which are more than 1,000 in number, are current CMU faculty members.
University President George Ross said faculty donations were up 13 percent from the previous year.
Additionally, a motion was passed to allow international students and students who studied abroad while attending CMU to wear sashes representing their home countries or countries they studied abroad in when they walk for graduation.
Students who studied abroad in more than one country may have a sash created with up to four countries represented. It was adopted unanimously.
