Enrollment at College Doubles from School’s Previous Initiatives

CHALLENGE:

Schoolcraft College was looking to improve the quality of its communications to be more aligned with their new brand positioning approach. The Personal and Professional Learning (PPL) course catalog was a key component in how they connect with the community, but because of the quantity mailed, the cost to increase the quality of the piece was significantly beyond the College’s budget. Because this catalog had been a key revenue driver for years, there was great risk in making any changes to the approach.

SOLUTION:

Having worked with us on other high-quality print projects, Schoolcraft asked us to provide a cost for the historical approach of printing and mailing 175,000 pieces. This was a new project for us, so we asked what the historical goals and strategy were for selecting the audience. 

After our discovery sessions, we had a clear understanding of the goals: increase attendance, improve Schoolcraft’s brand in the community and accomplish this with the same historical budget.

Our team of marketing and data experts analyzed the audience and historic approach to develop insights that would allow us to accomplish these goals. Using the insights, the team felt confident that by reducing the mail quantity to 50,000 pieces and focusing on a more targeted audience, all the desired goals could be met. In addition, we developed a process for which the results of our approach could be measured, which enabled us to continue refining the process and improving the ROI.

RESULTS:

From the start, our performance and continuous improvement approach have significantly improved results as well as the quality of Schoolcraft College's brand in the market — all while maintaining the same budget. 

Our results by the numbers:

• 46% response rate increase over the historical approach
• 72% reduction in the number of pieces mailed while generating a 25% increase in enrollment
• 30% reduction in the cost to raise a dollar in the first year
• 19% increase in average enrolled course fee in the first year