SPEAKER_03
You're listening to the Higher Ed Marketer, the podcast for marketing professionals in higher education. Join us every week as we talk to the industry's greatest minds in student recruitment, donor relations, marketing trends, new technologies, and much more. If you're looking for conversations centered around where marketing in higher ed is going, this podcast is for you.
Let's get into the show.
SPEAKER_02
Welcome to the Higher Ed Marketer podcast. We are together again, Bart, you and I, and today we have a wonderful conversation with DJ Menethvee of Bradley University. I think this should be a thesis or it should be a main topic taught for a semester of navigating or shifting from the traditional funnel to an innovative ecosystem within your enrollment community.
SPEAKER_00
Yeah. Yeah. I like the way he unpacks this because I think we're all used to the enrollment funnel. You know, I did, you've got the inquiries, you go down to getting them to apps, you get them to deposit.
It's the traditional linear funnel that everybody talks about, but I think DJ has done a great job of introducing this idea that it's more than just a linear funnel. It's an ecosystem because the students are going to come and go. You can't always predict where they're going to go.
You have to create this environment that you can actually react to and leverage the assets that you have. He does such a great job of unpacking that and then setting that up with the questions that he always asks as he's looking at that. It's a really fascinating conversation.
You're right. It could be a thesis. It could be a whole semester topic, but I think it's a blessing that we've been able to have him here for this time.
Just as a bonus, the fact that I learned that he's from my hometown of Anderson, Indiana, that was a nice touch. He's earned my fanboy that I'm going to be a fanboy now too to join you, Troy. It's a good episode.
SPEAKER_02
Speaking of, I encourage everyone to go and follow him on his LinkedIn. He is the vice president for enrollment, marketing, communications, and retention at Bradley University. Again, without further ado, here's our conversation with DJ Menafee.
I am so honored. I should say we are so honored to have DJ Menafee from Bradley University on the higher ed marketer podcast, but I can say for sure I am the fanboy of DJ as it comes between Bart and I. DJ, to get our conversation started, we'd love to know if you can share something that you would deem fun or interesting that our audience would like to hear of something that you learned recently.
SPEAKER_01
Well, first and foremost, I appreciate the acknowledgement. There's some shared fandom across this group. I look forward to having you to the conversation.
The other piece to your question is I want to be mindful that as I thought about this, there are people in the world that may like to hear this and there may be some that may not care, but I thought it would be interesting enough to share with the world. So the thing that I've learned more recently, gents, is that I thought that my shoe fanatic collection issue had waned a long time ago. And what I have recalled over the last few months and even over the last few weeks is the flame just needed to be reignited.
And so I am very much in this space of shoe head, a shoe fanatic, more so in tennis shoes, very specific to Jordan, LeBron, Nike phone posits. So I do have some very specific shoes that I'm interested in. And my wife would say it's great, but you always get the same colors.
So most of the colors that I get tend to have some sort of combination with white, black and red, which is very fitting, giving my role at Bradley University and our school colors. Nonetheless, that would be the interesting piece that I would share that even at this phase of my life and with having a beautiful family and other kids who are building their own shoe collections, I'm very much still a shoe fanatic.
SPEAKER_02
Well, thank you for sharing that with us. That's something that I wasn't as aware of as maybe as I should have been as a fanboy. So I'm glad that you shared it with us.
I will tell everyone the reason why we are asking DJ to be on the podcast is the way that he describes and the impact that he's making of why enrollment teams should make a mind shift from the traditional enrollment funnel to the enrollment ecosystem. But before we dive into it, if you could share with us a little bit about yourself, you mentioned your family and then your role at Bradley.
SPEAKER_01
Sure. So the first piece that I would say is when I think about my why I'm very centered on my family, my faith, my value system in terms of lifelong learning, my value system in terms of trying to be a servant, not only to those that are close to me, but just in society as a whole. And so those are the things that I would say ground me and that I try to always make sure that I revisit to stay sane, to stay focused and also to stay humble because in our space, whether it's because maybe we were in the Chronicle of higher ed on a Monday, we got acknowledged for being successful in an enrollment goal on a Tuesday.
What happens on a Wednesday could always humble you. And so I always try to stay humble and to be mindful that any success that that I have been acknowledged for has never come in isolation. I'm not here because of me.
