Ideas, information and industry news for collegiate retailers

Since "A New Hope" premiered in 1977, the Star Wars franchise has been one of the most successful and beloved media franchises in the world. In fact, the unofficial holiday "Star Wars Day" is celebrated by fans on May 4 — a pun off of the phrase "May the Force be with you."

It gave University Stores at Kennesaw State University something to celebrate as well. The store took the concept and ran with it for the week of May 2-6, offering a sale for 25% off Star Wars merchandise, and using a Star Wars theme to spruce up its display windows and advertise its rental returns.

Coming across a fun marketing idea when it is too late to implement is disappointing. As the year progresses, there are naturally times when setting up marketing events is easier than others, but the good ideas rarely seem to fall in those moments. Take advantage of one of the slower times of the year by making a plan. This month, instead of offering a single idea, we have 10 social media marketing events you can personalize and line up throughout the year to fit your schedule.

There are new apps created daily. Some are better than others, but few generate the kind of excitement the iOS app “Clips” did when it was released last month. What makes it better than any other video app already on your phone? That’s what we are going to find out.

You don’t need to live at 221B Baker Street to love a good mystery. As the semester winds to a close, it is a busy time for everyone on campus. Keep this month’s event simple, engaging and easy to manage with one or all of these ideas for a terrific Mystery May event designed to bring people into your store without taking up a lot of time.

We talk a lot about the different social media platforms and the potential benefit of using them because they provide a direct connection with students. As Willie Sutton said, “Go where the money is … and go there often.” However, just being on the networks isn’t enough. The content you post and its effectiveness will directly influence the return on your efforts. What does that mean? Your store needs to understand the relationship social media forges between the store and the student, and what students expect in return.

When Googling “the rising cost of education,” more than 63 million articles are available for our reading pleasure. We don’t have the time to comb through articles and whitepapers trying to determine the socio-economic and political root causes. Regardless, the rising costs of education can be attributed to two factors:

1. The rising cost of tuition
2. The rising costs of course materials

Host an April Showers Bring May Flowers customer appreciation extravaganza; your opportunity to make sales and motivate the troops as buyback approaches. With students preparing for exams and needing last minute supplies, you have an opportunity to generate a bump in sales.

As the world’s largest social media site, Facebook may be the hub of your online platform. With more than a billion active users on Facebook, it is a natural place to look when setting up online advertisements, but how do you ensure you are reaching your specific market? With the declining organic reach, it is increasingly difficult to reach loyal fans of your page, let alone engage with new ones. Advertising and boosting your posts are the next logical steps, but with such a large base, defining your audience is essential. You can choose to do it through keywords, regions, countries, pixels, etc. However, at the end of the day, if you aren’t using Facebook Pixels, you are ignoring Facebook’s greatest targeted advertising tool.

Prepare yourself for the March Bracket Battle chaos! This month people will be asking you which college basketball team is going to go all the way and let’s face it, we have no idea which team is better and can only name a handful of players. But your Bracket Battle can be about more than basketball, and you’re going to take the annual bracket bonanza to a new level.