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Overview of Deliver Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies

Rice University

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Table of Contents

Introduction................................................................................................................................................. 3

Uploading prospect data to Slate ................................................................................................................. 4

Logging into Slate ........................................................................................................................................ 5

Creating your first email .............................................................................................................................. 6

Build your Query .......................................................................................................................................... 8

Query building fields .................................................................................................................................... 9

Editing the Message Header ...................................................................................................................... 10

Editing the Message Body .......................................................................................................................... 11

Conditional Logic ....................................................................................................................................... 12

Images ...................................................................................................................................................... 14

Email Testing ............................................................................................................................................. 16

Sending your mailing ................................................................................................................................. 17

Tracking your mailing ................................................................................................................................ 17

General Email Marketing Tips .................................................................................................................... 18

General Marketing Tips ............................................................................................................................. 18

Templates, the Rice Brand, and other suggestions ...................................................................................... 19

Questions? ................................................................................................................................................ 19

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Introduction

Building a successful email marketing process is essential to student recruiting! With Slate, you have the ability to control and build your email messages. Want to reach international applicants with important information? Interested in sending a marketing email to prospects who live in specific states or are interested in a specific term of entry? The Deliver tool in Slate is used to create and manage email outreach to specific groups of prospects or applicants. The primary purpose of opening the Deliver tool is so that programs can send marketing emails to prospective students, as well as deadline reminders to applicants. This guide will help you create email messages in Slate via the easy-to-use Deliver tool.

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Uploading prospect data to Slate If you have a list of prospects you wish to upload to Slate, GPS is happy to help you with that. Columns needed in order to upload are below: Required:

• First Name

• Last Name

• Email

• Birthdate

• Expected Year of Matriculation

• Program(s) of Interest

• Source of the prospect information (e.g. ACS Conference, event at Rice, etc.)

• Date the prospect information was captured Strongly Encouraged:

• Current Institution

• GPA

• Major

• Seeking degree type Other fields:

• Mailing address

• Phone

• IPEDS Race

• Date of Bachelor’s

• Citizenship

• Gender Why is birthdate required? Slate is a large database, and prospects come from a variety of sources – RFI’s, GRE score submissions, GRE buys, conference lists, ENGINE upload, etc. Many times, prospects come to us in more than one way. Slate can verify that records are identical and merge them using the First, Last, Email and Birthdate fields. Lists should always be obtained ethically, and students should have opted-in to be on the list and aware they will receive emails from Rice.

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Logging into Slate

To login, visit gradadmissions.rice.edu/manage with your NetID and password. Ensure you have Duo Authentication setup. Duo is a two-factor authentication service that protects our database.

Don’t have access? If you have never logged into Slate before and need permissions, email Kate Cross (katec@rice.edu) for access. For access to Deliver specifically, request permissions from Jennifer Hunter (jkh6@rice.edu) and send her:

• Name

• NetID

• Program(s) you will be sending emails for

• Date of query training attended

Please allow 48 hours for creation of your permissions!

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Creating your first email

Once logged in, click on the Deliver icon in the Slate toolbar.

Step 1: Select “New Mailing”

Step 2: Name your mailing (I often use Year/Month/Day followed by what the mailing is for) Step 3: Put it in your Program(s) Folder to keep your mailings organized and easy to find! Step 4: Assign your mailing to your realm. Not seeing the option you want? Email Jennifer!

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Step 5: Select your method to be “Email”

Step 6: Set the Opt-Out as your program/school name. This will allow students to opt out of emails from your program vs. all programs. When a student selects the unsubscribe option, they will be taken to another window that confirms their choice. Don’t see your program name? Let Jennifer know.

Step 7: Leave UTM tracking disabled.

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Build your Query Kate Cross in the GPS office holds a regular Slate query training, which is required for Deliver access. If you need assistance with a query or get stuck, attend a refresher training and contact GPS for assistance. Common query filters/exports for mailings are at the end of this guide. Build your query by selecting your filters and exports using the “Edit Recipients List” tab.

