EFFECTIVE DESIGN FORENROLLMENT SERVICES

Examples from Georgia Tech

STEPHEN BOLLINGERCompiled and edited by

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EFFECTIVE DESIGN FORENROLLMENT SERVICES

Examples from Georgia Tech

Compiled and edited by Stephen Bollinger, Director of Creative Services, Georgia Institute of Technology

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Photograph by Rob Felt, Georgia Tech staff photographer

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Student recruitment starts with a distinctive student experience.

Effective enrollment services design portrays your institution’s unique academic qualities and student experience as consistently as possible.

Repeated impressions on the target audience will have a cumulative effect, increasing the likelihood that the target audience will correctly associate the benefits of the student experience with the institution.

In the pages that follow, we will demonstrate components that may be used to create an consistent, ongoing impression on your target audience.

It has always been difficult to get noticed and remembered. Repetition is the key component. Right around the time that your staff is sick of being consistent is when your campaign will be just starting to gain some traction with your target audience.

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Logo,Color, &Tagline

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The Georgia Tech logoThe current logo is a variation of the “Campanile” logo set created around the time of the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta. Many 1996 Olympic events were held in newly-built facilities on the Georgia Tech campus. The Olympic Village (housing for athletes) was constructed on the Georgia Tech campus and later used as student housing.

The Kessler Campanile is a structure funded by and named for alumnus Richard Kessler to serve as a focal point for on-campus, Olympic-related activities. It is surrounded by a fountain, plaza, and amphitheater which has been continually in use since the Olympics as a central gathering spot for student events and rallies.

The distinctive peaks of the Campanile intentionally recall the design of Tech Tower, the school’s traditional academic symbol and oldest building.

With the Campanile erected as a new, updated symbol for Georgia Tech, it was considered fitting for a design element referencing both the Campanile and Tech Tower to be included in the 1996 logo design.

The 1996 version of the Georgia Tech logo.

The Kessler Campanileand the surrounding plaza and amphitheater.

The Kessler Campanileserved as the inspiration for the 1996 Georgia Tech logo design, still used today.

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Tech Tower,the oldest building on campus and a long-time symbol for the Institute, served as the inspiration for the spiky top of the Kessler Campanile‘s design.

Tech Tower,the oldest building on campus and a long-time symbol for the Institute.

In 2006, permission was granted to the web team to shorten the Campanile graphic element, thus introducing a logo variation. In 2010, it was decided, as part of a visual identity revision, to make that version the standardized version for use throughout the Institute.

The Campanile design was shortened in 2006 and the shortened version was adopted as the standard in 2011.

1996 logo 2006 logo

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Using a taglineA tagline is a summarized selling point. Georgia Tech has had several enrollment marketing taglines over the past decade. In 2007, the tagline was “Knowing Changes Everything,” an excellent tagline for a top-ten institution of higher education. Unfortunately, someone created a logoized version of the tagline (image left). While appealing looking, especially to Georgia Tech’s teen demographic, the tagline in this form visually conflicts with the Institute logo when placed on the same page, diluting brand identity and brand recognition. By 2010, the decision was made to eliminate the logoized version of the tagline. The tagline was recast as a line of text rather than as a separate, competing element.

This version of the tagline was logoized, creating a secondary logo that competed with the main Georgia Tech logo.

8 x 8 brochure,used by Admissionrecruiters in 2011 to take on the road.

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Student focus groups often remarked on color choices (Institute or university color palettes). When color choices drift too far from established colors associated with an institution, audiences notice. This information drove the decision to establish color as a significant element with Georgia Tech’s enrollment marketing and communications vehicles.

Using colorGeorgia Tech’s colors are gold and white. The plain, solid color treatment tested well in focus groups, but there is only so much differentiation possible using size and shape. To keep the momentum going, a “tag” was created (see following pages) to carry over the color and logo in a consistent manner for the scores of communications to follow.

6 x 10 brochure, 2010 search mailer.

6 x 10 brochure, 2011quick facts about Georgia Tech.

7 x 5 Preview Tech brochure, 2011.

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Gold is a particularly difficult color to reproduce consistently, and yet it is a common school color. Many schools deploy several versions of gold, depending on the medium.

At one point, Georgia Tech’s Creative Services, working with the marketing director, considered reducing the use of “goldenrod” in favor of a true metallic gold. This presented two challenges:

1. metallic gold does not look like metallic gold when reproduced as CMYK, online, or on video, and

2. metallic gold did not test well with focus groups made up of potential students. Students found the marigold version of gold to be much more lively and appealing.

Due to these challenges, metallic gold was largely relegated to alumni, development, and capital campaign activities. That demographic found metallic gold “traditional” and “reassuring.”

The use of marigold for student-oriented communications was codified to create consistency and reinforce that color as representing Georgia Tech with this constituency.

Logo, color, & tagline — examples

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USING TEMPLATES

A strong template platform speeds up the creation of high-quality, brand-reinforcing communications. It creates a consistency that increases brand recall and retention, the building blocks of an effective enrollment strategy.

This effectiveness also translates into budget efficiency. Templates allow your communications efforts to be more nimble and responsive while maintaining consistency and quality.

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81/2 x 11 fliers

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4 x 9 brochures

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6 x 9 brochure

4 x 9 brochures

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Postcards, various sizes

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Postcards, various sizes

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By the end of 2011, Enrollment Services had better tools to track their marketing activities. The feedback they were getting indicated that the tagline was not increasing awareness among Tech’s target demographic of potential students.