I'm here because of those that have supported me and collaborated with me and lifted me up along the journey.
SPEAKER_02
If you would describe to us what inspired the concept of the enrollment ecosystem in your perspective.
SPEAKER_01
Sure, there are a couple of different things, Gens. I think the first was this old adage of only tracking single source, right? So this source is the name by this source was their lead generation coming from niche or coming from CapEx, coming from a different platform, coming from there, you visit virtual tour and assuming that that one piece was successful in its own right or not versus thinking about the interconnectedness and not to tease too much in the ecosystem further, but the interconnectedness of the sources and what type of combination could maybe come together that would be the most impactful experience that you provide for prospective students and their families throughout their journey to make an informed decision about your institution. So I would say those would be the pieces that have come to shape the transition and the mind shift.
That would be one piece. The other pieces is when you think about assets and, you know, let's look at digital resources, video content, let's think about things that may show themselves on social media. You start to think about those pieces in a way that says, well, are they only valuable as one dimensional or is this a multi dimensional asset that can be of value at different phases of the funnel? Right.
So if I think about one of the newer initiatives that out in space and you think about the college tour and the video content, is this only a helpful resource as a prospect as an inquiry? Is it only there to build awareness? Can it build affinity and stretch the brand? Is it strong enough to help you build and maintain or stack upon reputation? So really starting to think through those assets and to say, how do we use them and are there multiple ways in which we can use them? And then I think I would say maybe the last piece of thinking about this evolution is also thinking about what assets should be available only to those that are in the ecosystem that you know of and what assets should be available and it doesn't matter if they're in your ecosystem or not because you still need to tell the story. You still can inform, you still can persuade and you still can call to action even if they're not actually in your funnel. And so I would say that was the other piece that was a part of the mind shift to truly try to ship into this new frame of thinking and seeing what we're doing as an ecosystem versus your traditional funnel.
SPEAKER_00
DJ, I really love so much of what you said and there's a lot that I want to kind of unpack for a second. But the first thing I guess, and it reminds me of a conversation I had this week with one of my clients and we're doing some work with them and we're really up. I mean, up in numbers of apps well above where they had projected the goals for deposits or well above, the inquiries are well above.
And I thought it was interesting that the VP was quick to say, this is great, let's celebrate. But you know what, we're not to matriculation season yet. There's a long road ahead and it's great.
Let's celebrate. Let's use this as momentum. And I think that's important.
And I think that's one of the challenges of the funnel is that sometimes we can get either ourselves as a team or leadership or even the board can get very focused on certain metrics within the funnel without recognizing that it all plays into an end goal of matriculating students and not only matriculating, but retaining them and graduating them and creating successful alumni. I think that sometimes the traditional funnel does get us a little bit too myopic on certain metrics. And so unpack that a little bit as you kind of have been thinking about that.
Is that part of your experience? How does that, how does that play out in your world?
SPEAKER_01
Bart, man, I appreciate you so much in just sharing that example. And it has me thinking of experience along my journey and even recent moments of not getting too high or too low on certain key performance indicators, right? Your KPIs. And when you're thinking about them, obviously, there are leading and lagging indicators, and I think those things are still very much alive and well in the ecosystem versus your traditional framework of a funnel.
But I think the piece that that I've tried to think about, and I guess I would give this example in the communities I've been a part of in the ecosystem framework. One of the things we do each summer ahead of your traditional application launch for your undergraduate population of recruiting is that's great. Our inquiry pool.
How strong is it? And when I say strong, it's not just volume, but the characteristics that normally put us in position to be successful. How are we doing with those characteristics that can be distance from campus? It can be socioeconomic. It can be demographic.
It can be academic areas of interest. It can be level of engagement. It can be campus visits.
It can be all these things. But in itself, all it is giving us some assessment of the quality and the strength of the inquiry pool before the application goes live. It is not equate to we've made it.
Let's celebrate. Right. Now, within it, it's okay to. I move away from celebration and I like to think about acknowledgement.
Right. Let's acknowledge that the goals we had to build, shape and cultivate the funnel at this time that we have hit the parameters and the markers that we knew were valuable markers for us. We are either hitting or exceeding those markers at this time.
