School A to Z Online School Community Corporate Communication NSW Department of Education and Communities Sydney

Transcription

1 School A to Z Online School Community Corporate Communication NSW Department of Education and Communities Sydney NEED/OPPORTUNITY The NSW (New South Wales) Department of Education and Communities is a significant global education provider. Within the department, 2,230 public schools provide education to more than 746,000 preschool, primary and secondary students. This creates significant demand from parents for online spaces where they can engage with education professionals and other school parents. Research activities conducted by the department in 2010 indicated a need for change in the way NSW engaged with and supported parents. The quality of communication materials was consistently high, yet parents were unaware of many of the department s services. In addition, there was no real opportunity for parent interaction and the range of materials was unsustainable. Busy parents wanted the ability to interact with other like-minded parents and education professionals via social media and discussion forums where issues and concerns could be voiced and addressed in a supportive, friendly and engaging online space. At the same time, mobile design and delivery was (and is) growing exponentially as mobile becomes a dominant communication channel. According to Gartner research (2010), by 2013 mobile phones will overtake PCs as the most common web access device worldwide. The School A to Z project presented an opportunity to utilize all digital channels web, mobile and social media to create an online community. INTENDED AUDIENCE The primary audience for School A to Z is parents of preschool and school-aged children. This includes: Parents who are highly active in the support of their child s education and wellbeing, and who want high-value, multi-device content that is relevant and easy to consume. Parents from economically disadvantaged backgrounds who require content in a variety of formats as they do not always have direct access to a computer at home. Parents with low literacy who need content that is easy to assimilate. Indigenous parents who relate to content that is highly visual. Parents who speak a language other than English and require translated content. Parents from regional and remote areas who want access to experts. Parents who do not engage with their school communities and want to be able to source information without the need for direct contact with their school. The secondary audiences for the project include students, department staff, the media, education professionals and other education jurisdictions worldwide. 1

2 GOALS AND OBJECTIVES To create a homework and school life online community for parents that is engaging, comprehensive, easy to use, practical and relevant. Key objectives: 1. Provide relevant and engaging content for parents. Within the first 12 months of launch: Users will spend at least eight minutes on the website per visit. The website will generate an average of 20,000 unique visits per month. The School A to Z app will achieve an average of 200 downloads per day. The School A to Z app will be ranked within the top 100 education apps in the itunes Australian App Store. 2. Facilitate conversation with and between parents and education industry professionals. Within the first 12 months of launch, generate 90 percent positive/neutral user sentiment. 3. Create a consistent, positive user experience across all digital channels mobile, web and social media. Within the first 12 months of the launch, have at least 20 percent of traffic to the School A to Z website sourced from other School A to Z channels. Ultimately, the successful implementation of this project will improve students academic outcomes by providing parents with practical and relevant content that better equips them to support their child s learning and school life. SOLUTION OVERVIEW OBJECTIVE 1: Provide relevant and engaging content for parents 1.1 Strategy: Utilize internal expertise Tactic: Use real teachers for content production. Active teachers were sourced from across the department to design and develop content that is accurate, relevant and reflective of classroom learning activities. All educational content for the site was subject to review by the department s Curriculum, Learning and Innovation Centre prior to upload. 1.2 Strategy: Use research to inform and direct content production Tactic: Parent research sessions. User research indicated parents content interests over the schooling life-cycle of their child. These are the areas of focus for School A to Z content. 1.3 Strategy: Provide a variety of content formats Vodcasts (video podcasts). Real department teachers from across the state provided advice on key topic areas such as starting kindergarten, bullying, homework, and classroom learning concepts. Podcasts. Personality James O Loughlin conducted a series of interviews with industry professionals on a range of topics including mental health, study and homework help. Webcasts. Journalist and mother Rachel Friend hosts a panel of experts ready to answer user-contributed questions. Questions are submitted via and website commenting. Help sheets. Help sheets were produced to visually explain primary/secondary classroom concepts and provide learning activities for pre-school children. 2