Once your query is built and you are satisfied with it, navigate back to your mailing using the breadcrumbs.

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Query building fields Note that when you build your query, you will need to choose a base of either Prospects or Applications. What your messaging is about will determine what you choose. Remember that Prospects includes applicants to your program. A few common fields to use in mailings, either as filters or exports: Prospects/Applicants:

• Preferred Name: if they have a nickname captured, this will pull into your mailing. If there is no preferred name recorded, it will default to First Name.

• Date of Get: this is the field that tells us when the prospect was put into Slate. Only pertains to uploaded data (vs. RFI form).

• Recruiting Source – internal: where the prospect name came from.

• Mailing Sent: Can use this field to exclude or include prospects who have received a previous mailing.

• Application Submitted Status: can filter a mailing on where an applicant is in the application process.

• Graduate Program of Interest: (e.g. Chemistry, Computer Science, etc.)

• Degree Type:

• Application Open Until: this is tied to your final deadline in Slate. If you are a program with an early deadline, use caution in using this export in mailings because this value will be set to your latest deadline.

• Tag: to exclude records tagged as “test” you can filter on this field. (e.g. NOT IN test record)

• Recruiting source: e.g. GCURS, ACS conference, ENGINE database, etc.

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• Active Address (City/State/Country): trying to visit with prospects in a certain area? Filtering on the active address could help.

• Mailing Sent: you can filter on this to exclude prospects who’ve received a previous mailing.

• Form submitted: You can send or exclude prospects who’ve completed specific forms.

• Expected Start Term: You can filter on those interested in a specific term, e.g. spring 2020, fall 2021). Applicants:

• Application Matric Term: use this to differentiate between your fall/spring applicants

• Application Graduate Program: The name of the program the prospect has an application in. You will not use this field if you’re using a base of Prospects.

• Application Degree Name: filter on this to narrow to specific programs, e.g., Ph.D., Master of Computer Science, etc.)

• Application Status: awaiting materials, awaiting payment, etc.

• Application Exists: can choose exists/submitted, exists/unsubmitted, not exists)

• Application open until this deadline: you may want to use this as an export within your message. Please note this does not reflect a priority deadline your program may have set.

Use the NOT tool to filter out or exclude specific records. It’s always a good idea to run your query, export it to excel for review, and then spot check a number of the names on the list to see if anything weird comes up. If you have multiple programs you’re putting conditional logic together for, this is even more essential. Need a refresher on query building? Attend the next training!

Editing the Message Header

You can edit your email header, recipient field, sender field and message body by selecting “edit message” in the left gray toolbar.

Decide on a subject line for your message. Subject lines with strong calls to action (Apply Now! Webinar Today!) are recommended. Emojis are supported; it’s up to your discretion on whether to use them. You can use an export in a subject line! (Hey, {{Preferred}} – apply now!)

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Determine the sender, or who and what address the message will come from. Use the format: “your program or chair name” <email@rice.edu> Drag the recipient email from your exports on the right into the “Recipient” field.

Editing the Message Body Now you’re ready to edit the body of the message. We recommend starting from a template. When your email editor is open, click on the “Template” icon in the WYSIWYG editor and select the template..

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Once the template is applied, edit the email message using the tool bar. Utilize the exports on the right side if needed. You can add more by adjusting the query. Want to use your own template? Create your own HTML email and manipulate the source code! Using the toolbar – we’ll quickly review a few of the tools you’ll use most. Hovering over each icon will give you information on what the tool in the bar is.

Conditional Logic

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If you manage communications for multiple programs, it is sometimes easier to send one email to a large group of prospects (vs. segmenting via the query) and customize the information within the email using conditional logic. You can access the conditional logic tool when editing a message by clicking the if icon.

1. While in the “edit message” window, highlight the text in your message to be conditionally displayed.

2. Click on the if icon.

3. Specify the conditions for showing the text.

4. Click ok.

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Images A word about images: Programs are welcome to upload and use their own images. We ask that when uploading, you keep all images for your program in your specific sub-folders. New folder creation inside of your sub-folders is welcome. Please do not delete an image from the library – this could do some damage to active mailings. You can access the image library two ways – through your email editor, by clicking on the picture icon in the tool bar, or by going to the Deliver tool and clicking on “Library” in the right column.

