A Joint Proposal from Diversity
Task Force, Enrollment Management Advisory Committee, and the Integrated
Marketing Communications Task Force |
Cost/Benefit Analysis of Identity Research for Saint Mary’s College
Submitted to Strategic Plan Advisory Committee by:
Diversity Task Force
Enrollment Management Advisory Committee
Integrated Marketing Communications Task Force
March 4, 2005
Saint Mary’s College Identity Study
Proposed by Diversity Task Force, Enrollment Management Advisory Committee, and Integrated Marketing Communications Task Force
The proposed Saint Mary’s College Identity Study is a comprehensive quantitative and qualitative research project designed to better understand our audiences and their perceptions of Saint Mary’s so that we can more effectively connect with these audiences, enhance the image of the College, and work toward becoming recognized as a top 50 national liberal arts college.
Originally, we submitted two separate proposals: one joint proposal on market research into prospective student audiences from the Diversity Task Force, Enrollment Management Advisory Committee, and Integrated Marketing Communications Task Force; and one proposal on defining Saint Mary’s identity from the Integrated Marketing Communications Task Force. The proposals were combined in an effort to approach necessary research in a more comprehensive, integrated manner. Instead of approaching research into different audiences in a piecemeal fashion then attempting to consolidate the separate results, this project would be a cohesive study.
In order to discern how we need to communicate and position Saint Mary’s in the future, we need to understand the current perceptions and needs of our various audiences – high school women, parents of current and prospective students, current students, alumnae, faculty and staff. The College also needs to measure how it is perceived in relation to its competitors and, perhaps, its aspirant institutions. This project would establish a baseline upon which we can build our marketing efforts – a baseline that would be important as we look forward to ongoing evaluation through a regular cycle of research into our main audiences.
This proposal is co-sponsored by the three task forces because this research has the potential to significantly impact our efforts to appropriately increase enrollment, to increase diversity, and to effectively market the College to key audiences.
This type of study was undertaken in 1997 with Maguire Associates. The Maguire study entitled “A Marketing Opportunity and Image Analysis” focused on “high school juniors and seniors in the College’s prospective applicant, or inquiry, pool.” Given the importance of parents as partners in the college search process, Maguire included parents in their study.
The results of the Maguire study were revealing and the Admission office has used the recommendations to guide their marketing efforts over the last several years. While still valuable, the Maguire study is no longer an accurate picture of students considering college. Maguire was a snapshot in time – the high school juniors and seniors surveyed in 1997 are now college graduates. Students have changed, and the College has changed over the last seven years. Research needs to be updated on a regular basis to remain relevant and useful, a point highlighted in the strategic plan with “establishment of a research cycle” listed in two initiatives. A more appropriate cycle would mirror a “generation” of college students – 4 years.
Phase 1 – Researching perceptions and position of Saint Mary’s College
The first component of this study, given enrollment issues, is research into our highest priority audiences – prospective students and their parents. The Office of Institutional Research gathers annual data on the “known” prospective students – those who apply to Saint Mary’s. The students who do not apply are an unknown. Therefore, we believe we need to poll more “suspect” students – those higher in the admission “funnel” who fit the desired profile of a Saint Mary’s student, but who have not yet made any connection with the College.
Since admission efforts have expanded to include more freshmen and sophomore high school students, these younger audiences should be considered as part of the study. The parents are included, as they were in the Maguire study, because they are an integral part of students’ college evaluation and selection.
Prospective students are the primary audience, but as we think long term about strengthening the reputation of Saint Mary’s, we need to think about how we are perceived by other key audiences. These audiences – current students, parents of current students, faculty and staff and our alumnae – are already part of the Saint Mary’s family and, therefore, they have the most potential to shape the Saint Mary’s reputation. These reference points are necessary to reliably construct a more comprehensive view of what image the college has, and to determine what work we need to do to keep outside perception and our desired perception as closely aligned as possible.
Other audiences to consider in this analysis are those outside Saint Mary’s who have an influence on how the College is perceived. Two potential groups to consider are opinion leaders (academic leaders, political leaders, editors) and high school guidance counselors.
