Category: Marketing Communications

How Restaurants Can Use Cause Marketing to Enhance Branding

Post author By admin
Post date February 4, 2022

Restaurant owners and marketers know more than anyone how important it is to form a strong relationship with customers. Creating shared values promotes brand loyalty and increases word of mouth. Cause marketing is one way restaurants can connect with their customers.

As a branding strategy, cause marketing is on the rise and is becoming significantly more important as millennials expect more from the places they do business with. They don’t just want a nice restaurant experience with a good atmosphere, they want to know that their hardearned dollars are doing something for the greater good. In fact, it’s been reported that 91 percent of millennials are willing to change their buying habits to support brands that rally behind a social cause.

So how can you implement cause marketing into your business? Here are five tips to take your strategy to the next level:

1. Align with a cause that actually makes sense for your brand.

Finding a cause that is the right fit for your restaurant is crucial to any successful cause marketing program. With hundreds of social causes to choose from, there should be one that speaks to the heart of your brand and even the hearts of your guests.

2. Commit to your cause.

Whether you’re giving a portion of your proceeds to a non-profit or committing to eliminating food waste by the way you dispose of unused food, you want your team to have total buy-in. Showcasing your whole team’s commitment to the cause and publicizing these efforts can help to build a connection between your restaurant and customers.

3. Leverage your cause in your marketing efforts.

No good deed should go unnoticed. If your brand is supporting a social cause, you may win some earned media through press coverage. Being a socially responsible brand can earn you an advantage over competitors. Your restaurants’ involvement with a charity may be your guests’ deciding factor when looking at their dining options. The content of this document/layout will be officially proofread prior to the final approval of the art or copy document.

4. Authenticity is a must.

If the cause chosen is one your brand is truly passionate about, it should sell itself. Let the message organically show through your marketing choices. Here are a few cause marketing examples that were well received because of their authenticity. Consumers know an inauthentic message when they see one, which could potentially result in catastrophe for your restaurant’s image.

5. Learn how Push can help with your restaurant cause marketing.

We’re always here to help you strategize and execute a strong cause marketing campaign or platform. Just take a look at the work we did for Sonny’s BBQ. Restaurant store design, marketing strategy and brand positioning are a few other ways we can help your restaurant build a strong, relevant foundation for its future. Check out more of our work here.

Not sure if an agency is right for your restaurant? Our recent article about bringing a branding agency on board might help you decide!

Retail Marketing Communications Digital Media Advice Trends

Using SMS Marketing to Get Return Customers to a Retail Shop

Post author By admin
Post date January 21, 2022

Despite recent events sky rocketing the success of retail SMS marketing, text strategy has steadily grown in the last decade. From time pressing promos to lapsing coupons, retail SMS marketing campaigns have proven to be a more effective marketing channel than email campaigns. You’re able to send short, to-the-point, high priority messages straight to the consumer’s preferred channel of communication. When it comes down to it, 78% of shoppers say SMS is the fastest way to reach them and they are six to eight times more likely to engage with text messages than emails.

In fact, 99% of SMS marketing campaigns are read and email marketing has failed to meet the same metrics, dropping 47% in open rate performance over the last 5 years. Through open lines of communication, like text messaging, you can make your retail shop more accessible. Social media platforms and SMS marketing allow shoppers to interact with your brand on a personal level. Sharing feedback and coming face to face with your brand’s voice in casual settings are just a couple of reasons shoppers are able to build a relationship and trust with your store.

Retail SMS marketing technique wins engagement over shoppers at every level of the marketing funnel. Whether they are prospects or existing customers, shoppers signed up for your store’s SMS marketing builds customer loyalty and fosters repeat purchases. Once you have their information, you can send new discounts or products available your shoppers might be interested in.

You can make your retail SMS marketing campaigns more successful by sending personalized and pertinent messages. Bulk text blasts are a thing of the past and are not viable in the retail industry. One-to-one messages deliver content shoppers truly want to read and have the potential to communicate your brand’s voice, values and image on a completely different level. To see how Push has helped retail stores seize their potential, check out our case studies.

So how can you push retail SMS marketing messages to drive sales? Here are four tips get shoppers back in-store.

