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Presenters:
Antonia Martinez, Rockefeller University
Ken Caldwell, University of Michigan
Keith Allison, New York University
Moderator: Jessika Reed, University of Alabama at Birmingham
Notetaker: Becky Klein, Valparaiso University
Resources
Resources
Presentation Notes
Presentation Notes
Newsletters Mini Master Class
September 14, 2018
Discussion Topics
Newsletter content, marketing, and promotion strategies
Social media strategies to amplify newsletter articles as they are published
Whether or not to allow reader comments (and should they be anonymous?)
Sending periodic email digests and summary of recently published articles
How to invite regular contributions from people outside of the planning team
Whether to do a newsletter or not (and what else you might do instead)
PLUS
An interactive exercise in writing dynamite headlines for your articles
Notes from the Webinar
Antonia (AM):
One person department
Newsletter is primary responsibility
Came from magazine/newspaper background and applied to IT
Some internal comm, but mostly for bigger projects.
New name: iNEWS, restricted access
Current format: monthly email/blog on WordPress. Everyone is subscribed by default; they can opt out.
Summer experiment: newsletter was “as needed” only (does it need to be communicated, and if so, does it need to be sent now?). This led to Antonia having more time to communicate more effectively and being able to spend time on other projects.
Back on monthly schedule now.
Ken (KC):
University of Michigan is a decentralized campus with numerous embedded IT units. He works for ITS but their newsletter represents the Office of the VPIT-CIO.
Michigan IT News is published on an ongoing basis, but an email is sent monthly to everyone with an IT-related role across all U-M campuses. New hires are added, but it is also an opt-in list (Non-IT staff are encouraged to join).
WordPress website. Email newsletter delivered monthly is custom HTML.
4-5 articles featured each month. Experimenting with multiple subject lines.
Stories also amplified via Twitter @umichTECH. Ken encourages everyone else to use social media to promote stories.
Volunteer newsletter planning group meets every two weeks to set editorial direction and review the content calendar. The group represents diverse IT departments, with the goal to continue including additional units.
Content focus: benefits of IT to the rest of campus, not just technical project updates. Michigan IT News focuses on how IT delivers value to campus and enables teaching and learning.
Regular calls for content are sent by email. Contributors can submit a Google Form and use writing guidelines for help.
Central ITS is ~700 regular staff; closer to 1,000 if you include contractors & temps. This doesn’t include the embedded IT units; that takes it closer to 3,300.
Keith (KA):
Centralized IT Comm unit: director, 4 FT, 1 student. Partners with central public affairs office.
All of them share newsletter editing responsibilities.
Now on WordPress back end for website.
Newsletter helps with the human side of IT and how it’s used across the University. Sent to all of campus; ~81,000.
Separate internal IT staff newsletter edited by another team member.
Similar to UM: posted as news comes out, cross-promoted on social media. Then email summary sent.
What platform is used?
AM: web = WordPress; email platform = Newsletter plugin for Wordpress by Tribulant (also use if for regular email to campus or targeted populations)
KC: web = WordPress; email platform = Ariel Enterprise (limitations) and Emma (in trial), Twitter & Hootsuite
KA: web = WordPress; email platform = Lyris
Frequency?
AM: one single comm over summer, great results, will continue to experiment and segment audience. Still will do monthly if there’s a lot to say but leaning more toward focused comms.
KC: reader poll earlier this year indicated monthly is desired. Considering twice monthly due to amount of content; stories are competing for attention. Will monitor analytics to gauge impact.
KA: strict policy limits them to once monthly; seems to work well. User option allows weekly subscription but not many take advantage. They try to schedule mailings so they don’t compete with central messaging.
How to make gathering content more collaborative?
AM: Externally, it’s very easy to reach out to labs & departments to ask what’s going on. Internally, colleagues are good at forwarding info to her. She does a lot of interviews; people are willing to share info with her and she writes it up.
KC: working group holds a round table every two weeks and all attendees are expected to contribute. Content generally scheduled months out. Deadlines and review are regularly stressed; the consistency has helped.
KA: externally, they follow a lot of other department social media & websites to look for interesting stories. Internally, they generally know what services & projects are launching so they can more easily source those stories. Sometimes these stories prompt other areas to share other news.
For Keith:
How does his approach help? His background as a non-IT person helps him more easily think about how IT is applied in various contexts. He sometimes appeals to the ego in writing stories to help drive content engagement.
Some experience with departments taking credit for IT’s work; write it to focus on the artist/department and downplay the IT contribution so there’s no competition for the limelight.
Social media: strategies to help promote engagement, favorite platform?
AM: doesn’t use SM in IT; central SM will sometimes highlight.
KC: IT only uses Twitter. Central dept that manages Uni-wide SM. Twitter is mostly a vehicle for project comm for them. Newsletter is more article focused; articles are selectively tweeted. Considering IG but hard to envision the visual content for that platform.
KA: Twitter & FB, late to set them up. Considering IG, but not sure they have personnel at this point. Twitter is more popular than FB.
JR: good success cultivating their audience via IG stories; using a student to help with that platform.
Is newsletter the most effective platform for getting news out?
AM: user groups work well for them when focused on specific technologies or services. Smaller, more intimate, good interaction.
KC: Michigan IT Symposium, annual event, brings everyone together to share news, breakout sessions, training; also, communities of practice are like minded ppl who get together and share thoughts/expertise on specific topics.
KA: “Torch Tech” Uni-wide email list to discuss IT topics (similar to CG); they host a couple events each year (tech highlight or speaker) to engage people, but in-person is difficult bc they’re so scattered.
Interactive portion: Antonia
Headlines are key! 6 word stories.
Google Keyword Planner is related to ads used on Google to help match topics to the best keywords.
Headline this synopsis...
Headline this captioned photo...
Balancing clickbait vs grabbing headlines?
KC: protect your reputation! Don’t resort to clickbait. Stay honest, candid, forthcoming, brief. Don’t use cheap tactics. You’ll lose readers’ trust otherwise.
KA: you’ll hear from your users if you betray them.
Other Q&A:
How to do a newsletter makeover? What to focus on?
AM: be clear on the purpose of your publication & who the audience is. Content planning & strategy is paramount. Consider a campus survey to find out what would be useful. Currently looking at how to target smaller groups as opposed to the entire campus.
KA: Know your university & make an effort to understand what’s important to them (it may not be the same things that are important to you). Comparison: a restaurant’s website. Reassess what you know every couple years as technologies and methods of engagement change.
Challenge: leadership wants more and more communication but there are limited resources, limited collaboration, and not as much interest in the content as some think.
KC: content generation is always a challenge even for bigger dedicated offices. Know your sources and pound the pavement to get the stories. Reach out! Even bullet points are helpful.
KA: it’s peaks & valleys; CIO sometimes puts weight behind content requests.
AM: tie content into strategic theme; CIO always contributed a letter for quarterly newsletters which helped. Newsletter drove project calendar (rather than vice versa). Metrics and measurable objectives help. ROI of newsletter effort.
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