Phase 2 – Aligning perceptions – developing and delivering the Saint Mary’s message
In phase one of the project, we hope to learn more about the awareness and perception of Saint Mary’s from the outside-in. In phase two of the identity project, we would analyze the gap between Saint Mary’s desired perception – what we want to be known for and how we support that promise – and the outside perceptions identified in phase one. We would build on the information gathered in phase one by using it to develop core messages and supporting strategies that help us close the gap through an Integrated Marketing Communications program.
Marketing Saint Mary’s is not limited to the departments who promote the College. Everyone associated with Saint Mary’s tells our story – whether it is in casual conversation, a presentation, a news release, or in a direct mail campaign. The more consistency Saint Mary’s has in the messages and images we deliver, the more likely our constituents’ perceptions of the College will match the reputation we seek.
One tool we would expect as a result of this project is an institutional identity system (or “institutional image [brand] portfolio” according to consulting firm) to ensure that consistency. This kind of system is a guidebook to help everyone who communicates for and about Saint Mary’s to stay “on message,” and “on image” with: core messages, tagline, logo, type preferences, color palettes, standards for usage, etc.
The process of developing a Saint Mary’s identity system would help educate and build buy-in on the part of the internal community about the importance and necessity of Integrated Marketing Communications. It would also create more efficiency in the development and approval of all promotional materials by having a clearly defined set of standards for messages and design.
· Why is this activity particularly important to the College?
Enrollment is down, and at an institution as tuition-dependent as Saint Mary’s, enrollment issues have had and could continue to have significant impact on the College’s budget. We realized this year that we reached a point where our applicants were much more price sensitive, and that there was a lack of perceived value for the cost of attending Saint Mary’s. The College needs to explore the perception of value to help determine next steps. Lack of diversity remains an issue on campus. The College needs to dig deeper to identify issues causing these trends. Identifying the issues, and adjusting our programs and marketing accordingly, can most effectively be accomplished through actionable research. More understanding of our outside audiences and their perceptions will lead to recommendations that can have a more significant impact in our recruitment, retention and development efforts.
· What would be the impact if this proposal is not funded?
Enrollment efforts would suffer because of a lack of understanding of audiences and perceptions of the College outside of our traditional applicant pool. Diversity efforts would continue, but would not have the benefit of actionable data on specific audiences and perceptions. Marketing efforts would continue, but would still be developed “inside-out,” lacking the benefit of audience insight and the baseline of perceived value.
Proposal addresses:
· Strategic Area III – Recruit, retain and graduate a diverse student body that ensures the College’s leadership in women’s education.
· Initiative 2: develop and implement an effective Enrollment Management Plan in order to achieve optimum enrollment and enrich the vitality of the College
a. Action 2.2 – Establish a systematic research cycle for enrollment management
i. 2.2.1 - Collect, analyze and use available data regarding internal constituencies: new students, current students and alumnae
ii. 2.2.2 - Collect, analyze and use data regarding external constituencies: competing institutions, peer groups, national trends.
iii. 2.2.4 - Analyze the perception of value of Saint Mary's education in relation to college pricing and affordability.
b. Action 2.4: Market the distinctive features of a Saint Mary’s education to accomplish enrollment management goals.
· Initiative 3: Develop a student body with a wide variety of backgrounds, interests, capabilities, and life experiences
a. Action 3.1 – Increase enrollment of historically underrepresented students, including international students
i. 3.1.2 - Research and develop special programs for prospective students from historically underrepresented groups and their families.
· Strategic Area II: Cultivate leadership and enhance communication
· Initiative 4 -- Create understanding of and achieve commitment to integrated marketing communication (IMC) by the Saint Mary’s College Community
a. Action 4.1 - Develop and implement an internal and external integrated marketing communication plan.
i. Action 4.1.1 – Establish a planning structure
1. 4.1.1.4 – An appropriate research cycle is established
2. 4.1.1.6 – The Saint Mary’s community is educated about the effectiveness and importance of IMC
b. Action 4.2 – Market the distinctive features of a Saint Mary’s education
i. Action 4.2.1 – Identify the College’s distinctive features
· What results do you anticipate?
