From time to time we spotlight Balfour advisers and schools. In this guest post, Northern Highlands Regional High School adviser Doreen Albano shares how a unique marketing plan engaged the entire school. Doreen, who co-advises along with Mary Lardiere, is in her ninth year teaching and advising. This post originally ran in the Fall 2018 issue of Balfour’s magazine Elements.
In the winter of 2016, I went to the Pandora Holiday Live Concert in NYC where they had various promotional giveaways and activities throughout the venue. One of them was a ball pit, sponsored by Mentos, where people could jump into a pool of plastic balls and be photographed. Videos or photos were sent directly to each person’s email afterward.
When I came back to school the next day and showed the promotional experience to the juniors on my yearbook staff, they loved the idea and wanted to incorporate it into their senior yearbook concept. We started brainstorming for theme ideas that could relate to a ball pit concept and from there, our next book was conceived.
The 2018 book’s number 8 is created by two circles. Our editor in chief, Jordyn Freedman, along with her assistants Rachel Hittman and Hrithika Ravuri, chose the theme “I’m IN” with two circle graphics creating the “8” in 2018. This verbal/visual strategy illustrated the balls in the pit and captured the immersion in the plastic balls. The phrase “are you in?” was used on our marketing posters and videos to reference both the ball pit and the yearbook theme.
From there I researched online and ordered a large inflatable pool and more than 1,000 clear plastic balls. Because they were made in China, six weeks passed before they arrived. Once we had everything, we did a dry run of the ball pit in late August, just to figure out the logistics.
During this time, yearbook staff members came in to film and pose for our first promo video that announced the promotional event to the school community. On Spirit Day in early October, we held our first ball pit experience. We had our photographers on hand to capture students jumping into the ball pit—it was a huge success! Because we wanted as many kids as possible to jump in and get their photos taken to use in the yearbook, it was a free event. The pit was such a hit that we ran it again during our “Holiday Hoopla” in December with a new promo video to advertise it.
Both videos were shot by a senior staff member, Megan Sileo, who would be pursuing video production in college. I pulled Megan, along with some staff members, from lunch or study hall periods, and we roamed the school with bags of plastic balls. We entered a few classrooms, found students or teachers in the hallways and library who were willing to help, and filmed the promotion over the course of just a few periods.
After editing, adding music, an intro and graphics, we had a great video that was posted on our Canvas Learning Management System and played in homerooms for all students to see. Thankfully, we have a very supportive administration and faculty who were eager to appear in our videos or play along in any way they could. Since we ended up with so many great photos too, we decided to use them not only on the spreads inside the book but all over the front and back covers as well.
We used a special heat reactive coating so the book would first appear as having a traditional black cover, but when exposed to heat or sunlight, it would reveal the black and white ball pit images underneath. The ball pit event was a huge success, nicely tying together our theme and visual graphics. It was also just plain fun! The only thing I worry about now is how to top the theme-related marketing strategy in the future.