Let's acknowledge that while also acknowledging other areas of opportunity for us to continue to enrich it so that next time we get ready to grade the pool again, we're even a better place than we were that year prior. Right. If you move to a different portion of the funnel and let's talk about yield season, which in this day and age is longer or shorter, depending on if you're thinking about fast simplification, or if you're in a different position in the marketplace and based on how you release admission decisions, but even through yield and tracking ahead or behind, every pool is different. Every cohort is different.
And so instead of a knee jerk early celebration, it's let's acknowledge where we are. Let's continue to dive deep into the ecosystem and seeing the signs of what we're seeing, what's working, what's not, what can we pivot, what needs adjustment so that they can continue to put us in position to be successful. Right. I've been in places where everything looks good until the final week ahead of May one, and then the whole floor dropped. And it's like, oh, what happened? But maybe along the way, there were some signals that were giving us a head, a heads up the A.
Maybe something's not going to shape up in the way that we anticipated on the way that we thought. And so really kind of framing it in that mindset of how do we acknowledge our own the journey? And lastly, I would say planning is always a focus. If you've got planning in place and you've got a strategy in place, it allows for more flexibility when you need to pivot versus trying to do everything at once and then you need to pivot and you don't really have the timing and the resources to be able to do those things.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00
And I'm going to just add an asterisk to something that you said, because I think it's important. I know that a lot of people that listen to this are smaller schools. I think that you want to make sure to take what DJ just said about grading your inquiry pool.
Now, your inquiry pool might not be that big. And so you can actually do that rather easily. But I really like what you said, DJ, about really kind of looking at where do they come from? What are the demographics? What are the psychographics? What are the, you know, kind of being able to kind of create those individual personas even within an inquiry pool.
Cause I think too often we are, it reminds me of that. I think MailChimp has a new video out, new commercial consumer commercial. It's about the customer where they just kind of put everybody into this big cluster and everybody is one big customer.
And the end of the day, no, even within an inquiry for your particular school, there's nuances of what's going to appeal to them and how you're going to meet, need to communicate with them and how they're going to react to maybe an email versus a text, versus whatever. It's better to kind of grade them and then be able to create personas and specific plans within your ecosystem, utilizing those assets that DJ talked about to be most effective. I mean, one of the things we did recently with the school was.
Hey, before we just send out a postcard to everybody on the list, let's see who's actually engaging with our email to begin with her. Let's see who's engaging at any level or where did they come from? Because I mean, sending 40,000, 40,000 postcards out, there's a lot in postage alone. And so being able to kind of start grading things and saying, okay, this is the group that's going to get this level.
This is the group that's going to get this level. And that, that starts to kind of get back to what you're talking about with the assets. And I don't know, maybe, maybe kind of pushback on me if I'm thinking differently, DJ, but I'm just curious what you think about that.
SPEAKER_01
Well, it's less about a pushback bar and it's more of, of thinking about the context. So I have to own and be mindful that the value of inquiry assessment is likely going to be based on your positionality in the marketplace and understanding your institution. How much of your incoming cohort is heavily based on how you've shaped and cultivated the sophomore and junior pool of high school students ahead of time? If your pool has normally been shaped by, and your enrollment has normally been shaped by senior search or activity happening in senior year, stealth applicants, it's probably less applicable.
And if you have that type of brand in the marketplace where you don't really put a lot of energy and time into inquiry pool cultivation because you haven't had to, I also want to make sure that I'm acknowledging that and thinking about that as well, because every institution is going to be positioned differently. How they build their funnels may be different. How they may want to build it in the future may be different.
And lastly, the resources that they have with their leisure to do so may also be different.
SPEAKER_00
And there's a little bit of spectrum there, because, I mean, yes, there are the schools that have a large brand reputation that can just, you know, a little bit of catcher's bit, because, I mean, hey, we know this, these seniors are going to come, they're going to, you know, we're going to do that. And they might not put as much effort on the sophomore, junior cultivation. Then on the other end of the episode of it, it's like, they're the schools that are kind of strapped and they are really kind of reacting to everything.
And so they're totally focused on senior, because you know what? I don't, I mean, I talked to a school the other day who they willingly said our admissions counselors will ignore any inquiries from sophomores because they're too focused on the seniors. And so it's that mindset of there's got to be an in-between for a lot of schools. You can't be one, I mean, if you are struggling, you can't be only focused on your senior class.
You've got to start that cultivation. And I know a lot of people are like, well, that takes a lot of time. Good things take time.
