Clarion University's Social Media Presence

Now, I know I spoke of Clarion University in regards to my post on how to use Twitter within the Higher Education marketplace, but I feel there is more that can be said in regards to how and why I feel their utilization of Social Media is one of the best when it comes to the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education.

Clarion University itself had an early jump on the Social Media scene, with a Facebook presence for about 3 years.  Moreover, they use their Facebook page in both creative and effective manners.  They ensure that there is a consistent line of communication with their audience by having a designated social media strategist at the handlebars at all times; summer, fall, winter, or spring.  They also focus on creating collaboration between other inter-department university related offices as well, such as athletics, student organizations, and so on.  They capitalize on creating the most effective posts by ensuring a consistent stream of interactive and consumer related content, as well as using it in a manner to disseminate pertinent news topics.

This same type of philosophy has landed them success within the Twitter world. The most important aspect to their success here is that they also know how to differentiate their content for the platform itself.  They ensure presence of brand consistent meta tags, and they also use search methods to ensure the highest levels of audience interaction.    Furthermore,  they know how to deliver messages within the succinct manner Twitter itself demands.

The most important aspect to their success though is the leadership and organization behind their endeavors.  Every Wednesday the University's Marketing and Communication Department hosts a Social Media round table in which the Director of Marketing is present to assist in any marketing related questions.  Furthermore, the presence of such higher leadership keeps the student leaders who are in charge of creating the content focused on important aspects such as metrics and other methods in which they can gauge the success of their content.  This brings up another important facet to their success, which is the fact that they have students of a wide variety of backgrounds, ranging from Marketing and Communications, to Advertisements and Film, in charge of brainstorming for content creation.  Social Media itself is a marketing channel that is overwhelmingly dominated by demographics of a young age.  By ensuring the creators of your content are demographically similar to the market segments in which the University is targeting, they mitigate potential dissonance issues between content creators and consumers while simultaneously gaining insight on what type of Social Media channels are being utilized by said consumers.

Such organization has led to their recent expansion into the field of LinkedIn, in which Clarion University was one of the first PASSHE systems to take use of LinkedIn's brand new University Page feature.  This endeavor, while elicited by upper level management, was taken on by a student named Paul Yi; a young professional student who was in the process of studying the marketplace and identifying key industries he desired to work in.  By having someone with such a mindset at the helm of their expansion into LinkedIn, they were able to directly match the exact ways in which the University Page feature was supposed to be utilized; as a gateway for current students to match up with alumni and businesses of which they are interested in.

Overall, Clarion University's Social Media presence has continued to strengthen over the years, and this is in large thanks to the proper leadership and organizational structure that is in place.