Introduction

The present report suggests a direct marketing campaign for the Training and Development Agency for Schools (henceforth referred to as TDA) in order to achieve precise objectives that are outlined below. As TDA is currently in need of specific applicants such as Maths, Science and students with a degree of 2:1 or above, appropriate communication to suit each of these segments was devised. It was deemed necessary that TDA should establish a strong presence inside Universities as a way to engage in a more personal communication with students. Both online and off-line media are considered as a means to reach this wide audience through different channels and on multiple occasions during the day.

This campaign focuses on media channels popular among the target audience, such as Spotify, Facebook and websites addressed to graduates, in order to maximize the response rate. Traditional media were also considered as a means of increasing brand awareness and brand recall.

Two different stages are proposed for this campaign. The first stage aims to acquire a number of 40,000 prospects. It is proposed that this could be achieved by producing tailored communication with both an emotional and economical benefit appeal so as to attract a response from the target audience. It was deemed necessary that each medium be tested at a confidence level of 80 per cent in order to make an educated decision regarding which creative solutions and medium would be more effective. Both qualitative and quantitative research was carried in order to get an insight into how teaching is perceived among the target segments.

The second stage is looking for a conversion of 30 per cent, reaching a final number of 12,000 applicants.

Objectives outline

The following is a summary of the objectives of this report and functions as an overview of the whole marketing campaign devised. Each point is going to be looked at in more detail further on in this report.

  • generate 40,000 enquiries (warm prospects);

  • increase enquirer-applicant conversion from 26 to 30 per cent (12,000 applicants);

  • stimulate students and graduates to have teaching in their career ‘consideration set’;

  • change perceptions that students currently hold of teaching;

  • devise communication strategies for ‘high fliers’ (1st, 2:1);

  • devise communication strategies specifically tailored for Maths and Science students;

  • ensure TDA is in the evoked set of those people considering teaching as a career;

  • enrich, enhance and update current database as a future means to analyse trends and patterns in prospects’ behaviour, evaluate media effectiveness and generate ‘hot lists’.

Market overview

SWOT and PESTEL analyses are shown in Table 1, while the results of Porter's (1980) Five Forces analysis on the market in which TDA operates are shown in Figure 1.

Table 1 SWOT and PESTEL analysis
Full size table
Figure 1
figure 1

Porter's (1980) five forces model applied to TDA's current market position

Full size image

Competitive landscape

Levels of competition are very high. As a company offering a teaching career to graduates, TDA is competing against virtually all other careers available to graduates and is therefore in competition (although indirect) with websites such as prospects.ac.uk and milkround.com offering a plethora of job opportunities. As a consequence of that, TDA needs to ensure its presence inside universities to get students interested in teaching at an earlier phase.

Primary research

Research has been carried out in order to find out students’ perceptions of teaching and what would make them consider such a career. A hundred questionnaires formed the basis of this primary research alongside a series of in-depth interviews. This paragraph is only a summary of the main findings that were deemed as germane for building a relevant communication. For a deeper analysis of both quantitative and qualitative approaches, see Appendix A.

Quantitative

The survey conducted helped devise the following strategy for the communication:

  • Mention that TDA is Government operated so that any thought of possible scam is instantly dispelled.

  • Clearly state the annual income of a teacher in order to alter poor perceptions around the average teaching salary.

  • Show how teaching can be both very challenging and rewarding.

Qualitative

The five in-depth interviews helped shape the right emotional appeal and appropriate tone of voice (TOV) to be given to the communication strategy:

  • teaching is about inspiring people and sharing one big, powerful passion;

  • teaching is not an ordinary job: it is alive and only honest passion nurtures it;

  • it is a fair job, in the sense that the two parties involved will benefit from it only if both feel equally rewarded;

  • bad teachers are quickly forgotten; great teachers will be remembered forever.