The tagline appeared to neither help nor hurt Enrollment Services marketing activities. As a result, they requested that the tagline be dropped all together.

The tagline was phased out of ongoing communications while, simultaneously, another design change was taking place: a logo refresh.

Eliminating the tagline — examples

81/2 x 11 flier

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81/2 x 11 brochure

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4 x 9 brochures

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4 x 9 brochures

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6 x 9 brochures

Postcard

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81/2 x 11 brochures

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81/2 x 11 brochures

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Revised logoSmaller campanile symbol in logo

2011 saw a logo redesign. The original logo had been designed around 1996.

The logo is mainly a wordmark with a stylized decorative illustration meant to depict a commemorative structure on campus named the Campanile.

Sometime prior to 2007, permission was granted to the web development group to alter the design of the logo, to shorten the Campanile illustration. This had the effect of creating yet another logo for Georgia Tech. It did not make much sense to have two logos so similar, so the decision was made to phase out the taller Campanile logo illustration version in favor of the logo with the shorter illustration. This helped bring greater consistency across different media.

Revised logo — examples

Postcards

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81/2 x 11 brochures

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6 x 9 brochure

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81/2 x 11 brochure, horizontal

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81/2 x 11 brochures, horizontal

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81/2 x 11 brochures, horizontal

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81/2 x 11 brochure

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Postcard

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Postcard

Ads

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6 x 9 brochure, horizontal

Email header

Postcard

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Postcards

6 x 9 brochure, horizontal

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4 x 9 brochure 6 x 9 brochures

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Credit-card-sizedbrochure

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6 x 9 brochures

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4 x 9 brochure

A note on QR codes: Georgia Tech employed QR codes for a brief period of time. Each QR code linked directly to a video clip, hosted on YouTube, created especially for that publication. We kept the videos short and made sure that the video underscored the message of the printed piece where the QR code appeared. Often the goal was to bring a featured photo to “life” by linking the video to a photograph of the student profiled in the video.

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81/2 x 11 ads

About this ad series: This ad series was designed to engage potential engineering undergraduates. To help make the message friendlier and more engaging, the designer added some bright colors to the usual Institute color palette and hand-lettered the headline (using the Institute’s Helvetica font as a guide). The result is a warm, friendly looking ad that cleverly breaks out of the Institute’s visual identity while continuing to maintain that identity.

A similar concept is used in electronic communications targeted to a wider range of potential students (see page 80).

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81/2 x 11 brochures

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81/2 x 11 flier

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81/2 x 11 brochures

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81/2 x 11 fliers

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Poster

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81/2 x 11 brochure, horizontal

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4 x 9 brochures

Portable, fold-out display

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4 x 9 brochure 6 x 9 brochures

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4 x 9 brochure

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6 x 11 horizontal search brochure

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4 x 6 postcard4 x 9 brochure

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81/2 x 11 brochure

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Postcards

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Email header

Postcard

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4 x 9 brochuresBookmark

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4 x 9 brochures

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Postcard

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4 x 9 brochure

Poster

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4 x 9 brochures

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81/2 x 11 flier

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Facebook,Web &Email

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Facebook marketing campaign.

Digital communications — examples

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Home page forviewbook web site.

Mobile-enabled version.

Web marketing campaign.

Web site — example pages

To cut down on postage costs, it was decided to shorten the printed viewbook. A web site was developed to match the look and feel of the printed viewbook and that site houses video student profiles along with all the information previously cut from the full-size viewbook.

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Web viewbook site map

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Email to potential students — examplesAdmissions installed customer relationship management software in 2012. It quickly became apparent that the CRM was a beast that required content. Monthly emails to prospective students were created.

The emails reflect issues presumably being faced by our target audience (which college should I attend? maybe I should schedule a college visit, etc.).

These emails also reflect seasonal holidays and a few are reserved as “school spirit” emails.

The CRM compiles metrics on who opened these emails, which email subjects get the most attention, response rates, etc. Those metrics then are used to refine email tactics for the following year.

Georgia Tech’s enrolled freshmen class for 2013 exceeded all previous classes in both size and quality. Georgia Tech’s goal is to become more selective while simultaneously increasing the quality of applications.

Georgia Tech has continuously improved the student experience. Tools such as print, web, video, and email are getting the point across more consistently than ever before.

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VideoA link to a YouTube-hosted video is a prominent feature of most of the emails that are sent to potential students. A new video, written and produced especially for that month’s email, has to be produced.

Video produced for another purpose occasionally can be successfully repurposed. Also, infographics may sometimes take the place of video.

Enrollment Services uses the Institute Communications staff photographer to shoot video. Typical resources used to plan, shoot, and produce each video include the Enrollment Services marketing communicator and the design, writing, and photography staff of Institute Communications.

Video is planned as an integral part of each scheduled email.

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InfographicsInfographics are sometimes a feature of student recruiting emails (and are sometimes repurposed for print).

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Email to accepted students — example

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Email to high school counselors — examples

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Email to high school counselors — examples

Designers whose work is represented in this book include:Justin Rent, Rhys Black, Stephen Bollinger, Brenda Sanders, Lee Thompson, Emily Erdman, Ziyo Wang, and Holly Chong.Photography: Rob Felt. All designs appearing in this book are copyrighted by the Georgia Institute of Technology 2006-2013.

EFFECTIVE DESIGN FORENROLLMENT SERVICES

Examples from Georgia Tech

Compiled and edited by STEPHEN BOLLINGER Director of Creative Services,

Georgia Institute of Technology, Copyright 2013