1. Deliver discount details:

When shoppers know a sale is starting, and more importantly ending, it will drive more traffic to your store and website to purchase before the promotion is over.

2. Send can’t miss coupons:

More often than not, coupons are extremely timely. They are a simple marketing strategy to attract shoppers for saving on regular prices. But it also positively impacts your customer loyalty, therefore increasing repeat purchases.

3. Enrolled loyalty program messages:

If you don’t already have a loyalty program, you should consider setting one up for your loyal shoppers. Personalized messages are important to this audience because you are making their shopping experience quicker, easier and personal. Loyalty programs not only measure repeat purchases but connects your brand to shoppers.

4. Seasonal sale reminders:

These promos bring in big bucks and helps sustain stores during slow periods. You can also build off of these sales to increase loyalty among shoppers.

For more strategies on how to drive traffic to your retail store, check out our previous blog titled 5 Strategies to Bring Customers Back to Your Retail Shop.

Email marketing may not be completely out of the picture, but shoppers are 40% more likely to convert when they receive text marketing. If your goal is to drive in-store traffic and increase repeat purchases, retail SMS marketing is a useful resource. Short, concise and personalized text marketing, according to the voice and tone of your brand, has shown statistical success and can help your store grow in more than one aspect.

Retail Social Branding Marketing Communications

4 Ways to Use Social Media for Retail to Drive Sales

Post author By admin
Post date November 11, 2021

Social media platforms are very powerful tools for brands. And while their primary use is for sharing content and customer engagement, there are ways to use social media platforms to drive sales. Here we discuss 4 ways brands can use social media to make their cash registers ring.

Identify the correct platform to activate.

Different social media platforms are utilized in different ways by different audiences. Knowing what you want to say is great, but knowing where best to say it is equally important. Your message, your offer and your desired audience should dictate which social channel you choose to activate. While not all social channels will directly drive in-store sales, all platforms should be used in ways to help you reach this goal. To get the right social media mix, you need to analyze each social channel to determine where your audiences are and how they behave on the platform. Then tailor your campaign messaging and calls-to-action accordingly.

Use your social media channels to showcase your brand’s voice.

Social media platforms give brands the opportunity to speak directly to their followers, fans and the public at large. In fact, 60% of consumers engage with brands across their social channels before making a purchase. By consistently using your brand’s voice across all channels, your current and potential customers will better understand who your brand is, how you speak, and what you stand for to determine whether or not they want to engage, interact, and ultimately purchase something from you. That’s not to say you say the exact same things in the exact same ways across all channels. There is a time and a place to let your brand’s hair down if you will. For example, Wendy’s brand voice on Twitter is notoriously irreverent, sarcastic and even combative, whereas their voice on Facebook, while still fun and irreverent, dials down the combativeness and dials up the legit customer service responses.

Make your store accessible and shoppable directly on social media platforms.

Of all the retail social media tips, this one is a bit of a no-brainer, but critical to driving sales, both online and offline: make sure customers can access your store without leaving their current social media platform. At the very least, you should provide your store’s key information on all of your social channels—URL, physical address, phone number, hours of operation, etc. But various social channels now offer ways to showcase and sell your products within their platforms. For example, Instagram allows you to create a shoppable feed where users can view and purchase tagged products within lifestyle images and checkout without ever leaving the app. Your online efforts pay dividends offline as well. After following a brand on social media, 84% of people will visit the brand’s physical store closest to their home.

Increased Reach through paid ads.

As social media feed algorithms continue to evolve and organic reach declines, paid social advertising is a great way to reach your desired audiences. Most social media platforms provide the powerful ability to create custom audiences to advertise to that can greatly increase traffic to your business. With an effective paid social media strategy, you will be able to see tangible data and results that could provide key insights into your overall target audience and positioning in the marketplace. You can even tailor ads to specific objectives like click-throughs, reach, impressions and engagement. These tools allow you to truly streamline your message and customize your ads to make them extremely effective with the audiences that matter to your brand.

We hope you find these tips helpful, but if you need assistance with retail social media marketing, don’t hesitate to reach out—407-841-2299.