Overall brand considerations

All marketing strategies and creative solutions proposed throughout this report do not aim to alter TDA's brand image or branding strategy; instead, they suggest a sound communication plan whose core and sole purpose is to ease prospects’ acquisition and subsequent conversion. In order to ensure that the communication plan devised is in line with past and recent company's branding strategies, a comprehensive analysis of TDA's brand identity was carried out so as to keep the tone and the mood consistent with the brand across all marketing communications.

Brand awareness

From in-house research conducted, it was discovered that 70 per cent of students did not know about TDA. More importantly, among those who were considering teaching as a future career, only 37.3 per cent had heard of the company (see Appendix A.3.1).

Brand identity

TDA projects a strong image of reliability and professionalism; it represents a serious yet innovative company whose mission is to guide and inspire young, bright graduates through the process of becoming teachers and take the challenging, highly rewarding opportunity to make a difference in somebody else's life. Considering this is tactically important, as it sets not only the way the brand is expected to behave but it is also helpful in identifying and addressing properly the right target (Figure 2).

Figure 2
figure 2

Brand identity prism (adapted from: Kapferer, 2002, p. 183)

Full size image

Communication outline

Bearing in mind that TDA is asking for a life-changing decision, the communication strategy proposed in this report will focus on the challenging and rewarding aspect of teaching in order to change perceptions currently held of the profession. This will become a dominant emotional selling proposition (ESP) across all communications. Primary research has also shown that students perceive teaching salaries as being very low (see Appendix A.3.2); therefore, it is deemed strategically important to alter these perceptions. All advertising and marketing messages will share the following basic guidelines:

  • TOV: honest, reassuring, exciting, challenging, inspiring

  • Mood: professional, helpful, enthusiastic

Segmentation

The main target market of this marketing campaign is graduates with a qualification of 2:1 or above; however, within this segment three further sub-segments have been identified and profiled (Table 2).

Table 2 Prospect's profile
Full size table

Acquisition (Stage 1)

It illustrates the various steps that will lead to prospect acquisition via marketing and advertising communication on relevant media channels.

Objectives

  • Stimulate 40,000 enquiries within a 12-month period.

  • Enrich and update current database.

Strategy

  • Strong integration of online and off-line media as a means to corroborate the message being sent, as well as reach the target audience on multiple platforms at different times.

  • Build strong presence on-site with TDA stands in student fairs and advertising onto Universities’ newspapers, magazines, radios and websites.

  • Reach Maths and Science students at the very source of their passion, thus meaning advertising in key science magazines such as New Scientist and Focus, and distributing flyers in front of Science Museums.

Campaign

The 12-month campaign (starting May 2011 and ending April 2012) is targeting both students and graduates; therefore, while TDA's presence in Universities is almost mandatory other media different than those primarily targeted at students will be employed as a means to get in contact with people who graduated up to 2 years ago (Academic Year 2008–2009).

Off-line media evaluation

  • University: Advertising in Universities’ newspapers, magazines and radios. This can be done through BAM, the UK's leading student marketing booking agency. Since the company could not disclose information regarding prices, a list of 34 Universities is provided as an example in Appendix B.

  • Plasma TVs: Complement aforementioned advertising. The service can be purchased from SubTV, a multi-channel marketing agency with a system of plasma screens across 86 Universities that are estimated to reach approximately 1.75 million students aged 18–24 at a cost of £5/’000.

  • Outdoor: High-impact billboards and bus stop advertising situated close to Universities will be used (along with flyers) to increase awareness about TDA among students and reinforce all other marketing activities carried out.

  • Students Fairs: A list of 20 Universities offering Maths, Physics and Chemistry courses is provided in Appendix B.1 where TDA will have stands during Students Fairs in the months of October 2011 and March 2012. The cost for each stand is around £300 comprising cost for promotions undertaken by Universities through students’ portals and private emails.

  • Newspapers and Radio: Metro, Guardian and Heart FM are used to reach people who have already graduated.

  • Mobile: A list of students’ phone numbers is to be rented at campusmedia.co.uk at a cost of £150/’000. Students have already given permission to be contacted; therefore, there is no violation of the Data Protection Act (1998). Texts will be sent through Dynmark Direct at £35/’000.

