The Office of Admissions has created the Live Up Campaign to draw in prospective students.
Live Up is a social media campaign that was created as a contest for prospective ACU students. Students were required to submit a video of themselves “living up” and making a difference. The winner of the contest would receive a full-tuition scholarship.
“The Live Up Scholar Award was created to engage our prospective student audience in a new way,” said Kris Evans, director of enrollment marketing. “The campaign challenges prospective students to think about what it means to live up to God’s calling for their lives and how an ACU education can prepare them to do so.”
Not only did the Admissions Office want to get students involved, but they wanted to advertise the university in an unconventional way.
“The overall purpose of the Live Up campaign, website and Scholar Award is to move away from the typical college sales pitch with pretty campus pictures and smiling faces,” Evans said.
With the help of Robin Saylor, ACU online marketing web editor, they were able to create a website that highlighted different faculty members and students.
“We want to share the incredible stories of ACU’s students and alumni because they tell the authentic story of who we are as a university and, hopefully, inspire high school students to live up to God’s calling for their lives,” Evans said.
The contest was successful and created a lot of Internet traffic via social media.
“In a span of 15 days, more than 28,000 unique visitors from 7,300 cities across the world logged on to the contest site,” Evans said.
In previous years, future students received information booklets in the mail to inform them about ACU, but this year, they took a different approach.
“Rather than sending a booklet to tell the ACU story, we used our budget to buy and send every applicant a Red Thread Bracelet accompanied by a letter from alumna Brittany Partridge,” Evans said. “Her letter directed students to the Live Up website (acu.edu/liveup) to learn more about the Live Up Scholar Award and how ACU students, faculty and alumni ‘live up.'”
This impact of this change was two-fold. Students who received the bracelets saw a true example of a student who was “living up” to God’s call, and the Red Thread Movement was able to sell $27,000 in bracelets.
“Live Up’s purchase of bracelets in 2013 accounted for about one third of RTM’s revenue, showing just what an impact this campaign has had on RTM,” Partridge said. “The Red Thread Movement staff are incredibly grateful for ACU’s continued support of the movement.”
