Missouri State University students, faculty, staff, alumni and community members let the good times roar Oct. 12-18 during Homecoming.
Homecoming promotion:
Homecoming was promoted in many different ways for months leading up to the big week. Some ways Homecoming was promoted online and through digital marketing include:
- A series of five emails from the Alumni Association and a few event-specific emails
- Promotion in the Bear Bulletin monthly newsletter in July-October editions
- A custom banner in MSU Mobile that pointed to the Homecoming website
- Photos on the Missouri State homepage that promoted key Homecoming events
- A Homecoming themed Go Maroon spread
- A promotional feature on the Alumni Association homepage
- Two Homecoming themed Instagram videos featuring President Clif Smart
- Social media promotion through the MarooNation and Missouri State University accounts
- A social media kit posted to the Web and new media blog and sent to social media managers of related University accounts.
- Aggregation of conversation around #BearsHomecoming through Tagboard
- Live coverage of the Friday and Saturday alumni Homecoming activities via the MarooNation social media accounts
Website traffic:
This year, the alumni Homecoming website was updated to a mobile-friendly template so that it would be easier for users to access during Homecoming festivities. This proved to be a very positive step as 41% of all traffic on the Homecoming website was from a mobile device.
Traffic to the alumni Homecoming website was tracked through Google Analytics.
- The Homecoming campaign was the top campaign for both internal and external users in October, accounting for 15% of all campaign related traffic.
- In October, 72% of all pageviews on the alumni Homecoming website were from external users.
- In October, 76% of all pageviews on the alumni website were of the Homecoming subsite.
- 46% of all traffic to the alumni website from Sept. 1 – Nov. 1 occurred during the week of Homecoming.
- In October, the Missouri State University and MarooNation Facebook pages were the top external referrers in the Homecoming campaign.
Social engagement:
Homecoming was heavily promoted by the MarooNation and Missouri State University social media accounts leading up to and during Homecoming. Members of the Missouri State community were encouraged to engage in the social conversation about Homecoming by using #BearsHomecoming.
Missouri State Facebook:
Homecoming Week – Oct. 13-18:
- 20 Homecoming posts
- Reach of 98,001
- Engagement of 10,264
Homecoming Weekend – Oct. 17-18:
- 6 Homecoming posts
- Reach of 66,096 (67% of weekly reach)
- Engagement of 8,443 (82% of weekly engagement)
MarooNation Facebook:
Homecoming Week – Oct. 13-18:
- 24 Homecoming posts
- Reach of 19,839
- Engagement of 3,885
Homecoming Weekend – Oct. 17-18:
- 16 Homecoming posts
- Reach of 11,821 (60% of weekly reach)
- Engagement of 3,414 (89% of weekly engagement)
Missouri State Twitter:
Homecoming Week – Oct. 13-18:
- 25 Homecoming posts
- Favorites: 118
- Retweets: 104
Homecoming Weekend – Oct. 17-18:
- 14 Homecoming posts
- Favorites: 104 (88% of weekly favorites)
- Retweets: 90 (87% of weekly retweets)
MarooNation Twitter:
Homecoming Week – Oct. 13-18:
- 76 Homecoming posts
- Favorites: 160
- Retweets: 142
- Retweet reach: 166,200 users
- @MarooNation mentions: 20
- @MarooNation mention reach: 19,600
Homecoming Weekend – Oct. 17-18:
- 70 Homecoming posts
- Favorites: 152 (95% of weekly favorites)
- Retweets: 115 (90% of weekly retweets)
Tweets by others:
Homecoming Week – Oct. 12-19:
- 964 tweets by users
- Users posted 238 photos using #BearsHomecoming
- Four posts were made to Missouri State’s Instagram account. They garnered a combined total of 831 favorites and comments.
- Two Instagram videos featuring President Clif Smart with a combined total of 290 likes and comments
- One #ThrowbackThursday Instagram video with 153 likes and comments
- One photo of the Bronze Bear unveiling on Homecoming Saturday– 388 likes and comments