  • Magazines: Maths and Science students/graduates are readers of specialized publications, such as New Scientist and Focus. Advertising inside these magazines is deemed tactically important, especially in the form of loose inserts.

  • Science Museums: Flyers will be distributed in front of Science Museums of the five biggest cities in England: London, Birmingham, Leeds, Manchester and Liverpool. Figures for monthly visitors were estimated from sciencemuseum.org.uk and the average response rate was taken from Marketing Minefield (2011).

A summary of the off-line evaluation elements is given in Table 3.

Table 3 Off-line media evaluation
Full size table

Online media evaluation

  • AdWords: Since Google is the main search engine utilized by the target audience identified (DoubleClick, 2011), paid search advertising through AdWords is going to be used in order to drive traffic to TDA's website. The average CPC is estimated at £0.90 for the following keywords: teaching, TDA, become a teacher, teacher training, pgce courses, get into teaching, graduate opportunities, graduate jobs, graduate careers, become a maths teacher, become a math teacher, teach mathematics, teach maths, maths graduate careers, maths graduate opportunities, become a chemistry teacher, teach chemistry, chemistry graduate careers, chemistry graduate opportunities, science graduate opportunities, science graduate careers, teach science, train to teach, become a physics teacher, teach physics, physics graduate opportunities, benefits of becoming a teacher, how to become a teacher, want to become a teacher, why become a teacher, why becoming a teacher.

  • Facebook: Facebook has been identified as the second most popular website (after Google) among TDA's visitors, with 9.33 per cent of them accessing the social network before going to tda.gov.uk and 11.72 per cent after (Alexa, 2011). Facebook's reach is estimated at 2,448,940 people for both graduates and current students aged 18–25. Average CTR is around 0.08 per cent and subsequent conversion ranges from 5 to 15 per cent (Facebook Advertising, 2011).

  • Spotify: Over 1.5 million people aged 18–24 are registered as Spotify users in England and Wales. Audio adverts supported by scrolling banners will be used to reach the large target audience.

  • Twitter: It is proposed that TDA should have a solid presence on Twitter throughout the campaign. Tweets will inform followers on a daily basis about teaching events, graduate fairs where TDA is present, testimony of people who have chosen a career in teaching, also information on competitive salaries and bursaries.

  • University: Advertising on Student Unions’ portals can be done through BAM. As the company could not disclose any information regarding pricing, a list of 32 Universities was compiled to illustrate part of this medium's potential.

  • Banners: Flash banners will be placed onto employment websites, as well as onto job sections of influential newspapers (Guardian, Daily Mail).

A summary of the online evaluation elements is given in Table 4.

Table 4 Online media evaluation
Full size table

Search engine optimization (SEO)

SEO will play a major role in the online activities suggested in this report as it will help improve TDA's website ranking on search engines. The main problem identified was the lack of redirection between tda.gov.uk and www.tda.gov.uk. This can lead to a risk of duplicate content, and search engines would give more importance to the one that gets more backlinks. Although the www and non-www types of a site lead to the same page and have the same content, they are different subdomains (Seda, 2009).

Campaign timeline

The proposed campaign timeline is shown in Figure 3.

Figure 3
figure 3

Campaign timeline

Full size image

Testing

Each medium employed in Stage 1 is going to be tested to ensure that it delivers the expected results. Furthermore, when two or more solutions are proposed, testing becomes necessary to understand which alternative pulls more responses. Owing to the high costs of testing, it was decided to operate at an 80 per cent confidence level. A higher rate of confidence level (ie 90 or 95 per cent) would have in fact demanded far too many names for each test to be significant.

SMS (cold list)

The sample size for SMS was calculated (and rounded) at 4,500 names, working at an 80 per cent confidence level but limiting the error tolerance to 0.25 per cent. As the average response rate for SMS from a cold list is 1.75 per cent (Media Burst, 2011), the test will establish whether this also applies to this case. Considering all things work as planned, this medium should deliver a response rate fluctuating within the range of 1.50–2.00 per cent.