Marketing Communications Advice Education

5 Lessons From Successful University Marketing Campaigns

Post author By admin
Post date October 28, 2021

Colleges and universities looking to stay relevant with today’s potential students are presented with a unique challenge to create and share content that entertains and inspires. And, as new student enrollment continues to decline year over year it’s becoming increasingly important to implement marketing strategies that have a proven track record. So, here are 5 lessons your institution can implement into your next campaign to help engage potential students.

Lesson 1: Get Emotional

According to several studies, appealing to your prospective student’s emotions with a positive spin can help make your message resonate. In fact, a Nielson study found that individuals are 8.4x more likely to trust a company and 7.1x more likely to make a purchase when they feel a positive emotion from that brand.

What’s more, showcasing real and shared experiences with photography and video can help invite your prospective students in, such as an inspiring story of an alumni’s financial life after getting their degree, or showing how networking through school helped change a life. For example, a Harvard University campaign showed how two graduates with disabilities connected and worked together to form a resource that empowered other students. Whichever stories you choose to highlight, as WordStream notes, it is import to “think outside the box and pull together some compelling story lines to draw new leads in.”

Lesson 2: Emphasize Career Outcomes

In a 2019 survey of American college freshmen administered by the Cooperative Institutional Research Program at UCLA’s Higher Education Research Institute, the most popular reason cited for attending college is to get a good job. While that may come as no surprise to some, it emphasizes the fact that alumni careers are an effective strategy to showcasing the possibilities with a degree-seeking students. One great way to do this is to highlight outstanding alumni and work with them to become brand ambassadors off campus. Another, is to take Boston College’s approach with a webpage dedicated to listing the career outcomes for their previous students.

Lesson 3: Know Your Audience

When it comes to reaching prospective students, instead of a general and wide approach, aim for narrow and niche. Is your university known for environmental science? Or an outstanding business school? Personalizing your message to prospective students with interests in the programs your University is known for is more likely to resonate and engage those prospective students. This is especially true in targeted social campaigns across age, gender, detailed targeting and interests for current high school students. Justing as we’ve covered in 5 Post-COVID Branding Trends for Universities, “If you try to appeal to every possible student looking to go to college, you might not be speaking as directly as you could be to those students who would be the perfect match for your school and who are more likely to enroll if you’re able to connect with them in the right way.”

Lesson 4: Pivot to Video

It’s a phrase popularized by the rise of short-form content on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Youtube, Snapchat and TikTok. But it couldn’t be more true when it comes to getting your university in front of prospective students. Video content is digestible, visually stimulating, has the power to convey a powerful message effectively and is suited to the mobile experience. And seeing as how 8 in 10 students visit college websites on mobile, this is an incredibly important factor. Furthermore, marketers who use video grow revenue 49% faster than marketers who don’t. It’s also no secret in the higher education industry, with 86% of universities and colleges having a presence on YouTube.

One great example is a Leeds University campaign ‘Student Life at Leeds’ which “not only speaks the language of existing and prospective students, but puts people in the shoes of someone studying at the university in a way that is visually inspiring.”

Lesson 5: Showcase UGC

A study from Digital Marketing Institute found that “brand engagement improves by 28% when consumers are exposed to both professional and user-generated content.” Plus, the same study found that 9 out of 10 students consult a college search review site when researching where to study. From this, it’s clear that prospective students trust the insights and opinions of their peers, which is all the more reason to leverage user-generated content (UGC) in your next campaign. This could take the form of student social media takeover days, student-led Q&A sessions via Facebook or Instagram live and even guest blog posts on your institution’s website written by existing students or alumni. Any of these UGC strategies can help your prospective students to connect with existing students on a personal level, which shows transparency and builds trust with your brand.

For more on how Push can help with your education marketing efforts, contact us or here or call 407-841-2299.

Marketing Communications Digital Media Advice

7 Ways To Bring More Customers With a Google My Business Listing

Post author By admin
Post date October 7, 2021

When it comes to search, Google is the undisputed heavyweight champ of the world, getting an average of 40,000 search queries per second or roughly a whopping 3.5 billion searches a day. This makes Google an incredibly powerful tool for businesses to gain brand awareness, improve website traffic, acquire new leads and more.

