New Content for a New School Year: Copywriting and back-to-school angst

For anyone working in educational marketing, communications or publishing, back-to-school begins long before August. But no matter how much content has been printed, published or posted in advance, the first week of school still brings its share of back-to-school angst.For me, the first week of school presented a hodgepodge of projects for K-12 and edu:

Web content:

Writing and posting two new web pages for Inly School, an independent preK-8 Montessori school in Massachusetts.

Marketing copywriting:

Writing email blasts for K-5 teachers to promote this year's new Subway Random Acts of Fitness for Kids, a national campaign for SubwayKids.com (for ad agency Jack Morton Worldwide).

Video scriptwriting:

Conceptualizing, writing and editing script for a new admissions video for a Catholic high school in Connecticut (for Keating Associates).

Copywriting:

Coining slogans and signage copy for a new sustainability campaign for a large university (for Hall Pass Group).

A crazy week, and crazy deadlines, but all fun stuff. I've got my #2 pencils sharpened and my colored folders and Mac files in order (well, almost).Happy September!

* pencil illustration (created by Mark A. Hicks) from Discovery Education's Clip Art Gallery.

Content marketing + cause marketing: Public relations with a purpose

Copywriting + corporate clients

Around this time last summer, I was busily dealing with my own child's end-of-school activities while developing a year's worth of content for SUBWAY Kids™ (via the Boston office of ad agency Jack Morton Worldwide).For the Random Acts of Fitness for Kids™ project, developed to promote physical fitness and healthy habits in elementary schools throughout the U.S., I devised 365 "random" content snippets, 52 weekly activities, 12 mini field day activities and a culminating field day program. I also wrote copy for a teacher's guide, teacher calendar and planner, classroom poster, and collateral for teachers and parents. All in about two weeks while trying to leave on my own summer vacation. Phew.

Cause marketing + bonus branding

SUBWAY® Restaurants has had a successful string of win-win partnerships with select organizations and government institutions, and is now widely known for its commitment to the fight against childhood obesity.For the Random Acts of Fitness and related campaigns, SUBWAY Kids™ partnered with We Can!™ (a National Institutes of Health (NIH) program), the American Heart Association and Little League® Baseball and Softball. For another campaign on conservation, it partnered with The Nature Conservancy to provide reusable lunch bags and educate kids about the importance of recycling, reusing and reducing waste. [See my blog post: Earth Day interactives: Copywriting with a conscience for corporate clients.]The SUBWAY restaurant chain is now the largest in the world. According to the Wall Street Journal it surpassed McDonald's last year as the world's largest chain, in units sold. Not that it can be attributed to savvy cause marketing, but heck, they must be doing something right in the brand department.

Useful content for a range of constituents

June is field day season in American elementary schools, and also a time when restless kids get summer fever. The "Random Acts" guide also features quick exercises and activities that kids can do in the classroom to get their bodies moving and minds re-focused.It also extends into the summer months, with ideas for at-home activities and seasonal recipes right through the last days of August, when kids are bored and restless once again, waiting for school to begin...

Happy summer!

(This year, I'm outa here!)

    

Web content and the eternal home page question: How much is too much?

 I love this Venn diagram by xkcd. It was projected on the wall at the start of a Future M seminar I attended this September called “Beyond the University Website – The Future of Digital Marketing in Higher Education.” This image keeps coming back to me, in content decisions for both edu and B2B.Sponsored by ISITE Design, and moderated by chief strategy officer Jeff Cram, the panel included Mike Petroff, Web and Technology Enrollment Manager at Emerson College; Perry Hewitt, Chief Digital Officer at Harvard; Gene Begin, Digital Marketing Director at Babson College; and Tom Baird, Vice Chancellor of University of Michigan Dearborn.

Content Overload? It's all about balance.

I’ve been working on content strategy, optimization, writing and editing for an independent preK-8 school website this year and am about to begin on one for an independent high school. Funny how, regardless of the size of the school, the home page issues always seem to be the same.

How to balance content for current vs. prospective students and constituents? How many news feeds, blog feeds, photo and video galleries do you really need? How can we make sure it's all optimized for search? What is the true purpose of the home page anyway? How much is too much?

I'm knee-deep in content migration from one CMS to another on the above mentioned website, but once I come up for air I'll grapple with this question some more. Got any formulas for success? Would love to hear them.

FutureM wrap-ups:

Here are a couple good summaries of the FutureM seminar, along with some choice tweets on CMS quandries (as universal as the homepage ones, it seems to me), mobile stats for edu, and the need for social strategy:Open Parenthesis: Future M on Higher Educationpost by John Eckman of ISTEInside FutureM: Digital Marketing and Higher Educationpost by Erik Devaney on New England Post