How to convince HE stakeholders that content marketing is the way to go

1/ Start with the problem you are trying to solve.

Include:

*An outline of the issue

*The segment that’s affected

*How it impacts university objectives

EX: “The attendance rate for undergraduate business students at careers events has fallen 32% over the last three years. This has led to increased demand for careers services in the students’ final year of study (too late in the university experinece to provide the most effective support.)

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2/ Position content marketing as the solution.

Include:

*Your target audience

*The benefit of having an audience

*What an audience can do for the university

EX: “By building an audience of business students, and redesigning event activity around popular career topics, we could encourage engagement earlier in the university experience.”

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3/ Share how the audience's needs are currently underserved.

Include:

*Departments already providing content

*Why it doesn’t meet the needs of the audience

*The gap you are addressing and how it adds value to the audience.

EX: “At present, there are three departments that provide ad hoc events for business students, but few openly address the early-career challenges they will face. Given time, our aim is to build an audience who view us as the “trusted advisor” for their career guidance.

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4/ Suggest content medium and cadence

Include:

*What format your content will take

*How often you will publish, where and when

*The leading indicators that will be used to measure success.

EX: “Based on past experience and audience needs, we suggest using a combination of a regular newsletter and virtual events. We will publish a fortnightly newsletter and events will be monthly, and have those experience feature real student voices. Our initial goal will be 500 engaged email subscribers within three months.”

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5/ State timeframe for ROI

*How you plan to hit your goal

*The time it will take you to get there

*The impact for the university as a result of doing so

EX: “By engaging our existing students, we expect to achieve 1000 subscribers within 6 months. We expect to see a 20% increase in event attendance between the 12 and 18-month mark of the communications activity.

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Of course, this is only designed as an executive summary for buy-in.

You’ll still need to create a content plan considering your:

*POV

*Topics of expertise

*How to align both with your audience’s needs

But with stakeholders on your side - It’ll be 10x easier.