That was my editorial in the middle of DJ's interview. So let's talk a little bit about some of the ways that these different assets, go back to that and just talk a little bit about that, because I think that's something that maybe a lot of marketing years perked up a little bit and like, well, that's what my job is to develop assets. Talk about that and how you partner with your marketing team.
SPEAKER_01
Yeah. So one of the things that I think about, Bart, is when you get into a new role or you get into a new environment, one of the things you need to do is assess your resources, assess your assets, understand your ecosystem or funnel whatever language you use. And as you start to understand it, while also being mindful of the generation of students you're trying to engage in what they prioritize and what they value, then I think that becomes the piece where you identify, okay, what assets do we have? How can we better use them or maximize their use? And what do we still need? What are we in dire need of and how do we get there? And so when you think about either overseeing marketing communications or partnering with marketing communications, depending on your org structure, and you think about kind of coming together for those assets, you also have to be mindful of what resources they have in terms of human resource and funding.
And so, for example, if your team has invested in a videographer of sorts, and maybe you're starting that anew and you haven't quite developed and cultivated video content, then really start thinking critically about how can, from an enrollment lens, given your close proximity to the students you're trying to engage to enroll and to retain and to graduate, what assets are they looking for, what assets best tell your story, and how do you partner, collectively speaking, to get there? And so I remember a more recent activity where we were trying to build a video for the admit student experience, right? And it was to be in alignment with brand. And so, you know, the videographer was like, Hey, here's what we got. This is what we're looking at.
Here's our video script. And here's what we're thinking. And our team came to it and said, okay, let's go back and revisit the brand guide.
Let's go back and visit the visuals that they were aligning with this brand. And if we don't see it, how can we provide a recommendation to shift subtly so that when this deliverable comes out, it is hitting on all cylinders. And so then you say, this is an asset that we need.
And then you say, well, if I'm thinking about this asset as an example, this asset has a limited scope because it's only for admitted students. So then for the other assets that, that could be more evergreen, that can serve a variety of populations. How do we build and cultivate a launch pad and planning for those assets that we can use in multiple ways and in multiple places, right? And so, Hey, we need an asset for digital disbursement in relationship to encouraging campus visits.
That's evergreen. Anybody at any aspect of the ecosystem or funnel, whatever language you prefer, people, that asset is going to be evergreen. It can be used in all of those different places.
No different than you think about an asset that is in relationship to virtually distilling your campus community. That asset can be evergreen in the various ways in which you use it. But how do you partner with your teams to say, okay, well, what's the social media aspect of how are we going to use it on social? What's the strategy behind that? What's the aspect of how we're going to incorporate it into our email drip campaigns? Who is it targeting? Are we doing it by segmentation? Is there certain audiences that that piece is not going to have as much of a powerful impact on because they don't care about it versus just doing the masses because it's simple and it's easy and it makes sense.
SPEAKER_00
Well, you said so many things right there that I have like two or three things I'm going to pull out just to kind of put an exclamation point on. I really liked that very last thing that you said, we just do it because it's easy and it's simple. Do not do that.
I mean, I'm joking a little bit, but at the same time, as marketers, as enrollment leaders, you have to have the hard conversations. And if you're looking at a video that your video teams put together, you need to have the hard conversation and the courage to be able to say, it really needs to be vertical. All of our people are Gen Z and Alpha.
We need it to be vertical so it can show up on their phones. And I think that sometimes, whether we just don't want to deal with the challenge of having confrontation or whatever, sometimes we just need to have the conversations and sometimes depending on where marketing fits in your school, whether it's under enrollment, whether it's by itself, whether it's under advancement, there can be a whole kinds of different ways of thinking that through. And so first off, just to have a lot of conversations, be honest with each other.
And then second, I would also add the fact that do not use the excuse that you don't have a person or a tool to say, we can't generate that asset. I've talked to too many people where it's like, OK, what are you doing for texting? Oh, we don't text. Why not? Our CRM doesn't do texting.
Figure out a way to get around that and do texting because that's the number one people, the way the kids want to be communicated with. You have to understand the ecosystem and understand who you're talking to. And that that inquiry group so you can pull the assets together and you have to get creative.
I've had another group that says, I asked him, what are you doing for video? Well, we don't have a videographer. Do you have an iPhone? Yes. OK, you've got a videographer right there.
