The cost of utilizing social media in your admissions office is relative low in comparison to the travel budgets, publication materials, etc. that most typically incur.  So what’s the true barrier to entry for social media?  One aspect has to be staff education. Our office doesn’t happen to have a full-time person doing web development, graphic design, or e-comm.  We attempt to do as much of that as possible in-house, and then we look to IT for any additional support.  Our staff of 16 counselors has their plate full with all kinds of different non-social media programming, so to learn...

My first post on AD back in July was about Wufoo, a site that allows you to create embeddable forms fast. I haven’t spent a ton of time working with the site in the meantime (travel season, you know), although we did use it for registration for our East Coast Plane Trip.  In the last few weeks Wufoo has become of great use as we look ahead to our spring programming.  Once you start using the site your imagination will run wild, but I thought I would point out a few things that make Wufoo really shine: 1. It’s cheap. If you consider the time and resources needed to hard code forms like...

I’m always looking for new ways to use my MacBook Pro!  I love this computer, mostly because it makes so much of my job really easy.  Redesign is hot on our radar right now, and in the midst of rummaging through highly touted sites on eduStyle, I came across Biola University, located in La Mirada, CA.  While taking a look at the undergrad site, I was this posted in the lower right: Being that my MBP is outfitted with a built-in iSight, I’m [of course] thinking, “why didn’t I think of that before?”.  So I decided to put together an email campaign to prospective...

I’ve been toying for a long time with the idea of actually getting this site hosted outside of Wordpress.com.  I finally bit the bullet this weekend and created the all-new AdmittedlyDutch.com.  I’m going to continue modifying the look and feel, but what you see is the basics of the new site.  I look forward to continuing to share my thoughts.  Feedback?  Be sure to leave a comment and let me know! Admittedly Dutch: Where technology meets recruitment for higher...

Like many of you, Hope College Admissions has created a “page” in order to have an additional presence on Facebook.  What you begin with is pretty basic, but there are some tricks to get a more interactive experience going, particularly with the page’s profile picture/box.  I realized this after I came across the Facebook page for another institution.  My first thought: What a huge value-add to be able to have students link back to our site… I want this now. The first thing I did was take a look at the source of that other institution’s page.  Somehow they were able...

I’m pretty excited about the latest project we have going.  We recently picked up a Kodak Zi6** (pocket video camera), a cheap ($159) camera that shoots in HD at 720p.  I was initially intrigued at the idea of taking quality video from campus events (traditional events, athletics, arts events, etc.).  I then realized that video could be a great medium for delivering short messages about admissions-related topics. The following video is our first attempt at addressing one of these topics; in this case, a brief reminder to students to apply by our early notification deadline.  We shot the...