Furthermore, two creative solutions are proposed at this stage and need to be tested. The first one has a more emotional appeal, whereas the second focuses more on showing the teaching's economical benefits. It is assumed here that the second solution will pull more responses.

Newspapers

It was decided to advertise on a quarter page (22×5) rather than half page. Owing to Sainsbury's square root principle, an advert space that is double in size will not pull twice as many responses, but just the square root of the increase in size. Only the cost would double. The quarter page was therefore deemed as a more cost-effective solution. A/B split runs will be used on both Metro and Guardian to test two different creative solutions, as well as the effectiveness of each medium.

Radio

Heart FM will be tested during the first 3 weeks of September, right before students return to University. It is here assumed that Heart FM will not deliver as expected (0.15 per cent response rate). As it scored quite poorly in the off-line media ranking (12th out of 14, with a cost per lead of £13.89), any response rate lower than the one estimated cannot be tolerated.

Magazines

The effectiveness of both Focus and New Scientist is going to be tested. As they scored low in the off-line media ranking (respectively, 11th and 13th out of 14), the testing is trying to understand whether a response rate higher than what is initially believed (0.15 per cent) can be achieved. It is here assumed that the response rate will not be higher; therefore, advertising in both magazines will be abandoned in favour of loose inserts.

Loose inserts

Split-run tests have proven particularly effective with loose inserts (Bird, 2007). The advantage of this medium is that more than two solutions can be tested at the same time. For example, along with the usual split between emotional-driven and benefit-oriented messages, also a mix of the two can be tested, as well as a fourth and fifth creative solutions. Since testing is undertaken at an 80 per cent confidence level and the expected response is well below 1 per cent, it is important to keep the error tolerance to a minimum.

Furthermore, each newspaper and magazine has its own rules regarding the minimum quantity of loose inserts to be purchased; therefore, increasing the quantity of the sample size will reduce the error tolerance and meet the publisher's demand.

Science museums

Distributing flyers in front of the five Science Museums will be tested for 2 weeks. This may seem quite a long period of time, but it is necessary to allow a little longer for this kind of activity to deliver results as they will not be as immediate as with SMS. It is here assumed that the distribution of flyers will prove to be very effective, especially in targeting key segments such as Maths and Science students. For this reason, it will be carried out for 3 months.

Outdoor

Billboard and bus stop advertising will sustain marketing activities undertaken inside Universities. Such outdoor activities are believed to have an important impact on the amount of enquirers acquired through students’ newspapers, magazines and radio as they build brand awareness and recognition. However, they will be tested too. Their effectiveness, in fact, will be monitored in the month of October and compared with results obtained in May, during a period when the same marketing activities were undertaken in Universities, but outdoor had not yet been employed. If successful, outdoor advertising will be used again in March 2012.

Student fairs

Here, it is expected that at least 1 out of 200 second- and third-year students will participate at the Student Fair and apply to get more information on becoming a teacher. Since this appears quite feasible to accomplish, it is assumed that the target will be met and TDA will renew its presence for a second Student Fair (March 2012) in all 20 Universities.

AdWords and Facebook

Both Google and Facebook offer free software to monitor pay-per-click campaigns; therefore, both activities will be tested for a month. Along with the medium itself, also the different solutions proposed are going to be tested to understand which creative approach is more effective and/or whether some of the solutions need to be improved.

Banners and spotify

The effectiveness of Flash-animated banners will be tested on all websites and Spotify. Furthermore, since different versions are provided, tests will also show which one is proving to be the more effective in terms of prospects’ acquisition.

Evaluation

Results and budgeting from the campaign Stage 1 are shown in Table 5.

  • Total number of enquirers: 40,309 (circa).

  • Total budget allocated: £500,000.

  • Total budget spent: £431,822.

  • A minimum of £50,000 of the leftover is to be spent on database and website maintenance, as well as market research.

  • 3.64 per cent leftover (£18,178) will be used for unexpected expenses, unforeseen events and all sorts of contingencies.

  • Average cost per enquiry: £10.71.