Below we discuss seven ways to use Google My Business to increase customers. If you haven’t already set up your Google My Business account, we suggest you do so now. It’s free, so why not?

1. Become more visible online, aka rank better in search results.

Google likes business that are trustworthy and offer high quality goods or services. By setting up a Google My Business account, you are letting the search engine know that you are a legit business that has disclosed accurate information about your company. Your unique information helps you stand out from your competitors and can help you rank higher.

2. Increase trust and credibility with customers.

There are many Google My Business features that can make your listing more appealing to viewers and credible to potential customers. You can upload different types of photos to show off your physical space, your products or services and more. There’s even an option to publish an indoor Street View as a virtual tour of your business. Is it worth the effort to enhance your Google My Business listing? Yes! Listings with photos and a virtual tour are twice as likely to generate interest. As far as increasing your online credibility, customers are 70% more likely to visit businesses with a Google My Business listing and 29% more likely to buy something.

3. Show customer reviews.

These days, online customer reviews can make or break a business. In fact, 87% of potential customers won’t even consider businesses with low customer ratings. Google My Business not only allows you to display customer ratings, it allows you to respond to customer feedback and reviews, which gives you the opportunity to resolve problems and demonstrate great customer service.

4. Improve discoverability/visibility.

Almost everyone starts with search to find your business or products. Make it easier for them to do that. A Google My Business account ensures that when someone searches for your company or product online, your company shows up on Google Search and Google Maps. Once it does, your listing has all the information they are after, like website, location, contact info, how to visit, etc.

5. Keep customers quickly and easily informed.

Having your company’s information clearly displayed on your Google My Business listing helps customers get important information instantly. But beyond listing helpful things like your address, hours of operation and contact info, Google My Business allows you inform customers of updates, like that you’ve expanded your services, temporarily closed or fully reopened. This is a valuable feature, as updates like these can help avoid customer confusion and build trust.

6. Be discoverable on local searches.

When someone searches for a restaurant using search terms like, “restaurants near me” or “restaurants in…” Google displays local listings. These local listings have seen an increase in visibility over or organic search results. So having your accurate info in Google My Business is the best way for your company to be discovered when people are looking for products or services in your area.

7. Customize your listing to perform best.

We’ve discussed how you can use Google My Business to increase sales, boost traffic and elevate your search rankings, but you can customize your listing to make it do even more. Add your business phone number to enable people to contact you in a click. Or consider adding buttons like “Share,” “Make a Reservation” and “Call Now” to allow people to take immediate action.

Google My Business is a powerful resource to put to work for your company. It’s free and takes just a few minutes to set up, which makes it a no brainer. Ready to step up your search game? This is a good place to start.

Marketing Communications Advice

Increase Revenue and Reduce Costs with Employee Communication

Post author By admin
Post date September 30, 2021

We all know the importance of good communication in our personal relationships and the positive impact it has on our lives. So it’s important to remember that open, clear and ongoing communication in a business setting has just as many benefits that leads to better profits. In fact, it’s been reported that companies with effective communication strategies see 47% higher total returns to shareholders. Here, we’ll take a closer look at the very real cost of poor communication with employees and offer a few ways to improve your internal communication strategy, and in turn, the health of your business.

How Does Employee Communication Affect Your Bottom Line?

Poor communication can have several adverse effects on your business, and all of these issues result in one common thing—less profit. Here are just a few of the issues that can arise and end up impacting your bottom line.

Weakened culture

A breakdown of communication can cause a collapse of company culture when employees don’t feel engaged. The Gallup State of the American Workplace report put it succinctly: “Actively

disengaged employees aren’t just unhappy at work—they are resentful that their needs aren’t being met and are acting out their unhappiness. Every day, these workers potentially undermine what their engaged coworkers accomplish.” These disengaged employees can be a drag on productivity, morale and profit. Inversely, a Gallup study of nearly 200 organizations reported that companies with the highest levels of employee engagement were 22% more profitable and 21% more productive than those with low levels of engagement.

