Fave Five for Friday: Mining the Depths of My Twitter Faves

32 ways to tweak your blog in an afternoon via MarianLibrarian. I love this list because it is so basic, requiring rudimentary skills to implement.

Why choose Oberlin College? Because of their over-the-top unofficial web site.  The boldest marketing efforts are generally the most memorable.

A new way of looking at higher education fund raising. Think of alumni as champions, friends or acquaintances. The next logical thought from that set of audiences: tailor messages, frequency and intensity to each audience based on affinity to the college.

Proverbs, axioms and idioms via PR Daily. Not to be confused with metaphors, similes and onomatopoeia.

Admissions is not sales, a response to Admissions…should think like a sales team. I have to come down on the side of “not sales.” I think recruitment is more like a courtship – dating, if you will. Sales is transactional, but admissions is about a relationship, interpersonally between a recruiter and a prospect, then growing to encompass the faculty-student dynamic, and ultimately the brand-student/alum relationship.

Two of My Favorite Organizations, Two New Web Sites

Two of my favorite organizations introduced new web sites this week. The first one I saw was that of Le Moyne College, which represents a huge advancement over what it has before. They opted for mega-menus, made some interesting font choices (Note: ALL CAPS is not easy to read), but did a great job in sticking to the brand that they have established since after I was a student there. They even have an interactive home page in the larger picture section. Very sweet. Go ‘phins!

The second that I just discovered this evening is one for the Springville Center for the Arts. I smile at just about every graphic design and art choice they made for it. Go see for yourself – it’s a small arts organization that is doing big things for my area.

Each organization is making their “support” function much more visible, and integrating social media platforms more thoughtfully than the typical nonprofit web site. It makes me proud to support their work.

Fave Five for Friday

Fave Five for Friday

Muffin tins aren’t just for muffins.  Via @lifehackerFreeze stock in muffin tins. Also, for mini-meatloafs, mini-lasagnas, large crayons.

A strategy for managing social media proliferation HT @markgr via @jowyang

I missed this last month: Instagram is coming to Android! HT @erinkdoherty via @mashable.

@Alumnitrending – a friendly, enthusiastic and informative voice for higher education and alumni relations professionals. Curated by the inimitable @sgro97.

Actual microcomputing – nanotech comes to information storage. via @nytimes.

Many Stories, Many Audiences at The Agency Post

I contributed another article to The Agency Post, “Many Stories, Many Audiences,” which was published today.

Creating compelling content for an organization presents a challenge for even the most seasoned writers. Working in higher education, I’m lucky to have several audiences to supply stories. Student achievements, faculty accomplishments and notable alumni all go into the metaphoric hopper to be spit out as stories, web content, testimonials and pitches.

Read the whole story at The Agency Post, and follow them @AgencyPost.

(And as a side note, I need to start doing a better job of practicing what I preach…)