· Expanded student funnel resulting in a larger pool of qualified applications
· Increased institutional awareness and prestige
· Appropriately increased enrollment
o Increased yield
o Increased diversity
o Increased retention
· Stronger connections with key audiences – prospective students, parents of prospective and current students, current students, alumnae, benefactors
· Improved usage of financial aid resources
· Greater philanthropic giving
· How will you assess your results?
· Applications
· Selectivity
· Yield
· Diversity statistics
· Retention statistics
· Development efforts
· Rankings
This project should be considered an investment and one way to evaluate the return on investment for this project is through incremental enrollment. For example, if the College decides to move forward with all components of the proposal and make the full proposed investment, the investment would break even in four years if it helped us attract, enroll and retain approximately five new students per year.
Another way to evaluate the return on investment is in incremental development revenue. For instance, if the recommendations developed in the project helped the Annual Fund realized an additional .25% of its annual goal ($2.25 million) each year, in approximately four years the investment would break even.
· Research/Consulting Firm – Detailed proposal with phases and components priced separately for consideration.
· Components include:
· Recruitment Audit – a preliminary phase to the research proposed in this study in which the consulting firm works in depth with the admission and financial aid offices to understand current recruitment goals, strategies to gain insight to help guide the research phase of the proposal. This may or may not be necessary since we have been working with Ruth Vedvik of Hardwick Day on many of these issues since Mary Pat Nolan’s departure – TBD by new VP of Enrollment. Estimated cost: $24,500
· Phase 1 - Image Research with Primary Audiences:
i. Prospective Students - $12,800 (±7% confidence interval) - $19,200 (±5% confidence interval)
ii. Parents of Inquiring students - $13,800 (±7% confidence interval) - $21,600 (±5% confidence interval) – Higher cost is related to difficulty of getting adults to participate vs. teens.
iii. Parents of current students - $17,000 (±5% confidence interval)
iv. Current students - $10,000
v. Faculty, Administrators and Staff - $10,000
vi. Alumnae - $10,000
· Image research with secondary audiences
i. Influentials/Opinion leaders - $10,600
ii. Guidance/college counselors - $9,900
· Phase 2 – Institutional Identity Development
i. “Institutional Promise” Development and Testing – team to help identify the core promise/benefit Saint Mary’s offers, test via survey - $24,805
ii. Institutional Image Portfolio Development – includes identity rationale, attributes, core messages, tagline, implementation and recommendations, campus presentation - $23,795.
· Staff time for study – VP Enrollment Management, VP College Relations, Institutional Research, Admission, Development, Alumnae Relations, Marketing Communications, Financial Aid, Select members of IMC Task Force, EMAC, Diversity Task Force
· Redesign of college-wide communication materials – brochures, view books, advertisements, Web site, letterhead, business cards, signage. This is an ongoing expense, independent of research, but research results would help with more effective/cohesive messaging, design and delivery.
· Design expense – TBD. Most major promotional materials are redesigned, or at least revised annually, therefore, this project would guide this process, not necessarily add expense.
· Printing expense – TBD. Since most major promotional materials are redesigned and reprinted on an annual basis, there would likely be little incremental cost to a redesign. Printing expense that would impact campus departments would be new letterhead and business cards.
· According to Printing Services, most letterhead and envelopes are ordered on an as-needed basis in quantities of 500 or 1,000 sheets. Departments don’t normally order large quantities of letterhead to keep in stock for more than a year. Therefore, there would be little impact on individual department budgets if any major changes to stationery were necessary.
· Given that the College’s tagline (The Nation’s Premier Catholic Women’s College) is outdated and is still included on current business cards, it is likely that many will likely need to be replaced in the near future, whether or not the College decides to move forward with this project. The identity system would help us establish standards for new cards.