Make sure your images have accurate alt tags setup in your messages for accessibility purposes. To add the alt text, double click on the image in your email and edit the “Alternative Text” field. This text should be a brief description of the image that will be read with a screen reader.

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You can upload your own image using the upload button in the browser. Be sure to save into a folder for your program under the main school folder.

You can link an image to an external URL using the tool bar. We recommend changing the target to “new window”.

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Email Testing Slate has a number of tools to help you test your email before sending.

Display Sample Message allows you to view the mailing for a specific prospect, and will tell you if a specific prospect meets the rules you set up in your query, and will or will not receive your email. Send Test Message allows you to send a test message to the email address of your choosing. Note that the email will look like it’s addressed to a prospect, and will have their information in the footer. The icons in the circle allow you to check links for the email and to display how the mailing will look on desktop or mobile. Testing outside of Slate: If you want to have the email sent through the service Email on Acid for a spam check and rendering test, notify Jennifer Hunter (jkh6@rice.edu).

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Sending your mailing When you are ready to send your mailing, send an email to Jennifer Hunter at jkh6@rice.edu, with a link to the mailing in Slate. She will verify the query with you, and schedule the email to be sent at the date and time you choose, pending other mailings scheduled. You can send by the recipient’s time zone if the recipient has an active address. All Slate mailings are sent using Eastern Time.

Tracking your mailing To view the reports and statistics from a mailing, click on the message title. The right-hand column displays how many messages have been sent and opened. The graph displays the number of opens and clicks over the time the message has existed. Slate automatically generates reports which you can download using the links under the graph and will display the names, emails and statuses of the recipients.

Using the browser/location tab, you’re also able to see which countries your email openers were in and what browser and device they were using.

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General Email Marketing Tips

Reports: Look at your reports 24 hours after your mailing is completed to get a good picture of your deliverability. An open rate over 25%, and a click-rate over 3% is generally good. Subject lines: Make these catchy – these will drastically affect your open rates. Emojis are supported. Call to action: Ask the reader to do something in each email – e.g. “Apply Today”, “Read Now” – this will help you complete the purpose of the email and keep the reader engaged. Links: Make sure each of your links is working. Images: Make sure images are sized appropriately and include alt tags for accessibility purposes.

General Marketing Tips Many factors go into successful graduate student recruitment.

• Make sure your website is up-to-date and includes information that prospects want to see, and make yourself a resource for prospective grad students:

• Why they should choose your program

• How to apply to your program and updated deadlines

• Job outcomes/alumni placement/student accomplishments

• Current research and/or up-to-date faculty pages

• Who to contact for support – should be someone who can respond

• Drive prospects back to your website for more information and to the application site to apply.

• Ask current grad students for help with recruiting – have them respond to student emails, talk to superstar prospects over the phone, write blog posts or feature them in testimonials, etc.

• Political Science is a great example of what to do!

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Templates, the Rice Brand, and other suggestions Rice Brand Programs are encouraged to review the Rice Brand information and adhere to their guidelines on color, logo, font, etc. Logos for each program and other important information can be found at brand.rice.edu. Grammarly Grammarly is an editing tool that can help check your email for spelling and grammar before it is sent out. GPS strongly encourages you to use Grammarly or an equivalent software. Email responsiveness GPS encourages you to test your email on desktop and mobile, and in a number of Email Service Providers (ESP’s), to check how the message renders. GPS has an account with Email on Acid, and can test your email on a number of ESP’s for you. Email Jennifer Hunter (jkh6@rice.edu).

Questions? Questions? Contact Jennifer Hunter (jkh6@rice.edu). Requests for Deliver assistance will be handled on a first-come, first-serve basis. Notice of at least one week for mailing scheduling is requested, and more is appreciated!