Decreased employee productivity

Even when your employees are engaged and striving to do their best, if you don’t have the proper communication channels set up, productivity can still suffer as they’ll waste time looking for vital information or have to take the time to redo something if they weren’t clear on a process or protocol to begin with.

Higher employee turnover

When employees don’t feel like they’re connected to company culture or are confused about their role and what’s expected of them, turnover is likely to follow. Employee retention and profitability go hand-in-hand because employee turnover is costly. As studies have shown, it costs employers 33% of a worker’s annual salary to hire a replacement, while other research suggests that it costs as much as three times their salary. So eliminating poor communication as a reason for employee discontent can certainly save you money in the long run.

How You Can Improve Your Communication and Your Profits

Now that we’ve discussed the importance of employee communication, let’s take a look at some ways you can better internal communication in your business.

Utilize communication channels and techniques

The first step to clear communication is establishing the foundation for how you will communicate with employees. Take advantage of technology resources that can make it easier to connect and establish a clear flow of how information is disseminated within your business. Additionally, make sure there’s an emphasis put on communication in your company culture. Expert Laquita Clear advises to “create a culture of communication within your organization” and to “establish new processes that focus on effective communication education and commit to maintaining awareness for the long-term.”

Ensure your employees have a voice

Making sure your employees are heard can go a long way in improving your culture of communication. This is vitally important given that as many as 78% of employees say they’d work harder if their contributions were recognized. And as we previously noted, employees feel more connected to and invested in your business when they feel listened to and heard. Setting up an ongoing way to collect their feedback and ideas can be as simple as an old-fashioned suggestion box, dedicated email address or a Slack channel where people can easily collaborate.

Create consistent training

Finally, getting everybody on the same page when it comes to communication starts with training. As we discussed in an earlier post, proper training ensures they feel connected to your business from day one and they can better communicate your brand story and make customers feel even more connected.

There are more ways to increase revenue with improved employee communication, but we hope these ideas are a good jumping off point for your business. For more on how Push can help with your education marketing efforts, contact us here or call 407-841-2299.

Retail Marketing Communications

5 Strategies to Bring Customers Back to Your Retail Shop

Post author By admin
Post date September 9, 2021

A year and a half into the pandemic, we all know that COVID-19 has led to dramatic changes in the retail landscape and has altered consumer expectations. Many retail stores have had to shut their doors or lack in-store experience due to a shortage of merchandise or staff. Customers have also grown more accustomed to shopping online over the past year, making it even harder to get them to come in. Even so, a little effort to get customers back into your store can go a long way, especially since a sizable 82% of Millennials still prefer in-store shopping to online. Consider these five strategies to attract customers and drive them to your shop.

Give guests a reason to visit.

One of the simplest ways to drive guests in-store is to give them a reason to visit with real benefits. Maybe that’s offering a special in-store discount. If that’s not possible for all guests, consider an initiative that rewards loyal customers for coming back, seeing as 62% of customers expect discounts or offers based on past purchases. You could also consider hosting local events that make the in-store experience more compelling or offer exclusive products and services in person that aren’t otherwise offered online.

Drive visits from your digital platform.

Even if you want your store to be your customers’ final destination, they’re likely going to find you online first. So make sure you have an updated website and active social media presence that will help keep you relevant and top of mind with customers. A digital presence that matches your in-store aesthetic will also help motivate people to visit to see more after getting a peek at what you have to offer online.

Invest in local SEO.

But to get those visits from your digital platforms, people need to be able to find you first. That’s where a strong local SEO presence will help. Given that 72% of consumers have been shown to visit a store within five miles when they did a local search online, it’s worthwhile to work with an SEO expert and invest in this area to make sure your site is optimized as it should be.

Focus on health and safety.

Given that we are still in the midst of a pandemic, it’s important to make sure your customers know you care about their health and safety. Clearly post or display the precautions your store is taking and what is expected of guests in-store. And if you do need to close due to illness or exposure to COVID-19, make sure to post your updated hours of operation on your website and social media pages so customers aren’t frustrated if they try to visit in person.

Leverage your employees.