Table 5 Stage 1 campaign results and budgeting
Full size table

Conversion (Stage 2)

It illustrates the prospect's journey after his/her enquiry and shows how the use of different media approaches and communications will ensure the required conversion.

Objectives

  • Acquire 12,000 new applicants (30 per cent conversion).

  • Enhance database. Divide enquirers in ‘Type 0’, ‘Type 1’ and ‘Type 2’ to analyse trends and patterns in their behaviour for future management's considerations.

Strategy

  • Testing of the message with emotional appeal vs. message with benefit at each new stage in the communication plan and apply the more effective.

  • Personalized communication for each segment at each stage.

  • Training of staff to deliver better support and customer service, as well as functioning as a powerful marketing tool to convert enquirers into applicants.

  • Send an online questionnaire to all non-applicants to find out why they have not applied and if they still consider pursuing a career in teaching. Label and archive them as either ‘Type 0’ or ‘Type 1’.

Campaign

The communication plan devised for Stage 2 is divided into seven phases and will last a maximum of 20 days for each prospect. Each message sent out at each phase will be highly personalized as prospects have entered their details when applying through the TDA's website during Stage 1. It is relevant to notice that, in compliance with the current Data Protection Act (1998), only people who gave permission for their personal details to be used (through double opt-in) will be contacted.

The seven steps

  1. 1

    Email (1): It will be administered through Dynmark Direct at a cost of 0.82p per message. The response rate from warm prospects is expected between 1 and 2 per cent (Tapp, 2008).

  2. 2

    Email (2): Same as Email (1) but response is a little lower.

  3. 3

    SMS (1): It will be administered through Dynmark Direct at a cost of 3.6p per text. The response rate from warm prospects ranges between 2 and 2.5 per cent (DMA, 2011).

  4. 4

    MMS: It will be administered through Media Burst at a cost of £85/’000. The response rate, although usually higher, is expected around 3 per cent for this kind of activity.

  5. 5

    Direct Mail: A personalized pack will be sent to all enquirers remaining. This report proposes a brochure as an example but it can also be something more complex. However, whatever pack is sent, it is extremely important that it is tailored to the specific individual. Prices for posting were acquired from Royal Mail (36p per pack for First Class) and overall CPT was estimated at around £600 during this phase, taking into account printing costs. The response rate is usually quite high, around 6 or 7 per cent and even slightly more sometimes (Bird, 2007).

  6. 6

    Telephone Follow/Up: It is demonstrated that a telephone call within 3 or 4 days after direct mail boosts response up to three or four times (Thomas and Housden, 2002). The phone call needs to be nothing more than a friendly enquiry and staff will have to be trained properly so as to make something similar to a soft-sell. Outbound calls will be administered by Lead Line at a CPT of £1,700.

  7. 7

    SMS (2): Same as SMS (1) but it will create a sense of urgency. This is a famous copywriting technique and will gain responses from those who wait until the very last minute to make a decision (Bird, 2007; Sugarman, 2007).

Database strategy

At the end of Stage 2, prospects who have not applied or have blown out anytime during the process will be sent an online questionnaire (see sample in Appendix C) asking the reasons for them doing so. The chance to win £50 worth of Amazon vouchers will be offered as an incentive to complete it. All prospects will then be divided into three types:

  1. 1

    Type 0: Prospects who have not applied and do not consider pursuing a teaching career anymore.

  2. 2

    Type 1: Prospects who have not applied but still consider pursuing a teaching career in the future.

  3. 3

    Type 2: Prospects who have applied.

Prospects labelled as ‘Type 0’ will not be contacted again, whereas those who have been archived as ‘Type 1’ will constitute the key starting point for generating future ‘hot lists’. Prospects who have not compiled the questionnaire will be archived as ‘Type 1’ as default. Future managerial implications and database management are discussed later in this case study.

A flowchart of Stage 2 is shown in Figure 4.

Figure 4
figure 4

Stage 2 flowchart

Full size image

Testing

Each medium is going to be tested at an 80 per cent confidence level. When two or more creative solutions are proposed, testing will establish which one pulls more responses.

