One question we're often asked is: how long will it take me to set up and launch my first Community? The answer is - it really depends on you. I've launched a Community from scratch in 35 minutes!
While you don't have to do it quite that rapidly, tools are in place for you to quickly and seamlessly put a Community together - templates, quick-invite tools, and simple settings.
Pre-Launch 📄
Think of this as your planning phase. You might have already considered this as part of the decision to implement a Community. Who is this Community for, and what do you want students to get out of it?
Consider Audience Needs: Identify your target student audience (e.g., offer holders, current students, non-traditional students) and the topics/information valuable to them.
Decide on Community Spaces: Create tailored Spaces based on audience needs, (e.g., Accommodation, Campus 101, General Chat, Clubs & Societies, Life in Your City, Student Tips + Hacks). Set expectations with your Space descriptions and cover imagery - what will a student get from joining this Space?
Internal Liaison: Are any other university teams (e.g., Admissions, Accommodation Services, Student Services) going to be involved? How will they contribute to or utilise the Community (e.g., providing offer holder updates).
Develop an Engagement Plan: Devise a strategy for promoting the Community to students, and plan content and activities to foster engagement once launched.
Set Up a Test Community: You might like to create and familiarise yourself with a test Community, trying out content ideas and moderation aspects.
Prepare your Ambassadors: Train your Ambassadors on Unibuddy Community, either in-house, or at our live monthly webinar - where we cover content creation, driving engagement, and safeguarding. You should agree time spent on participating in Community per week or per month, especially if they are paid.
Launch 🚀
When to Launch?: Communities can be launched strategically, perhaps close to offer letter send-outs for conversion, or aligned with other relevant timelines. Midday to 3 pm is a peak time for online traffic.
Kickstart Spaces: If you are using Ambassadors, they can introduce themselves to kickstart conversations and build trust. We recommend assigning Ambassadors to groups based on their experiences and insights.
Post an Update: Updates is your one-way broadcast channel. You'll see it pinned to the top of your inbox when you join your Community - and so will your invited students. Community members can see all posts retrospectively, so we recommend posting a welcome message and/or some key info for them to see here when they join.
Add your To-Do list: Add dates, deadlines, events, or tasks that your students need to keep on top of. You can choose to segment by international or domestic cohorts, and your students can check tasks off once completed.
Invite your Students: Simply copy/paste your invite URL (or download your invite QR code), or paste your list of. invited email addresses into our Private Invite tool.
Invite URL/QR code = shareable link - anyone with this link can sign up. Private invite tool = gated - only those email addresses can join.
Marketing and promotion 🏪
Social Media: Scheduled posts, ambassador stories, and signposting to ongoing conversations.
Offer Holder Communications: Embed your invite URL/QR code into offer letters, offer holder portals, and accepted student webinar slides.
Email and Text Campaigns: Open day check-in emails, offer holder communications, SMS blasts, email signatures, and nurture campaigns.
Printed Collateral: Embed your QR code on posters, flyers, bookmarks, and brochures.
On-Site Promotion at Events: Your unique QR code can be used at open days and taster events (e.g., at registration, on materials, in presentations, on pull-up banners) to facilitate quick student sign-up.
Unibuddy Nurture Campaigns: The Unibuddy private invite tool sends an automated email nurture campaign (reminders 2, 4, and 8 days later) for students who haven't yet joined.
Sustaining Engagement 🔧
Ambassador-Led Engagement: Your Ambassadors should be tasked with actively sparking and maintaining conversations, answering questions, providing insider knowledge, sharing campus life images, and contributing their tips.
Admin Curated Content - Updates Tab + To-Do's: As an admin, you can post important announcements, event reminders, deadlines, PDF documents (campus maps, timetables), and Polls, triggering push notifications for app users.
Image Sharing: Have Ambassadors share photos of campus life, study setups, dorm rooms, events, and local scenes.
Short-form Content: Share digestible content like study hacks, budgeting tips, fun campus facts, and recipes to ignite conversations.
Open Questions: If a Space is quiet at first, Ambassadors can post open-ended questions to revive discussions - i.e. "What's your go-to study music?", or "What are you most excited about exploring at university?".
Polls, PDFs, GIFs: Enrich Spaces with Polls, downloadable PDF documents, and GIFs.
Monitoring and Moderation: Both Admins and Ambassadors can monitor public Spaces for ongoing safeguarding and moderation.
Student-Led Interactions: Students can form their own private groups and interact with friends they've made, which can be tracked in Analytics, or request new public Spaces from you, based on their interests.
Continuous Content Strategy: We recommend posting regular new content in Updates and To-Do's, approving student-requested Spaces, and keeping up a consistent, informative presence, to encourage students to return to the Community.
Post-Enrolment 🏫
For many of our university partners, utilising Community for conversion, a successful outcome is when students have arrived on campus, and no longer need the Community because they have formed connections and are chatting elsewhere!
However, you can keep the Community open, facilitating connections and sharing information as students ease into their first semester. Alternatively, you can re-purpose your Community, removing offer holders who didn't join you, refreshing your Spaces to suit your current cohort, and inviting teams such as Accommodation or the Student's Union to get involved.
If you'd like to close your Community down at the end of your intake, we'd recommend posting an Update to inform members that the Community will be sunsetted, ahead of time. This allows your students to make note of any important info, or swap contact details with new friends.