So you got to be creative. And I think that especially what's coming with the enrollment cliff and a lot of change coming down the pike, we can't afford to just sit back on our laurels and say, well, we just don't have that. We can't do that.
And again, I'm preaching again. I'm sorry. But DJ, you're shaking your head and for the people that can't see it,
SPEAKER_01
tell me your reaction. Well, the thing that I'm thinking of right now is progress is a process. And what I mean by that is is I can remember a recall and experience where I'm working with a team.
And at that moment, there was nothing in the yield engagement sequence that talked about the academic programs. Well, what's one of the most important priorities for a student in the process is the programs they're interested in. And so at that point in time, we didn't have the resources.
So it was like, OK, but everybody has a phone. So all of our academic leadership programs, they can record themselves on a short little video of, hey, congratulations. And over the series of communications, you're going to receive from the admissions team.
We're going to hit on these three categories. They help you have a better understanding of how you can have an engaging and purposeful experience in said program. And so we worked on that.
We modeled it out and then we begin to deliver it in that way. And we got it from a study that came from our reputation and had said, hey, in order to be able to move your reputation a little further forward, here's some recommendations. And one of the recommendations was better showcased the strength of your academic programs.
So then it was easy to then tie the line to our partners in academia and say, hey, this is why we're attempting to do this. Here's our plan to do it. Here's how we're going to roll it out.
And acknowledging in that moment, Bart, that that wasn't going to be the final solution, but it was a start. It was the start of progress. And then to do that and then capture the value and say, well, now we know we're in a place where we can see the value.
But let's move away from DJ self recording it and let's move a little bit more to Marvel comic quality video content to better tell the story.
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, you're kind of doing that crawling before you're walking before you're running, because I think a lot of people are just kind of like, well, I can't run, so I'm not going to do anything. Good.
SPEAKER_02
DJ earlier in the conversation, you mentioned the philosophy of what's your why and it was in relationship to some of your love, personal loves and pursuits. But we'd like to know if you can also share what that means to you, that philosophy and how you incorporate it or why it will be crucial to incorporate within the enrollment ecosystem.
SPEAKER_01
It's a great question, Troy. And I think where I would start, I'm going to frame it in the terms of our working enrollment is the foundation, the why tends to stem from the mission and value system of the organization, which also shows itself through what I would call the strategic imperative, which could be the strategic plan for the university. And so in the places I've been blessed to be, that has served as the foundation of the strategic enrollment plan as we build it.
Once it's built through the community with community and finalized in front of and support of the community, as we're taking on a different initiatives and moving, we always are founded and grounded in our why. So when somebody comes and Bart comes to pitch me a new idea, hey, listen, I saw this new initiative and I think it's going to work. Well, I'm hopeful that Bart has already assessed how that new initiative bounces off and aligns with our strategic enrollment plan that we're already working towards.
And if he did, I can promise Bart that I'm always either going to find the resources and I never shy away from asking for more resources that align with the vision and direction that we're going in. And so anytime somebody poses a new initiative or idea or they want to access a different portion of the budget, I'm always trying to make sure that it's connected in our why it's connected in a direction that we're headed in. It's connected to our North Star and the vision.
And if we need to pivot along the way, we can all assess that. And sometimes Bart or Troy, the idea may be great, but it doesn't fit the direction. And in those moments, it's okay to say, you know what, those ideas are phenomenal.
Let's park them for a moment because they don't align with the direction and the focus that we have right now. It doesn't mean that we don't have reason to pivot or change in the near future or long-term future. But for now, that doesn't align with the direction that we're headed in.
I remember in our prep dialogue, one of the things that came up was being in a conversation about TikTok, right? And well, this is where the, my 14 year old is, this is where the young people are. And that may be true. And I want to be mindful that there's probably a lot of our peers out there that have found success and strategies with using TikTok.
I don't mean to say that that's not it. But my question was grounded in the why. Why beyond saying that's where that population is, why do we want to use it as a strategy? How does it align with the direction we're headed in? If we build followers, what does that mean? What are we doing with that as we cultivate them? The need to be able to then position ourselves to develop new and fresh content all the time, are we positioned to do that? And what is the value at and how are we going to measure and assess that value over time? And just because the audience is there, Bart and Troy, is that where they're going to learn and engage college? Just asking, is that connected to our why? And so always thinking about it from a strategic lens, when you build a framework and a strategic comparative, how are you always making sure the decisions that you make, the initiatives you consider and what you measure and assess are all grounded and connected to your why?
