Key marketing messages

Current key message: "We educate Minnesota. We make it work."

Background

Creating an integrated marketing campaign

Degrees of Success: Making Minnesota Work

After four years of sharply reduced state appropriations, significant enrollment growth and a nearly 60 percent increase in tuition, the Minnesota State Colleges and Universities system launched an integrated marketing, public relations and government relations program to turn this picture from bleak to bright.

Called "Degrees of Success: Making Minnesota Work," this multi-faceted campaign was designed to strengthen public understanding of how these 32 state colleges and universities dramatically improve the quality of life for individuals, communities and the state as a whole.

The target audience was state legislators, particularly lawmakers who set higher education funding priorities, and the people who influence them - opinion leaders. Secondary audiences include the 370,000 Minnesota State Colleges and Universities students and the system's 16,500 employees. The goal was to secure enough state funding to avoid more double-digit tuition increases.

To that end, a Communications Team formed with representatives from all units within the Office of the Chancellor to ensure consistent use of key messages throughout the system.

Marketing and media

The Public Affairs unit developed and ran a two-part print, radio and television advertising campaign, "Amazing Facts I" and "Amazing Facts II;" prepared a "Presentation Toolkit" for the chancellor's staff and institutional presidents that lays out key messages, system facts and sample speeches; created a "tuition wheel" that displays the relationship between appropriations and tuition; developed a brochure, "Degrees of Success: Making Minnesota Work" (PDF), that presents a solid case for the system's operating budget request given to legislators; prepared the chancellor's first-ever "State of the System" address and crafted a series of letters to business leaders making the case for more public support.

The Public Affairs staff with the Office of the Chancellor also redesigned the system's Web site (www.mnscu.edu) to increase system recognition, generated news coverage of a system study and a student survey assessing the impact of double-digit tuition increases on students, and strategically placed opinion pieces in significant media outlets.

The system's Government Relations staff held regional meetings with lawmakers and college and university presidents to inform lawmakers about the institutions' needs and their value and managed the first-ever "Minnesota State Colleges and Universities Week" at the Legislature. Four-member teams (a college president, faculty member, student and local business leader) visited lawmakers from their region during that week.

Government Relations also honored lawmakers who are graduates of system institutions with their pictures in a two-page spread of Performance, the system newsletter. The purpose was to strengthen their allegiance. Results: The system secured a $107.5 million increase for the biennium, or about an 8.5 percent increase in the state appropriation. This helped hold tuition and fee increases to an average of 5.8 percent, the smallest increase in five years. In addition, the Minnesota State Colleges and Universities secured $213.6 million in bonding authority for repairs, improvements and expansions at all 53 campuses.

The approved amount was 113 percent above what the governor recommended. Another measure of effectiveness is that in 2002, the system received 57 percent of its request for capital improvements. This year, the system received 73 percent of the request.

Developing and implementing the system's key message

A Communications Team that included representatives of all units in system office formed and met regularly to create key messages, develop tactics and ensure consistent systemwide use. The team also solicited ideas from faculty and student associations. Public affairs and government relations staffs spearheaded the effort.

For an effective advertising campaign, it was important for the Minnesota State Colleges and Universities to discern what key messages were important to communicate to the public.

To that end, the system's research department conducted an analysis that showed the Minnesota State Colleges and Universities return $6.14 for every dollar invested, educate 62 percent of the state's undergraduates, train 140,000 workers a year in customized training programs and pump thousands of nurses into Minnesota's health care system, among other things.

Another in-house analysis revealed that four out of five system graduates stay in Minnesota to work or continue their education and that the Minnesota State Colleges and Universities produces four out of five nursing graduates, nine out of 10 law enforcement graduates and three out of six teaching graduates for the state. Illustrating these powerful facts became the basis for the advertisements. And, ultimately, the group decided that the best way to do that was to put human faces on these facts.

Armed with that data, the Communications Team developed key messages. The main message was: "We educate Minnesota. We make it work." The public affairs staff selected particular facts that any member of the public or business community could understand and appreciate. Two series of print, radio and television advertisements, "Amazing Facts, Parts I and II" were developed with Riley Hayes, an advertising firm, to heighten awareness and name recognition of the system.