3 1.4 Strategy: Encourage content co-creation Tactic: Use community engagement to source and develop content ideas. The School A to Z community uses Facebook and the website commenting tool, Disqus, to source useful advice, tips and content ideas. This feedback is used to drive content development for the project. 1.5 Strategy: Ensure content accessibility Use plain English. Ensure all content is written in an engaging and approachable tone that is easy to understand and free of department speak. Provide tools for parents with low literacy levels and visual and audio impairments. Transcripts are provided for all audio and video materials and a listen function is available on every page for use by people with low literacy levels and visual impairments. Enable content translation for parents from non-english speaking backgrounds. A translation aide was integrated onto every page of the site. OBJECTIVE 2: Facilitate conversation with and between parents and education industry professionals 2.1 Strategy: Understand and engage in the social media landscape Deep listening and engagement. Crucial to the project was the use of social media deep listening to map existing parent community patterns, identify the influential social media outlets and participate in relevant conversations. Social media monitoring. A combination of free and paid social media monitoring tools are used to monitor parent discussions. The keywords used for monitoring are based on topics of interest identified in focus group research. Establish a social media presence. Facebook, Twitter and YouTube channels were created for School A to Z and branded accordingly. A warm, friendly and personable tone of voice is used to create a non-judgmental, supportive environment where parents can ask questions and share advice. 2.2 Strategy: Integrate social media across platforms Enable sharing of the School A to Z app. App users can post the School A to Z app on their Facebook page (via the app). Cross-promoting the social media channel on the website. Facebook and Twitter feeds are incorporated into a conversations area of the website to promote the discussions happening beyond the website. All website pages also have the capability to share content via Facebook, Twitter or . Provide the opportunity for comment on the website. Every page of the website has the capability for users to comment on content or contribute ideas (via Disqus). 3

4 2.3 Strategy: Build internal social media capability Create a social media team. A social media team was established with a seven-day roster to ensure ongoing monitoring and timely responses to social media posts. Define expectations for social media responses and interaction. An internal social media guideline was developed to provide a level of structure and continuity around social media activities within the team. OBJECTIVE 3: Create a consistent, positive user experience across all digital channels 3.1 Strategy: Ensure strong School A to Z branding Tactic: Utilize consistent design elements. The core design elements for School A to Z are emulated across the website, social media channels, the mobile app and the supporting print materials. 3.2 Strategy: Utilize user-centered design Tactic: Use research to continually inform and direct project development. Corporate communication follows a process of user-centered design, which involves a significant level of user engagement in the design and delivery process. At each phase of the School A to Z project, user feedback was sought to ensure the product design and delivery reflected user needs and enabled parent feedback to be continually integrated Strategy: Streamline content production Tactic: Content syndication. A content syndication engine was developed to share content across the website and the mobile app. This eliminated the duplication of effort for content input. 3.4 Strategy: Develop in-house mobile capability Upskill staff in mobile design and delivery. All corporate communication team members attended training to upskill in mobile content production and mobile design and delivery. Create an in-house mobile team. Development of the School A to Z app was performed by an in-house development team. This enabled app development to be an organic process where feedback could be quickly integrated into development. It also ensured that the app remained true to the School A to Z brand. (Note: Development of the website was also performed in-house by an existing development team.) 4

5 MEASUREMENT/EVALUATION OF OUTCOMES OBJECTIVE (in progress): Provide relevant and engaging content for parents. OUTCOMES: Users spend more than 16 minutes on the website per visit. The website generates an average of 33,000 unique visits per month. The app has achieved more than 95,000 downloads (more than 500 downloads per day). The app achieved the No. 1 education app ranking in the itunes Australian App Store two weeks after launch and is currently ranked as the No. 4 education app. It was also selected for the itunes App Store Rewind Feedback from the app indicates very positive user response. OBJECTIVE (in progress): Facilitate conversation with and between parents and education industry professionals. OUTCOME: The School A to Z community has grown to more than 6,000 with daily activity increasing. A formal social media review is scheduled for August OBJECTIVE (in progress): Create a consistent, positive user experience across all digital channels mobile, web and social media. OUTCOME: In terms of cross-channel traffic, more than 60 percent of visits to the School A to Z website are from the mobile application. A review of cross-channel traffic is scheduled for August