Email (1)

  • Subject line A (emotional) vs. Subject line B (economic benefit).

  • Content A (emotional) vs. Content B (economic benefit).

  • Banner vs. No banner.

Since each of the three testing elements has only two possible permutations (A or B), a total of 23 permutations are identified Table 6.

Table 6 Email testing elements
Full size table

The problem with setting a low error tolerance (0.20 per cent) is that it will require far too many names inside each test cell to be significant (6,850). Therefore, testing needs to be done either with a higher degree of error tolerance (if deemed reasonable) or by assuming that emails with banner will pull more responses, thus meaning cutting down the lists from eight to four.

After testing, the permutation that pulled more responses will be sent to all other prospects. It is here assumed that List 7 will pull more responses.

Email (2)

  • Non-openers of previous email will be sent a different subject line but same content.

  • Openers of previous email will be sent the same subject line but different content.

SMS (1)

For SMS, two versions of creative are to be tested.

After testing, the message that pulled more responses will be texted to all other prospects. It is here assumed that the benefit-oriented message will pull more responses.

MMS

As with SMS, two creative solutions are to be tested: one more benefit-oriented, the other playing on a more emotional level (ESP).

It is here assumed that the message ‘Benefit’ will pull more responses.

Direct mail

A brochure personalized by subject studied will be sent to all prospects. The copy will play both on the challenging role of becoming a teacher, as well as on the competitive salary and benefits. Testing will be carried out to understand which of the following permutations pulls more responses (Table 7). All future brochures will be sent according to the outcome of this test.

Table 7 Direct mail testing by list
Full size table

SMS (2)

This is a final call to action. Prospects will be literally invited to ‘hurry up’ and complete the application form. The text message will emphasize what the prospect is missing if he/she does not apply to become a teacher. This can be either an emotional reward or, once again, a pure economic benefit.

Evaluation

Results and budgeting from the campaign Stage 2 are shown in Table 8.

  • Total number of applicants: 12,022 (30 per cent conversion).

  • Total budget allocated: £100,000.

  • Total budget spent: £93,764.

  • 6.24 per cent leftover will be used for unexpected expenses, unforeseen events and all sorts of contingencies.

  • Average cost per application: £7.80.

Table 8 Stage 2 results and budgeting
Full size table

Database

The following paragraph is for the consideration of present and future database management. It sets the objectives to meet in order to carry out reliable data research and illustrates the different steps in the strategy to achieve this. See Appendix D for possible database structure.

Objectives

  • To organize data in order to ease its usage and accessibility for building future marketing communication strategies.

  • To use database to segment customers in order to create more relevant, better tailored communications.

Strategy and management

  • De-duplication. Cleanse database from duplicates deriving from the purchase or rental of ‘cold lists’ or multiple enquiries from the same prospect.

  • To ensure database processes comply with the current Data Protection Act (1998).

  • To offer double opt-in option to enquirers.

  • To draw a picture of the average enquirer through the identification of patterns and commonalities from his/her response to advertising and further subdivide prospects into ‘Type 0’, ‘Type 1’ or ‘Type 2’.

  • To gain understanding in media effectiveness and best time/location of contact.

  • To identify geographical areas that are under/over-represented.

Future managerial implications

With the large amount of data gathered after Stages 1 and 2, the database manager in charge will be able to distinguish between prospects who were converted (Type 2) and prospects who were not converted; in that last group, an online questionnaire sent to all non-applicants (see Appendix C) will allow to further discern those who still consider teaching (Type 1) from those who do not anymore (Type 0). This will provide future management with a list of warm prospects and the understanding of which medium works better as far as the acquisition of prospects is concerned (an example is provided in Appendix D).

Recommendations

  • Undertake further qualitative research on perceptions around teaching, especially inside key segments such as Maths and Science students/graduates.

  • Monitor brand awareness, recognition and recall to ensure TDA is in prospects’ evoked set.

  • Continually enhance, maintain and update database to provide present and future management with more insightful and accurate information.