SPEAKER_00
I love that idea because I think that what I'm hearing you say, is that needs to start personally, but then it needs to go out to your small team and then it goes, needs to go out to the larger team. Because what I'm imagining is if, and I've seen this happen far too often, either marketing or somebody in enrollment is at the cabinet level. Somebody asks a question and challenges of, you know, this or that or tick talk or, Hey, I think we, I'm not seeing any billboards.
Aren't we doing any marketing? Those kind of ideas and those typically come up with the board because you've got this, you know, very successful owner of a car dealership and he's like, well, this is the way we get customers. Why aren't we doing more of that? And I think that having that clarity within your own team is going to be able to escalate its way up to those questions that when people are challenging your marketing or challenging your enrollment decisions or challenging what you're doing, if you can have the why and the KPI and the data that is going to help align in that why, and you've really thought it through, that's going to give you a lot more confidence and ability to answer those questions at those different leadership levels. And I don't care if you're a marketing manager or if you're VP or, or if you're president having to, you know, answer to the board.
I think that why really gets to that level of importance. And I'm sure that you've experienced some stories with that as well.
SPEAKER_01
Bart, you ended where I was intended to jump in on and try to add value and you already really did it. And it was this notion that, you know, when you think about these roles that we may occupy as senior leaders of X, Y or Z. Yes, that's our portfolio, but we are also asked to help steward the institution for, which means we have to be able to step outside of our comfort zone and outside of what our background and experience may very well be in to contribute to the whole university, to contribute to the whole organization in the success of that organization, short term, long term, and not only in terms of head count and discount, but also just overall and future responsibility.
And so when I think about it from that lens, why wouldn't everything that an institution does and approaches be grounded in the Y? When it's time to make tough decisions, it's easier to navigate them when you know they're grounded, right? It's easier to take a calculated risk when you know it's grounded. It's easier to take a risk and to fail and fail quickly because you know it was grounded in your Y.
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I love that. I think that's so, so wise. And I think that that is something that a lot of, a lot of institutions and schools can keep in and really making sure that they make that philosophy a part of really thinking that through.
And I think that that then goes back and come in full circle and putting a bow around this whole conversation. Knowing your Y is going to help you understand what to do in that ecosystem. It's not a linear funnel where it's like, you know, chunk, chunk, we're moving the train down the track.
I mean, knowing that Y is going to give you kind of the ability to do the audibles when you need to, to be able to kind of make those adjustments during the year and during the enrollment season, depending on whatever it is, whether it's application season or yield or whatever, maybe unpack that a little bit. I mean, how do you tie that back to that ecosystem and all those tactical daily things and how they kind of roll up under the Y?
SPEAKER_01
So when I think about it, right, if the Y is connected to our mission, our values and our strategic imperative, and I shape a strategy around that, how would that strategy not show up in the way in which we shape the ecosystem, which is really thinking about the varying levels of interactions and the varying levels of interconnectedness within those, those initiatives, those resources. And to that point, also thinking critically about the measurement and assessment of and the Y, those measuring assessments are a value, right? So when I think about what may happen in you all's day to day or somebody in your team's day to day is being able to articulate the value of clicks, impressions, right? How do you articulate that to a trustee or trustees who may not live in that world every day? How are you able to capture that? Yes, this is 600,000 impressions. What does that mean? How can I deliver the meaning to you? And how was that connected to our Y, right? You see that this new initiative costs $100,000.
And so you want to be able to measure it very quickly. Well, let me see, show you why it's connected to the Y. How long of a life this resource is going to have the multiple ways and dimensions that that resource is going to be able to be used in and the various ways we're going to measure and assess it over time.
And then this is why this is a value because this tool, whether as an individual entity has value and also I don't want to use your, your customer line, Bart, but in terms of thinking about clusters, right? College board uses neighborhood and high school clusters, right? And so I love that language. I study the clusters frequently. So if I'm thinking about it in that way, then what cluster of these initiatives, of these sources have the most value? And so, well, if I can connect the number of impressions to this plus this source, it's less about a single entity.
