3 Steps (and 3 tips!) to Engaging Alumni on ACACIAConnect
In working with over 1,200 chapters, ChapterSpot has seen a lot of active chapters successfully re-energize their alumni base. By following these 3 steps, we (the team at ChapterSpot) guarantee that your alumni base will be the strongest it’s been in years.
Step 1: Register your alumni
Email your alumni roster to support@chapterspot.com .
We’ll register them and send them activation links.
*Tip: Just like Constant Contact, your alumni need to opt-in by clicking on the activation link. Don’t worry if this doesn’t happen right away because you can send them up to 2 more reminders! Simply click "# Unactivated Members" under the "Members" tab to re-send activation reminders.
Step 2: Get your website ready for alumni visitors
- Create an Alumni page if you don’t have one (explain that you are making a new initiative to communicate with all alumni)
- Place an Events widget showing upcoming Alumni events
- Place an Alumni registration form on your Alumni page/Homepage
Step 3: Post Alumni Updates!! (this is the fun/important part)
The trick is posting often and posting consistently.
1. Pick an alumni you know well, call them, and ask them to answer a simple survey
What’s your occupation:
Where do you live?
Describe your average Friday night:
Any other alumni/actives living close to you?
Are you Married/Girlfriend/Boyfriend/Single?
What’s your favorite undergraduate memory?
What Alumni should I interview next?
What do you think of our new website?
Have you posted a link to our new website on your Facebook?
2. Post the survey as a News post on your Website (make sure you have a News widget on your homepage and on the Alumni Page)
3. Send a Message to all your Alumni
"Alumni – We just posted our interview with Brother John Doe. To see what John says he does on his Friday nights, click here to visit our Alumni page on our new website: [YOUR ALUMNI PAGE LINK HERE]. We’ll also tell you who John asked us to interview next week! New interviews are posted every Friday!"
4. Post the same message on Facebook/Twitter in case some Alumni aren’t in your email system (*that’s why you need the alumni registration form)
5. Reach out to the next Alumni and continue the trend!
Tips:
- Keep to your routine! Make sure to have a post every Friday no matter what. Once you miss posts, you lose reliability.
- Collect surveys whenever you can! Ran into an alumni at a BBQ? Survey them, save the responses in your phone and when mid-terms come up, you’ll have a interviews saved up.
- Things moving along quickly? Great – start thinking about featuring Alumni businesses!
- Check your database before calling to make sure you have their latest contact details
Questions! (Leave comments below)
Brothers: What survey questions do you think would be good to ask?
Alumni: How should Actives grab your interest?
Thursday, November 3, 2011
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