Industry: EdTech
Key Channels: Website, Video, Facebook, Email
Renaissance Collaborates with MDR to Build Continued Awareness Among School Leaders
ABOUT RENAISSANCE
As a global leader providing assessment, reading, and math solutions for pre-K–12 schools and districts, Renaissance® is committed to providing educators with the insights and resources needed to accelerate growth and help every student be their most amazing self. Today, Renaissance solutions are used in over one-third of U.S. schools and in more than 90 countries worldwide. The Renaissance portfolio includes Star Assessments for reliable, accurate insights into student learning; myON to increase students' access to high-quality reading materials; Accelerated Reader to support research-based reading practice; myIDGIs for accurate assessments of early learning; and Freckle for teacher-led differentiated instruction.
CHALLENGE
School leaders regularly clock more than a standard, full-time workload every week. In fact, a recent study showed that on average, principals work nearly 60 hours a week. In addition, thousands of education technology companies and other education vendors are competing for their already overworked attention. A leader in pre-K-12 learning analytics, Renaissance wanted to continue to build awareness of the company as a thought leader and resource for educators. In addition, Renaissance aimed to spark continued engagement with education decision makers, including directors, principals, and teacher leaders.
Renaissance and MDR recognized that to achieve these objectives, it was crucial to develop a campaign with high-value content to capture the attention of these extremely busy school leaders.
SOLUTION
In collaboration with experts from Renaissance, MDR created a series of guest articles for its School Leaders Now and WeAreTeachers online communities that drove visitors to deeper content on the Renaissance website. The articles were promoted through branded email and social media campaigns to build third-party endorsement for the content.
The goal of the articles was to promote four free guides created by Renaissance:
Education Leader’s Guide to Reading Growth, which shares essential research about reading practice, growth factors, motivation, comprehension, and other elements to know to support student success.
A Passion for Learning: 30 Ways to Motivate Students, which provides practical strategies for engaging students across the three different stages of motivation.
What Kids Are Reading report, which is the world’s largest annual study of K–12 student reading habits.
Tests and Time: An Assessment Guide for Education Leaders, which explores the different interactions of tests and time and what they mean for today’s educators.
RESULTS TO DATE
The guest article program helped Renaissance reach school leaders with relevant content, raise brand awareness through social media impressions, and drive traffic back to the Renaissance site.
“We appreciate the opportunity MDR provides to share our original research and data-fueled insights with their large audience of educators, so they can use the information to help accelerate learning for all students.”
— Linda Germain, Senior Director of Marketing Operations, Renaissance
The first article, “10 Staggering Statistics About Struggling Readers and Reading Growth,” posted on School Leaders Now, was one of their most successful posts with 44,000 page views. It also garnered a 4 percent engagement rate and a 2.2 percent click-through rate on social media. Two influential social media channels in the education space, the National Association of Elementary School Principals and blogger, Imagination Soup, shared the article with their followers, serving as a strong education industry endorsement for the content. In addition, it drove traffic to the Renaissance website with more than 2,000 clicks on links back to the site, driving 12% of the total guide downloads.
The second article, “Want to Infuse Motivation Throughout Your School? Here’s How,” also saw strong performance on the School Leaders Now site. Despite being published during the busy end of the school year when distractions can pull school administrators in many directions, it has received more than 6,300 page views and 105,000 social impressions. This article was the #1 source of traffic to the 30 Ways to Motivate Students guide download page and responsible for nearly 40% of total guide downloads.
The third article published on School Leaders Now, “The 7 Biggest Complaints Teachers Have About Testing—and How to Fix Them” highlighted findings from the Tests and Time guide to help teachers find the best assessment to accelerate student learning. The article has received 4,886 page views and 3,500 engagements on social media.
With a fourth article, Renaissance wanted to target the teacher audience to promote another piece of free downloadable content on Renaissance’s site, the annual What Kids Are Reading report. The Books Kids Read Most, According to 8.7 Million Students was published on MDR’s WeAreTeachers online community and has realized 35,094 page views, off-the-chart email results with an open rate of 47 percent, and nearly 1,900 clicks to the report on the Renaissance website.
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MDR’s team includes top email marketing experts, social wizards, the brightest of data geeks, award-winning writers, and many former teachers. If you’re ready to get started building engagement with educators, schools, and families, contact us!