And finally, be sure to utilize your employees to help boost your marketing efforts—a topic we wrote about in more detail here. Your employees are the people who can best advocate for your business and help spread the word through their networks. A few ideas to consider are allowing them to post guest blogs or updates from your store’s social media pages and encouraging them to share those posts to their own channels. Another area not to overlook is training. Making sure your employees are all on the same page and have the same solid understanding of your store can help them accurately reflect your brand’s values to customers and to their broader networks.

We hope these tools and tips can be used to help shore back up invaluable in-person traffic to your store. For more on how Push can help with your retail marketing efforts, contact us or here or call 407-841-2299.

Restaurant Marketing Communications

How Restaurant Menus Evolved During COVID

Post author By admin
Post date August 26, 2021

The COVID-19 pandemic forced restaurants to make major changes, especially when it comes to their menus. And while some changes are temporary, some are most likely here to stay. At least for the foreseeable future. What will restaurant menus after COVID-19 look like? No one knows for certain. But the changes that have already happened may be a good indicator of what’s ahead. Let’s take a look.

Fewer Menu Items. Greater Kitchen Efficiency.

Labor challenges, supply chain interruptions, and safety concerns caused restaurants to rethink their menu offerings. As a result, many restaurants have reduced ancillary items, eliminated single-dish ingredients, and limited customizable options to help save time, increase efficiency and focus on their core revenue-driving menu items. They’ve also reduced or ditched sharable items all together for safety reasons. But the good news is, most diners don’t mind. In fact, 76% of people have no problem with restaurants offering a reduced menu upon reopening.

Have Food. Must Travel.

Due to lockdowns, capacity restrictions, and consumer safety concerns, off-premise preference has skyrocketed. So much so, that 92% of restaurant traffic is now off-premise. Since more people are using delivery services and grabbing to-go than ever before, this has caused an increase in challenges for operators, including more incomplete or incorrect orders, deliveries arriving late, and food being cold and unappetizing upon arrival. To combat this, restaurants are prioritizing menu items that will travel well for delivery and takeout. To-go packaging is also getting reimagined, with innovations in venting, insulation, dividers, and production materials to help food travel better.

Paperless & Disposable Menus

One of the biggest changes diners may notice in restaurants after COVID-19 is a lack of physical menus. Reducing or eliminating physical menus was prompted by safety concerns for staff and guests but has benefits for operators, including cost savings and increased efficiencies. As experts in menu design who work with numerous restaurant clients, Push developed Paperless Menu to give restaurants the ability to quickly and easily convert their physical menu into a robust interactive digital menu. Not only do digital menu solutions like Paperless Menu eliminate the production costs and waste associated with traditional physical menus, but they can also be instantly updated to accommodate today’s changing needs and unexpected challenges. Better for diners, operators, and the environment, digital menus in some form or another are here to stay.

More Innovative Value Options

With so many people experiencing economic hardship during the pandemic, people are looking to get more for their money now more than ever. The fact that 66% of diners say “value” is a top factor when deciding where to eat has prompted many restaurants to make value offerings an even bigger deal. From new combo meals and food bundles to create your own at-home meal kits, restaurants are finding creative ways to provide larger portions at a greater price.

These menu changes came fast and furious due to the pandemic and some have been difficult to implement and adjust to for both guests and operators alike. But they aren’t all bad. In fact, many of these temporary solutions to unprecedented challenges have brought positive outcomes already and will continue to do so in the days, months, and years ahead. Welcome to the future. Can we take your order?

Retail Marketing Communications

Getting your Employees to Add to your Marketing Efforts

Post author By admin
Post date August 19, 2021

The people who can advocate best for your business are often the people who live and breathe it every day—your employees. They can be an incredibly valuable asset as you look to improve your marketing and communication efforts. So how can you utilize them effectively? Take a look at the following four ways to help bolster your bottom line with the help of your employees.

Listen To Their Ideas

Your employees are often the ones closest to the day-to-day operations of your business, and they likely could provide critical insight into better ways of working or offer ways to get the word out that you may not have thought of yet. More importantly, they’ll feel more connected to and invested in your business when they feel listened to and heard. So make sure you have an ongoing and exciting way to collect their feedback and ideas, whether that’s an old-fashioned suggestion box, dedicated email address, or even a Slack channel where people can drop ideas or easily collaborate.

