Background
We work with educational institutions across the country every day that share many of the same pain points. These issues range from recruiting leaders and stimulating event attendance to fundraising and leadership turnover. For Colby-Sawyer College, a Hustle customer since May of 2019, the college sought a more effective communication channel with alumni for school news, donation campaigns, and more. Alumni, particularly young alumni, are spun into any combination of career, relocating, marriage, child-rearing, student loans, and much more. The “real world” often leaves little prioritization to those critical quarterly donations or alumni engagements that help continue making academic environments better.
While these new life chapters are exciting, they don’t have to mean inevitable disconnectivity with the alma mater, as proven through Colby-Sawyer College. Together with Hustle, the private baccalaureate college integrated peer-to-peer texting into their alumni association outreach practices and reported back increased interest and engagement from their audience. Using Hustle has enabled Colby-Sawyer to serve information to alumni through the undeniably preferred method of direct text, all sent from real humans ready to enrich the interaction with individualized answers to questions or valuable informational updates.
Who is Colby-Sawyer College?
Colby-Sawyer College is a dynamic and innovative liberal arts and sciences college located in the scenic Lake Sunapee Region of central New Hampshire. Originally founded as a coeducational academy in 1837, Colby-Sawyer College is now ranked top 10 in three categories (Best Regional Colleges – North, Best Value Schools – North, Social Mobility – North) by U.S. News & World Report in the 2021 Best College Issue.
The Problem
Before using Hustle, a longstanding problem facing Colby-Sawyer College, like many schools, was maintaining an open window of engaging dialogue with alumni. More production time was spent attempting to make contact as opposed to speaking about school news, upcoming events, and donor opportunities.
The Solution
Implementing peer-to-peer texting campaigns to Colby-Sawyer College’s alumni association through Hustle offered engaging content served through text, today’s preferred mode of communication, especially for millennial alumni. Their team described peer-to-peer texting as being “very helpful with young alumni who are inclined to communicate this way.”
Drive Alumni Engagement with Hustle
"Hustle allowed us to connect with alumni in a way that we couldn’t previously. In particular, we know young alumni do not want to answer the phone, but a text is something they will automatically reply to."
Luke Gorman
Peer-to-peer texting is a preferred method of communication because it provides brief, non-invasive exchanges of information as opposed to emails or phone calls. Colby-Sawyer College is one of many exciting examples in our portfolio full of educational institutions revitalizing their alumni outreach with the use of authentic person-to-person campaigns designed to spark curiosity, continue quality conversations, and deliver measurable results.