It's more about this formula of this cluster is very dynamic. How do we make sure that more of our students are engaging with this cluster throughout their journey in the ecosystem? Because this is where the value is.
SPEAKER_00
I love that. I love the way that you've kind of wrapped that up and kind of tied that bow. So thank you.
That's great.
SPEAKER_02
If we can ask for a final thought or maybe a piece of advice that you could offer that could be implemented by a listener soon after hearing it, maybe next week, what would that piece of advice be?
SPEAKER_01
I would say it has shown up quite frequently in the conversation that Bart and I and then you Troy have been able to have today. I think the quick takeaway, regardless of where you fit within your organization or within your team, is you can walk away from this conversation and say, can I answer the why? Why am I doing this in my particular role? Why are we investing in these resources to help us get to our North Star? Why is my work valuable to help us get there? And so I think in many ways, anybody can start from that. Why the second piece? I know you only asked for one, but I love two for one deal, Troy.
So here we go. The other piece to that is if I'm thinking very much in terms of the ecosystem language that we're using, anyone can ask the question when they walk away from today and say, hmm, I wonder what sources make the best combination in our ecosystem or our funnel, because right now we're only tracking single source. Or right now it's hard in our system to track the multiple multi source and how different types of sources work well together in a student's journey.
So how can we start to assess that? And whether somebody's tracking pings and their slate CRM or some other way in which they're able to capture the variety of different sources and their values to student journeys, asking the question, well, what combination is the best and how do we try to be proactive and putting forth that combination to the amazing students and families in our recruitment ecosystem?
SPEAKER_02
DJ Menethy, Vice President for Enrollment, Marketing, Communications and Retention at Bradley University. Thank you for being our guest. Thank you for your wisdom.
Thank you for your warmth. DJ, if what would be the best way for someone to reach out to you? I know you're on LinkedIn because that's where I spend most of my time being your fan, but what's the preferred way that you like to be contacted for someone that would like to follow up with you?
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I mean, the best way to be connected with is obviously, I think LinkedIn is an amazing resource. It is a place that I spend time, whether it's sharing things that I've come across and wondering if it will be a helpful resource to others in the space, but also being able to connect with me via the email at myinstitution, bradley.edu. It would be the other way in which they can connect with me. So I look forward to connecting and I'm also mindful that when you connect with me, I'm going to look to learn more from you than maybe I'm going to be able to impart for you.
SPEAKER_02
Again, thank you, DJ. Bart, any final thoughts from you?
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, there was just a lot of really good nuggets in this episode and I would encourage you to go back and listen to some of them, but especially just the idea of kind of rethinking the traditional funnel into this ecosystem. I feel like it kind of adds a third dimension or even a fourth dimension to some of our thinking as it goes to enrollment marketing and enrollment management and recruitment. I think that a lot of what DJ has talked about with kind of that asset management when we start looking at that as well as just that idea of segmentation.
When you look at your group, I really thought the idea of just being able to grade your inquiry pool early in the year, kind of those rising seniors and being able to grade them at that moment to be able to say, okay, here's how we're going to kind of segment this. This is the assets we're going to use. And then how can you use those same assets again when you're in yield season or when you're getting to deposits or whatever you want to do, figuring out how you can kind of do that.
And then just basing all of that on the why. I think that's such an important thing. I mean, I think a lot of us are familiar with Simon Sinek and the whole book around that.
If you haven't read that, take a listen to that. I think that would be a good one to read or listen on an audiobook. I think it gives you context on a lot of DJs thinking, but I think it does get down to the root of what's really going to matter to us and how, if we really understand what the why is, not only for the institution, but for ourselves, I think that gives us a lot more confidence to kind of lead effectively and do the work that we need to do effectively.
So really again, DJ, it's been a pleasure getting to know you and spending the time on the podcast. Thanks for joining us.
SPEAKER_02
Would also like to express thanks to our producer, Rob Conlon at Westport Studios and also our sponsors, which we are sponsored by Bart's company, Kailer Solutions, an education marketing and branding agency. And by the company that I represent, Ring Digital, providing direct mail for digital, accurately serving ads directly to the handheld and household devices of your inquiries on your most preferred mailing lists. On behalf of Bart Kailer, DJ Menafee and myself, Troy Singer, thank you for joining us today.
SPEAKER_03
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