Encourage Them to Spread the Word

We know word-of-mouth marketing works, and your employees can be some of your most powerful megaphones. In fact, 42% of online customers ﬁnd recommendations from friends and family inﬂuential, and your employees can help make your business seem more relevant to their peers and social circles. So encourage employees to spread the word about your business via their social media channels, whether that’s posting about certain products, sharing their positive experiences as an employee or even just by sharing, liking or commenting on your brand’s social pages. To help incentivize them to do so, you could consider giving employees personalized coupon codes and rewarding those who help to bring in the most business.

Promote Employees on Your Social Channels

Put a face to your business by promoting your employees on your social channels. Not only will that help make customers feel more acquainted with your brand, but it could help your employees feel more attached to your brand and more motivated to re-share your store’s posts on their own social channels. For example, you could do short proﬁles on employees, have them take over your page or handle for a day to give customers a look into your story from their unique POV, or even write a guest blog. They could also demonstrate a favorite product or model new clothes, knowing that 73% of consumers are more likely to purchase a product or service if they watch a video explaining it beforehand.

Incorporate Them Into In-Store Marketing Efforts

Statistics show that 70% of customers make their ﬁnal purchases in brick-and-mortar shops, not online, so it’s important that your in-store marketing efforts are equally as compelling as those online, and employees can be a huge part of that push. Start them off on solid ground and help them put their best foot forward with proper training. This will ensure they can effectively help customers, communicate your brand story and make visitors feel even more connected with your store.

We hope you’re able to apply some of these employee marketing tips to help drive business. For more on how Push can help with your retail marketing efforts, contact us or here or call 407-841-2299.

Marketing Communications Education

Using Alumni to Boost Student Retention

Post author By admin
Post date August 10, 2021

According to the National Center for Education Statistics, the retention rate for full-time degree-seeking undergrads who entered 4-year degree-granting institutions in fall 2018 was 81%. And the retention rate of private, for-profit 4-year institutions was just 63%. But this doesn’t have to be the case for your college or university. By involving your alumni now, you can boost the confidence of your undergrads and ultimately retain more of your student body. So here are a few strategies to engage your alumni for long-term student retention and growth.

HIGHLIGHT ALUMNI ACCOMPLISHMENTS

Current students are more likely to gain confidence in their university if they see what their alumni have accomplished out in the world. After all, an alumni’s success after graduation is the university’s true “proof of concept.” So it’s important to showcase your successful alumni by displaying “alumni spotlights” to current students in the classroom, on social media and through special events on campus such as speaking events or career fairs.

FOSTER MENTORSHIPS

Forming an alumni-student mentorship program could also be key to increasing retention rates. As illustrated by The Nursing Journal, 76% of full-time students who’d been mentored successfully by an older student completed the semester. By contrast, the completion rate was just 36% for students who hadn’t been mentored.

With this in mind, consider engaging alumni for mentorship opportunities based on the same field of study via LinkedIn or quarterly in-person events to help your students and alumni develop relationships. Inviting alumni that are experts in specific fields to guest lecture is another excellent way for them to get more face-to-face time with students. Your alumni will feel more connected with your university if they know a few current students and can be a resource to them.

KEEP YOUR ALUMNI IN THE LOOP

two street signs that read Alumni DR and Homecoming Circle

An updated alumnus is an engaged alumnus. So provide them with consistent and fresh content that keeps them in the loop with their alma mater and then invites them to share their resources such as their time, career insight, pro tips from their time as a student and more.

This could include inviting them back for more than just reunions to stay connected, playing up the nostalgia of being a former student and amping up the feeling of youth with your communications, or making your alumni feel important by asking for their input on surveys for future decisions in the university. The latter is also an excellent way to keep alumni employment and demographic info up-to-date to help better inform your future marketing strategies.

In all, retaining your student body is all about connections. If your students have an opportunity to meet with past alumni, see their success, as well as a path to their own success, your students are more likely to graduate from your college or university. Alumni involvement and engagement is vital to the long-term life of your university. So give them every opportunity to stay engaged, visit and mentor the next generation of alumni.