As marketers and content creators, it is our responsibility to provide an experience for all users whether that be platforms such as websites or social media channels. This, however, is not always the case. The world of digital accessibility is vast, unregulated, and inconsistent.

So how do we help the brand we manage become accessible to all? By ensuring that we do our best to advocate and understand all the nuances of digital accessibility. That we immerse ourselves in another user's world and ensure that our content is accessible for all. This session will provide a look at best practices for digital accessibility for marketers when creating content for social media platforms. Plus, it will provide resources for how to continue your educational journey beyond this session.

Key takeaways:

• Understand what the key elements/definitions of digital accessibility are when creating content on social media platforms.
• The best practices of how to utilize digital accessibility features.
• How to teach your team and advocate for change within your organization.

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When budget season comes around, we often see social media getting the smallest slice of the marketing pie. A single billboard may gain more funds than the entire social media budget. Nevertheless, your highly targeted social media campaigns show exactly how many people were sent to the website, how users engaged with the school, or the precise number of leads gained. And while it can be frustrating to see these successes juxtaposed to the often ambiguous or inflated metrics associated with traditional media, there are actions you can take to create internal advocates to help support and elevate your social media efforts.

This presentation will focus on two elements of social media: metrics (how you measure social media success) and translation (how you express this in terms others will understand).

• The metrics portion will show you how to identify key metrics, how to strategize your efforts towards increasing them, and how to engage in ongoing tracking and optimization

• The translation portion will review tactics on how to present these metrics to internal audiences who may not be well versed in digital marketing. The goal is to express your social media success in ways that allow others to speak clearly and effectively on your behalf

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What if you could capture that seeing-is-believing campus visit feeling and make it available to anyone, anywhere on the planet? That was the challenge presented to Bucknell’s Communications and Admissions teams — even before the COVID-19 pandemic.  

In this session, you’ll see how the Bucknell Virtual Experience started from scratch to become an interactive multimedia space that can be experienced on a desktop, mobile device or through an Oculus Quest virtual reality headset. In addition, it will walk you through the creation of a multi-channel launch strategy — including social media best practices in both organic and paid content.

Takeaways:

1. Tips for bringing your campus and University brand to life within a virtual visit experience. 
2. Tangible how-tos for incorporating virtual visit options within your existing admissions strategy. 
3. Best practices for launching a major initiative across multiple channels (organic and paid social, University website, digital advertising, media relations, in-person, etc.). 

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This presentation will focus on ways Bob has taken elements of the Harvard Business School Office of Alumni Relations social media (like tweets and Instagram polls) and developed them into shareable content -- most notably in the form of videos. 

During his session, the audience will find ways to think differently about social media content and how--even if you're a one-person team like him--you can create engaging content around episodic social media events. 

His presentation will focus on basic tools one can use (e.g., Wakelet) to more advanced means (e.g., Adobe Premiere).

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When performance audiences began to tune in from the comfort of their own homes during the pandemic, Penn State College of Arts and Architecture pivoted to remote content delivery and marketing for their music and theatre seasons, lecture series, art exhibitions, and admissions recruitment. While this meant expanding our virtual reach, not to mention our donor pool, it also presented a challenge - competing for airtime and viewers with other virtual events and streaming platforms. 

Using social media to promote and stream events, engage our viewers, feature our Broadway alumni, and enhance our visibility has changed the way in which we intend to continue marketing when we return to in-person performances and events. Hybrid is our new model for outreach. Through our social media platforms and virtual program offerings, we will be able to increase engagement and community building by meeting audiences where they are, rather than only engaging with those who are able to come to us in-person. This is particularly important for maintaining virtual connections established with donors and alumni over the course of the pandemic through social media.

Stephanie will discuss:

• Alumni (group engagement, fundraising, and takeovers)
• Donors (virtual events hosting and crowdfunding campaigns)
• Prospective students (hashtag campaigns and student spotlights for recruitment marketing)
• Hybrid events marketing (Theatre and Music promotional marketing and livestreams/simulcasts on Facebook and Youtube as well as virtual tours of exhibitions) using "extras" and "behind-the-scenes" content. We also created a multi-night Penn State alumni performance livestream event with our Broadway alumni, using influencer marketing techniques to increase our audience.
• Subscription-based offerings (tiered content access via social groups and promotion)

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In this talk, we’ll discuss how to effectively highlight university career outcomes on social media. Using tactics such as videos, graphics, and toolkits, you’ll learn how to best announce and bring attention to career outcome results at your university.

What you’ll take away:

• How to best socialize your career outcomes results within your university
• How to best prep for the career outcomes announcement
• How to announce career outcomes on social media

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As in-house marketing, communications, and social media functions become increasingly ubiquitous in higher education, the size of these creative teams continues to grow. With the rapid evolution brought on by COVID-19 and quickly shifting technical needs, these teams need to be functioning at a high level to produce their best work.

With our unique silos, limited budgets, and specialized goals, building a creative or technical team in higher education looks different than it might in a corporate setting. However, the benefits of investing time in team development are innumerable. Drawing on the wisdom of Patrick Lencioni, Seth Godin, Todd Henry, Simon Sinek, and others, this presentation helps participants define a philosophy for building and supporting their creative teams within a higher education framework.

In this session, participants will learn:

• How to build trust and connection within their team
• How to facilitate a conversation around shared values
• How to create an environment where their team can thrive
• How to best lead their team to success

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From the new book, "The Death of Content as King: How a Data Democracy has Revolutionized Marketing." Social media has experienced a once-in-a-century paradigm shift over the past few years as content tactics of yesteryear fail and data-driven strategies have revolutionized the way students interact with platforms. The ever-changing algorithms and diminishing reach of organic content on major platforms will require new framework models and a modern consumer journey that takes advantage of the available data.

Key Takeaways:
-An analysis of what has changed as mature and unicorn platforms have emphasized user-generated content while making institutional content pay-to-play.
-An introduction of a new modern consumer journey that replaces the over hundred-year-old AIDA model and embraces data as the voice of the student with actionable data-driven stages.
-Provide a new data framework model that universities can deploy to find valuable, organizable, targetable, and explainable data across their organization.

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